The Endless Food Summer

So a couple of people have asked me if I had given up on my Food Summer.  The answer is definitely not!  It's just that it occurred to me that writing about taste-testing recipes was growing monotonous and if I was having a hard time writing' em, well, my extremely small group of readers probably didn't want to read 'em either. Henceforth, I will only blog about my recipe tests when I have hit upon one that is worth writing about. Here's a couple of them.

Last week, T and I made Apple Pie Bars. And they are sooooo worth writing about.  My family loves pies and this one looked interesting; basically it is apple pie for a group larger than 8:

Tangy apple filling encased by two flaky, buttery crusts...it's a pie lover's dream.  I liked the fact that the pie crust was pretty easy to work.  Our humidity does cruel and frustrating things to pie crust so having this one roll out smoothly then peel off the waxed paper neatly was a huge, huge bonus.  The flakiness of the crust was incredibly rewarding for a frustrated pastry cook like me.

We cut the pie into bars as the recipe suggested.  They sure didn't last long--all the bars were gone by the next day.  Another bonus--refrigeration didn't make the crust soggy!  Definitely a make-again recipe!

Tonight I decided to make shrimp and grits.  Except I didn't have shrimp, I had slipper lobster.  The only thing I missed about the shrimp is its pretty pink color when cooked.  Slipper lobster is rather bland-looking by comparison, but the taste more than made up for it!  Nothing that bacon, garlic and onion can't fix!

The grits were a really nice change.  I told E that I could see why farming families ate it--it is so economical and so filling.  I love that it is such a versatile vehicle for all kind of flavors and toppings.  I put cheddar cheese in my grits so they could definitely have been a side dish in and of themselves:

The farmer's market at Windward Mall sells Nalo Farms' greens--I bought two big bags of baby kale for $5.50 each and a smaller bag of Swiss chard.  The kale went into a pot with seasonings and smoked turkey legs.  They were a great accompaniment to the grits dish:

Hmmm--not highly attractive on the plate perhaps, but they were an awesome meal.  A said she thinks I am actually a closet Southerner.  I'll take the regional foods but they can keep their weather; they have even more humidity than we do! ;-)