kayb

Please allow me to get in a shameless plug here for a new product -- Nut Butter Nation, an all-natural, non-GMO peanut butter in traditional and flavored versions. May be acquired here. Disclaimer: This is my daughter and son-in-law's startup, which is based in Nashville, TN, and going great guns at this moment. Sorry if the blatant commercialism of my promotion of it isn't proper -- please remove the post if that's the case! But FWIW, while I don't care for the dark chocolate or the brown sugar, the honey vanilla is Da Bomb!

This one? A staple of every church pot-luck I ever attended in my life (and I attended a LOT of 'em!). Always the first dessert to go, though it was a close race with the pecan pie.

Tried the tomato pudding. I used fresh mozzarella, because it was what I had, and it did not do well -- baked up too rubbery, and was hard to cut. I'll go with something else, next time. I used a jar of my homecanned marinara sauce from last summer, which worked marvelously. I also baked a thin layer of cornbread for the bottom, as the gluten-free child was there for dinner. Truth be told, I'd just as soon forego the bread element entirely, or I would crumble the cornbread for a crust layer (this I baked in the 8 x 8 and just sliced in cubes and left in situ). The rest of it was excellent, but for the fact I forgot the staged baking, as I had a chicken in the oven roasting as well, and baked the whole thing for an hour at 350, uncovered. Which may have had something to do with the rubberiness of the cheese.

Forgot to take photos of this past Saturday's haul, as we were in hurry to stash it and get to Amazing Grandson 1's third birthday party! But the goodies included a small watermelon, a BIG cantaloupe, green beans, purple hulled peas, two dozen ears of corn, okra, tomatoes and zucchini. I love summer.

i have a fair amount of peaches I'd planned to do peach butter with. But we're eating our way through them fresh with little problem. Peach crop is down this year; half a bushel was $20 at the orchard last week. They hadn't been graded, so were a variety of stages of ripeness which has allowed us to enjoy them fresh for several days. I've frozen several pints of corn and purple hulled peas, and expect to start canning tomatoes this week. Looking for Kentucky Wonder green beans to can, as well. Shelby, I envy you your Silver Queen corn -- hoping to run across some when I go to Georgia next month. No one grows it around here.

Glad to have run across this exchange. I have cornbread in the freezer, leftover roast chicken in the fridge, chicken and dressing on the menu this week. Must Get Cranberry Sauce. Note that I had no question at all about why cranberry sauce was in the fridge. That's where mine lives as well.

I had forgotten how much I enjoyed Lynne Rossetto Kasper's books, as well as her radio show. I've saved both of these; they will likely make an appearance soon. Wondering if I can sub cornbread for the bread slices on the bottom of the pudding? I don't really see why not.....in fact, could simply bake a very thin cornbread layer and build the pudding on top of it....

Put me down as another one on the owner's side, although I agree she shouldn't have yelled at the child. The parents, on the other hand, needed SOMETHING to get their attention, as the child certainly was not. i took my eldest child out to eat, and many other places, from the time she could sit in a high chair, and she was, for the most part, perfectly behaved, particularly if given something to drink and a package of crackers until her meal came. When my second daughter was about three months old, the four of us went to dinner. As soon as her little diaper-clad butt hit the high chair she commenced to scream, and nothing would quiet her, not even being taken from the chair and held. I was mortified. I took her outside, while my husband changed our order to "to go." And I waited about two years before I tried taking her out again. She was never as well-behaved in a restaurant as her sister, and consequently, got to eat a lot more fast food and home cooking.

Cantaloupe and cottage cheese for lunch. Watermelon for dinner.Too damned hot to turn on the stove.

I'm on your side of the Hellmans' vs. Miracle Whip debate. And making one's own is not such a production with the immersion blender....

I don't see the mayo on the sandwich. Mayo is critical! And I will speak up for pimiento cheese on a bacon and tomato sandwich. Lettuce is optional.

i've had good luck using walnuts in pesto. And I scored walnuts for $3 a pound at the grocery this week. My basil, though, is not growing really well. But it's finally gotten HOT, so maybe it'll come on. I froze seven pints of sweet corn yesterday. Cut off the corn, cooked about 10 minutes, let it cool and ladled into pint freezer cartons.

Old fashioned Southern Sunday dinner here: Chicken fried steak, gravy, mashed potatoes, creamed corn, purple hull peas, fried okra. My daughter's plate (mine was minus steak, an afterthought when I have fresh summer veggies around, and plus a wedge of cornbread). Blackberry cobbler and ice cream for dessert. I am happy to report I have mastered the chicken fried steak. I've always found that, even using jacquarded round steak, the quick cook they get when making CFS just doesn't provide a tender bite. So last night, I sous vided the steaks for two hours at 140F, then took them out and tossed them in the fridge. Today, I floured, egg-washed and dredged in panko as usual. Perfect. I forgot the gravy and let it go a bit long, thus it was overly thickened. No one complained.

