Random Musings on Country Cooking.

It is safe to say that when Big Daddy and I met I was somewhat less than a whiz in the kitchen.

It is safer to say that I was basically a disaster.

Big Daddy's Mama, my mother-in-law, whom we shall now dub - for official blog purposes - "Cooking Mama"  (also a wickedly addictive game that Jack and I both play obsessively on the Nintendo DS).... anyway, Cooking Mama was horrified at the prospect that her only beloved son should face the rest of his life with a companion who had only just got as far as mastering the art of boiling water.

She decided very quickly to teach me a thing or two - or fifty hundred million - in the kitchen.  I was a slow pupil, but eventually I started to learn a few things.  I am happy to say that I have finally learned a passable imitation of the art of home cooking.

And so it is that Big Daddy returned home tonight from his week in the Czech Republic, and together we prepared a feast fit for the king's return to his castle.  He threw a couple of New York Strip steaks on the grill (after liberally seasoning with cajun spices).  Hearty rounds of salted, sliced pineapple joined the steaks over the toasty coals.  Add some fresh cobs of boiled corn, some even fresher homemade fried okra, and a big bowl of chopped heirloom tomatoes tossed with balsamic vinegar and olive oil.... and it was Summer on a plate.

And see that part up there? The part where I said "Fresh Fried Okra".  THAT, my friends, is the product of having a culinarily inclined mother-in-law with an Alabama/New Orleans sensibility in the kitchen.  I FRIED FRESH OKRA.  If I had completed Maggie's challenge to write up 100 life goals?  That would totally be up there, so I'm going to go ahead and start my list just so I can cross that off.  

I'm not kidding when I tell you that before the tutelage of my kitchen mentor, the finest thing I ever cooked in the kitchen was a pot of spaghetti with a jar of ready-made sauce.  It dawned on me tonight that I've been cooking for long enough now that I didn't even think to be scared of boiling and frying okra - AND I was able to use the corn meal we bought at a local agricultural festival last fall - from a guy who we watched grind the corn fresh - corn that he had grown on his own farm and harvested with his own hands.  

Holy crap, I might be growing up to be a country girl after all... or at least a woman who can cook like one.  Next Cooking Challenge: wait for the apples on our tree to get ripe this fall so I can make an honest-to-goodness homemade apple pie from scratch.

In the mean time, the plum tree is nearly ready for fruit harvesting.  Anyone know what on earth I can do with several bushels of plums?  (Don't say can them.  Anything but that.)

...

And with that - admitting my lack of canning knowledge? - I believe I just heard my hard-fought Country Kitchen credibility shatter into a kajillion tiny pieces.  Somewhere, Paula Dean just shuddered involuntarily.  

Ah well.  The education continues.  It's not like anyone is going to be all that impressed anyway -- especially after I admit that the kids and I lived on bologna sandwiches and Papa John's pizza for most of the week that Big Daddy was away.

But. Still.  I FRIED OKRA!