Faith, Folklore, and Friends

If you love gardening, you have probably seen P. Allen Smith's Garden Home on Create and other TV  stations. Last week, Hub and I toured his home and garden at Moss Mountain Farm.  A.maz.ing!!!!! There was seventy of us, and they fed us lunch here. It turned out to be a hot, most excellent day!  In fact, Hub and I are planning to return in the spring.  Want to go?

It is that time of year again.  There are lots of green tomatoes on the vines that are now dying, just about done with their cycle of life. We have had numerous BLTs and salsa-drenched omelets and burritos, so it is okay to pick the green tomatoes now. There are hundreds of  fried tomato recipes online, so here is another one for you. Starting from the left: 1/2 cup of plain flour; 1/2 cup of milk and an egg; 1/2 cup corn meal, 1/2 cup of bread crumbs, and, just to make it interesting, 1 Tablespoon Tony Chachere's Creole seasoning.  Beat the egg and milk together, and mix the meal, bread crumbs, and seasoning. Slice some firm, green tomatoes that have been washed and dried.  I usually use one tomato per person. Dip the tomato slice in the flour, then in the egg/milk mixture, making sure you cover it completely. Shake off any excess, then coat with the meal, bread crumbs, and seasoning mixture.  I did this wi...

Stories from my Daddy Storytelling is the oldest form of record keeping.  Most of what we know of ancient history is from oral telling of facts and events, with each generation passing them on to the next. Stories are the most important inheritance we have to pass on.  ~ Donald Davis I cannot remember a time when my Daddy wasn't telling stories.  He told them while we worked, at the supper table, before bedtime.  In the summer, when the heat from the tin roof and wood cook stove drove us out of the house, we sat on the porch with a gnat-smoke in a metal half-bushel tub and Daddy told stories: Stories about hard times, violent deaths of people we didn't know but had allegedly shared DNA, war stories, and mule stories. They included tales about his siblings, which amazed me because his subjects were now elderly people with children of their own, and it was so hard to imagine my sweet aunts jumping fences while running from snakes. Daddy told stories of favorit...

One of the joys of having a backyard garden is fresh tomatoes.  This year, we have managed to grow more tomatoes than the squirrels can eat, and we have enough for salsa.  There are thousands of recipes for salsa, and this is my favorite one.  One large green bell pepper chopped fine. You could use a red one as well. One medium purple onion chopped fine.  A white one would work, but I love the way the purple looks in the salsa. Two jalapenos with the seeds removed, chopped very fine.  We love the heat in ours.  You can leave this out if you want to.  But why would you want to? Chop the tomatoes, although they don't have to be as fine as the jalapenos.  I do not peel the tomatoes. Ain't that pretty?  It is ready now, but I like to add a little extra. This is about half a bunch of cilantro.  It is hard to chop when it is wet, so I wash it before I start and use paper towels to dry it.  Hub loves t...