Two Very Different Books

Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain was one of a stack of books I received for my birthday and I devoured it at once. I'd read excerpts of it in The New Yorker and was eager to continue this wild, irreverent exploration of the culinary underbelly.

We rarely eat out -- and even more rarely do we eat at restaurants of the sort Bourdain is describing-- but I found myself fascinated by his account of the interplay between the various members of a restaurant's staff. The drama! The choreography! The planning! The testosterone! The bitchiness! 

I'm a pretty good cook -- resourceful, innovative, organized -- but I wouldn't last five minutes  in the world Bourdain describes. I sure enjoyed peeking into  it though.

And I will never order fish on Sunday or Monday.

~~~

About as far away from Bourdain's kitchens as one can get is These is my Words by Nancy E. Turner.

Based on Turner's family memoirs,  this story is told in the form of the diary of Sarah Prine, 1881- 1901. Traveling with her family on a wagon train into the Arizona Territories, Sarah encounters almost every kind of danger the frontier has to offer. Her indomitable spirit carries her through an unsettled childhood, an unhappy marriage, motherhood, widowhood and more. 

Sarah's voice is real and compelling -- and in spite of all the perils and hazards of her life, there's a wonderful humor in this book. I was reminded of Lee Smith's Fair and Tender Ladies -- and that, is high praise.

Is there a Magician in your Kitchen?

It's that time again. Time for a GIVEAWAY!!

What am I giving away?
You'll see...

but first, a quick recipe share

I have family in Louisiana and spent many summers and holidays in Baton Rouge.
One of my favorite dishes from that area is Jambalaya.

Meet the players:

chicken breasts, sausage, diced tomatoes, french onion soup, cream of celery soup
and a special jambalaya rice mix.

I special order this stuff and won't cook jambalaya with any other mix.
I'm a jambalaya snob.

I'm not going into details of the cooking,
but just know that I had to cut up sausage while the chicken cooked.

Opened all the cans and got them ready

Chicken's almost done

then you take the chicken out and put all the other stuff in.

Here it is about halfway through cooking:

This is my handy-dandy magnetic timer. I love it and can't cook without it.
It lives on my refrigerator.

While everything is cooking, I had to cut up the chicken.

Here is Annie on the kitchen floor...she may or may not be ready to pounce on any chicken scraps that might have been purposefully dropped fallen on the floor.

I know, Annie, it smells soooooo good.

You're such a beautiful girl.

It's done and should feed a whole family no problem.

Now on to our giveaway.

I received this 11" Thomas Stir Fry Pan free from my grocery store.
and since I have plenty of pans, I've decided to pass this on to you.

It's dishwasher safe, oven safe, comes with a glass lid and is $70 in value.

And with this fabulous piece of cookware I am including
a package of Cajun Magic Jambalaya mix.


And, I might throw in some more stuff as a surprise, but for now, that's all you need to know.

So, leave me a comment telling me about:
your favorite dish to cook for a big group,
or something you cooked recently,
or if you've ever been to Louisiana...or just comment about anything!

One comment per person, please.

And, post about it for an extra three entries.

Contest ends Friday night at midnight, Texas time (Central)

Smoothie Queen

I'm the queen of smoothies.

I bet you didn't know that.

I am.

I rock at makin' smoothies. Well, at least one kind. Strawberry-banana.

Ok, that's the only one I've ever made, but I'm really good with that one. It's the best smoothie ever.

Yep.

Now, Pioneer Woman-style, here are the ingredients. Spiru-tein protein powder (strawberry flavored) is awesome. I buy it from GNC or my local healthly vitamin store. It comes in different sizes. This is the grandaddy size, but they have baby-sized packets too. And other flavors, like chocolate and vanilla.



I also use, as you see pictured, apple juice, bananas, stawberries and crushed ice (not pictured). You need a measuring cup and a blender.





First you peel the bananas (of course) and then break/cut them in half. And then put them in a freezer safe Ziploc bag. Non-Sequitur: My mom gave me this cutting board when I was first married. I think it's corian, which is like some kind of superman material that holds up well.

