So, as you know, this past weekend I catered a luncheon at church. It was for the North Texas Junior Bible Quiz coaches (JBQ) and if anyone deserves something special they do.  Then I must have been on a cooking roll because I topped it off by making lime blueberry muffins for the family Sunday morning and beer batter onion rings that afternoon. Whew! A couple of dozen buttermilk biscuits this morning and I am done in.

I was happy with the menu:

Grapes
Chicken Breast with Maple Chipotle Glaze and Savory Cranberry sauce
Chili Lime Corn
Dinner Rolls
Blue Corn Muffins
Double Apple Cake

I am going …read more

Potentially there will be no Saturday Surfing this week. It may actually end up being Sunday Surfing or no surfing at all.  You see, I am busily catering a sit down dinner for 50….or 40….or 35. We aren’t sure.
I wanted to really bless a close friend and she was heading up a luncheon….so I offered to create magic if at all possible. I chose a Southwestern – New England Fusion menu and I will be blogging it over the next week or so.
This is Kyrie creating magic. My daughter Erin took the picture. One of my favorites…

Anyway….
The menu looks like …read more

O.k..I said I was going to do this, and I am! I am still working out some kinks but this is my menu for this week. I try to leave one day free, as a cook’s choice sort of day to allow for weirdness in my week. We rarely have leftovers but it is a good time to use them if you have them. There are several recipes I am working on in the mix this week, as well as a new glaze for turkey that I am working on for Thanksgiving.
Monday nights are hectic because the kids have activities …read more

As I said I worked on my planned Father’s Day Menu today. Because I was developing the recipes I thought it would be good to do it when I had time to make adjustments. It turned out to be a good thing. Marc has to work Father’s Day so I just said, “Well, Happy Father’s Day, then!”

Pictured above are all of the items on the menu. I did it all in one day so I could better give you an idea of how to make things ahead, and what kind of time you are looking at. This post is the …read more

So, I wake up this morning and Nick (9) says, “I am not going to church, mom, I am feeling really sick.”
Marc has had a horrid cold, which he passed to Matthew (17) and Nick was sniffling and sounding stuffed up. I was not going to argue with him. I don’t like taking the kids out when they are sick, even a little. It exposes other people to what they have and, with their immune systems all ready compromised it adds to the likelihood that they will pick up something else.
My kids are a pretty healthy bunch, we get maybe …read more

Just thought I would share! Baby showers are so much fun. I did not decorate for this one but I got some great ideas from the woman that did decorate! The complete menu is posted at Kettle and Cup.

Isn’t this duck the cutest thing?

It is no secret that my political leanings are definitely Republican.  I am not as thrilled as many of you, and would have preferred Colin Powell to be the first African American President, to be honest.
But, now that it is over…meh…we’ll see.
Anyway.  I thought you would like to know that the menu and recipes for the inaugural luncheon menu have been released and you can recreate the luncheon in all of it’s glory at home.   For some serious change.  Because these ingredients aren’t cheap.

 
It would be because Marc Audet accidentally

 
Lifestyles theme day today is A Blast from the Past.  I thought it would be fun to look at historic fourth of July Menus.

There is something about Texas food. it is unassuming, not particularly fussy and usually easy to make with local ingredients. The flavors are as in your face as a drunk cowboy and it seems to be served in amounts that would feed a whole corral of hungry cowpokes.
For me, Texas foods and flavors are just exactly what summer is all about.