I have cooked very little all week, having been gone and busy and such, other than a cucumber/grape tomato salad with feta cheese and kalamata olives that was quite tasty. I used a honey-citrus-balsamic viniagrette I'd made, and I like the touch of sweet it lends. I did have an excellent Monte Cristo at one of the few sandwich shops I've found where one can still get a classic Monte -- battered en toto and deep fried, as opposed to made with a couple of pieces of French toast. They cut the sandwich diagonally, batter it in a fairly thick batter, and fry it. I always ask for it without the powdered sugar, but bring on the raspberry jam! It's so rich I can barely eat half of it, but it's worth it. Excited about next week -- dinner one night is from Jones' Barbecue in Marianna, Arkansas, the only James Beard award winner in the state although we've had several compete. Jones' won an American Classic award a few years back. It's the oldest continuously operating, same family owned African American business in the state; he cooks nothing but pork shoulder, and serves it with white sandwich bread and slaw. And people come from everywhere to get it, and he's sold out by 10:30 every morning, at which time he goes home.

I grew up with a "snacky" type breakfast -- cereal, toast, something to that effect -- a fairly light lunch, generally sandwiches or soup, and a hearty dinner. early, 5 p.m. or so, after my father got home from work. I gave up on breakfast after I was on my own for a long time, but started back at it later in life because I found it easier to control my weight when I ate breakfast. Now that I work from home, my meal schedule is more flexible; I'll generally eat a good lunch, lots of veggies and protein, although it's generally a cold one. Dinner, I tend to stick with a meat and a couple of veggies if my daughter or any of the rest of the fam are eating, and I may skip it entirely if it's just me, or have just an appetizer-type plate of cheese, fruit, olives and so on. I do enjoy breakfast-for-dinner and dinner-for-breakfast, and indulge myself quite often.

Had to chase that link and save that recipe. That looks like a keeper.

liuzhou, that is just the way I like clams. Those have the most beautiful shells I've ever seen. How large are they?

I love my grill baskets for fish and veggies. I also have a box for wood chips. On reflection, I think the foil worked about as well.

I'm presently roasting two quarts of cherry and grape tomatos which, when dry, will go into the freezer on the baking sheets and then, after a couple of hours, into freezer bags. I love to pull them out during the winter for salads, quiches, pizzas, casseroles, sauces, and just about anything else you can name. I'll do a couple more batches before they're gone. Debating on whether to buy yellow-and-white sweet corn to freeze, or hold out for the Silver Queen white sweet corn I think I can get in August. May have to hedge my bets. I've frozen some purple-hull and crowder peas already, and will do more before the summer's out. Also need to do a big baking sheet of okra. And I'm about to need a bigger freezer.

Personal favorites: shrimp and grits at Mr. B's Bistro; chargrilled oysters at Acme or Felix's; the aforementioned shrimp po'boys at Mother's and the beignets and cafe au lait at Cafe du Monde. Soft-shell crab at Antoine's. Friday lunch at Galatoire's, if you can get in. No reservations, and there is ALWAYS a line.

Liamsaunt, I am off in search of Fine Cooking for that corn and crab cake recipe, not that we can get really good crabmeat here in flyover country. Scubadoo, that burger makes my mouth water. Been on the road for a week and not in the kitchen, but I did have a very interesting pizza the other night -- thin, crispy crust, topped with fresh corn, fresh mozzarella, bacon and truffle oil. Pretty exceptional. I've cooked the last couple of nights at my daughter's house, mostly summer produce I brought with me because I went on autopilot last weekend at the Farmers' Market and bought like I was going to be home all week. Today I am going to attempt to make a cake using a food processor, because the child doesn't have a mixer. Sigh.

I've heard good things about grilled okra. Going to try it.

I eat yellow squash at least twice a week in the summer. I love it sauteed with onion, in just a bit of olive oil; I love it brushed with olive oil and grilled; I ike to steam it with onion and then stir it up with eggs, cheese and cracker crumbs and bake. I shave it into ribbons along with zucchini, steam it, toss it in butter and tarragon. I will, if prevailed upon, bread and fry it. I agree, I've never found any good way to preserve it, though.

Love the idea of the stuffed tofu blocks!

I felt like cheese. Clockwise from 12 o'clock, Irish cheddar with porter; butterkase; fromage d'Affinois; frog (fig-raspberry-orange-ginger) jam; Castelvetrano olives; bread-and-butter pickle spears. A little honey in the center for the cheddar. Ritz crackers on the side.