Midnight in the Kitchen of Good and Eatin'

  caramel custard pie with graham cracker crust   © Better Homes and Gardens: Good Food on a Budget, 1971   © Oster 1986   What I like about this pie is that it's very easy to make and doesn't require any ingredients that you, probably, already have in your kitchen (and like me, stuff that's been in my kitchen a long time). Though it's from a cook book published in the '70s I'm pretty sure the recipe is one of those Depression Era staples. My only customization was to add a 1/8 teaspoon of vanilla extract, about 1/2 tablespoon of cinnamon and I swapped a graham cracker crust for the pastry crust. In the past I have added shredded coconut or raisins so, I guess, you could try adding whatever you like.  

 Mango Ginger Chutney Peanut butter, banana and mango ginger chutney sandwich     1 lg unripe mango, peeled and chunked about 1 tbl grated fresh ginger, more or less 3 cloves garlic slivered 5+ cardamom pods 1 dried Thai bird pepper 1 dried habanero 1-2 tbls sesame oil + 1 tbl vegetable oil 1 tbl cider vinegar 4-5 tbls sugar (I would have used brown sugar if I had any) 1 tsp cinnamon a little salt water   In a mortar pound the dried pepper with the cardamom just enough to break it up. Heat the oils in a small saucepan and stir in the dry stuff for about a minute. Add the garlic, ginger and mango. Add a enough water to cover and the salt and vinegar and simmer until the mango starts to soften. Add sugar and more water if necessary to keep it from burning but cook until it starts to thicken. Stir often. Cook until the mango is as soft as you like, like about apple pie apple-soft. Allow to cool, put in a clean jar, chill, eat. good with plain rice, grilled meat...

The Zombie's Breakfast Special "Rose Pork Brains in Milk Gravy" flanked by Monkeys in Fezzes salt & peppers shakers given to me by Lauren "Green Bean" Johnson   My friend Christopher Goodwin often posts photos on his Facebook page of the oddities he finds around his current home in Durham, NC. He's one of my favorite artists and a lot of his photos are of abandoned stores, fast food failures and kitschy motels. He's a pretty fascinating guy. So, one day, he posts a photo from a Food Lion of cans of Rose Pork Brains in Milk Gravy and most of the reactions were of the "EWWW!" variety but I was salivating a little. My paternal grandmother would occasionally cook brains and eggs for her breakfast but I always visited too late to try them. Once, I almost got there in time but my Uncle Skip beat me to them and refused to share. I don't know where Granmom got the fresh brains she cooked but, at one time, you could find calf brains at the ...

Okay, first off I have to say that I rarely look forward to cooking when I get in from work as it is, most often, after 9:00pm or later. Sometimes it's because I had a late "lunch" around 6:00 that consisted of a big sandwich or some other culinary delight from Chef Al at Magruder's deli . Sometimes I'll be in a rush because of some event at work and end up with one of my junk faves, a Double Whopper with Cheese from Burger King (though, personally, I like Wendy's better but there isn't one nearby). That being said, I'm not really hungry when I get in. The problem here is that I know I'll be up as late as 2:30am unwinding. I listen to my records or watch TV or watch DVDs of " Fringe " or " Wonderfalls ". I then realize that, if I go to sleep, I'll just wake up later hungry. So then I decide that I have to eat dinner but I want to make something quick and easy because I don't want to stay up all night cooking Carbonn...

Okay, so it snowed a little today here in the City Without a State. It didn't amount to much but I didn't feel like going out because I was having too much fun playing records, doing a little housecleaning and playing with DevilKitty. As the day wore on I started to get a little hungry and thought to myself, "Hey, I sure would like some cornbread". Alas, as I was getting the ingredients together, I realized that I'm almost out of flour and the milk in the fridge was actually quite a bit less than I needed. Not to worry though as the flour turned out to be just enough and the milk, well, I stretched it with some honey flavored Greek yogurt and it was damn tasty! With a wire whisk mix together 3/4 cup of flour 2-1/2 tsp baking powder 3 tbls brown sugar (i used a fork to mash it into smaller grains though I'm sure there's an easier way to do that) 3/4 tsp salt 1-1/2 cups cornmeal 3tbls butter or bacon fat 2 eggs, beaten In measuring cup I poured ...

First off let me state that I am not a "soup person". Soup as a meal never seemed like a good idea to me because, in my formative years, it was just a can of liquid with a little bit solid stuff floating around in it with neither amounting to enough to be a meal. It was always something you had while you waited for the entree. A time killer. As I got older, and started cooking for myself, soup was a base to which I added mountains of meat and/or vegetables to end up with a stew. In the back of my mind, however, I kept thinking that there must be something to this soup-as-a-meal thing, that there must be a bowl of liquid out there that would be hearty enough to stand on its own. Serendipity stepped in to change my thinking as I had bought a large acorn squash a week ago thinking I would do with it as I usually do: slice it into rings and bake it with a buttery maple glaze. Then I remembered having tiny cups of butternut squash soup served as an appetizer at some of the events...