Sherry – Rosemary and the Goat

Melon Salad with Goat Cheese and Lime Mint Salad

Brunch or lunch, delicious!

The past three weekends the Round Top Antique Show has been going on and we’ve had company three times. I made this salad twice during that time and liked it better each time I made it.

Life has kind of gotten in the way of me posting lately. Back in the Fall I started playing mahjong and now play twice a week and have withdrawal if I don’t play. I’ve learned to play by myself for practice so that helps until I can play again.

When we first moved to Round Top almost 5 years ago it was hard to imagine what our lives would be like. RT is the smallest town we have ever lived in with population of 87. I knew my HUB (aka Papa G around the brewery) would be smokin’ meat but after our house was finished and I was no longer in the kitchen helping Paul then I started getting involved with all these other activities that were available for me to get involved in like RT Lunch Bunch, Coffee Shop morning, Herb Society once a month which also has a culinary group I attend, mahjong at Busted Oak Cellars and again at RT Family Library and then all the events that pop up throughout the year definitely keeps us as busy as we want to be.

April 4, 2025 By Sherry

Pork/ Side dish

Crispy Rice Salad with Pork Belly

Another “saved” Instagram recipe!

How many “saved” recipes do you have on either Instagram or Pinterest? I have hundreds. I’ve probably tried more from Pinterest than Instagram. This Crispy Rice Salad was sent to me by my daughter and it sounded so good I had to give it a try AND with only a few additions.

I just happened to have some English cucumber, and frozen edamame in the refrigerator/freezer and had leftover rice from making some chicken chow mein the night before so why not make this for dinner tonight because with a UT football game on my HUB wasn’t going anywhere.

My additions were to add some crispy pork belly to top to go with the crispy rice. The pork belly came from Trader Joes and even though it is around $6 for a small 12 oz. package, it was already cooked so I just had to cube it and brown in a skillet. This recipe was posted as a salad but I didn’t want to make a main dish so the pork belly saved the day. I also added some sliced avocado to the finished bowl of crispy/crunchy goodness and a little squeeze of lime never hurt anything.

February 1, 2025 By Sherry

Beef/ Beef/Veal/ Pasta/ Pork

Mazetti AKA Johnny Marzetti

This recipe bring back memories of my adventure into cooking.

One of the first things I was looking for in our new home, (fast forward to 2024) was a special place to put all my cookbooks. The day I wanted to make some choux puffs (cream puff shells) to use for a tea sandwich I knew where to look; not on the internet but the same book I have gone back to for almost 55 years for making cream puffs or a savory shell to use for a tea party and that was my Good Housekeeping cookbook.

Now, the book. Upon opening it, I thought I would start sneezing, and I did. Not only had it been in storage for 4 years, it has been around my house for 55 so it has a really musty smell. There are so many recipes I want to revisit and try to update from this book and the Mazetti (aka Marietta) recipe is one of them. The GH version calls for canned tomato soup and that is something I never liked anyway so this version is a little old and a little new and perfect for a weekend dinner for the family.

December 21, 2024 By Sherry

Fish/Seafood/ Soup

My Favorite Gumbo

What more is there to say than — GUMBO

I did not grow up eating gumbo. In fact, the only gumbo I ever heard of was Campbell’s Chicken GUMBO soup that my mother used to make her Sloppy Joes. (recipe)

There are so many different kinds of gumbo with different ingredients and ways of preparing it. I like a really dark roux which I make in the microwave. Some use a lighter roux. Some use tomatoes (I do) which is creole version and no tomatoes would be cajun recipes. I love okra in my gumbo and I still use a little file powder at the end of cooking.

Do you put your rice on top or on the bottom? I personally like a shallow pasta type bowl with the rice in the middle and ladle the hot steaming gumbo around the rice. Do you like cornbread (me)? Or, do you like French bread? If it were homemade French bread I’d go for that but not the soft tasteless French breads from the grocery. I don’t think you can beat a good cornbread.

November 20, 2024 By Sherry

Entree/ Pork

Smoked Ham with Spiced Apricot Glaze

So delicious you will not want to wait until Easter to make it.

I have to give all the credit of this recipe to my husband, (Papa G, GA, or papagsmokinroundtop (instagram). He has honed his bar-b-quing skills since he was a teenager and he watched my dad bbq. Along the way of our 55 years of marriage he has picked up many skills in the culinary world.

Growing up, and that has taken a very long time, we always had ham for Easter dinner (or lunch). The ham was always baked the same way. My mother would cut criss crosses in the fat of ham and insert whole cloves and then toothpick pineapple slices all over the ham. The glaze was pineapple juice mixed with brown sugar and some mustard. Always delicious not matter who made it for Easter. And, of course we had to have deviled eggs and usually potato salad and I knew just about anything my mother made would be delicious.

October 19, 2024 By Sherry

Entree/ Fish/Seafood/ Pasta

Chili Crisp Shrimp Scampi

Another pasta dish for the cooler months to come.

