Entree – Rosemary and the Goat

Smoked Sausage with Roasted Vegetables

Lots of veggies in this dish!

One day I was thinking of my mother’s backbone or country style ribs with kraut and next thing I knew I had the idea of baking smoked sausage and instead of using kraut use cabbage and then as I dove deeper, getting lost in the internet, I came across a couple of sites that had sheet pan dinners and one that caught my eye was from Chelsea’s Messy Apron blog. I did change a few things when I added some of our garden ripe tomatoes and some purple kale to go along with the cabbage, carrots, onions and the Kielbasa sausage.

Back to my mother’s kraut and ribs. I’m sure all of you can envision certain things your mother (or dads) made and I think my memories or best when it comes to food. I can smell her kraut, ribs, mashed potatoes just thinking about them. And, I knew the cornbread going with that dinner was going to be the best cornbread I ever ate. I can think about foods we have on trips or dinner parties and all those menus trigger things about the trip/restaurant/dinners that I might not remember otherwise. I can tell you almost every restaurant we have eaten at on trips because I journal them and if it is from a restaurant, I guarantee you that I will try to get the recipe from the chef and several times I’ve succeeded. Continue Reading…

July 1, 2025 By Sherry

Entree/ Fish/Seafood/ Pork/ Poultry

Chicken Pad Thai

Fresh, spicy and somewhat easy!

I’ve been making Asian dishes since I’ve been married (56 years this August). Early marriage I made lo mein, chow mein (which is American recipe), Chop Suey (Chinese), Somasos (Indian), and Sushi (Japanese). I’m sure there are many others I have forgotten about.

Back when we were dating in high school, GA asked me to dinner at his house. His mother had made chicken chow mein, which I had never eaten before, and it was delicious. To this day everytime I make chow mein, I think of that dinner at his house and him filling my plate and saying “you are really going to like this”. I don’t know why she served rye bread, with butter, with the chow mein BUT I can’t have chow mein without having a loaf of rye bread and some really soft butter.

I made a few changes in this recipe I found somewhere on the internet (I can’t find exact site even though I printed off). Anyway, I had lo mein noodles (the long flat kind, not ramen, recipe called for rice noodles), I had bought ground chicken for another recipe and decided to use that instead of chicken breast. (See note if you want to use breast or thigh meat). The recipe called for 1/4 cup of brown sugar which we though a little sweet; next time I would use two tablespoons.

June 18, 2025 By Sherry

Appetizers/ Beef/ Beef/Veal/ Desserts/ Fish/Seafood/ Game/ Lamb/ Legumes/ Pork/ Poultry/ Salads/ Soup

Michie’s Family Feast

The history of our Michie Feast!

In case you aren’t familiar with my blog or our family who loves to cook, this post will show you a little of how it all started — our love for food and family. So take a minute to look at one or two of our “family feast” dinners and if you get a chance look under “stories” for some “it’s not always about the food” stories/dinners.

So, our Michie feast started one Thanksgiving (before all the grandsons (6) ). This was the first year my husband started frying our turkeys. After buying something like 3 gallon of oil, we wanted to use that oil again before the kids all went back home.

Our first Michie Feast would have, of course, been a fish fry with my dads famous hushpuppies (see blog for recipe). Then the next family feast came the oysters (fried, smoked, Rockafellow, and raw of course). After that it didn’t matter that we had all that oil to find a use for; we just wanted to make a special meal together where everyone cooked a dish, presented it to the group (whoever was in town for Thanksgiving), pairing it with wine/cocktail of their choice. Friends of ours would be there every other year and occasionally one of the kids brought some extra guests.

June 3, 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

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

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

Entree/ Poultry

Chicken with Pesto and Bowtie Pasta

Easy to make with a rotisserie chicken!

Recently I bought this beautiful bow tie pasta made by Good Hair Day. Don’t ask me why any food product would have “hair” in the description of any product but the packaging was pretty cool. Beautiful girl with long hair and the clear opening of part of the package where her hair is has the pasta shape showing through. This pasta retained its beautiful color after cooking and there’s nothing more I like than color.

It’s been a while since I have posted a recipe. We are in our new house and after two weeks of unpacking we have about 95% of things put away. Organizing all that stuff will come later.

My daughter came to help one weekend and even though there were still a few boxes and pictures around that had not be put away or hung we cooked our first meal in our new kitchen. I have not read any of the manuals to my new equipment and I just guessed on some of the new features on the double ovens which are suppose to proof, air fry, dehydrate, convection and steam; I’ll read them on some rainy day.

March 18, 2024 By Sherry

Entree/ Poultry

Grilled Spatchcocked Greek Chicken

Spatched what?

So what does spatchcocked mean? Well, it’s when the backbone of the chicken is removed and you flatten the chicken out. It looks pretty and also helps the chicken pieces all finish cooking at the same time on the grill.

Occasionally I will do a recipe exactly as it is written and then the next time I make it maybe tweak it with some extra ingredients. This night I told my husband (GA or Papa G as he’s know around the brewery) that I had a whole chicken we (he) could throw on the grill. He searched around the internet and came up with this recipe from Food Network. It was delicious and he went to the store to buy the extra ingredients that we didn’t have on hand. He did it all, spatchcocking the chicken, of course, making the marinade, cooking it, carving it, and when we were finished eating, he deboned the remaining chicken and put in the refrigerator. What a guy!

January 17, 2024 By Sherry

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