Grandpa's Home Cooking

Cukes & Onions and Tomatoes Are In

Nothin' could be fina than sittin' down to eat Grandpas cukes n' onions and a big ol' tomato fresh from the garden on a summer's eve. If you're like me, you'll want more love. So I'd serve some other garden treats like hot corn on the cob drippin' with butter and salted well, and while you're at it, why slide not a pan of slo-roasted vegetables on the table.  This is a garden love feast. Serve it all up with a pitcher of sweet iced tea. You're looking at a gallon jug of cukes & onions that I can pull out of our refrigerator for a great instant meal side.

You'll find my cukes and onions recipe, dated just over a year ago, June 7, 2010, in my category for Side Dishes. Just look at my blog Category List in the right column of the blog and click on side dishes. Then scroll down until you come to the cukes and onions recipe. Also look at the Cottage Cheese Farm Salad recipe which follows the Cukes & Onions recipe. Cottage Cheese Farm Salad also includes fresh summer cucumbers and tomatoes.

I've constructed this blog to be just like a cookbook so that you can easily find recipes I've posted in the past. This is a recipe you don't want to forget!

Put a crock of cukes & onions on your table for lunch and supper. They offer goodness and a fresh bright taste to every meal. Add them to your salads. Eat them for a snack. 

It's a great time to visit your local farmers market and stock up on wonderful fresh produce.

Slow Roasted Vegetables

What do you do when you open your refrigerator vegetable bin and find an odd lot of vegetables that you'll lose if you don't do something with them soon. Don't wait. Gather them up, wash them, trim roots, peel, and arrange them in a roasting pan to make a nice looking presentation.

Last nights roast included cabbage, potatoes, sweet onions, beet greens, and beets. When I have beets, I try to separate them from other vegetables so they don't color the other vegetables. Some people cut off beet greens and throw them away. What a shame. They are so sweet and delicious.

Last week's roast included potatoes, small white turnips, Vidalia onions, and about two dozen cloves of garlic. I tucked the garlic in between the vegetables throughout the pan. Goodness how delicious. When you eat one of the roasted garlic cloves it's like biting into a piece of candy! 

Preheat your oven to 325 degrees.

Arrange the vegetables in the roasting pan. Drizzle the vegetables with olive oil. Salt and pepper the vegetables to suit your taste. Cover the pan with aluminum foil. Then pop the roasting pan in the oven and roast the vegetables for about two to two and a half hours. Goodness how delicious!

Some vegetables roast better than others. For example, cabbage is sometimes still a bit firm (but still good to eat). There is nothing quite so good as root vegetables such as potatoes, turnips, carrots, leeks, onions. And if you have it, don't forget the garlic cloves!

Here's a good story. When George Whitman, owner of the Paris English language  bookshop, Shakespeare & Company, met customers and learned they were travelers, he nearly always said, "You can sleep here in the bookshop if you like. There are sofas and chairs throughout." Some folks took him up on the offer. I didn't. I was forewarned that the sofas were full of bedbugs. Some guests of the house reportedly slept at the shop for weeks. One guest, Jeremy Mercer, author of Books, Bedbugs, and Baguettes, writes that George often fed his guests a soup made of vegetables he gathered from the throw away bins of street market vendors. Reportedly, George just cut out the bad spots, washed them up, and cooked them in water. If you haven't read the book, I highly recommend it. 

Grandpa's Delicious Deviled Eggs

Eggs are reasonable. Start with a dozen or more hard boiled eggs. Some eggs are easy to peel and some aren't. Some look good after they're peeled and cut and some don't. You're going to need more yolk to have enough prepared mix to stuff the whites. You'll not have too many eggs. They'll disappear from the platter lickety split. Mark my words, you'll wish you had more.

Ingredients:

• 12-14 large eggs, hard boiled* and peeled. 
• 1/2 cup of real mayonnaise
• 3 Tablespoons of sweet pickle relish
• 2-3 teaspoons of prepared yellow mustard
• Sweet pickle juice, if needed
• Salt and pepper to taste
• Paprika and chopped fresh basil for garnish

* Hard boil eggs. Gently line a pot with eggs in cold water. It's best to fill the bottom of the pot with eggs so that there is not room for eggs to bump and crack when the water starts to boil. Turn the burner to medium high. Stay close and be watchful for the water to start boiling. When the water boils, turn the heat to low, put a lid on the pan, and set the timer to 12 minutes. The minute the timer reaches :00, turn the heat off and take the pan off the burner. Set the pan in the sink. Take the lid off, position the pan under the faucet, and start running cold water in the pan. Let the water run in and over the pan until the eggs are no longer too hot to handle. When the eggs start to feel cool enough to pick up, gently pull the eggs from the pan and put them in a dish. You can peel them then ... or do as I do ...  put the dish in the fridge and let the eggs get cold before you peel them.

Instructions:

Halve the eggs lengthwise. Gently pick the yolks out of the whites and drop the yolks into a mixing bowl. Set the egg whites on a serving platter. Discard any torn egg whites. You want to have plenty of prepared yolks to fill good egg whites.

When the mixing bowl is full of yolks, use a fork to mash the yolks. Stir in the mayonnaise, sweet pickle relish, and mustard. Add salt and pepper to tase. You want a nice creamy mix. If the mix is too firm, add a half teaspoon of sweet picke juice and stir the yolk mix until it's creamy

You can use a teaspoon to fill the whites with the prepared yolk mix, but it is a lot easier to squeeze the filling into the yolks. Fill a zip lock bag with the mashed yolk mix. Cut off a corner of the bag and squeeze the delicious prepared yolks into the egg white shells. Decorate the eggs by lightly dusting the eggs with paprika. I also like to lightly sprinkle the eggs with finely chopped fresh basil.

Roasted Maple Pork Tenderloin, Braised Red Cabbage, & Black-eyed Pea Salad

Here's the finale! A delicious and tender roast pork tenderloin. Serve this roast with a braised red cabbage and a black-eyed pea salad and you'll have a great dinner. (Scroll down or use the index to find the recipe for the braised red cabbage and black-eyed pea salad sides.) 

This is a delicious meat option that is often overlooked. Although called tenderloin, the meat may not be tender if not carefully prepared. The cook can influence the outcome. The tenderloin is the leanest cut of pork. As you know, without fat, meat may end up being really tough--unless you prepare the meat to achieve a better result.

Great grandma used her muscle power and a great big sharp kitchen fork to tenderize lean meat. You can do the same--or--you can use a modern hand tool, such as a Jaccard Tenderizer, to get a super result. Put the tool on the meat and push down. This tool has many blades to penetrate the meat. Secondly, great grandma didn't overcook the meat. When she looked in the oven, and she may have even poked the center of the roast with her index finger, she knew when the meat was done just right. Great grandma may have also used her carving knife to make a cut in the middle of the roast to see if it was still slightly pink.

