Sherry – Page 32 – Rosemary and the Goat

Pork Fries with White Bar-B-Q Sauce

You say “white” bar-b-q sauce!

How do you like your fries? I like mine with mustard instead of ketchup. Some people eat cheese fries, chili fries, loaded fries or even milk gravy on their fries. While in France a few years ago, every afternoon we stopped for frites and wine.

Now, these are not your normal fries. Far from it because they are not even made from potatoes; they are made from pork and I guess, in a way they look like chicken-fried anything — but I’m calling them fries.

If you grew up where we did, pork was the king of bar-b-q meats and just about the only type of bar-b-q you ate was some kind of pork.

I’m sure these days there’s some chicken, sausage, and brisket thrown in now and then but never beef until we moved to Texas; and Texans do love their beef brisket. The last few years I’ve been seeing more and more pulled pork showing up on menus and it must be the influx of southerners moving to Texas that caused Texans to start lovin their pulled pork.

In our home town (Caruthersville, MO) you know where to find the good bar-b-q (Carmean’s). If you live anywhere close to me there’s only one place for bar-b-q and that’s my house with my husband at the smoker.

When it comes to sauce red sauce (bbq sauce) was the only type of sauce to go on bar-b-q or so I thought until eating these “fries” with white bbq sauce.

I love telling you (if there’s anybody out there listening) about restaurants we visit. WELL, here’s another one. While in Nashville a couple of years ago with my sister, we visited the Urban Grub restaurant. We loved it from the minute we walked in, but, I will have to say my shrimp and grits were better than their’s.

December 11, 2015 By Sherry

Food Stories

Southern Inspired Meal

First we eat, then we play!

My husband and I were born and lived the first 21 years of our lives in the “bootheel” of Missouri. We were just across the Mississippi River from Tennessee and on the border of Arkansas so we feel like we have always been “southern”; maybe not deep south but we definitely claim southern roots.

Southern cooking runs in our blood, bacon wrapped everything, cornmeal battered, deep-fried, fresh from the local farmers market or your own garden. Some of our southern favorites growing up were fried chicken, black-eyed peas (any kind of pea), gravy (mostly milk gravy), fresh-side pork (pork belly), smothered everything. Talking about food always brings up memories of “my mother made this, or my grandmother made that”.

Since everyone, even if not from south of the Mason Dixon line, seems to have a love affair with comfort foods, we decided to do a modern take on some down home favorites for our annual Friday night Feast meal after Thanksgiving. Most of our meal was inspired by things we all remember whether you are from Missouri, Alabama, Louisiana or anywhere in between.

So, our meal started off with an amuse bouche (my dish) of buttermilk soup with cornbread. For me, that brought back memories of my grandfather drinking (or eating) buttermilk with cornbread crumbled up in his big goblet glass.

December 6, 2015 By Sherry

Side dish

Cream Spinach with Glazed Mushrooms

Very tasty spinach dish!

Thanksgiving is over but this dish would be perfect anytime of the year and I think it would be great served with prime rib for Christmas dinner.

Every Thanksgiving I tend to do the same foods — turkey, dressing, gravies (two kinds), cranberry relish, two kinds of potatoes and something green. Years ago for holidays I would do green bean or asparagus casseroles but my kids would never touch those dishes. This year I decided to do something with spinach. I’m probably the only person out there that likes canned spinach. Of course, I would choose fresh or frozen over canned for serving to anyone other than me and my husband; and this dish is made from frozen for two reasons; one is that I would have to cook 4 containers of fresh spinach and wash and stem it to get the same size dish I got with two large packages of frozen spinach.

Who does love mushrooms and browning them and topping the spinach with them makes the dish so mouth-watering good. If you want to add a fried bacon to the dish or some baked prosciutto, crumbled I think that would be delicious.

November 30, 2015 By Sherry

Salads

Spicy Bean Sprout Salad

This is so easy, I’m almost embarrassed to tell you about it.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone and I hope every eats and enjoys the day without worrying about calories. When I decided to post this Asian salad it brought back memories of The Christmas Story (movie) (not this recipe but Chinese food) and how the dogs got into the house, ate the Christmas turkey and the family had to go out for Chinese food for Christmas Day. Well, that won’t happen at our house but this is a great little starter appetizer/salad to serve if you are doing anything Asian.

I love small plate restaurants, especially when you order lots and lots of small plates which we did the night we ate at this Japanese bar in Northbrook, IL. and this bean sprout salad was served to us when we first sat down.

