kayb

While I have used my blender to make cheese dip (Velveeta, tomatos, chiles, cumin and garlic), mole sauce (more ingredients than I care to list), hollandaise (the lazy way) and assorted other stuff, I have come to recognize the highest and best use of the blender is for a watermelon mojito. 1/4 cup light rum 1/4 cup simple syrup 2 cups watermelon chunks 4-5 sprigs mint juice of one or two limes, depending on how juicy they are Whiz it until it's all nice and frothy, pour it over ice in two tall glasses, and top with club soda and a sprig of mint. Make a second blender-full before you drink the first ones, because you WILL want them.

Oh, my. I love the idea of that sandwich, and, being a fan of any and all kinds of potato salad, I MUST try this one soon!

Surf and turf. Sirloin steak, medium rare; broiled lobster tail; roasted broccoli with lemon and walnuts; new potatos with Vidalia onions, tarragon and dill. Great start to the long weekend that will feature burgers tonight, pernil tomorrow, and ribs on Monday. And the gallon pitcher of sangria in the fridge!

One that I did for a good-sized group for a brunch was an asparagus/cantaloupe salad. Roast however much asparagus you need (with just olive oil and s&p, and arrange it on a platter. Dice up a half a medium cantaloupe and 4 oz of fresh mozzarella for each pound of asparagus, and sprinkle that over the top. Top that with a lemon viniagrette, a sprinkle of salt, and a few grinds of black pepper, and some grated parmesan. Nice, easy salad you can make in advance, which is always a Good Thing, but doesn't have to be refrigerated once you get it where it's going, which is another good thing.

And today, my first attempt at aebleskivers -- got the pan as a Christmas gift, finally getting around to using it. These are stuffed with browned sausage, topped with a drizzle of honey, and served with apple butter.

Banana bread (the Cooks Illustrated recipe), sausage quiche and sliced tomatos.

Perhaps the best banana bread I ever made: http://leitesculinaria.com/409/recipes-banana-bread.html

My all-time favorite sandwich -- the BLAT: Bacon, lettuce, avocado, tomato. Only thing that could have improved it was spicy aioli, but I wasn't energetic enough to make any.

Dyjee, that lamb WILL be my dinner tomorrow night; I lamb stew meat in the freezer and all the rest of the ingredients. I can't wait. Kim and RobirdsTX as always, your meals look wonderful. DKarch, I am in awe of your presentation skills! Nothing exceptional at my house this week, but here are some samples... Whole-wheat penne with sugar snap peas and bacon, caprese salads, multi-grain baguette from the bakery. Chicken stirfry with mushrooms, carrots, peas over brown rice. Roasted pork tenderloin (I went to no great lengths to plate it, and my plating skills leave much to be desired anyway, so this is just after slicing on the roasting pan).

Avocados. I buy too many when they're on sale, and they go from too hard to just right (where they remain for a period of approximately 36 seconds) and to way-past-prime and speeding toward unusable before I can go through them in guacamole, soup, and sliced on BLTs. And various unidentifiable things that have decomposed into I'd-rather-not-know in plastic containers. Thank God for cheap Gladware....so I can throw out container and all!

Been on the road. First night to cook once I got home was the first homemade pizza I've made in probably 25 years (not a big pizza fan). Pepperoni, baby portobello mushrooms on half (some non-mushroom eaters in the house), tomato sauce, fresh basil, grated mozzarella and grated pecorino romano. I thought between the pecorino and the pepperoni, it was overly salty, but not bad for the first time in a quarter-century.

Drowning in asparagus. Now, THAT'S the way I want to go.

Only place I've ever had barbecue (ribs) in Alabama was Dreamland, which everyone raves about but I was completely underwhelmed. Add to the Arkansas list Whole Hog and Sims, both in Little Rock. Can't leave them out.Whole Hog also has an outlet in Hot Springs.

Memphis, of course, is iconic; Interstate Barbecue is my favorite, followed by (tie) Central Barbecue and Germantown Commissary, followed by (tie) Three Pigs, The Barbecue Shop and Cozy Corner. I'd add Trolinger's in Paris, TN, and the Smokehouse in Camden, TN. Lewis's in Moscow, TN, gets raves, but I've never been overly impressed. Ditto the go-to place in Covington, TN, whose name escapes me. Can't leave Arkansas out of the mix. There's Jones Cafe in Marianna; Craig's BBQ in DeValls Bluff; and over here in my adopted home town of Hot Springs, there's McClard's (favorite of former President Bill Clinton) and Purity Barbecue Lounge, my current favorite.

Last night, as I was cleaning out the fridge (there were things in there that were old enough to vote), I discovered the heavy cream was about to hit its expiration date, so I decided to make up some creme fraiche. I usually use yogurt, instead of buttermilk, but I discovered the only yogurt I had was strawberry, so I used sour cream instead. Left the container sitting on the counter with a lid on it, as I had been invaded by gnats and didn't want to add protein to the mix. In short -- I forgot it until this morning. Took off the lid and sniffed; smelled fine. But it was thin. Until I stirred it, at which point it began to thicken up remarkably. Never got quite as thick as what I make with yogurt, but certainly thick enough to make a nice sauce. I sweetened it and just ate an entire 12-ounce carton of blackberries drizzled with it, in two helpings. Two questions: Is it still creme fraiche if you use yogurt or sour cream, instead of buttermilk, as your culture? And why did my batch wait to thicken until I took off the lid and stirred it?