A roast ought to be still slightly pink in the center to be done just right! You lose the pink and you've over-cooked the meat and it's going to be d-r-y and t-o-u-g-h. Fortunately you and I have the option to buy an instant read thermometer and check the roast temperature often enough to make sure we do not cook the meat beyond 160 degrees. That is done! If you don't have an instant read thermometer--use your eyes to look for doneness, your index finer to feel the doneness, and cut into the center of the roast with your carving knife to see if the center of the roast is still a little pink! Suit your self on doneness, but I prefer to serve the meat at a bit less than 160 degrees (155 degrees), but still done. To each his own. 

The picture is of 1/2 of a 3lb pork tenderloin roast I prepared. Spoon some of the liquid from the pan on the roast (I didn't do this for the photo to keep the picture clear.) I spooned baked Granny Smith apple chunks around the roast.

Three pounds will serve 6. If you buy a prepackaged roast, as I did, and you have a small family, you'll probably have enough meat for two dinners. We like to prepare enough food for two meals. 

Here's how to prepare a pork tenderloin roast.

Ingredients:

• 2.5 to 3 pound pork tenderloin roast
• 2/3rds cup maple syrup
• 3 Tablespoons dijon mustard
• 2 Tablespoons apple cider (or whatever juice you've got)
• 1 Granny Smith apple chopped 
• 2 Tablespoons of soy sauce
• Salt and pepper (I like to use my mix* of salt, pepper, and garlic powder)

* Combine 1 cup of salt, 1/4th cup of black pepper, and 1/4th cup of garlic powder in a jar. Cap the top and shake. Use your fingers to sprinkle the seasoning mix over the meat. Keep your jar handy and use the seasoning mix often. 

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

In a small mixing bowl, mix together the maple syrup, mustard, apple cider, apple chunks, and soy sauce.

Get your cutting board and tenderizer tool out and set them on the counter. Put your pork tenderloin roast onthe cutting board and use your tenderizer to puncture the entire roast! Use a big cooking fork if you do not have a tenderizing tool.

Put the meat in a roasting pan. Pour the sauce over the roast. Season the meat to your liking. Roast the meat at 350 degrees for about 45 minutes. Baste the meat every 15 minutes or so. After 30 minutes when the meat starts looking near done, start using your instant read thermometer to check the temperature. The meat will be done at 160 degrees.  (I prefer the meat to be roasted to 150 to 155 degrees).  When the roast is done to suit your taste, let the meat sit for 10-15 minutes before you start carving it.

Delicious Braised Red Cabbage

This is a wonderful dish to serve with a pork roast. I'll bet your family table hasn't had this braised sweet and sour red cabbage dish since your great grandmother was cooking. I served it with a roast pork tenderloin and we ate it in abundant quantities.  The recipe makes about twice as much as you see pictured. I got this recipe from the book Louis Osteen's Charleston Cuisine, Recipes from a Low Country Chef.  I took a cooking class with Mr. Osteen at the gourmet emporium, A Southern Season in Chapel Hill, NC.

Ingredients:

• 1 large red cabbage, cut into ribbons or chunks
• 1/4th cup duck fat or peanut oil (Mmm Duck fat!)
• 1/2 cup carrots, sliced thin
• 4 cups yellow onions, sliced thin
• 1 cup red wine
• 3 cups chicken stock or broth
• 1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 ths tablespoon black pepper
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• (forget the bay leaf ... yadda yadda)
• 1 sprig fresh parsley
• 1 sprig fresh thyme
• 4 cloves fresh garlic (a big tablespoon of minced works)
• 2 cups unsweetened chestnuts (I didn't add this schmaltz because I didn't have it:-)

Instructions:

Core the cabbage and chop the whole head in threads or bite size chunks. WOW ... its a lot! Don't fret because it will cook down and you'll be happy, happy, happy that you have it all.

Now melt that lovely duck fat in a heavy bottomed non-reactive pot (or whatever pot you got) over medium-high heat. Saute the carrots and onions stiring the pot frequently until the onions are translucent. Add the cabbage until you can get it all in the pot and then simmer the pot until all of the cabbagge is all wilted.

NOW ... have a sip of red wine from your full glass and add the cup of red wine, stock, vinegar, salt, pepper, sugar,garlic, and  herbs to the pot.  Stir the pot well. Adjust the heat to a simmer and heat the pot for 1/2 hour. If you have the chestnuts, add 'em now! Simmer the pot for another 1/2 hour.

Delicious!

 

Grandpa's Black-eyed Pea Salad

I came up with the idea for this salad as I considered a menu to prepare a special Saturday night dinner for Grandma. I'm calling it a Black-eyed Pea Salad, though it occurred to me that it could be called Grandpa's Carolina Caviar. Nancy liked this salad so much she asked me to please fix it often. Together, we ate the whole bowl of salad in two meals (about twice the amount pictured). 

I served this black-eyed pea salad with a delicious braised red cabbage and a wonderful roasted apple pork tenderloin. I'll post the braised red cabbage and roast pork tenderloin recipes soon. 

Ingredients:

Here's the exact ingredients; but use whatever you have on hand and/or what is available!

• 2 1/2 to 3 cups black-eyed peas, cooked but still firm  (not mushy!)*
• 1 cup white onion, chopped fine
• 1 cup yellow, orange, and green bell pepper, peppers chopped fine
• 1 stalk of celery, cut  lengthwise in three strips and sliced thin
• 1 carrot, cut lengthwise in three strips and sliced thin
• 1 cup chopped cucumber
• Grandpa's sweet and sour dressing (see below)
• 4 very small heirloom tomatoes (red, blush, orange, and/or yellow), chopped

* Use dried black-eyed peas. Rinse twice. Put in a saucepan. Pour water to provide two knuckles of water above the peas. Bring to a boil & tun heat to simmer for an hour or until the peas are cooked but are still firm. You don't want 'em mushy! Hold on there!! You also need to check that water level regularly and pour more water in the pan if the water gets low. You don't want burned peas and a burned pan. Use canned black-eyed peas if you must, but mark my words that they'll be too soft.

Grandpa's Sweet & Sour dressing:

• 3/4ths cup of sugar
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup vinegar
• 1/2 cup salad oil
• Salt and pepper to taste

Instructions:

Combine the vegetable ingredients and pour on just enough dressing to coat the vegetables. Salt and pepper the salad to taste and serve it when you feel like it:-). If you end up with too much dressing, just do a little dance and pour the leftover in a canning jar and refrigerate. You'll use it up soon enough on salads or on another batch of black-eyed pea salad. My wife likes it so much she said, "Why don't you make more of that salad the first of the week."

Here's a picture of a dinner plate with rounds of roast pork tenderloin the braised red cabbage, and the black-eyed pea salad. 

Jalapeño Corn Casserole

  
You've all seen a dish of corn, so I decided to give you a different picture. When I think of corn, I think of my visits to corn fields near San Juan Ostuncalco in Guatemala. Here women pat out their staple corn food, tortillas. The Mam Indians I've visited in the Western Highlands of Guatemala actually grow their corn right up the side of a mountain. It's true. You should see it for yourself. It's back breaking work from sunup until sundown. Plowing is done by hand with a tool that is similar to a hoe, but larger. It's primitive out there, but not so primitive that you can't find a bottle of Pepsi, as seen in the picture. The Pepsi will not be cold. I could tell you more stories than you want to hear, but hopefully I've put you in the mood for a taste a Jalapeño corn casserole.

