rps

Was out and about today - big city shopping and a matinee performance of Kinky Boots. Home right at 6:00 PM so reheating frozen Pasta Fazool. Enjoy your evenings everyone.

Bravo! An excellent adaptation!

Today was a snow day for me. I did a little cooking. Fantastic Fish Pie. http://www.ozarkrevenge.com/2016/01/fantastic-fish-pie.html

One of the perks of small town Arkansas school teaching is access to Latino families. Nancy and I simply make it known we are willing to buy tamales and several different families stop by after they hold a tamale making party.

A little before 7:00 this morning, I put a pound of soaked navy beans in a crock pot with a diced onion, chopped celery and carrot, three garlic cloves, a sliced leek, a meaty ham bone, two left over chicken drum sticks, a can of diced tomatoes, and two quarts of chicken stock. I threw in some pepper and herbs as well. This evening I will remove the bones and skin/fat and leave the meat. Since they called school, I get to smell it all day. By dinner I will be very ready.

We have had company since Friday and I have used that as an excuse to do a few things. For example, I thawed a bone in ham from Nueskes and sliced generous portions from it for reheating tonight. The remainder I chunked up to refreeze and use later. I kept the ham bone for later this week. I feel some Senate bean soup coming on. To go with the ham, I have a potatoes au gratin casserole in the oven and an extravagant salad ready to dress.

While in London, Nancy and I ate at one of his restaurants for a Valentines Day treat. Excellent meal but they rushed the patrons to finish by the next sitting time. One of the instructors at Le Cordon Bleu had been a sous chef for him for about 10 years. He told me that once you got used to him, he was not a bad boss.

I may have mentioned Frank Stitts' cookbook on this thread before. The title is The Southern Table. I highly recommend it. I have made the recipe in it for pimento cheese. Very similar to the one posted above. Good stuff! http://www.splendidtable.org/recipes/miss-verbas-pimiento-cheese

You guys have named some classic good cheeses. Add Stilton, Double Gloucester, and Cheshire to your list. For fun, google Neal's Yard in London and look at their goodies. https://www.nealsyarddairy.co.uk/

Last weekend I made a meatloaf. I have posted before how I make one. Needless to say, the loaf was much larger than two could consume. Tonight I took the remainder and cubed it. Much went into a baggie for the freezer. We will use it later. What we used tonight went with onion, mushroom, and fingerling and new potatoes. I drizzled olive oil over everything and seasoned it. Now it is in the oven and declared as hash.

Ziggy Stardust? Little Drummer Boy? What is this topic? On Saturday I found some beef bones marked down from their 2.09 per pound price. I bought them and roasted them until they were very brown. I had an onion, a carrot, and a celery stalk in the pan with them. Those went into a crock pot and slow simmered in water over night. I strained the solids out and refrigerated the liquid. I removed the fat cap and started tonight's dinner from there. I made a small roux with tomato paste, added a bit of wine, some fish sauce, some Worcestershire sauce, some salt and pepper, and a herbs de Provence. What we have here is a beef barley mushroom soup. Nancy made cornbread for the starch side. Does it get better than this?

Actually, I bet pig tongue could be good. When I was a boy, the Osher family taught me how good cow tongue could be. Snout? Not in this life time.

Thanks for the compliment. However, it is roughly an hour each direction and my principal expects me to be on time. Fry bacon and bake can biscuits for breakfast. I don't know anyone worth fishing with who will turn that down. At night, turn steaks into charcoal briquettes with bloody red centers and brag to each other about how your doctor is trying to make you give up meat. Have a great trip!

Multiple layers of buttered phyllo dough - the same stuff you find in baklava.

Greek Green Beans + Spanakopita

I believe I posted my Over the Top Meatloaf somewhere on here in the past. It is posted on my Notes page on Facebook and at some point in the future I will transfer the pictures to a blog post in Living Well in the Ozarks. In any event, this dummy did not thaw the bacon frozen in my freezer so we won't be having the bacon wrap tonight. However, the loaf of beef and pork will contain onion, leek, sweet pepper, celery, mushroom and herbs and spices. Doesn't get much better in the Ozarks.

