Trailer Park Karma

Congratulations! You have a teenager! Happy Birthday, Bunny. <3

Barrio Berries. Just As Sweet.

We have a berry patch on our homestead in da hood. Well, it's not exactly ours or even in our yard, but there's nobody living in the house next door and the patch springs up right on the edge of the back fence, even though every week last summer and at least monthly since autumn, the dudes with the Killer Huge Mowers and damned loud weed eaters have assaulted the air, our ears, and every living creature on the other side of our wrought-iron fence posts, where The Barrio Berries live.

So in my thinkin', since (a) nobody lives there, and (b) the poor plant has managed to survive human onslaughts to the extent of sprouting a little fruit this spring in spite of being not just neglected but attacked, it's mine. Just like those dogs and cats I used to find dazed and stinkin' on the road.

The Editor will have nothing to do with the berries. They look absolutely fine to me. In fact, I daresay these berries look maybe even better than a lot of wimpy produce you can get from those farms.I guess when a vine only has one or two or three fruits to work on, there's more of everything to go around and everybody's happier.

Of course, I did consider (with The Ed's suggestion) that the plant may have experienced a spray or two with toxic chemicals by folks who don't love volunteer berry patches as much as I do. But I've ingested a whole handful's worth by now, and so far, so good. (Y'all will tell me if I start glowing, right?)

Picking berries is one of those things that kids did more of when I was younger. I'm glad to hear about those farms where you can drag the little burb children on a 2-hour ride to wander around in the intense swamp heat escorted by mosquitoes to fill up plastic buckets with berries -- almost any time of year!

Yeah, I never did that to my kid. The Boy learned about berry picking the old fashioned way, like I did, when he was three years old. We lived in a different part of Swamp City, just as urban but with lots more shade trees. The huge empty corner lot across the street used to host a house, but it had long ago burned down and never been rebuilt. There's almost nothing more fertile in the city than where a house burned down. A few carefully positioned trees were surrounded by wildness. We used to wander over there when I got stir-crazy in our tiny century-old house, to feel like we were in the country. And we stumbled upon some of the biggest berry patches I'd ever seen outside o' the cow pasture in back of our house in the South-Park-now-called-Martin-Luther-King area of Swamp City. (Now there's a story -- up to the time I was nine, we lived in a house that backed up to Ben Taub's field. He had a hospital named after him. We sat on the top of the fence (it was built like a ladder with a flat 2x4 on top) and talked to the cows and horses. We weren't supposed to, but of course, we'd slink down on the other side into the thorny bushes and grab a few berries.)

So I taught my son not just how to pick berries, but how to spot a berry patch in the wild. I figure when the End Times come, he's gotta eat somethin', even if there's no sugar to sprinkle on the berries by then.

My patch'll do fine by me. It's another little gift, for which I am thoroughly grateful (and lucky).

A Little This, A Little That. You Got A Fed Kid.

The Little Editor is visiting. That means (besides a house full of giggles) The Editor and I are faced with the challenge of how to entice a smart, headstrong young boy to eat nutritious foods.

Fortunately, his mom (the same woman whose chicken liver recipe is the best I've ever had) left us with a list of Little Ed's faves. Only thing is, he's not eating in his natural environment. Or eating food that's prepared by the people he's familiar with already.

Good thing he's got a bouncy attitude, like most kids his age. And really, there's a lot to be said for an appetite that favors sameness, especially when you live on a budget like ours. And thank goodness for ketchup.

The other night, our special Valentine's Day dinner at home included homemade chicken nuggets. Winner winner winner! Whew. Today, we scored again. This time it was with one of his mom's recipes, altered to fit what we had in the cupboard. And they're tasty enough that I plan on making them again, even when the giggles have returned home.