Ingredients:

• 2, 15 1/2  oz cans Green Giant Sweet corn, drained of juice
• 1, 8 oz container of onion & chive cream cheese, at room temperature
• 2-4 Jalapeño peppers, deseeded and chopped into small pieces

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

In a mixing bowl, combine the ingredients and mix as well as possible with heavy wooden spoon. Pour the mix into a greased 1 1/2 quart casserole and bake for 30 minutes in a preheated 350 degree oven. Stir the corn and serve the dish hot.

I got this recipe from my Sister-in-law, Maryanne, and it is delicious!

Here is a picture of corn growing near San Juan Ostuncalco, Guatemala:

A Dish of Hot Beans, Onions, & Potatoes

Would you like to make the job of preparing supper easier? When you're feeling fresh in the morning, snap some beans, chop some sweet onion, and peel and cut up some nice redskin potatoes. Put the vegetables in your crock pot. Pour a box of organic chicken broth over the vegetables. Season the pot with salt and pepper. Then put the lid on the crock pot and set the temperature on low. Let those vegetables cook slowly all day long. Peek now and then and stir the pot.

I would have liked to add a few more ingredients to the pot, but the family would not have approved, so I didn't. What other ingredients would I have added? Heh, heh, heh ... you can bet on it ... that I would have added some apple smoked bacon grease and a hefty shot or two of balsamic vinegar.  It also would have been excellent to add some chopped cabbage. I like'em like that. But, sometimes the cook has to instead add a dash of temperance.

Now when I was a boy, way back into the 1940's, times were tough. Those were war years. I remember I loved spending a lot of summer days and nights at Grandpa and Grandma Pipes house. They were poor. For the most part, we got along grand. I only remember being in trouble once. On the third night in a row grandma once again sat  a dish of hot cooked green beans, cabbage, onions, and potatoes on the table for our dinner. All were from grandpa's garden. I said, "You mean, we're having beans, cabbage, and potatoes for dinner again?" (Yeah, and we had already said grace.) Grandpa said, "Son, you go to your room and not come down until breakfast." I was to go to bed with no dinner. I lay in bed and wished for some beans, cabbage, onions, and potatoes. Besides, I knew there was also going to be toast and grandma's homemade jam.

Tastes good. Been even better if the vegetables and been cooked with a little bacon grease and balsamic vinegar:-)

Duck Fat Potatoes

How 'bout it! Do these potatoes look good, or what? I picked up one of those small mixed bag's of fingerling potatoes from Trader Joe's. I lik'em because you're getting a pretty and a good tasting collage of white, yellow, and purple potatoes! You can also shop at Whole Foods, where you don't have to buy a 10-pound bag of one kind of potato:-) Just just pick up an assortment of a few white, yellow, and purple potatoes. 

On a beautiful fall day like today, I like to take a collander of washed potatoes, my parin' knife, and bowl of ice cold water to the front porch and sit in a comfortable wicker chair to prep the potatoes. I have a little table next to my chair that comes in handy for kitchen chores. "Hey Nance, will you bring ol' grandpa a glass of red wine to sip while I'm peelin' these taters?" 

I peel'm and let the peelin's drop into the collander and then drop the potatoes in the ice water, so they don't turn brown while I'm takin' my time peelin' taters and sippin' wine. When the wine glass is empty it's a good time to go back in the house to cook.

Ingredients:

• As many white, yellow, and purple potatoes as you or your family can eat
• 2 Tablespoons of duck fat or olive oil if you happen to be out of duck fat:-)
• Salt
• Fresh ground pepper
• Your favorite oven-proof skillet (I love my seasoned cast iron skillet!)

You'll find duck fat at a local gourmet grocery or at nearby farm. I keep asking the local Whole Foods to carry it, but so far they haven't listened. You can also order it online.

If you ask, don't ask the butcher. This is a dairy item ... the dairy folks don't seem to understand this. If you ask, you'll need to explain that duck fat ought to be sold right next to the cow's butter. 

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

After peeling the potatoes, cut the potatoes into bite size chunks. 

Drop a couple of Tablespoons of duck fat into your favorite skillet on a hot range burner. When you've drained the water off of those potatoes so good that you're not going to get popped with hot grease, drop the potatoes in the hot skillet.

Salt, pepper, and brown the potatoes a little (as shown in the picture). Then pull the potatoes out of the skillet with a spatula and put them in a baking dish. Put the baking dish in your preheated oven for about 20 minutes, or until the potatoes are cooked to perfection. 

That's all there is to it. Enjoy those potatoes! 

Autumn Apple Sauce in a Crock Pot

What you see is what is left of a big crock pot full of apple sauce. Oh my, it was good! We ate a significant amount of a new batch of apple sauce I made yesterday. We make and eat a lot of apple sauce when the new autumn tart apples arrive at the supermarkets. Here is about the easiest recipe you can prepare!

Ingredients:

• 8-12 tart apples (such as Honeycrisp, Gala, Johnogolds, Braeburn, or Granny Smith)
• 1/4th cup sugar
• 1/4th cup cinnamon (try fresh Chinese cinnamon sometime!)
• Crock pot

Instructions:

Peel, core and quarter 8-12 tart autumn apples and put them in your crock pot. Do not add liquid! The apples will make as much liquid as is required. Put as many apples in your crock pot as it will hold, because folks will eat this apple sauce at every meal. It won't last long. Spread 1/4th cup of sugar over the top of the apples. Then spread 1/4th cup cinnamon over the top. Cover the crock pot with the appliance lid. Set the crock pot to low heat and leave the apples alone for 4-5 hours. Peek now and then to see how the apples are doing and to smell the wonderful aroma. You can pull always bump the temperature to high near the end of the cook time if you're running short of time. When the apples are fully cooked, use a big wood spatula or a big spoon to crush the apples into a thick sauce. Don't stir them to death. Its best to serve this sauce nice and chunky, just as the sauce is shown in the picture.

Here is a picture of my neighborhood near the lakefront on West Wellington in Chicago 33 years ago in the autumn of 1976. I had a bachelor apartment (see the next photograph) in a four+one building at 455 West Wellington. I cooked a lot of meals and served them on the little table. I used pillows on the floor for seating. Oh yeah, it was a cool place. A four+one was 4 floors of apartments on top of a floor for parking. I walked to the nearby Lincoln Park Zoo and rode the #151 Sheridan bus to my not too far away office on East Chicago at Michigan Avenue. And, of course, I rode the El all over this wonderful city. I love Chicago.

And here is a picture of my 1978 batchelor studio apartment. I paid $350 a month for this apartment which was considered to be a reasonable rent then. I understand the same apartment rents for $900 a month today.