I keep a box of graham crackers and a jar of peanut butter and honey in the credenza at work; it serves for breakfast if I oversleep, lunch if I can't get out or don't bring anything, or a snack when I have what is fondly described in the South as a "sinking spell"... I also like cheese, any kind of fruit, carrots and hummus. I'll often keep a block of cheese and a bag of apples in the office fridge for snacks/lunch/breakfast for several days.

Been on the road, so little cooking this week. Did manage an old favorite, a BLT, or a BLAT, if you insist: Just before I left town, a group of which I'm a member held a fundraiser -- we sold pre-orders for live Maine lobsters to be flown in, and gave buyers a choice of either cooking their own or us cooking them for them. We cooked about 100 of the 120 lobsters we sold (also sold 150 frozen lobster tails). It was a great fundraiser, and a lot of fun, as we cooked corn and potatos, went through about 10 pounds of butter, had a blues band and the whole works. We'll do it again next spring. Lobsters came in big styrofoam coolers with dampened newspaper. The finished product, below: They were great! The outdoor setting and the music, not to mention the keg of cold beer, were all big pluses. And I loved that some folks came out fully prepared to enjoy their lobster:

Challah French toast.

I had a really good hummus at a restaurant recently that had a flavor I couldn't identify (but it was good!), so I asked. Allspice. I now add allspice to mine, which is pretty traditional otherwise.

There are a multitude of good bottled barbecue sauces on the market; I like Sweet Baby Ray's (which may be regional). But if I'm doing a pork loin or loin chops, I prefer a sweet-hot sauce, like: -- guava jelly, horseradish and white wine -- raspberries, chipotles in adobo, and red wine -- pineapple, habaneros, lime juice and so on and so on.

Catching up after a busy few days.... --- Kim, Easter dinner looked fabulous, and I will be trying Mr. Kim's smoked lamb! The tostadas and the shrimp quesadillas looked pretty amazing, as well. --- MiFi, loved your photos, and everything looked mouthwatering. --- Rico, that etouffee looks remarkable. I'm going looking for that book. --- DooDad, you're breaking my heart with that Low Country Boil...I want that, now! Managed to find my way into the kitchen a few times in recent days. One evening, my first attempt at paella: with a plate of caprese salads, with the first ripe tomato of the spring (greenhouse grown, but still...) Red beans and rice, with arepas and tamales (the tamales from our signature barbecue joint here in Hot Springs) For a dinner for friends, grilled pork loin chops with raspberry chipotle glaze, roasted carrots, roasted broccoli with lemon and walnuts, and salt potatos. And finally, some shrimp, homemade cocktail sauce and tomatos I prepared quickly to go with this spring pea salad I was recipe-testing for Food 52 -- and it's a wonderful salad!

I had a very interesting starchy salad I've often thought I'd try to recreate sometime I needed to serve a crowd. It's a combination of all sorts of grains/small starches -- barley, quinoa, brown rice, wild rice, wheatberries -- cooked and then refrigerated in order to dehydrate a bit so the grains will separate. Then they're tossed with a dressing -- the one I had was with a balsamic viniagrette, but it could be any kind -- and some halved cherry tomatos. I could also see adding some halved olives, mostly because I love olives. Or you could eliminate the tomatos and olives and go with dried fruit....

Here's one I love with toasted baguette slices or pita chips: 1/2 cup black olives, minced 1/2 cup green olives, minced 2 cloves garlic, minced 1/2 cup dried figs, soaked in wine or cider to rehydrate, minced EVOO balsamic vinegar You could put it in the food processor, but I prefer to just mince it finely. You can also mince some tomato, drain it,and stir it in. I season with the balsamic until I get the flavor I want, and then add the EVOO until I get the consistency I want.

I'm making RBR this week, with the bone from the Easter ham. I soak my beans overnight, and boil the ham bone the night before for stock as well. When I'm ready to cook, I'll brown my andouille and my diced ham and some cut-up chicken thighs (boneless, and I'll generally skin them, as well, since the skin gets soggy in the remaining cooking process. Then I'll brown the onion, red bell pepper and garlic (don't like celery, so I don't use it, but I use at least six cloves of garlic for a pound of dry beans). If I'm drinking wine at the time, I'll add a quarter-cup or so. Here's where my version departs from the traditional Creole RBR. Drain the beans and put them in a pot with the aromatics, the meat, and two cans of diced tomatos and a can of diced tomatos with green chiles. Add enough ham stock to give you enough liquid to cook the beans. Season with paprika, bay leaves, salt and pepper, a few dashes of Pepperdoux or Pickapeppa hot sauce, bring to a boil and then simmer until the beans are tender. Add a heaping tablespoon of gumbo file powder and simmer for another 45 minutes. Not the Creole version, but it's good.

Great post! Drooled my way through it thinking about when I could make a NOLA run (can drive it in abput 7 hours....h'mmm...). Hate you missed Willie Mae's, though.