The Little Editor's Cheese Pancakes

1 egg

1 & 1/2 cups baking mix (the kind that you use for everything from pancakes to dumplings to meat coating)

1 cup cottage cheese

2 tsp vanilla extract

splash of milk


Beat the egg well, then add and combine the baking mix, cottage cheese, and vanilla. Add just enough milk to make sure all of the baking mix is moistened. The consistency isn't like pancake batter at all. It's more like very lumpy, sticky dough. 

Plop spoonfuls into hot, melted butter in a frying pan. Cook on medium low heat until the first side firms up a bit (about 3 minutes), then flip over carefully and mash down a little with the back of your spatula to make a flatter pancake. Cook until golden brown all over, adding butter to the pan as needed. 

I made a couple of extra big ones shaped like hearts, then poked a few frozen blueberries in before flipping. Since they were so huge and already nicely browned, I made sure they were cooked through by sending them to the toaster oven for 10 minutes at 250.

The whole batch made just enough to serve the three of us. Served them hot with some sour cream and raspberry preserves on the side. 


We're gonna miss the giggles. A lot.

The Editor's Perfect New Year's Eve Grilled Cheese Sammich

Okay, I know you're busy getting ready to bring in 2012, running around buyin' out the liquor store, maybe rolling a few tamales, digging your clip-on tie and dress shoes out of the box in the attic, curlin' your hair, and washing your prettiest undies. So you might not have time to feed yourself right now.

I have your answer. The Editor just made the best grilled cheese sandwich in the world. I think it's EXACTLY the thing you need before you start inundating your po' ole belly and liver with alcohol. OR this may be the best hangover food you ever had, either way...

It's a lot easier to list the ingredients than it is to explain how to make this sammich. But The Editor gets big points for perfecting the art of sammich grilling. No way could I translate exactly, in the end, but you can figure it out, I'm sure.

The Editor's Perfect New Year's Eve Grilled Cheese Sammich

Chop up one clove garlic, fine. Brown it in 1 tablespoon olive oil. 

Add 2 tablespoons butter to pan and melt it. 

Here's where it gets complicated:
Swipe bread pieces in pan on the inside side (know what I mean?) of the bread. So now you have a couple of pieces of plain bread, each with a coating of garlic-y goo on only one side. 

LAY ONE PIECE ASIDE AND DON'T TOUCH IT YET.

Add about a tablespoon more butter to pan. Fry up ONE of the bread pieces with the inside gooey side down -- then flip it over (to the plain aka outside side) and toast the outside side in the now sopped-up/relatively dry hot pan.

Now... hang on, you can do this, I promise... 

Flip the slice in the pan over and lay the following on the inside gooey side:

3 quarter-inch thick slices medium cheddar

sprinkle (about a tablespoon or 2) shredded mozzarella

Pick the cheesed slice up with a spatula. Slide the other, non-cheesed slice GOO SIDE DOWN in the pan. THEN put the cheesed slice, PLAIN TOASTED SIDE DOWN/CHEESE UP, on top of the non-cheesed slice.

This, let's say, perfection-oriented bread-flipping trick is the key, I think, to this otherwise plain ol' sammich.While the bottom slice is toasting, the cheese is melting on the upper slice.

Now -- put your sammich together, cheese side of one slice against the now-fried goo side of the other. Then finish by putting the sammich back in the pan, untoasted side down.

I'm exhausted just from trying to transcribe this process. But I swear, it's worth it. And it's actually a lot easier to do than to read about.

Hatin' On Turkey

I'm not a turkey fan. I was just having a conversation yesterday with The Editor about it. See, we're going to his mom's for Thanksgiving, and she's concerned that I'll be disappointed that we're not having the traditional turkey-centered spread. 

Now, before you get to thinkin' that it's a Buddhist or vegetarian thing, it's not. I am a completely conflicted meat-eater, which is to say that I'll eat and even enjoy meat immensely, but the whole time I'm doing it there's part of my brain that's knock-knocking on my heart and waggin' a finger.

