Food for Fall and Football

Are y’all as excited as I am that it is FINALLY getting chilly outside?! My roommate Kathryn has been teasing me because all I can talk about is how excited I am to wear a turtleneck again! I LOVE Fall almost as much as I love Winter- mainly because it means it’s almost time for coats and Christmas, but it has its own personal perks as well- one of them being football. Now, many of you who actually know me may laugh when you read that because you probably know that I don’t really understand football all that well, and you would be correct, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t LOVE it.

                Going to the University of Alabama, football is clearly a big part of life. I may not understand the game, but I definitely understand the party that goes along with it. There is nothing like waking up early for a game, putting on your gameday dress and pouring a whiskey drink. It may not be the most ladylike cocktail in the world, but goodness it’s good. When you can’t make it to the game though, here’s one of my favorite recipes for a gameday dinner at home. This is PERFECT for a house full of boys. Two weekends ago, I had a few friends over to watch the game and this is what I made for them.

The Menu:

Nana’s Babyback Ribs

Guy’s Slaw

Creamed corn

Nana’s Baby back Ribs:

This recipe for baby back ribs comes from Mrs. Vivian Martin, better known to me as Nana. Nana was Vivian’s (my childhood bff) grandmother and it is AMAZING! I always remember having these growing up- and thank goodness it was one of the few recipes that we could squeeze out of the secret Schreeder recipe lock-box. First, I need to explain my personal feelings on barbecued anything. I like it rather dry. I am not a fan of any sort of barbecue sauce, unless it is the thin liquid spicy sauce from The Dixie Pig in Blytheville, Arkansas. Don’t even get me started on The Dixie Pig- I’ll just tell you that I look forward to Suggie (my grandmother) bringing this barbecue every Christmas more than I look forward to the presents she brings. Nana’s recipe is for a dry rib- and to ask for bbq sauce with them is almost insulting. It would be the equivalent of asking for ketchup with a filet. Just don’t do it. However, if you MUST, then at least try a bite without before you ruin it. Click HERE for the recipe!

Guy’s Slaw:

This slaw is named after my grandfather, Suggie’s husband, Guy Newcomb (better known in our family as “Big Sug”). If you’re wondering where these nicknames came from, yes, they are what Guy and Jean Newcomb were/are called by their grandchildren, but what is even sweeter, is that this is what they called one another. “Sug”- pronounced “shug,” but under no circumstances spelled that way- stands for “Sugar.” And so he was “Big Sug” and she was “Suggie.” Guy Newcomb loved  his slaw, and because of that, I am EXTREMELY particular about how it is made. If you plan on buying a bag of pre-shredded cabbage, don’t even bother reading the rest of this recipe- that’s simply not how it’s done here. The way that the cabbage is chopped is what makes Guy’s Slaw unique. It must be chopped into small squares that are about they size of a key on a keyboard. Everything else is in the instructions is pretty straight-forward, but I had to be specific about that one! Click HERE for the recipe.

Creamed Corn:

Creamed corn is an ultimate Southern comfort food. I love how we consider this a “vegetable” with our dinner, when really it is a starch, heated with melted butter, then thickened with whole milk, corn starch and salt. Still sounds pretty wonderful though, doesn’t it?

I have a few tricks for you with this one. First of all, haven’t you always thought that it was called “creamed corn” because the corn was drowned in cream? I sure have. Until my Mama taught me this trick. When you are slicing the corn off of the cob you need to do it in two thin layers. First cut the kernels in half, taking the first layer off. Then cut the rest of the kernels off the cob. When you do this, you let the “cream” out of the corn. I thought this sounded ridiculous, but it really does let the milky wonderfulness out of the kernels and makes your creamed corn 10,000 times better!

                Trick # 2 comes from Rachel Ray via Mama. When cutting the corn off the cob, place a small bowl upside down in your large bowl and balance each cob on top while you slice. This makes it SO much easier! Here’s what it looks like.

This “vegetable” is the perfect comfort item to finish of this menu. Click HERE for the recipe. Enjoy!

Last Night's Dinner at Dad's

       I am home in Huntsville for the weekend, which always means LOTS of cooking. When I come home, I take full advantage of my time and SPACE to cook for my family and friends. Minuscule is a kind way to describe the kitchen in my apartment at school, so my cooking is limited there. I am staying with my father this weekend and decided to cook dinner for us last night. I wanted to try something new, so I flipped through the August 2010 issue of Bon Appetit magazine and honestly had a hard time picking out of the multitude of delicious looking recipes, but decided on the bruschetta with rosemary, roasted plum tomatoes, ricotta, and prosciutto to start, followed by the grilled mustard chicken with fresh corn polenta. Both of these recipes can be found on the magazine’s website. I tweaked both recipes a bit due to my forgetfulness at the grocery store.

       This bruschetta is now one of my FAVORITE bruschetta recipes I’ve come across. Since they were out of plum tomatoes at the grocery, I used cherry tomatoes instead and I think I actually prefer them since they are smaller and more appropriately bite-sized for this particular dish. Instead of using their marinade for the tomatoes, I used my own that I frequently use. After placing the halved tomatoes on a sheet pan covered in foil, I sprinkled them with some good olive oil, balsamic vinegar, salt (it is essential to use a good salt- kosher at least, but a good fleur de sel makes such a difference), fresh cracked pepper, rosemary and oregano. Then I tossed it with my hands and let it sit for a few minutes to absorb the flavors. Then into the oven they went!

       This recipe says to roast them at 425 for about 35 minutes, but keep in mind that they are using larger plum tomatoes. It doesn’t take quite as long with the cherry tomatoes, so just keep an eye on them. 