Then you cut the tops off the strawberries, and depending on how big they are, you might need to cut some of the strawberries in half. Then put them in a ziploc baggy also. (See the monster berry in the container? HUGE!)

Here are my baggies of bananas and strawberries, and I put them in the freezer. Where they live, the rest of their days, until I gobble them up with my superior smoothie-making skills.

Here's my blender. Non-Sequitur: I received this commercial grade blender as a wedding gift but didn't even open the box or use it until eight months ago. (I've been married just about 12 years!) You see, ever since we've been married, we've lived in tiny apartments, so we boxed and put almost all our wedding gifts in storage for all this time...until we moved into a big house with room for everything!! And, I got to find all my wedding gifts all over again. It was better than Christmas, because I got an amazing haul when we got married. People were way too nice. Especially to a 19 year old who was pregnant. Shhhh!! Ok, everyone knew.

This is a Thermos brand cup that I have to drink my smoothies in. I have blue ones and pink ones, and I found them at Target. They have thick straws and thick double-insulated bodies made out of polycarbonate and are just awesome. I make my boys use them around the house so they don't spill drinks all over the place.

Ok, back to making our smoothie. I pour anywhere from 1/2 a cup to a cup of apple juice, depending on my mood. And it goes into the blender first.

Then I add 1/2 a banana (NOT the whole banana) which I break into halves (so two 1/4ths, I guess) and also add the frozen strawberry, just one.
Then I add a very generous helping of protein powder next. This stuff is great but messy. It comes with it's own scoop in the container.

Finally, last but not least, about a cup of crushed ice. Add that in and get ready to blend.

When you're done blending, it should look like this...sweet heaveness.

And, then I pour it into my king of all cups...
and, pouring while trying to take pictures is dangerous...and I spill some. ooops. Might have to lick that up.
And, ta da!! All done!!

I am the smoothie queen.

Rollin' with my homies...or pork chops.

I'm not a huge cook. When I got married, one of my sisters gave me a recipe book with family recipes in it. I have added to it over the years....more recipes from family members and friends. For the first time ever, I added my OWN recipe to it....well, one I found on the Internet...all my myself, thank you very much. It's really easy, relatively low fat and very yummy.

It's name was originally Low-Fat, Oven-Baked Pork Chops, but that's way too boring, so we came up with a new name for it...Baked Buttermilk Pork Chops. That'll do for now. My creative juices aren't flowing tonight.

So, taking a page from Pioneer Woman Cooks, here are the ingredients you need:

Pork chops, buttermilk, bread crumbs, basil, paprika, lemon pepper and garlic salt.
Here's a close-up of the pork chops I bought at our local Tom Thumb.

Then I measured out two cups of buttermilk

and poured it in a bowl.

And then added the pork chop.

and all the other pork chops. Then the bowl goes into the refrigerator for an hour while the pork chops soak in the buttermilk.

After the hour was up, I talked my 11 year old, Donny, into helping me. He poured the bread crumbs, basil, lemon pepper, paprika and garlic salt into a bigger dish. (He was on crutches for a sprained ankle at the time.)

This is the mixture before it was..uh, mixed. Then we put the hour-long soaked pork chop into the mixture and coated both sides.

And then placed it on a baking sheet that I covered in aluminum foil.

And here they all are, ready to go into the oven, where they cook at425 degrees for 20-25 minutes.
While they cook in the oven, I cut up a ripe Cantaloupe into a bowl...

and prepare some broccoli covered in lemon pepper.

and, then, tadaaaa, the pork chops are done!

This was a new favorite in my home! My husband, my two sons, my elderly father and I all love them. You can, of course, serve whatever side dishes sound good to you.

Here's the actual recipe (I doubled everything):

4 pork chops - trimmed of fat

1 cup low-fat buttermilk

1 cup fine dry breadcrumbs

2 tsp. dried basil

2 tsp. paprika

1 tsp. lemon pepper

1/2 tsp. garlic salt


-Allow pork chops to soak in buttermilk, refrigerated, for at least 1 hour.

-Combine bread crumbs and remaining spices; spread mixture onto wax paper.

-Coat each pork chop in dry mixture.

-Place pork chops on greased cookie sheet and bake in a 425 degree oven for 20-25 minutes, or until chops are no longer pink inside.