No, I just really, seriously have never understood what people see in turkey as a dish. Even as a kid -- I heard the clamoring, both in my family and among friends and, of course, on TV, radio, billboards, magazines... And I always thought maybe one day, I'd finally get the magic. Turkey Magic. My eyes and heart would open wide, the clouds would part, my mind would expand blissfully up and out, and the rest of my miserable un-turkey-fied life would be nothing more than history blowing in the wind.

Yeah. Didn't happen.
I'm serious -- give me a super juicy burger even over turkey any day. And you can ask my kid, I'm not that big a burger fan.
I just.don't.get.turkey.

So -- here's what's better: gumbo. 
That's right. Gumbo for Thanksgiving. There is NOTHING on this revolving rock better than seafood. Nothing. 

And you know what's even better? Easy Trailer Park versions of gumbo. Sure, you can get all cerebral with your roux experiments, but me, I'd just rather spend less time cooking it and more time eating it. I'm not in this for the applause. 

I present to you, from the kitchen of one of the most expedient cooks in The Republic -- my Momma -- Polly's Rouxless Gulf Coast Gumbo. She dictated it to my dad, Dave, just for this very blog. 

And if you're still struck by traditional stuffing-love (or it just doesn't feel like a holiday to you until your feet are swollen from standing in the kitchen), but you want something more in line with my seafood idea, Sister Martha has graciously released to public (RIGHT HERE!!) her very own Corn Bread & Rice (& Oyster) Stuffing recipe. It. Is. The. Best.

By the way, I think it's funny that neither my mom nor Sister Martha specified how to cook the finished product (so I added those bits). I think that's a family-cook thing; I bet you can relate. It's all in the ingredients. Then you cook it. You just cook it.
 
(And sorry - no pictures yet. What -- it's gotta look good? It's gumbo and oysters. Need I say more?)

Polly's Rouxless Gulf Coast Gumbo

[Note: You can make a boat-load of this stuff to feed your minions in about half an hour prep time. Start with a big pot -- cook it all in there. If you've never cooked seafood -- shrimp are 'done' when they're no longer transparent-ish.]

1 large yellow onion, diced.  
4 stems celery, diced.  
1/2 lb bacon, diced. 

Saute above until bacon is cooked.
 
Add 2 cans of diced tomatoes, stir. 

Add 2 cans mushroom soup, stir. 

Defrost one box of frozen sliced okra, rinse well, stir in. 

Shell and clean shrimp, the more the merrier (1 to 5 lbs) & add to pot.
 
Season with salt, cayenne pepper, and gumbo filet until it tastes good. 

[This is me: Simmer on low at least til the shrimp are done, longer if you have time so the flavors can get all in there. I once left a giant pot of this on low for hours during a party. It just got better and better.]


Lynn's (That's Sister Martha's Real Name) Corn Bread & Rice Stuffing (& Oyster) Stuffing

[Note: If you're into skipping turkey like me, you can buy pre-plucked-and-packaged giblets at the store. Beyond that skip-it trick, this recipe is so involved it just might render that good ol'time, swollen feet feelin' of cooking all day for a crowd. But it's worth it.]

Makes about 12 cups of stuffing

Corn Bread for Stuffing

1 ½ cups yellow corn meal
1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
1 ½ cups skim milk
2 eggs
¼ cup butter/margarine, melted 

Stuffing

4 cups water
Turkey giblets
¾ cup diced celery (about 1 ½ ribs)
1 carrot, peeled and sliced
1 small onion, peeled and sliced
Salt to taste
Freshly ground black pepper to taste
2 cups thinly sliced celery (about 4 ribs)
2 cups chopped onion (2 large)
½ pound mushrooms, sliced
3 tablespoons butter/margarine
1 cup long grain rice, brown or white
Water
Reserved corn bread cubes
2 cups cubed stale whole wheat bread 
1 cup chopped pecans
1 teaspoon thyme leaves
1 teaspoon sage
1 teaspoon tarragon, crumbled
Salt, to taste
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste

TO PREPARE THE CORNBREAD

1. Preheat the oven to 425 F.

2. In a large bowl, combine the corn meal, flour, baking powder, and salt.  Set the bowl aside.

3. In a small bowl, combine the milk, eggs, and butter or margarine.  Add the ingredients of the small bowl to the flour mixture, and beat the batter with an eggbeater for about 1 minute or until the batter is smooth.  Pour the batter into a greased 9 X 13-inch cake pan.

