"Oh go back to your double-wide and fry something!"

Any other "Sweet Home Alabama" fans? That has to be one of my favorite rom-com's and it's lucky that they play it on TV like every other day so if you're flipping channels looking for something to watch, chances are good that you'll stumble upon it. How could you go wrong? Reese Witherspoon, McDreamy, Josh Lucas (who doesn't have a Mc-hot something nickname but is no less deserving) and Candice Bergen (who is one of my favorite actresses whose name I do not know) make a great cast with lots of awesome soundbites: 

- the title of this blog

- "Why'd you wanna marry a guy like me?" 

"So I can kiss you whenever I want." 

The center has it on VHS so I might just be watching it later... 

Anyways, I named this blog after that quote because for the first time I really fried something. I've done stir-fries but this was the first time I poured a half-inch of oil into a pan and set things to bubbling in it. It was lots of fun. 

I had to do it because a friend, Kay, the woman who taught me the quilt stitch, gave me four squash from her garden last Wednesday. She gave me two summer squash and two yellow crookneck squash (which I had to Google under "bubbly yellow squash") and said, "You have to fry 'em, like this..." and told me how to do it but I forgot. Thank goodness for the internet. I used someone else's Grandmother's recipe and made some adaptations.  

I don't peel my squash. The skin tastes just like the rest of the vegetable and I figure it's more healthful to keep it on. Instead of using six pounds of squash like the recipe says I just used two squash (don't know how many pounds but nowhere near to six). I wasn't sure how much Ryan would eat because he said he wasn't that big a squash fan - we still have leftovers.

I scooped out the seeds of the crookneck squash by inserting a knife into the squash in a circle, then scooping with a spoon. I composted the seeds and cut the squash into rings. (A good way to eat "onion rings" if you don't like onions!) 

I left the seeds in the yellow squash because they didn't seem as easy to cut out. So I just made slices. (Interestingly, these ones were much more flavorful. Perhaps that was the seeds? Perhaps they were more moist because they weren't in rings?) 

Once the squashes were sliced I prepared the frying ingredients. The recipe called for a milk and egg mixture instead of buttermilk, which I didn't have. Then I was reminded that buttermilk is really just curdled milk, so if you have white vinegar and milk and a little time, you have buttermilk.

The dry mixture included cornmeal, flour, salt, and garlic and herb spice.

I tried to use as little oil as possible and was happy with the results. I also used olive oil, though I think vegetable oil is what most people use for frying. 

The summer squash made up the second batch and I used even less oil than the first batch. I didn't change the oil in between batches, though I considered it. The cornmeal added an extra crunch, as did the half white, half wheat flour that I use. 

Ryan's contribution stole the show, really. He said, "Shouldn't we dip these in something?" He mixed together mayonnaise, olive oil and Frank's Redhot Sauce. It was out of this world delicious.

These are the leftovers. Unfortunately fried things like this never taste as good as they did right out of the frying pan, so I recommend making these for more than two people. I think at least four would be ideal. Also, be careful to prepare less dry ingredients if you're using less squash. I only used about half the wet mixture and still have about half the dry mixture. Hopefully I can use the dry mixture to fry some chicken tonight but I don't know if it'll still be good. I hate when things go to waste. 

(Unfortunately I didn't have any Oreos... I could have tried frying marshmallows but I feel like that would just make a mess. I wonder what would happen if you froze them and then fried them? HMMM... that just might be my next blog post! Oh look - 'fried marshmallows' is a thing. Thanks Google!)

Do you like to fry? What do you fry? 

Camping: An Excuse to Eat Marshmallows at Every Meal

This weekend I simply had to get out of town for at least one night - I got 24 blissful hours. I drove out to the John Flannagan Dam and went to a campground I had looked up online. I'm so glad I went. I had an amazing time, sleeping rather comfortably in my car, swimming in the reservoir, and eating the non-perishable foods I had carefully thought out: lots of fruit, peanut butter and crackers, cereal and tuna fish. 