A Great Cole Slaw

I prefer to cut cabbage into slaw with a chef's knife instead of using a grater. And I use my recipe to create an old fashioned dressing. If you prefer the dressing to be a bit less tart than my little bit tart dressing, just add a bit more sugar, mayonnaise, or both. I like to dust my slaw with Hungarian paprika. If you don't like to dust your slaw with paprika, don't. It's your slaw after all.

I use 1/2 of a large head of cabbage. Whole Food's will sell you a half head if you ask the produce person to cut one for you. My dressing works well for 1/2 head of cut slaw. If you want to cut an entire head of slaw, just double my dressing recipe.

Ingredients

• 1/2 head of cabbage, hand cut with a wide chef's knife into slaw

And for the dressing:

• 4 Tablespoons apple cider vinegar (or white vinegar if this is what you have)
• 6 tablespoons mayonnaise
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1/4th teaspoon salt.
• Black pepper to taste
• Hungarian Paprika (optional)

Instructions:

Mix the dressing ingredients up in a small mixing bowl. Use a whisk to thoroughly mix the ingredients. Use a teaspoon to taste the dressing. Is it as you like it? Good. But if you wish it to be a bit thicker, add another tablespoon or more and whisk the dressing again. If the dressing not sweet enough, add more sugar. When you're satisfied, pour the dressing on your cut slaw. If you like, dust your slaw with a little black pepper or maybe some Hungarian paprika.

I love Cole slaw as an accompaniment to a meat sandwich or a meal of pork chops, ham, or chicken.     

Baked Apples

Baked apples are delicious and they are simple to prepare. It's a good year-round choice, but I especially love baking apples in the fall when there is a variety of tart apples to choose from. I love to use tart apples, such as a Jonathon, Braeburn, Granny Smith, or Grimes Golden, but some people might prefer baking an apple with a more subtle flavor, such as a Washington State apple.

My all time favorite apple is the Jonathon, but good Jonathons are hard to find these days. When I was a boy my father, Lloyd Pipes, took the family to church member Marvin Norton's Indiana farm for apples several times each fall. There we picked, and ate while picking, really big red Jonathon apples. Marvin was an expert at grafting apples and the result was that his apples were prize specimens. They were so good and juicy that the juices rolled down my little face as I ate them. There is a wonderful picture of my father in one of Marvin's apple trees appears after the recipe.

Ingredients:

• Juicy, tart apples (such as Honey Crisp, Braeburn, or Pink Lady)
• Butter
• Brown sugar
• Cinnamon   

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Use a sererated apple corer to remove apple cores. Cut apples in half. If you do not have an apple corer, you can cut apples in half and use a teaspoon or a sererated grapefruit spoon to dig out the core.

Place apples in a baking dish, cut side up. Put a pat of butter (1 tablespoon) in the core hole of each apple half. Put about a tablespoon of brown sugar on top of the butter. Then sprinkle the apple with cinnamon. Fill the baking dish with apples and put the dish in a preheated 350 degree oven. Bake the apples for 45 minutes to an hour. The apples in the picture were baked for 45 minutes. I usually bake them for one hour until they are very soft. Baked apples are a delicious treat for the family table. I always prepare them when I serve roast pork or fried pork chops.

Here is the wonderful picture of my father, Lloyd Pipes, up high in one of Marvin Norton's apple trees. Oh, how I miss him!

I remember driving out to Norton's farm in our big old 1939 Buick. The excitement built as we drove out in the country on a beautiful sunny Sunday afternoon after church. We'd pick and buy two bushels of apples. Then we'd go to the farm barn where Marvin would be pressing cider. Dad bought each of us a big glass of fresh ice cold cider. Then Mom went to the farm house to buy a quart of fresh cream from Marvin's wife, Audrey. You ever poured fresh sweet cream on cereal? Oh my, you haven't lived until you've eaten cereal with fresh sweet unpasteurized farm cream.

By the time we got back in the old Buick Dad had already eaten 3 or 4 apples. As soon as we got back on the road Dad would holler out to my brother and I, who were crammed in the back seat with one of the two bushels of apples, "Hey boys, hand me a big red Jonathon apple." Dad would polish off that apple in no time! My brother, Jerry and I would already have been at work eating apples. Pretty soon, Mom, Charlotte Pipes, would speak up and say, "I guess I'll have one of them apples too." Bless her soul, we greatly miss her! The other bushel of apples and the rest of our farm goods were in the trunk.

By the end of the coming week we were out of apples. After church the following Sunday, we'd head back out to Norton's orchard to buy more apples. 

The only Jonathon's I can find these days what some call medium in size. 

From Wikipedia:

 

There are two theories about the origin of the Jonathan apple. One is that it was first grown by Rachel Negus Higley. Mrs. Higley gathered seeds from the local cider mill in Connecticut before the family made their journey to the wilds of Ohio in 1804 where she planted them. She continued to carefully cultivate her orchard and named the resulting variety after her husband, Jonathan Higley. The other theory is that it originated from an Esopus Spitzenburg seedling in 1826 from the farm of Philip Rick in Woodstock, Ulster County, New York. Although it may have originally been called the "Rick" apple, it was soon renamed by Judge Buel, President of Albany Horticultural Society, after Jonathan Hasbrouck, who discovered the apple and brought it to Buel's attention.

 

Roasted Leeks

If you've never eaten a roasted leek, you don't know what you have been missing. The French love leeks steamed, roasted, or cooked with other vegetables using their favorite vegetable recipe. Leeks are similar to onions but milder. 

My palate loves leeks roasted in pure butter and dusted with salt and pepper. However, if your diet doesn't tolerate butter, leeks are delicious when drizzled with olive oil and roasted.

Try roasting leeks with fish. Yum! Serve them with fish, beef, or chicken.

Ingredients:

• Fresh leeks, as few or as many as are needed for your table (1-2 per person)
• Olive oil or butter
• Salt
• Pepper
• Aluminum foil

Instructions:

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Carefully wash leeks to remove traces of soil. Cut off a sliver of the root end to remove the roots. Trim the top of the leek, but leave some of the green. I eat them from the white bulbs up to the light green portion of the vegetable. I doubt that many will eat any of the dark green foliage.

Put the leeks in a baking dish that is just big enough to hold the number of leeks you will roast. Drizzle them with olive oil or pour enough melted butter over them to coat the stalks. Dust the leeks with as much or as little salt and pepper as is required to suit your taste.

Cover the dish with aluminum foil. Put the dish in a preheated 350 degree oven and roast the leeks for 45 minutes to an hour. I roasted the leeks in the picture for one hour. If you like for them to be white and a bit crunchy, you might find that roasting them for 45 minutes will suit your taste. 

I'll not be surprised if roasted leeks become a favorite at your table. Lay a few leeks next to a serving of fish, beef, or chicken and I believe you'll find a winning combination! 

Autumn Apple and Arugula Salad

My wife is a salad artist. While Grandpa was baking salmon and fixing potatoes tonight, Nancy worked her artistry making this beautiful salad of arugula, yellow California heirloom tomato, new crop Honeycrisp apple, dried cherries, walnuts, and cucumber. We dressed our salads at the table with a light drizzle of Italian extra virgin olive oil and red raspberry balsamic vinegar. Oh boy, this salad was delicious!