4. Put the pan in the hot oven, and bake the bread for about 25 minutes or until it turns golden brown.  Take the pan out of the oven, cool the bread, cut it into ½-inch cubes, and set it aside.

TO PREPARE THE STUFFING

1. While the corn bread bakes, in a medium-sized saucepan, combine the water, giblets, the ¾ cup of diced celery, carrot, the small onion, salt and pepper.  Bring the mixture to a boil, reduce the heat, cover the pan, and simmer the giblets for 20 to 30 minutes or until they are tender.  Remove the cooked giblets from the pan, strain the broth into a measuring cup, and reserve both the giblets and the broth.  Remove the cooked flesh from the turkey neck, discarding the skin, chop the reserved giblets, and set them aside.

2. In a large saucepan or skillet, preferably one with a nonstick surface, sauté the 2 cups of celery, the 2 cups of onion, and the mushrooms in the butter/margarine until the onions are just soft.  Stir in the rice, and brown it lightly, stirring it constantly.  Add the reserved giblet broth and enough water to measure 3 cups.  Bring the liquid to a boil, reduce the heat, cover the pan, and simmer the rice for 15 minutes.

3. In a large bowl, combine the rice-vegetable mixture with the reserved chopped giblets, the reserved corn bread, cubed whole-wheat bread, pecans, sage, thyme, tarragon, salt, and pepper.  Mix the ingredients to combine thoroughly.

Everything can be made in advance, except for adding the oysters.  Just stir them in with their liquor right before baking the dressing.

For the Oyster part, I added one pint of oysters with the liquor to about a quarter of the dressing I made.  So, I guess to make the whole thing with oysters you'd have to add 4 pints.

[This is me again: You can bake stuffing/dressing in or out of the bird. In our family, there was always 'plain' stuffing in the turkey and oyster stuffing baked on its own, in a buttered dish at about 375 degrees for an hour. Not everyone likes oyster-flavored turkey, apparently.]

Sometimes You Just Need a Good Roll In the Hay

It's Monday. :::yawn:::

Do it like Burb Dawg does -- and I hope someone greets you at the door with a crunchy oatmeal cookie treat!

And Now, It's Dave With the Latest Financial News

[Editor's note: I've never had a thing to do with the stock market (and we try not to think about those options I got just before the Dot Com Bomb), but my dad follows such things. I know some of you do, too, so this post's for you. Dave feels your pain...]

(from the emails of David G. Morris, with permission)

Mein Gott, the stocking market, today, exploded in my face (also, did it last week in a lighter fashion) and wounded the lovely smile on my countenance.  My sweet old granny of Swedish origin would have said to me, "Oh, Dafit [she couldn't pronounce 'David'], sing someting [someting, not something] or whistle while I play my guitar and sing Rock Candy Mountain."  Stomped her foot as she plucked, she did.  I was too young to know that was the forerunner of "rap." 

Among other things of value, guess I'm gonna have to up and sell my Lamborghini along with my prized '78 Ford Pinto Cruising Wagon (what a great car that are -- no rear windows on the rear side panels, just a couple of portholes).  Damn the S&P and it's cohorts, wantin' to do me in!  Haji Baba and A Siss-boom-Bah! What time is it Portney, and bring the wine! 

Quien Sabe? 