Because I knew I wouldn't have refrigeration, I brought instant nonfat dry milk. I've made it before but always chilled it; without refrigeration, I figured that it would still be okay. It tasted like something-that-resembled-milk and it wasn't water in my cereal, so it was good enough for me. 

The triumph of my trip, however, was the Peanut Butter Filled Toasted Marshmallow. I made sure to buy a bag of marshmallows on the way so that I'd be able to roast them. (I roasted marshmallows at dinner, breakfast, and lunch, hence the title of this blog.) I also had peanut butter with me and for some reason I imagined putting peanut butter inside a marshmallow and then roasting it. Perhaps I thought about how marshmallow sauce and peanut butter sauce on sundaes can be so yummy together.

So I tried it out.
 

I twisted a hole in the marshmallow with a knife, then squished peanut butter inside.

I like setting my marshmallows on fire and then blowing them out. The peanut butter gets all melty and delicious inside of the marshmallow. 

It really is an amazing thing - fluffy, sugary, air with peanut butter inside.

The low point of my camp culinary exploits was the can of tuna that I brought. I took with me a combination wine opener and what looked like a can opener. After all of this

I realized it is not a can opener. I also tried to open the can using the method that these guys say will be useful in a zombie apocalypse but it didn't work. So I kept trying with the wannabee can opener until I was able to spoon out the tuna and eat it on crackers. This is what the can looked like when I was done:

But to end things on a good note:

Just look at that! 

What do you like to eat while camping? 

The Brilliance of Knowing What You've Got

Today was one of those days where you just don't want to get out of bed. I woke up around 10:30 but instead of getting up and doing things, I read a magazine in my nightgown under the covers. My body ached from I don't know what and I just wanted to veg. Sometimes I don't need to eat right after waking up and am able to just chill out. 

Lots of the women in the magazine I was reading were talking about eating pancakes so I thought about making them. But I'd made them last week so I couldn't again. (I made carob pancakes with walnuts - so delicious!) Then I remembered the sourdough bread slices in my freezer and got reallllly excited. 

Last week one of the quilters had a birthday so we had a potluck luncheon. She brought two loaves of homemade sourdough bread and let Ryan and I have the leftovers. So I asked him if he'd be interested in french toast for his lunch and of course he said yes - breakfast is his favorite meal of the day. I used a classic recipe, though I pretty much knew how to make french toast. My mom's mom, my Grandma Bee, used to make french toast for me when I lived in her house on Main Street: scramble eggs with a little milk, dip the bread slices in the mixture, and fry. Sometimes you fry them in butter but today I didn't, hence the blackened toast. I added cinnamon to the egg mixture and served the french toast with cantaloupe (for me) and blueberries (for Ryan.) 

It was hog heaven. 

Thanks must go to Martine for giving me some of her cantaloupe. We had dinner at her apartment last night and she insisted on sending me home with a quarter of a cantaloupe, a bottle of juice, and three slices of the chocolate cake she made. 

Doesn't that just look like a painting? It's so luscious. 

What's in your frying pan? 

These Beans and Barley Oh... or Something...

Does anyone else remember a song that goes "something beans and barley oh?" Or am I the only one? Even Google has no idea what I'm talking about.

Anyways, I tried cooking pearled barley for the first time this week. An AllRecipes magazine I got from a friend had an article about those crazy new grains (like amaranth and a bunch of others) and how to cook them. I hadn't heard about eating straight barley before; I thought that was something that people ate a long, long time ago that had since fallen out of favor. 

But not all the new grains are popular everywhere you go. Last weekend when we went to the grocery store here in the mountains I wanted to get quinoa or something like it. I said "Do you have matzos and quinoa?" to one of the managers and he said, "Uh... the what?" I asked again but added, "It's like a grain, like rice." So he showed me the rice aisle where I found pre-cooked quinoa in single-serve bowls. Nearby I saw bags of organic barley and thought, "Hm..."