I’ve had some unusual small plates recently — pig tail in Austin at Swift’s Attic and also Pig Cheeks also from there. The Pig Cheeks were great because they were fall off the jaw tender (ha, that’s funny) and served with crispy toast that we spread with fig jam, then Dijon mustard, then the shredded braised spicy pig cheek. Yum. Blistered shishito peppers is another small plate we have tried. Even though I have made those several times (after having them in Vego, Spain) I will always order them in a restaurant. Fried Eggplant Chips with Honey Drizzle was a small plate that we had in Seville, Spain and I had to recreate it as soon as we got home. We’ve tried tripe also on a small plate; I was glad that was a small plate.

November 25, 2015 By Sherry

Appetizers/ ColdApp/ HotApp

Spiced Glazed Nuts and Pretzel Mix

Looking for a new snack mix for the holidays?

Can you believe that Thanksgiving is just a week away. What’s happened the last few years that you blink and another year has gone by.

Thanksgiving happens to be my favorite holiday and if you’re like me, I’m always looking for new snack foods to serve during the T’day, Xmas or for that matter any time you have friends over OR just because you want a nice little munchy to go with that glass of wine in the evening.

I have been a follower of David Leibovitz Living the Sweet Life in Paris blog since before we went to France three years ago. As usual for that trip I was searching for places to eat while in Paris and then the week we were spending in Provence and I came across some recipes of David’s and have followed his site ever since. His cookbook My Paris Kitchen was voted best cookbook of the year in 2014 by Amazon.

Almonds, pecans and peanuts were already in my freezer so I decided to use a mix of all three. If you want a gluten free snack, substitute gluten free pretzels for the regular ones. I couldn’t wait to try this mix out on friends. I’m upping his 1 1/2 tablespoon of pure maple syrup to 2 tablespoons and changing the dark brown sugar the next time I make them to light brown sugar. Continue Reading…

November 20, 2015 By Sherry

Appetizers/ HotApp

Spicy Potato Samosas

Chunchy, potatoy, spicy.

I spend a lot of time on my computer looking around at recipes and other crafty things I might want to make in my spare time. I do have a lot of spare time and sometimes think I need to get out and get a job but then I pinch myself and say “are you nuts, what are you thinking”.

The day I sat down to write this post, I had checked about 6 errands off my list before noon and then I got this message from my husband saying our new warming drawer unit isn’t fitting into our outdoor kitchen. I was determined not to go home until they had the problem fixed but no such luck. I arrive home and they were still working on it and I’m determined to not even look at it until it is completed. It seems like an eternity since the project was started back in August.

So to get myself out of this mood I was getting myself into I started looking at some of the food pictures from our Indian dinner we cooked while in Chicago. This appetizer was part of our meal that night which consisted of Indian Chicken Kabobs, Spinach Dahl, garlic naan and these Spicy Potato Samosas we served with a mango chutney.

November 15, 2015 By Sherry

Morning Foods/ Pastries

Baked Oatmeal with Some Twist

Oatmeal or Boatmeal? Depends on who’s eating it.

Maybe you don’t remember the scene out of Oliver Twist where the little boy is eating gruel (see pics below) but I do and for some reason I think that’s why I never cared for the bowl of mushy stuff. I just never saw the appeal to a bowl of lumpy cereal. Seems like steel cut oats are all the rage these days but when I did the comparison, there doesn’t seem to be that much difference so don’t feel guilty not making that bowl of oatmeal that takes about 45 minutes to cook.

While visiting in Chicago back in September on a cold wintery day (ok, it wasn’t that cold but 40’s is cold coming from Texas) my daughter-in-law, Missy, made some oatmeal for the boys one morning. This wasn’t just plain old oatmeal but it was BOATMEAL with little sails in each boat. She make one chocolate/chocolate and one with cooked cinnamon apples that we had left over from dinner the night before. She uses a basic recipe she found on Pinterest then adds in what she thinks the boys would like. The chocolate/chocolate one she sweetens with banana, syrup and chocolate chips. I’m using a chocolate ganache to sweeten mine because I had some left over ganache from making chocolate martinis one night (I rimmed the glass with it).

November 10, 2015 By Sherry

Entree/ Side dish/ Vegetables

Spinach Dal (Dhal, Dhall)

I think this might actually be my first Indian dish to make (other than naan).

Halloween is gone but this is kind of a trick or treat recipe. Kind of looks like corn in above picture (trick) but the treat is if you like Indian flavors you will enjoy this dish of yellow lentils and spinach.

I can actually remember the first time I ever had Indian food and it was at an Austin restaurant, the Clay Pit and it was one Christmas and my daughter-in-law, Brooke was pregnant with our first grandson, Milo. Our kids have always encouraged us to try different types of food and Indian food was always one we resisted.