Dave (Fox)

Lest Ye Think I Jest

All my life, people have said to me, "You don't sound like you're from Texas!" They said it on the phone. They said it to my face. (Remember "One of the Voices In My Head Eats Buttermilk Fritos"?) I've never been exactly sure how to respond to such a comment.

It's sort of like telling a woman she's "so skinny!"

Is that a good thing? Or a bad thing?

Of course, in my head, it doesn't matter. One of the best things about the way I think (and there's plenty not so good about my mind, so I like to harp on the good stuff when I can) is that I've learned to let praise and blame wash over me. Well. Mostly. Sometimes, I trick myself into thinking it matters again. But I usually pull up eventually.

Anyway -- another thing I get a lot: "You are NOT white trash!" This comes on the heels of my self-reference, and they say it like they're trying to make me feel better about myself.

It's sort of like telling a woman "you are NOT too skinny!"

The thing is, all of us are merely what we tell ourselves and others. There's no way to encapsulate anyone. Sure, you can haul out the DSM-IV (or V if you're really hip, or III if you're really fixated) and jam yourself and everyone else into a neat hole. And it is easier to point fingers at specific, physically occurring situations, like "you're a diabetic" or "that’s a bunion" and yes, eventually we'll probably be able to look into each others' gray matter and say, "Yep, what we got here is a little bipolar stuff..." But for now, nope.
 
And that goes double for observations that are purely (almost purely?) filter-based, like what you think about how my dialect sounds or whether or not your concept of white trash and mine are the same.
But some things are provable. Some conditions are documented or at least documentable. 

Take my having lived in a trailer park.
 
Now, I don't have documents verifying that I lived there, but I know a few folks who can testify. If you really need verification, just ask me and I'll refer you on to them. Or you could be really clever and look them up yourself and surprise them with your questions about me. Some of them read this blog, so I hereby grant permission to anyone who knew me back in the day to verify to anyone who asks whether or not I lived in a trailer park.

And here's the only representation of said park I could find on a quick Web search. Check out those reviews, would ya...

CitySearch's place profile page (there's damned fine commentary at this one)

(oh, and a few interesting review reads here, too)
MerchantCircle's attempt

That right there is where my little kitten who used to climb up my entire naked body [Editor’s note: yeouch!] as I washed dishes was attacked and killed by two rogue Irish setters who jumped their chicken wire fence.

And besides my own Time Well-Spent in Atascosita, I'm "trailerpark" by way of blood, too: My old man's mama, my Swedish, born-in-Louise-Texas grandma, lived out a whole lotta her life in what we like to call a "mobile home". Spent many a weekend there myself, and it was only a handful of miles from where I live now. I remember sneakin’ a smoke right outside the back of her trailer. I was at that age when kids also have no idea that just because they only have eyes for their current flame doesn't mean that the rest of the world can't see ‘em making out in public. What was I thinking?

So -- yes, I've lived in trailer parks. (And that doesn't count the in-laws' RV that we drove around to state parks back then, either.)
And I'd do it again.
{and here's yet another family photo sans moi, with Ma & Annie Pearl sharing a private joke, taken in front of my grandmother's beautiful aqua & white trailer. and her mama crocheted that bedspread in the background. and don't Martha's kids look just about as perfect as 3 stairsteps can be in this shot? my Mamaw's behind Martha, that's the Stairsteps' Daddy to far left next to the Old Man, and there's uber-boyish H2 grinnin & bearin in the back.}

Where I Wax Rhapsodic Again About A Non-Sentient Being: Ode to My Crockpot

I'm not going to get all metaphysical or even metaphorical on ya in this one. I'm just layin' it on the line: I feel indebted to my crockpot. And damned near teary-eyed about it.

There are a few of you who understand, I know. You feel a deep love for some of your belongings, too. And in spite of all my Buddhist talk about the 2nd and 3rd Noble Truths, the reality is that I heart my kitchen stuff. Some of it, I cling to with a flourish of unashamed abandon.