       Instead of arugula, I used a yummy frisee blend and tossed it in a bit of the marinade I had prepared for the chicken (before it touched the raw meat of course) just because I already had it made and I liked how it would tie the mustard flavor into both of my dishes. 

       The final product was UNBELIEVABLY DELICIOUS! I do have one tip though: I did not follow the recipe’s instruction to fold the prosciutto slices and placing them side by side on the baguette. I didn’t really see the point until I bit into my finished product and the entire topping slid right off the baguette. I might even recommend roughly chopping your prosciutto into small pieces just to ensure that this doesn’t happen to you. 

       For the chicken, I used two bone-in chicken breasts instead of thicken thighs, simply because I like it more. I also did without pinning the skin down after placing the marinade beneath it, but in the end, I regretted it. I think the marinade would have stayed more in place on the grill, but oh well, live and learn! I also chose to combine a coarse dijon mustard with a smooth one. I didn’t really do this for any particular reason other than changing things up a bit, but I really liked how it turned out. 

       I had some of my roasted tomatoes left over from the bruschetta, so I placed them on top of my polenta, which added an extra boost to the overall dish. It ended up being a well rounded, comforting supper that I would recommend to anyone! Very easy and not too time consuming! I’d love to hear your take on it and any twists you may have made to the recipe! 

Enjoy!

Links to the Recipes: 

http://www.bonappetit.com/recipes/2010/08/bruschetta_with_rosemary_roasted_plum_tomatoes_ricotta_and_prosciutto

http://www.bonappetit.com/recipes/2010/08/grilled_mustard_chicken_with_fresh_corn_polenta

 

The Day My Mother Decided to Open a Restaurant

        I must begin this story by giving you a bit of background information on my mother. Mama has always loved to cook. Some of my earliest memories are in the kitchen with her. If she was at the stove whisking a sauce, I was right next to her whisking away, even if my pot was filled only with water and with no heat coming from the stove below it. But even more than cooking, my mother loves to entertain. Whether it was fancy hors d’oeurves at a political fundraiser or martinis and chili at our annual Halloween party, I remember watching the joy of the guests as they tasted her food. I was even more in awe of how much the joy escalated when she walked into the room. The woman always has and always will know how to work a room! 

Mama graduated from Ole Miss with a degree in elementary education (something she never really used). After graduation, Mama went to Paris for a sort of “finishing school” through the famed Maxim’s Restaurant. This is where she truly fell in love with cooking and eating French food. 

Following her return, Mama moved to Memphis, where she opened Lyn Newcomb Interiors. She didn’t major in interior design at Ole Miss because, although he was a supportive man, her father said “Lyn, anyone can be a decorator.” She protested making the point that she would be a designer, NOT a decorator, but at that day and age the man simply didn’t get it. Mama was hired to design a man’s home in Huntsville, AL, they fell in love and were married. And that is how my parent’s began. Eighteen years later, they divorced. I was a sophomore in high school then. It was ugly and horrible and one of the worst years of my life- but as it happens in many horrible situations, something wonderful came of it. 

Mama and I had moved into a new house just a few streets over from Daddy’s and had just begun to settle ourselves in. I woke up one morning to the sounds of clanging and banging of pots and pans and an array of mouth-watering smells coming from the kitchen downstairs. I wandered down (still half-asleep) and found my mother, still in her bathrobe and house shoes, pacing back and forth from the stove to the counter, checking recipes. It was clear that she was not making dishes that were appropriate for the breakfast that I had been expecting. I looked at her like she was crazy. Then all of a sudden, cast-iron skillet in hand, she turned to me and said in one of the most confident voices I have ever heard, “LeeLee, I’ve decided to open a restaurant. I have always had a father and a husband who told me I couldn’t. Now my Daddy is dead and my husband is gone, so by damn I’m doing it.” 

At this point, I wasn’t just looking at her like she was crazy. I truly believed she was. But there was no turning back from there. We spent the next few weeks together searching through all of our favorite cookbooks and marking recipes we thought would be perfect for her new restaurant. We must have gone through 6 stacks of post-it notes. We decided that the menu needed to be filled with the things (specifically the Southern things) that we loved the most. That was when we realized that Lyn’s was going to be special because of how personal it would be. A few crazy months later, Lyn’s Gracious Goodness was officially open for business. 

I don’t know how to describe Lyn’s other than by saying that it is SO my mother. The atmosphere is so happy and vibrant- all yellow, lime green and my mother’s favorite, orange. The menu is filled with the most personal of items- things that are really special to us. Don Wheeler, a family friend of ours, made the best pimento cheese in town and that is exactly how you will find it on the menu- “Don’s Pimento Cheese.” Another favorite is “Carl John’s Fried Bologna Sandwich.” Carl John is one of my best friends from childhood. Growing up, his mother, Sarah Gessler (much healthier and subsequently much thinner) didn’t keep bologna as a regular item in her refrigerator. So when Carl John would come over to our house, we would always have fried bologna sandwiches. The version of this sandwich at Lyn’s Gracious Goodness has been rated one of the “Must-Have” sandwiches in Huntsville. (Miss Sarah later agreed to buy bologna for CJ, but only the fat-free kind, which we all know... isn’t really even worth it.)

Looking back on that day she decided to open a restaurant, Mama admits that she really didn’t know what she was getting herself into. The restaurant business is known for its instability, long hours and unreliable employees. You can never really expect what will happen when you walk in the door each morning. Mama may have been a little crazy that morning, but I have never been more proud of her in my life. Opening Lyn’s Gracious Goodness brought her back to life. And in a way, it brought me back to life too. It showed me a side of my mother that I had never seen before- the most confident, hard-working and determined woman I’ve ever met- and it opened the door to the culinary world that I now love so much. 

Check out Lyn's Gracious Goodness Online!

www.lynskitchen.com