It's September and beautiful apples are arriving at the store every day. I'm all set to make homemade apple sauce, Nashville, Indiana, apple butter, and apple pie. It is also the time to pick up a crisp juicy apple and move to a comfortable chair on the front porch. Enjoy the cooler weather and say hello to your neighbors.

Ingredients:

• Fresh Arugula
• New crop Honeycrisp apple, chopped      
• Small heirloom tomato (yellow, red and yellow, green, or red), chopped
• Dried tart cherries
• Walnuts, chopped
• Cucumber, chopped
• Extra virgin olive oil
• Red Raspberry balsamic vinegar

Instructions:

Set the stage by arranging fresh green Arugula on salad plates. Now use your artistry to add the chopped apple, heirloom tomato, dried cherries, walnuts, and cucumber to the salad. Set the salads and little pitchers of extra virgin olive oil and red raspberry balsamic vinegar on the table. Each person can dress their salad to suit their taste.    

Moroccan Beet Salad

  
Moroccan dishes are tasty and good for you. I love beets. Here is a really nice Moroccan beet salad. We enjoyed my preparation of this as a side for a dinner. Expand your interest in the treasure of vegetables that are available and delicious when prepared in a variety of ways.

Ingredients:

• 3-4 fresh beets, trimmed of root and stem, but save the leaves!
• 3-4 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
• Juice of 1 lemon
• Light salad oil such as canola or grapeseed
• Salt
• Chopped parsley

Instructions:

Put the beets in a good-sized pot along with enough water to cover them. Cook them for about an hour, or until you can easily put a knife through the center of a big beet. You need to watch the pot and add additional water as necessary. When the beets are cooked  exchange the hot water for cold water and let the beets cool. When cool, you can use your hands to remove the peel. Cut the beets into a mixing bowl in bite size pieces of various shapes.  Add the garlic, lemon juice, salad oil, salt, and parsley. Gently mix the ingredients and turn the salad into a nice serving bowl. Refrigerate the salad. 

Fagioli

 

The spoken name, fagiloi, is pronounced fa-ZHOH-lee. Let's say it together now ... it's just one word sliding out of your best Italiano mouth ... FaZHOHlee! According to the epicurious.com dictionary ... fagioli are generally large white kidney beans. 

When Nancy and I walked through a beautiful part Tuscany ... on well worn paths through woods and farm fields ... we sometimes found ourselves in a two or three building village. We were at times fortunate to encounter a small restaurant, such as one in a villager's house ... where a number of people would pull a chair up to a very long table for a very long lunch.

It this setting you might expect the first thing to be served to be, "ah nica plat of fagioli" ... white beans with finely chopped onions, parsley, with a lovely drizzle of extra virgin olive oil. This would be, they said, "ze fagioli". The fagioli is often prepared with a different set of ingredients. As long as there are white beans ... sometimes they were small white Cannellini beans. So it is perfectly okay for me to create my own bean dish and consider it to be "ze fagioli!"

I lika the large white kidney beans. I found a nica jar of the big white kidney beans at the Halgo European Deli and Groceries, which is located at 4520 S. Alston in Durham, North Carolina (just across the street from the nica new Durham branch library). There is where I found a beautiful jar of Polish large white kidney beans. The minute I saw this jar of beans I said to myself ... "Self ... I'ma going to fix me some ah nica fagioli!" I bought the jar and also a nice long piece of Polish sausage after the proprietress provided a sample.  Then I went home to make my fagioli. It is the dish pictured in this posting. Let me tell you, these beans are so good I started eating them without adornment, just as they come from the jar! Then after consuming enough, I set about to create my own inspired fagioli using these ah nica Polish beans, a fresha heirloom tomato, some fresha Italian parsley, and of course, ze drizzle of extra virgin olive oil. And I served this fagioli on one of Grandma Stewart's beautiful plates. This became the appetizer for our evening dinner. How could you not love this dish of happy, happy food! Ees good for you too!

Ingredients:

• White beans

• Onion, chopped fine

• Parsley, chopped fine

• Tomato, chopped (Use Heirloom tomatoes if they are available)

• Extra virgin olive oil, a drizzle over the salad

Instructions:

Bring all of the ingredients together to make an artful and delicious salad. Use a light drizzling of olive oil for dressing.

Nancy and I were in Italy for 22 days in 1988. While there, I took this picture on our 8-day walking tour of Tuscany where we ate lotsa ze fagioli!

 

Roasted Pearl Onions

Roasted pearl onions are rich in flavor and nutrients. This is a great and colorful side to serve with my Kohlrabi Red Chard Lasagne and with fish and beef entrees.

Don't fret about the peeling of the onions. I'll provide instructions for a rapid and easy peeling process.

Advance preparation:

• Put a 11/2 or 2 quart sauce pan 3/4's full of water on a range burner set on high to boil.
• Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.
• Prepare a large mixing bowl of ice and water.
• Set a large colander in the sink.

Ingredients:

• Red pearl onions, 1 bag
• Yellow pearl onions, 1 bag
• White pearl onions, 1 bag (optional)
• Olive oil
• Salt
• Baking dish with lid

Instructions:

Sit at a table and slice the root end off of each onion and drop the onions in a mixing bowl.

Pour all of the onions into the pan of boiling water to boil for exactly 1 minute and no more. Set the timer. When the minute is up, pour the onions and the water into the colander you have in the sink to drain off the boiling water. Then pour the onions into the bowl of ice water to stop the cooking process. When the onions have cooled, take the onions out of the ice water and put them back in the mixing bowl and take yourself and the bowl to a work table. (Stand at the counter if you like ... but this grandpa likes to sit 'n peel).

Set your work table up with an empty dish for the peels, a baking dish for the onions, a bottle of olive oil, and your salt shaker. Put an Uncle Earl CD on your boom box and feel the Appalachians when they sing! (Do a Google search ... your lookin' for bluegrass music ... from 5 women who call themselves Uncle Earl.) Now you can do a bit of wigglin' as you peel! 

Now take the load off you feet by sitting down at the table! With the onion bowl in front of you ... we're goin' to do the easy peel. Pick up a pearl onion up by the stem ... squeeze the stem of a onion with your thumb and fore finger in a way to pull the onion stem and peel up and push the onion down ... so that a peeled onion will just pop out into your bowl. Just keep doin' it. Most of the onions will pop out of the skin so fast ... well ... you may have to swear at one or two onions that don't shed their skin easy as they ought. Once you get the hang of it, you'll marvel at how easy it is to peel a pearl onion. (If it ain't as easy as fallin' off a log ... you're doin' something wrong.)  

When your baking dish is full of pearls pretty red, yellow, and white pearls ... drizzle olive oil over them ... so as to lightly coat all of the onions with olive oil ... salt the onions ... and put the baking dish in your 350 degree oven ... 40 to 50 minutes will likely be enough to bake the onions tender.  Serve with your dinner entree and enjoy the fabulous full flavors of pearl onions.