My housemate, Ryan, suggested that we make barley with vegetable soup for dinner one night this week. He'd bought a couple cans of Campbell's and is really good at keeping a mental list of what we've got in the pantry. Last night I started cooking the barley and realized that it would take almost an hour including the time it took to boil the water. So while it was cooking I made spaghetti and we ate that instead.

Today we added the cooked barley to the soup with a couple slices of sharp cheddar cheese. We served the soup with salty crackers, toast, and the rest of the cucumber and tomato salad I made two days ago.

The soup wasn't great. I'm not really a big fan of Campbell's, or of canned soup for that matter. It's so loaded with sodium even when it tastes pretty bland.  The barley was great though; very chewy and with a nice snap. It had a subtle nutty flavor. All in all it was a filling meal and I'm happy with it.

My dessert was the best part though. I'm not sure when I started doing it, but I once decided to have a peanut butter sandwich without the bread. I put peanut butter, whatever jelly I had in the fridge, and Nutella in a bowl and mixed it together. It's basically a combination of different types of sugar - how could it not be delicious? Sometimes I add banana slices or pieces of fruit; whatever I have in the fridge. It's like an ice cream sundae without the ice cream. Soooo good.

PB & J in a Bowl

Pretty self-explanatory, hm?

Happy munching!

Those Elusive Cherries

I actually had an opportunity to use my apron! Woo!

Here in Clintwood there is a pear tree, several apple trees (which already have baby apples on them!), a cherry tree, a baby fig tree, and blueberry bushes. Quite the orchard! In the fall, they make apple butter and apple cider which they sell at fairs. Their cherry tree no longer has its low branches because somebody decided to cut them off to harvest the cherries one year... resulting in a tree full of cherries that taunt me from above. They look so red and juicy and delicious and no matter what I do, I cannot reach them. Fortunately some of them fall to the ground and don't get bruised so I was able to pick almost two cups over the weekend. I cut them into quarters after pitting them. Then I had to decide what to do with them.

They were rather tart but very juicy. I thought they'd go nicely in a bread of some kind so I found a great recipe off Food.com. Thank goodness I stocked my pantry with butter, flour, baking powder, sugar and a little salt.

There wasn't a whole lot in there, so I don't know if I did something wrong with the batter? The pictured bread has slices at least 4 inches high... I don't know what they did. 

The edges burned just a tad. The oven I was working with cooked the bread in about 35 minutes instead of 45. Although the edges were singed, the bread was moist and very tasty. It also made the house smell DELICIOUS.

I only used about 5 tablespoons of the cherries, so I made a sauce out of the rest. I added 3 or 4 spoonfuls of sugar to the cherries and let them sit for awhile before serving the bread.

So yummy! 

Even though I've eaten like a queen today, this still makes my mouth water... mmm... 

Happy munching! 

When Life Gives You a Vegetarian...

Apologies for a text-only blog post - it's weird taking photos knowing that you can't upload them to Facebook right away. West of Bland, VA I lost cell phone service. MetroPCS does not exist among the ridges of southwestern Virginia. This is at once freeing and limiting. I am simultaneously thrilled and disappointed that I do have internet in the Learning Co-op's building. There are eight episodes of Glee that I could catch up on, but I feel bad binge-watching TV while I'm in what should be the simple country. (By simple I mean quiet and easy, not at all stupid. The folks I've met so far are all very intelligent and absolute experts in what they do; I am humbled by and honored to know them.) But I just had to listen to Unkle and the only way I can do that is streaming on Grooveshark. I also need to, keep up with this blog, of course!  

Life gave me a vegetarian while at this internship with the Fourth World Movement in Appalachia in the form of Ryan, the young Marylandian (Marylander?) who's spending the summer with me and the team. He's super awesome and we get along really well, though he makes me feel old when he tells me that he isn't 21. (I scolded him not to drink my beers in the fridge, but I'm not really worried.) His favorite thing to eat is stir-fried vegetables, mainly chopped cauliflower, broccoli, onions, potatoes, and peppers. He adds lemon pepper, garlic powder, Mrs. Dash spices, soy sauce and hot sauce to make Chinese-food-esque stir-fries that are just awesome. Then he throws some cheese on top and dives in. I already love his cooking style. Next time I suggested he throw in some pineapple or mango chunks to add some tropical sweetness. 