I think that day started with my daughter and daughter-in-law Missy massaging Brooke’s feet because they had read that was suppose to start labor. Everyone decided we should eat Indian and when we stepped inside the restaurant I knew what we would be eating was going to be delicious because of the spicy aromas that smacked us in the face when we walked through the doors.

When we have eaten Indian in Chicago, we usually rely on son and daughter-in-law there to help us in ordering. Of course the naan is always a favorite; how could any kind of bread be bad and after having naan for the first time I did made it with great success.

I really want to try some other Indian recipes so if you have any favorites, please leave a comment below.

November 5, 2015 By Sherry

Candy/ Dessert

Date Nut Roll

Have a sweet tooth? It’s Halloween, who doesn’t?

If you have never tasted date nut roll you are really missing a sugary treat. It reminds me a lot of pralines but with the sweet dates added to it. The dates pretty much dissolve in the cooking process.

Do you still call your mom (or did you) if you have some cooking question. My mother has been gone for 7 years and my grandmother for almost 4 and I miss calling them with my cooking questions. Even though I could probably have found the answers on the internet, I just wanted to hear how they made a certain favorite of mine like chili and hushpuppies.

When I have questions about candy, I call my mother-in-law. She is known for her divinity and her date nut Continue Reading…

October 31, 2015 By Sherry

Entree/ Fish/Seafood

Asian Salmon with Avocado, Orange and Cucumber Salsa

This salsa good with any kind of fish.

Back in the summer (can you believe that is behind us now) we had friends over for dinner and we grilled salmon. I feel like “I” need to start cooking more because seems like my husband is always cooking the main course on one of the grills. My contributions recently have been the sides and desserts.

When it comes to “outdoor” cooking he’s been doing it for years, but three years ago when I had knees replaced, he started cooking inside and for a few weeks made me breakfast in bed, lunch and dinner. I’m feeling like he’s passing me in the culinary department so I need to step up my game to compete with him.

So, the night of the dinner party, he grilled the salmon which we sprinkled with Strawberry’s BBQ seasoning (doesn’t taste like bbq though) and I made a salsa with orange, avocado and cucumber along with some basmati rice with green onions and lemon. I love citrus salsas with fish and they are great with fish tacos too.

October 26, 2015 By Sherry

Appetizers/ Entree/ Poultry

Tandoori Chicken Thigh Kabobs

This isn’t a red tandoori and can be an appetizer or main dish.

I have been wanting to make an Indian dish for a long time. After a recent visit to Chicago to visit our son, daughter-in-law and two sweet grandsons we cooked Peruvian one night, ribs another night, out for Korean, then our last night there we prepared a wonderful very scentiful Indian meal consisting of Garlic Naan, Spinach Dahl, Samosas with mango chutney and my daughter-in-law, Missy made some Indian Chicken Skewers and we enjoyed the meal with some Indian music playing in the background. We like to coordinate our music to our meal. We also found some Peruvian music to go with the Peruvian chicken thanks to Google Play.

I think I tasted my first tripe in Chicago, my first Korean BBQ, cheeks, first Harissa fish dish, and probably some foods I didn’t know what I was eating while visiting. So, when it comes to Indian food, I rely on Scott and Missy to show us the way. I have made naan and samosas before but the Spinach Dahl was a first for me.

I only had one day after returning from Chicago to prepare something for our bunco meeting and killing time at the airport waiting for a delayed plane was the perfect time to come up with a recipe. Tandoori chicken kept popping up in some of my searches and after looking at a lot of recipes, I put together my own. Didn’t want it red since I had read that restaurants usually use red dye #40 to make their’s red and I realized that all tandooris do not have to be that bright red color. Anything that artificial looking quickly becomes unappetizing to me because I know that the color doesn’t come from a natural ingredient.

October 21, 2015 By Sherry

Appetizers/ HotApp

Prosciutto Wrapped Asparagus with Parmesan and Lemon

This was a nice little appetizer for night out at winery concert.

Summer is officially over but we’re still having warm (hot) days here in Texas. On an evening out at a local winery to hear a 60’s/70’s group play I made some homemade White Bean Hummus to go with vegetables and some Naan I picked up at the market. (I’ve made before but didn’t want to go to the trouble.). I packed a bunch of cheeses from Trader Joe’s, some crackers and we bought wine there. I thought these little (or big fat) asparagus spears would make the perfect finger food to go with the cheese.

I’m always looking for different recipes that pack easy for eating outside or on the go. Do you have any favorites? I remember vacations with our grandparents and how my grandmother would always fry the chicken and pack it in a shoe box lined with aluminum foil then put it in an old red Coke cooler for our trip and we would always stop at a road side table to eat. I can’t say I’ve seen anyone do that in quite a few years. Maybe, I’m just not looking.

October 11, 2015 By Sherry

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