Stick Horse Cowgirls

I loved V’s post on vintage recipes .  I knew MawMaw—knew V’s other grandmother, too.  Elsie, I must say, was a character—a Wonder Woman.  She was a kind, intelligent woman who could have been really something in today’s world of more opportunity for women—she raised a wonderful son mostly on her own.  Now that I am “of an age” to appreciate what her life was, my hat is off to her.  V has written about her before and must again. But the topic of recipes and meals with grandmothers is what I want to talk about. Both my grandmothers came from country stock.  My paternal Grandmother, Lyda, was accustomed to cooking for farm hands.  She was a humdinger of a cook, too. When we would go to Lyda’s house for Sunday dinner, the re would ALWAYS be these things:  Fried chicken, chicken and dumplings, mashed potatoes, a salad and angel food cake with canned peaches, homemade  biscuits (I don’t remember rolls) and a variety of vegetables.  Th...

The October 2010 issue of Psychology Today has an article by  Hara Marano  that has set me thinking.  Let me first say that I am an offender, here.  Let me get stressed, and I’ve been apt to send someone midday for a burger and fries, knowing full well that this is the wrong thing to do.  But this article, for some reason, has hit home to me.  I think that, if I haven’t yet turned the corner away from fast food, at least I am turning…it’s all a process. The article contains the usual bad nutritional  news about fast food.  We all know this: fast food just isn’t good for us.  The article points out that almost all fast food is laced with high-fructose corn syrup (even in fish patties and buns) and that it leads to obesity, clogged arteries, heart attack and high blood sugars.  So, if we know all this, why do we eat it?  Well, for one thing, becaus e it is “fast,” just as the name says.  We’ve stopped expecting to pack lunches...

What is your comfort food?  (I have, oh, so many).  Mine tend toward the heavy-carb side: mac ‘n’ cheese, chicken and dumplings, you get the drift.  But it has occurred to me recently that sometimes comfort food is defined not so much by the food itself or its taste, but by comfort associations with that food.  We  have a Brazilian restaurant near our office, one of our favorite places to eat.  Occasionally ( verrrrrry occasionally) we will send out for lunch there.  It is way too pricey to make this place a lunch (or even dinner) habit.  But the food is stupendous. It has some fancy-schmancy dishes on the menu—heck, they all look fancy-schmancy to me—but one that I love for lunch is a lovely chicken salad type of thing they call SALPICAO.  It is a warm dish, not the cold Southern chicken salad.  The menu describes it as: Finger-shredded chicken breast, Fuji apples, carrots, sweet peas, fresh herbs batata palha (potato shoestrings...

I feel very much like I am in a countdown to Thanksgiving. It is Sunday evening, and I have three full days of work at the office ahead of me. But the turkey is in the fridge, thawing, and the ham is down at MIL's because my refrigerator is bursting at the seams. There is an undercurrent of bustle that is surpassed only by that before Christmas...soon on the heels of this bustle! No wonder I'm exhausted by New Year's. This year my mother will spend Wednesday night with me, as will my niece Ellie and any other nieces who want to join in. We will spend Wednesday evening baking pies a nd getting everything ready for the "real" cooking on Thursday morning. We will, of course have pumpkin pie (obligatory)and Ellie and I have a new dessert recipe to try out--may be reporting to you all on that outcome. Though I like that whole-berry-orange fancy cranberry sauce, my entire family insists on the jellied sauce as well. My mother's specialty is cornbread dressing t...

V and I had planned to get her granddaughter, Julia, and my youngest niece, Ellie, together to make Christmas gifts and do a little baking...oh, we had big plans! We set the date and began gathering materials/ingredients. As I look back, I laugh at our ambition! We gathered enough for three days work, let alone a day with two little girls! Our group grew. My mother, never one to be left out where her children are grandchildren are concerned, came over Friday night to spend the night with Ellie and me. Mother-in-law joined us as well, and Julia's mother came to witness the festivities. So we had a nice little inter-generational group! Friends, all, who were also eager to catch up with each other's news and exchange a little innocuous gossip. I put a pot of beef barley soup on the stove and dragged out the panini machine so we could enjoy soup and gourmet grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch. V, the girls and I went to work. The rest of the women sipped coffee, offered a...

A couple weeks ago we had a real girlfriends’ night out. My mother, mother-in-law, sister, niece, V and V's two daughters and daughter-in-law (have I left anyone out???) went to see Julie and Julia . I liked the movie because for me it was a “double whammy.” I love blogging and I am a foodie/cook, although not of the Julia Child caliber. Although I enjoyed the humor and the victory of the movie, the most prominent thing I took away from it was the image of Julia’s kitchen with her husband marking a peg board to outline where each and every pot should hang. Man! That image would not leave my mind. My son and I are NOT (let me repeat, NOT) housekeepers. When we put pots away, they are generally “chunked” into the space beneath my range. No careful placing of the pots for us! What that means, of course, is that space turns into a nightmare. Nothing can be found without getting down and digging through pot upon pot, and things topple over and out of the cabinet with alarming ...