That's my crockpot --> 

Now, there's no sentimental value in this beautiful, cornflower blue, massive piece of crockware. In fact, I don't even recall where I got this one. It's not my first, by any stretch, and it's no different from the others, really. If I still had any of the others, I might feel similarly smitten with them. 

But this is the one I have right now; therefore, I am in love with it.

Dear Crockpot: To utter "thank you" in your direction is nearly an insult. Rather, I want you to know that your participation in my life has, well, prolonged my existence. You've kept me fed on something other than peanut butter and tuna fish sandwiches for weeks, even as the propane eeking from the big white tank to my stove dwindles into wimpy little flames beneath my coffee pot. 

Before you rescued me, you saved my child's life on numerous occasions. Had it not been for you, having dinner ready, magically, after my long day of running amok in Swamp City with The World's Most Field-Tripped Boy, well... I pull up short at writing what might have happened.

Oh, Crockpot, so many would devalue you and your food magic. They simply don't understand, or maybe they've only experienced crock-potted meals from unloved pots. I don't know. But there's a hearty few of us out there who get it. We know and appreciate your duty-cum-art. We love your art. We are your fondest admirers. And you never let us down. (Unless we forget to plug you in or turn you on, which isn't your fault.)

Sure, you have nicks and scratches, and you've even done without your busted plastic lid for a solid year or more -- go, you! -- providing meals for me and mine even without all your supposedly necessary accoutrements! Even with nothing more than cheap tinfoil covering you, you fulfill my dinner dreams with panache. You and your fitted heating element are a team. I don't know if the two of you set out intentionally to win my heart, but here it is, on a platter of slow-cooked gratitude, just for you.

Love, 
Trailerpark B.

(PS - Let's all pray now to the Kitchen Deities that I won't be writing an ode to my Camp Stove in the near future...)

Damned Ugly Oatmeal

I was never a "picky eater" -- my mom loved that about me. Of course, she and I were the only ones in the house like that, so we had to suffer through meals made from the few ingredients that the rest of them would eat: chicken fried steak, hamburger steak, rice and gravy, peas, and salad. And iced tea. Oh, and fried chicken once a week at my grandparents'.

Part of the whole "being picky" thing has to do with a dish's presentation. A whole lotta people won't eat something just because it looks nasty. I think that's just crazy. Now, I won't eat -- or so far haven't had to eat -- bugs, but it's not because of how they look. It's because the idea of crunching into a spiny critter's exoskeleton just wreaks havoc on my nervous system straight through to my intestines. But I ate snails a few times. Liked 'em for a bit, too. Lately not so much.

One of the things I love about The Editor -- he has experience with some pretty darn impressive, even snooty foods, but he'll eat what I make. He doesn't go overboard and rave about it, because I wouldn't believe him anyway and then I'd call him a liar, he'd get mad and go back to his computer... but he'd eat every bit of what I made. 

You MUST love a person who eats the food you make, even if it's ugly. You also gotta love him for being honest.

And here's a perfect example: Some of the ugliest stuff I've ever made. Granted, completely unadulterated oatmeal is pretty disgusting to the eye, resembling something that your dog shouldn't have eaten because there it is again on your floor in partially digested form.

But when you add a few things to oatmeal, you can make it not only tastier and more nutritious, but even uglier.

I can't wait to try this one on The Editor.

Damned Ugly Oatmeal for One

1/2 cup oatmeal

1 cup water

1/8 cup peanut butter

1 tsp honey

1/4 cup raisins

a dribble of half-n-half

Bring water to boil in small pot. Add oatmeal and simmer uncovered for about 2 to 5 minutes, until water is absorbed. Put the raisins in your bowl and scoop the oatmeal all over 'em. Plop the peanut butter on the oatmeal, then the honey. Now stir until peanut butter is melted and blended throughout. Dribble some half-n-half (or milk) to taste.

Looks disgusting. Tastes like a peanut butter-oatmeal-with-raisins cookie, and is much better for you.