Tonight for dinner I took the leftovers of his stir-fry, blended them with the leftover (boxed) rice pilaf that I'd made and scrambled it with six eggs. When I told Ryan my idea for dinner (as he and I are going to switch off cooking) he raised his eyes to the heavens and said, "YES!" We both agree that cooking is boring without another person in the kitchen, so it's safe to say that we're going to get along just fine. 

My other brilliant idea was the dessert, which I was thrilled to introduce to Ryan: banana "ice cream." He said, "But we don't have any ice cream." "That's what the air quotes are for," I replied. I sliced two frozen bananas into a blender, added the rest of the milk that was in the fridge (probably about a 1/2 cup - I don't have measuring cups in this kitchen, hooray!) and added a heaping tablespoon of carob powder. Ryan had never had that either and said that he couldn't tell the difference between it and chocolate. The result was guilt-free chocolate ice cream. It was so wonderful to have seconds and not feel bad about it! 

I'm really looking forward to cooking yummy veggies with this kid. On my mental menu are roasted cauliflower, baked sweet potatoes, vegetable frittata, and apple cake. I'm hoping to get my diet back in check and I think this will help! 

Hopefully the southwestern-style fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and mountains of cornbread won't set me back too much... 

Happy munching! 

Playing "Ketchup"

Goodness me... I have been a bad blogger. I apologize. After Mardi Gras, I thought that things might slow down enough for me to blog but instead they just got crazy busy. I left New Orleans in April after my yearlong term with AmeriCorps ended and despite being home in CT and having lots of time to laze about, I didn't blog. For weeks I was working and travelling and then when I got home I just wanted to do nothing. But I did make some things that I wanted to share.

Bachelor Pie

I've been eating a lot of toast for breakfast lately, but I never eat anything so boring as buttered toast - it's a full meal. My grandmother, Magy (Ma Gee for Ma Grosslein), has been making Bachelor Pie as long as I can remember and it's always a staple at her house. While spending a few days with her, my grandfather (Pagy) and my dad on Cape Cod, I ate a lot of Bachelor Pie with strawberry jam and fresh sliced strawberries. At home I made my own Bachelor Pie with peanut butter, bananas, and granola homemade by a cousin of mine. It was so delicious and kept me full straight through lunch time. 

Simple and Delicious Bachelor Pie 

Sliced bread, home baked or store bought; whole wheat and white are best but you can use any type

Butter, if desired

Jam or marmalade, any flavor (homemade is best!) 

Sliced fruit

Toast the bread to your liking. The darker you toast the bread, the more toppings it will support. Spread toast with butter if you prefer and follow with jam or marmalade. Arrange slices of fruit on top. Enjoy, especially with tea or coffee. 

Throwing Things Together (3T) Pizza

Yesterday after running errands Mom and I were contemplating stopping by the new wood fire oven pizza cart in town. Apparently it isn't open on Sundays - and thank goodness. We went home and realized that we had a pre-made pizza crust, lots of cheese, sweet potatoes and other miscellaneous ingredients to use up in the fridge. Mom let me choose what toppings I wanted to combine so I came up with the above: half marinara with avocado slices, cheddar jack and Mexican cheese blends and grated carrot with garlic powder and half sweet potato mash, gala apples and feta cheese with cinnamon.

I baked the pizza in a 400 degree oven for 14 minutes or so until the crust (brushed with olive oil) was brown and crispy. The apple half was sweet like a dessert pizza and the avocado half was heavy with garlic and Mexican and Italian flavors. We were thrilled and so glad that we stayed in!

It feels so good to blog again.

Happy munching!