The picture displays a few red and yellow pearl onions 'cause that's all I had the day I made the dish for supper and for the blog. I believe Trader Joe's sometimes sells a mixed bag of all three. If so, I'd buy and prepare two bags because I love to eat roasted pearls! I usually buy a bag of each ... red, yellow, and white. I love to serve this side when I bake my Kohlrabi and Red Chard casserole. You can't beat this delicious combination.

Six Bean Salad

Marta's great-great Grandma, Grandma Kelly, passed this recipe on to her daughter, Josephine Stewart, who passed it on to her daughter, Marilyn Wilson, who passed it on to her daughter, Nancy, (my wife), who is passing it on to our daughter, Marta. 

Grandma Stewart also gave this recipe to me, after I enjoyed one of her wonderful lunches. We were traveling and stopped at the Stewart homestead, one I will never forget. It is a big white house in Brookville, Pennsylvania. The house sits on a hill high above the courthouse and the setting offers an amazing view of the town. When the town is covered in a blanket of heavy snow it looks like a Grandma Moses painting. 

We stopped to visit Grandma and Grandpa Stewart on every one of our many trips to be at gatherings with Nancy's family in Hershey, Pennsylvania. Grandma was always ready to serve us a nice lunch before we settled into comfortable chairs to chat. Later, we'd walk down the hill through the snow to look at the shops downtown, not just to enjoy the natural beauty of Brookville, but to buy and eat Dan Smith's Christmas candy. Dan Smith makes chocolates, but my favorite is his Christmas Mints. Grandma always gave us a box of these mints for Christmas. If you want to give a special gift, you can order candy from Dan Smith http://www.dansmithscandies.com/ProductCategory.aspx?cat=Christmas. While at Hershey for Christmas, Grandma Wilson always gave all of her kids a box of Hershey Chocolates 

It was at a summer lunch, however, when Grandma served us her Three Bean Salad. I've up'ed the ingredients to make it a Six Bean Salad to add even more colors and flavors to the dish. But as far as I'm concerned, it is and always will be Grandma Stewart's Bean Salad.

You can keep this dish in the refrigerator for up to a week. Keep bringing it to the table for a nice and easy summer vegetable side dish. It tastes really good and looks beautiful.

Six Bean Salad

Ingredients:

• 1 14.5 oz can of cut Green beans
• 1 14.5 oz can of Yellow Wax beans
• 1 14.5 oz can of Red Kidney beans
• 1 14.5 oz can of Pinto beans
• 1 14.5 oz can of Great Northern beans
• 1 14.5 oz can of Baby Lima beans
• 1 sweet onion, diced
• 1 green bell pepper, diced
• 3/4ths cup of sugar
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup vinegar
• 1/2 cup salad oil
• Salt and pepper to taste

Instructions:

Combine vegetables, and toss them lightly to mix. Then combine and whisk together the sugar, vinegar, salt, and salad oil and pour this over the vegetables. Refrigerate the salad overnight. Before serving, toss the salad again to coat the beans with the marinade. Pick up a spoon and taste the salad. If you determine it needs it, add some salt and pepper. Gently toss the salad again and set it on the table. 

Heirloom Tomato Salad

This is a bright tasting salad! I make this salad often using big juicy heirloom or fresh from the garden tomatoes. We enjoyed the salad pictured for our dinner last night, along with baked Atlantic Salmon and Basmati rice prepared with the recipe of Tibetan monks. Oh yeah, for real! I've posted the instructions for cooking the rice as they would be cooked in a Tibetan monastery. l have also posted the instructions for baking the salmon.    

Ingredients:

• 1 big juicy heirloom or fresh garden tomato, chopped into bite size pieces
• 1 big long cucumber, quartered and sliced into bite size pieces
• 1 bunch of green onions, trimmed of root and leaves and sliced
• 1/2 cup fresh basil, chopped 
• Extra virgin olive oil, your best for this dish
• Balsamic vinegar, your best red balsamic vinegar (or apple vinegar)
• Salt, for the table
• Fresh ground pepper, for the table

Instructions:

Combine all vegetable and herb ingredients in a pretty cool salad serving dish and carefully mix toss the salad. Drizzle extra virgin olive oil over the salad. Then drizzle a bit more red balsamic vinegar on the salad. Toss the salad again to coat the ingredients with the olive oil and vinegar. Chill and serve when the dinner is brought together on the table.

Cukes 'n Onions

Grandpa Willie would smile and say, “If you don’t like cuke’s ‘n onions, they’s somethin’ wrong with you boy!” Ever since he made that speech, I’ve been a fan of cukes ‘n onions.

In the old days, Mom would have me slice up a bowl full of cucumbers and onions just before I went to bed. I was to put a saucer on top of the vegetables and on top of that a couple of cans of corn or whatever to weigh ‘em down. Then I was to leave the bowl on the counter all night for the cukes ‘n onions to wilt.  The next morning they’d look good and wilted to me, so I’d transfer them to a casserole dish. Then I’d commence to make a sweet vinegar juice for the dish as mom instructed. I’d pour a couple of big shots of apple cider vinegar in a bowl and mix in about a third cup of sugar. Then I’d pour in about 2 cups o’ cold water and stir it up good. I’d taste the mix and adjust it with more sugar, vinegar, or water as I thought necessary until the juice tasted darn good. Then I’d pour the sweet vinegar juice over the cukes ‘n onions and mix them well. We kept the bowl in the “ice box” (and in the 1940’s it was literally a box with a block of ice). We put them out at lunch and dinner until they were gone. 

Nowadays, folks don’t like to leave food out all night and they want exact instructons. Whatever!  

Ingredients

• 2-3 cucumbers sliced thin
• 1 sweet Viadlia onion, sliced thin
• ⅓ cup of apple cider vinegar 
• ⅓ cup sugar
• 2 cups of cold water
• Salt and pepper for the table

Instructions

Cut off the tip ends of the cucumbers. Score the green skin from top to bottom … so that when you slice the cucumbers they’re going to look prettier. Slice and combine the vegetables in a bowl and mix them well. Mix together the vinegar and sugar in a separate bowl. Add cups of cold water and mix well. Taste the sweet vinegar juice. If it doesn’t  taste good, add more vinegar, sugar, or water, as is necessary. Pour the sweet vinegar juice over the cukes and onions. There should be enough juice to cover the vegetables. If there isn’t enough, mix up a little more. Put a lid on the dish and refrigerate the dish until you serve the delicious cukes ‘n onions. Keep serving them for lunch and dinner until they’re gone. This will not take long because they taste good! Put a salt and paper shaker on the table to provide extra seasonings.

Cottage Cheese Farm Salad

This is one of Grandpa's favorite summer salads

Take your basket to the garden and gather a fresh tomato, cucumber, pencil onions, and a fistful of basil and head to the kitchen to make what is sure to be a refreshing salad.