Nothing says you can’t eat pasta in hot weather but this was such a homey dish that I started thinking of the cooler days to come. I think this dish would also be great served cold or even room temperature. It would be great to have it made and in the refrigerator and just pull it out a couple of hours before you are ready for dinner.

So one morning when I’m sitting at my computer planning some upcoming menus which I have done for the last 55 years of married life and I received the link to this recipe from our son Scott (Chicago) and after reading through the recipe I had everything need to make it for dinner that night. I was at the bottom of my chili crisp jar but had just enough to make this dish.

October 4, 2024 By Sherry

Bread

Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme Focaccia

Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme…a true love of mine.

Simon and Garfunkel had it right with these herbs. I have no idea why they used this in a song (read here for the symbolism of Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme) but these are my favorite combinations of herbs. In fact, I use to work for a catering company in Kansas City while in culinary school and the chefs there use to make a beef tenderloin or prime rib and they would tie parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme to the meat. So, years later if I want to remember what herbs they used all I have to do is think of Simon and Garfunkel’s song.

I have made focaccia bread for years; mostly for catering jobs I use to do years ago. I loved it because I could make in advance, cut, freeze and then take it out and use to make sandwiches. I’ve made a fougasse a few years ago and think it is similar to focaccia. Maybe it is just the shape that makes fougasse what it is — leaf shaped bread.

September 30, 2024 By Sherry

Fruit Dishes/ Morning Foods

Fruit in Prosecco

Spanish influence!

On a narrow cobblestone street somewhere in Seville, Spain back in 2010 we were breakfasting in the courtyard of a cute little restaurant. I remember having tomato toast (a first for me) and the waiter brought us two glass (see picture below) of fruit, which I was sure was canned fruit cocktail topped with Prosecco. It was delicious and it just took me 14 years to get around to making it. I’m not sure why I waited. I almost always for fruit and Prosecco in my refrigerator and always looking for something a little different to serve company.

Every trip we have ever taken I have journaled all of our restaurants and the foods we had and everything we saw and bought while on vacation. There have always been a few ideas that I want to recreate when I get home and some of those ideas take years to get around to making.

September 15, 2024 By Sherry

Entree/ Pasta/ Uncategorized

Lemon Ricotta Pasta & Spinach

Easy peazy meatless meal!

We love our meats. Whether it’s chicken, pork, beef, fish or or even game like quail, rabbit or venison we want it grilled, bbqd, or roasted as part of any delicious recipe we might find surfing online or something GA might find on YouTube. He watches a lot of grilling and bbqing shows so he is always coming up with something with a little different twist from the norm.

We do occasionally eat a meatless meal; sometimes it is all vegetables and sometimes it is a good pasta dish. Since I have pantry full of different shapes of pasta that I can’t seem to stop myself from buying, I always have the urge to look up a new pasta recipe. That’s when I came across this recipe from theclevermeal.com website and I just knew we would love it. This dish could always be served with some grilled or roasted meat but it’s great on its own and it is so quick and easy to make.

August 30, 2024 By Sherry

Pork/ Sauces

Tonkatsu Pork with Sauce

This recipe has been around awhile!

Back in our early married life (55 years ago now) I use to make a few Japanese dishes and not sure why I stopped but I did. I’m going to revisit some of those recipes soon and give them another chance.

I happened upon this recipe (and online they all seem to have the same ingredients) in my latest Cooks Illustrated magazine and then googled some online recipes, tried and really liked it. The CI version used flour to dredge the pork but several online used cornstarch, which I used and Cooks Illustrated did not include a sauce recipe with their recipe and that was one of the best parts of the dish.

August 28, 2024 By Sherry

Pasta/ Poultry

Chicken Fettuccini with Mushrooms and Asparagus

I love the creaminess of fettuccini!

Lately I’ve been focusing more on afternoon tea parties than the “what’s for dinner” question I get late every afternoon. I love making tea foods and planning the party and it is a lot more work than throwing something together for dinner. But while looking for some ingredients for making a new scone I realized the pantry needed a little TLC.

Seems like I reorganize my pantry every week. Before we moved into our new house and renting a little 850 square foot house, my pantry was a broom closet that my husband converted into a pantry. You wouldn’t believe what I could get into this tiny pantry. Now I have this huge pantry that holds not only food that would last me a year (not really) but every pan and gadget I own and believe me I have a pan for every need. You name it – madeline, donut, barquette molds, flower molds, cannoli forms, Charlotte pan; if you can think of it I probably have it and I have used probably 99% of them at one time. If you ever need a special pan and live close by, you can borrow one of mine.

August 21, 2024 By Sherry

Salads

Arugula Spinach Watermelon Salad

No feta with this watermelon!

Over the last umpteen years I’ve seen so many, like kazillion, watermelon and feta cheese recipes. I’ve never really been a feta cheese fan so why not trade out some good blue cheese; a little more tasty I think.

I would love to have watermelon growing out on our property but we haven’t really started planning where a garden will be. We have so much sun now we could put it anywhere. So, when I can buy a good watermelon in the middle of summer I buy it knowing that it will probably be really juicy and bright red on the inside.

July 16, 2024 By Sherry

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