Evidently the person I blocked months ago distracted us. Don't miss you one bit, JoeD. Are you related to the Jodi the songs were about in basic? Tonight, my wife and I proctored after school detentions as part of our extra assigned duties. Fortunately, we have been able to convince our separate building principals to let us perform this service on the same day each week. That means we arrive home well after 4 PM on Thursdays. Tonight, this led us to abandon our menu we had planned and we fell back to an alternative = a quick and tasty pizza. Read this link about a classic form of pizza: https://www.cookscountry.com/recipes/6887-grandma-pizza Tonight we made a variation that included sauteed mushrooms and a bit of ham underneath the cheese, but with the flavored tomatoes on top of the cheese. Really good stuff, friends.

May I ask indulgence for an anecdote? The teaching program at Le Cordon Bleu in London was arranged in three parts. Basic, Intermediate, and Bad to the bone. At the end of the third segment, they administered exams for the the victims. Those foolish enough to try for the Gran Diplome in Cuisine and Patisserie took exams (five hours) on consecutive days. Each day you had a list of ingredients and an expected list of products. For example, a sugar sculpture, a tempered chocolate dessert, a bon bon, and a brioche for patisserie. All the ingredients were required to be included in the final products, and some were ringers like marzipan. You were given the list of ingredients and the product list a week before the event so you could plan and practice. I remember wondering why I ever signed up for the event - I was the only person there who did not plan to become a real chef. I was the dilettante. However, once I said I was in I had to do my best. So, on the day of the cuisine event, we had to produce an appetizer pastry cup that was finished with a poached egg, garlic sauteed spinach, and a hollandaise. After I practiced, I discovered I could make the hollandaise early and put it in a warmed thermos to hold until presentation. That is what I did. At the school, one of the porters (kitchen help) was French and had been there quite a while. He was known to help the students and we all loved him. In the middle of the final, just as I sent my work out to be judged, he nudged me. In heavily accented English, he said, "Ilku needs help." Ilku was a very nice Turkish woman who had a job offer based on successfully passing the course. My response was, "What?" "Did you you use all of your Hollandaise?" I told him no. He told me to look away. I did. When I looked back, my thermos was gone. After the judges marked our presentations, one of the traditions was that we sat down with the judges for a critique. When I sat for mine I was confident but very curious how I stacked up. They started with the mandatory apetizer. Jan, the spokesman told me, "Randolph, your appetizer was the second best of the class. Only Ilku's hollandaise put her first."

First step in classic Hollandaise or Bearnaise.

Lots of very good, accurate information in the previous posts. Mike (powerdive) definitely knows what he is talking about. For a different perspective, and hopefully some help, check my articles on here about trolling and bottom bouncing. http://www.ozarkanglers.com/table-rock/trolling-for-walleye/ http://www.ozarkanglers.com/white-river-walleye-on-worm-harness/

Soup tonight. You need to make this. http://www.ozarkrevenge.com/

Once you invest the time to learn how to troll, you will love it. To troll cranks at 2 to 3 mph, I use my large motor (75 HP Etec tiller) and drop it in and out of gear to control the speed. For bottom bounce, I use my bow mount trolling motor with its electronic fob control. Feel free to message with any questions.

Since I moved here in 2002, the lake has endured four significant high water events (>925"). The present one is similar to 2008 and 2011 and earlier this year in water amount, but dissimilar in its timing. The other three came during the Spring and early summer. In the previous years, to avoid flooding downriver, the Corps released water slowly but steadily. As I recall, in 2011, very slowly would have been more apt. The timing of this high water changes the ball game. Traditionally, potential high water problems occur in the Spring and the Corps wants the levels down. From what I read, the Mississippi won't crest until early next month and that crest looks to be dangerously high. That means the Corps will want to release from the White River system very slowly. However, they face the Spring deluge threat if they dawdle and then the Mississippi will surge again with snow melt in March, April, and May. Talk about juggling odds and issues. Any thoughts?

Nancy and I live high on the bluff that looks down at the Holiday Island marina -> over a hundred feet above flood pool. Our most difficult chore yesterday was figuring the way home from XNA. Needless to say Beaver bridge is flooded.

The lobsters flew home with me from Boston yesterday. I stopped at the market on the way home from XNA to buy the take and bake mini baguettes, as well as some asparagus I blanched and chilled for salad. I also made a dipping remoulade from mayo, sour cream, Old Bay, Penzy's Sunny Paris blend, sweet pickle relish, pimento, and lemon juice. I poured a prosecco for us as the beverage. Chilled lobster and bubbles are a difficult combination to beat. On a happy last note, the lobster shells will become the base for the stock I will make today for tonight's walleye chowder.