Ingredients:

• 1 tomato (quarter and slice into chunks)
• 1 cucumber (quarter and slice into chunks)
• 1 bunch of green pencil onions (sliced thin)
• 1 fist full of fresh basil leaves (chopped)
• 24 oz container of large curd, 4% milk fat cottage cheese*
• A pretty serving bowl
• Salt
• Pepper

* 4% is better than 2%, but do as you wish. I recommend 4% large curd

Instructions:

Empty the contents of the cottage cheese container in a bowl. Add the tomato and cucumber chunks, round pencil onion slices, and chopped basil. I love the taste of heirloom tomatoes but any fresh tomato will be good in this salad. Stir the vegetables and cottage cheese together. Salt and pepper to taste. Spoon the salad into a pretty serving bowl and set it on the table.

Great Grandma Margaret See's Potato Salad

Great Grandma Margaret See's potato salad is simply the best I've ever eaten. This recipe will endure for generations. 

Ingredients:

• 8 potatoes peeled, boiled, and cut into chunks
• 12 hard boiled eggs, peeled and cut into chunks
• 2 cups celery, chopped fine
• 8 oz sweet pickle relish
• 1/4 cup sweet pickle juice
• 1/3 cup yellow mustard
• Enough mayonnaise for salad to hold together (easy, not too much)
• Fresh basil leaves for garnish

Instructions:

Cook the potatoes, but not too long. They should be well-cooked but still a little firm. Said differently, don't cook them potatoes until they're mush! Add all of the above ingredients into a big mixing bowl and mix gently but mix well. Go easy on the mayonnaise, adding it in small amounts so that the salad holds together. Too much mayonnaise will ruin the dish. Chill the salad until it is time to serve it. Then transfer the potato salad into a beautiful serving bowl and garnish the dish with fresh basil leaves.   

Great Grandma Margaret See always got this dish, and everything else she cooked, just right. Everybody's grandma has a potato salad recipe, but I like my great grandma's the best! The celery, sweet pickles, and sweet pickle juice make the difference.

If you really want to go all the way with this, as great grandma Margaret did, you'll want to remove the strings of the celery. Do you know how to do this? Seems like only the oldest know how to do this these days. Here's how you do it. Put the edge of your best paring knife to the very edge of cut celery and carefully pull the strings down and off. I am serious about this. If you're removing more than the green strings, you're removing too much. It really isn't that hard to do. What's the benefit? Keeps the strings from being caught between the diners teeth. And that's the truth, plain and simple.

You try this recipe. You'll love it. 

Finally, if you want a great combination for your cookout meal, make up a dish of my special baked beans and a bowl of great grandma's potato salad. These dishes will endure for generations.

Grandpa's Baked Okra, Tomatoes, and Vidalia Onions

For a family size casserole:

The first time I had baked okra was for breakfast. That's right. I'd put the time to be about 1949. Dad and mom took us boys down to Danville, Kentucky to visit my grandpa Willie and his sisters Kathryn and Freda. We lived in Indianapolis and Dad woke us up at 4:30 a.m. He wanted us to be on the road early to pull up to Aunt Kathryn's pretty old farmhouse in time for breakfast.

Aunt Kathryn put out a breakfast feast like you may never have seen or even dreamed about. We were served fresh farm fried chicken, country ham, bacon, mashed potatoes, green beans, corn, baked okra, sliced field tomatoes, deviled eggs, scrambled eggs, hot biscuits, hot chicken gravy, homemade apple butter, and strawberry jam. Afterward, Aunt Kathryn brought to the big table an array of fine deserts including cherry pie, peach cobbler, and an iced cake. There was plenty of milk, iced and hot tea, and hot coffee. Woo doggies. Did I eat? You betcha. I was one happy boy. 

There are a number of things I recall about that wonderful breakfast besides the sweet gentle old folk around the table. First you must know the reason that Aunt Kathryn Owens served such a large and grand farm breakfast. The key word is "farm." 

This tiny lady was about to send her men out to the fields to work with a full stomach. Breakfast was the big meal of the day. Lunch was sandwiches, leftover casseroles, and pie and cake served with iced tea. Supper was a might lean and so were the men and women. Supper would be soup or a pot of vegetables served with biscuits.  That is what the old days on a Kentucky farm were like. Aunt Kathryn Owens and my dad, Lloyd Pipes, are pictured in front of the old farmhouse in Danville, Kentucky.  

Today we run to work on a nearly empty stomach, eat fast food for lunch, and sit down to a grand dinner and get fat.

Now, let's talk about okra. Those who love it will clean their bowl and take more. Some folk can't stand the sight of it. They'll push up their nose and say, "No thanks!" But you'd not do that on the farm. You'd say nothing, but smile and pass the bowl to your neighbor. Nobody passed up Aunt Kathryn's bowl of okra because she knew how to cook it right. 

Here's the reason. Some folks will not eat okra because of the sticky liquid that oozes from undercooked okra. Some call it the "slime." (If someone serves you slimy okra, smile and eat it, for the slime will not hurt you:-) 

Now when you serve yours, tell 'em "My baked okra and tomato casserole is not slimy. It tastes good and it's darn good for you."

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.

Ingredients:

• 1/2 pound okra, washed in cold water; cut/dispose of stems, slice each pod into 1/2 inch rounds.
• 2/3rds cup Vidalia onion, cut in large chunks
• 2/3rds cup celery, cut in large chunks
• 1 14.5oz can Hunt’s diced tomatoes (include the juice)
• 1 bay leaf
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• sea salt to taste (and a little more to shake on at the table)
• ground black pepper to taste
• a squirt of Cholula hot sauce or a dash of cayenne pepper
• 1/4th teaspoon fresh or dried thyme
• 1 clove garlic, chopped fine

Instructions:

Combine all ingredients in a beautiful oven-proof dish. Gently put the bowl in the oven and stir it now and then for about 2 hours. Cover the dish for all but the last 20 minutes. Remove the dish from the oven, decorate the dish with a sprig of fresh basil, just clipped from the pot near your kitchen door and serve. This is good eating!

Grandpa's Special Baked Beans

Here they are, hot out of the oven!

When I was a boy fixin’ to make my beans, I always bought tall cans of Stokely Van Camp pork and beans. I went to high school with Mr. Stokely’s son, Al. He was not a close friend, but I still liked Stokely products because I knew Al, and more importantly because Luke Walton, the Indianapolis Indian’s best play-by-play announcer ever, also did Stokely’s commercials.

Luke loved broadcasting the Indians’ baseball games. He also loved doing Stokely commercials. He always made a big deal out of the Indians home runs by hollering, “And there it goes out into Stokely’s pea patch for a home run!” He drew the word home out for dramatic effect. I loved lying on the floor in front of our old cathedral- shaped Philco radio, listening to him broadcast those games.

Road games were especially fun, because I was convinced that Luke didn’t travel to those cities. I was sure he reported those games from a studio in Indianapolis, where he received cryptic play by play teletype printouts for every pitch and then made up the rest for color. You never heard the fans roar, just Luke.

The teletype would report “ball 2,” and Luke would lean into the mic and say, “The pitch…ooooh!…it just missed the inside corner…low and inside, ball 2.” And then, he’d ramble on about the pitcher or the player at bat while waiting for the next teletype report. “Janes steps out of the box…picks up the rosin and dusts his hands …now he steps back in…takes a practice swing…and the catcher gets into his position. Here’s comes the pitch.”

However, there were often long distance teletype mistakes. At the end of the inning, Luke might announce, “Indians 4, Colonels 3.” Then, during the commercial that followed, Luke would get a teletype correction report: “Correction, Colonels 4, Indians 3.” After the break Luke would open with, “Well, here we are fans at the top of the 5^th, and it’s the Colonels 4 and the Indians 3.” These mistakes would regularly occur during road games, but never during a home game when Luke was sitting in a booth high above home plate! In the 1950s, the Indianapolis Indians competitor mentioned above was the Louisville Colonels. Dad would say to me, “You better know how to say Louisville right, son!” It is not Louis-ville, or Louey-ville, but Luavul! Now let me hear you say Luavul.”

Mr. Walton was also one of the the well-known announcers on the Indianapolis 500 Radio Network. Luke was at starting line where he would introduce Tony Hulman, the owner of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. After his introduction, Luke moved the mic below Tony’s lips and Tony would speak the immortal words, “Gentlemen, start your engines!”

Years later, I freaked out when I learned that I had bought a house directly across the street from Luke Walton’s home on North New Jersey Street. When I saw him in his yard, I  ran across the street, introduced myself, and shared my boyhood memories. I told him  how I had listened to him and mimicked him as if I was the announcer, and how I had and dreamed of becoming one. My dream came true when I became a newscaster and disc jockey on a local radio station while I was in college.  

Ingredients:

• 2 large cans of pork and beans, drained of “mystery juice”
• ½ cup dark brown sugar, firmly packed
• 1 green bell pepper, chopped in bite-size chunks
• 1 jalapeno pepper, chopped fine (optional)
• 1 medium sweet onion, chopped
• ¼ cup yellow mustard
• Ketchup, enough to create plenty of juice
• ½ cup barbeque sauce 

Instructions:

Mix all of the ingredients in a large casserole dish. Add enough ketchup and Q sauce to make the mixture wet (the juice will be reduced as you bake the beans). Bake the beans at 350 degrees for 1 to 1½ hours. Cover the dish for 45 minutes to an hour. Then serve the beans and wait for the compliments!

Ramps

Ramps are wild, nutritious, and they are in season now through April.
Ramps are a rather pungent-smelling and tasting wild leek. Around here you'll find them near the top of an Appalachian mountain. You'll find lots of them in North Carolina and West Virginia. My favorite place to dig them is in Pocahontas County, West Virginia, in the Monongahela National Forest. 

Just pack a picnic lunch and take the family out for a great day outing. Pick a pretty spot along the Little Williams River and spread your picnic near the foot of a hill. Enjoy a nice picnic in a beautiful and scenic place. Then get the family moving up the hill to look for ramps. Print the picture and take it with you. You'll need a plastic trash bag and a couple of good digging tools. Spot a patch of ramps near the top of the hill and start digging! The broad leaves are several shades of green, the bulbs are white like a green onion, and in between the stems are a mix of color including purple. 

As far as I know, there are no restrictions to keep you from digging ramps in the national forest. Dig a basket or bag full, take them home, and fix your family some healthy greens and leeks. Cut the roots off and you can cut, cook, and eat any part of the plant. Eat them raw and you might have some folks distancing themselves from you. Cook them artfully and those that distanced themselves from you may join you at the table.

A local mountaineer is likely to wash 'em, cut off the roots, and toss them into a pot of boiling water with a little bacon grease and sugar. Wayne Arrington took me to his granny's place on the side of a hill. We sat at her table with her and enjoyed a fine dinner of ramps. You know, when the winter stores have run out, mountain folk can count on ramps for a fine and nutritious meal. You'll definitely get the mountain taste if you cook'em up in water and bacon grease.   

Ramps can be a gourmet treat if you know how to fix them. Carolyn Arrington tells me, "Nowadays, mountaineers clean, chop, and sauté the ramps in bacon grease, a little sugar, and a little vinegar. Then they cover the pot and let the ramps steam until they are translucent." Carolyn is right, ramps are delicious when fixed this way. 

If you're not up for searching and digging, visit a local grocery in the area and if they haven't run out of them, you might buy some by the pound. 

The Richwood West Virginia Ramp Festival is held in late April. The main attraction is a homemade ramp supper (over 2,000 pounds of ramps), along with ham, bacon, fried potatoes, pinto beans, cornbread, sassafras tea, and cake prepared by native Richwooders. You'll also find local arts and crafts, music, and a marathon and distance run.

While you're in Richwood, look in little shops for pickled ramps. Now we're talking serious delicious! 

Try this. Buy or prepare a delicious paté and some cherry compote. Arrange a slice of paté, a dollop of cherry compote, and three pickled ramps on a pretty plate, along with a basket of toast points. Pour yourself a glass of wine and partake of the feast. You want a recipe to make your own fruit compote. Stay tuned to this blog and I'll give you one:-)

If you live out west, you'll find ramps in western mountains too. I can't give you a specific location. But I know they exist. When we run out of local ramps, our local Whole Foods store gets them from California and the price per pound reflects the distance the greens have traveled by air. But hey, I like ramps so much that I pay the price. At this time of year you can get them free, by the bushel, if you're up for some fun.

If I were you, I'd hurry on to West Virginia before Easter when the ramps are young and tender!

Ross Pipes Escalloped Tomatoes

 I love escalloped tomatoes. Great Grandma See used to make the best. She didn't have her recipes written down. She cooked based on what she had on hand and her feeling about how to make it taste good. Since I learned how to cook from her, I came up with my own recipe and wrote it down. I wanted to remember how I did it the next time I want to make them. Folks have asked me for my recipe. So here it is: 

Ingredients:

• 4 Tablespoons of pure butter:-)
• 1 small onion, diced
• 1/2 green bell pepper, diced
• A hit of sea salt
• 1/2 cup brown sugar, packed tight
• 1 1/4 cups of dry seasoned croutons (or dried bread cubes)
• 1 28 oz can of Hunt's diced tomatoes
• Sweet fresh basil chopped (more is more better)

Instructions:

Melt the butter in a cast iron skillet. Add the diced onions, green bell pepper, and a liberal hit of sea salt. Saute the onions and peppers until the onions are translucent. Add the brown sugar and bread cubes and stir. Stir in tomatoes, the juice, and a handful of chopped fresh sweet basil.

Now pour the mixture into a greased casserole baking dish (use olive oil to grease your dish) and bake the casserole for 45 minutes at 350 degrees.

Nancy, Marta, and I love this dish. Sometime, when I am cooking just for myself, I think I am going to add just a little bit of Jalapeno pepper. (Nancy and Marta would not go for this, but I would).