I Do Love My Cookbooks

Yes, it's a bit of an obsession. But I love to sit down with a good cookbook. And I do have lots. I try to keep them fairly organized, so when I'm looking for something or need to embellish or confirm an idea I have, it's easy to go to the right spot.

These are some of my newest cookbooks -- two I can add to my collection of signed cookbooks, to join Wolfgang, Anthony Bourdain, Giada.

I've tried a couple recipes from the Hugh Acheson cookbook and look forward to trying his Atlanta restaurant soon, Empire State South.






I admit I have more French cookbooks than any other style, but these are my favorites.

 I have collections, home canning, special diets, and cookbooks devoted to using the pressure cooker. Then, I have some by celebrity chefs, but the Ina Garten books have great recipes and are worth a try if you don't have them.

I'm always thinking about new ways to prepare food for my clients. I try to keep ideas fresh and present new foods cooked in new ways so I use these books as inspiration. And I've ordered two new books on the Paleo Diet that should be here any day now. Obsessed? Maybe.

If you have a favorite cookbook, please let me know! It may be something I don't have and will need to rush out and get.

Busy Holiday Party Season

It was a very busy holiday season for me and I am very grateful to have been totally booked for the last 3 weeks of December. I cooked for my regular personal chef clients and also had events that were celebrating many different things, from mom's birthday to parent's 50th Wedding Anniversary. All the parties were different in style and theme and I love the diversity. The photo at left is from a family holiday luncheon, and one of the desserts was red velvet cake parfaits presented in jelly jars.

Another party I did was a small gathering celebrating a mother's birthday. Two daughters were in from Los Angeles and wanted to do something special so I did a hands-on cooking party. I started by showing them how to make two easy appetizers, then how to make a homemade citrus vinaigrette for salad.
We then made homemade pasta from scratch. Everyone was amazed at how easy it is and how much fun. Then I showed them how to cook salmon in parchment paper. This is a great healthy way to cook fish and lots of fresh vegetables can be added.

Another party I cheffed was a parent's 50th Wedding Anniversary. I was asked to come up with a Southern theme to honor their Southern roots. The menu: shrimp and grits, crab stuffed trout, Coca-cola glazed pork tenderloin, pimento cheese potato gratin, braised collards and skillet cornbread. Everything was delicious, the shrimp and grits plates all came back totally empty, and everyone came back for seconds. Dessert was a made-from-scratch coconut cake.

Thanks to all my clients new and continuing for a great 2012! And a big shout out to all my chef assistants who made me look good.

How 'Bout Them Apples?

Had a great week this week! I cooked for a new client on Monday and got feedback that "everything has been wonderful!" Yay! Love to hear that clients like my food. I'll be cooking for this new family every other week, so really happy that they're happy.

On Tuesday I went to Ellijay, Georgia with my mom to get apples. Loved spending time with my mom. We had lunch at Cantaberry Restaurant in downtown Ellijay. We both had the she-crab soup and it was divine! It was cream based, so what's not to like.

Next we went to two different apple places and bought apples and fried pies at both.

So many choices of apples, all freshly picked and delicious. I made my own 1/2 peck bag by choosing different kinds. At the second stop, I bought a bag of small apples called Yates and my mom and I split the bag. They're beautiful apples, tart and juicy!

Yates Apples

On Thursday, I met with a new client and confirmed a New Year's Eve party. We planned the menu and discussed all the details, so we're good to go. Should be a fun party and love it when people think ahead!

Also  yesterday, I picked up my last CSA bag for this year. It's been great and I'll definitely do it again next year. This week's bag had carrots, collards, spinach, mixed lettuce, radishes and turnips, all beautiful. Today, office work, menu planning and recipe research, getting ready for another week much like this one!

Cooking Southern

Last night I tried a new recipe for ribs that is in the October issue of Southern Living Magazine.
There's an article about Sorghum Syrup and Atlanta chef Linton Hopkins' use of the syrup with several recipes. I grew up eating Sorghum Syrup, but mainly on biscuits so I was excited to see these recipe ideas and eager to give a recipe a try.

I had a jar of Sorghum Syrup in my pantry, so all I needed was ribs! I bought some pork and some beef, just to taste test.

The recipe says to use the oven, but since I have a Big Green Egg, I knew it would be that much better so we got out the Egg.

First we cooked the ribs at about 250 degrees for two hours, with the rub on and wrapped in foil.  They were already looking good. Then, we removed the ribs from the foil and put them right on the grill rack and began basting with the syrup glaze, for about another hour and a half.

I'm telling you, this recipe is definitely worth a try! The glaze was this awesome sticky, sweet, but not too sweet, delicious burst of flavor in your mouth! Yum and yum.

The recipe, in my own words:

2 1/2 lbs ribs

1/4 cup sugar, 1/4 cup kosher salt, 2 tbsp ground black pepper, 1 tsp garlic powder, 1 tsp onion powder, 1 tsp smoked paprika, 1/2 tsp ground red pepper

1 cup sorghum syrup, 1 cup apple cider vinegar, 1 tbsp coarsely ground black pepper

Remove membrane from ribs. Mix sugar through red pepper together to make the rub and massage into ribs. Wrap and refrigerate up to 12 hours. Cover ribs with foil and cook in 275 degree oven for 2 hours.

Mix syrup, vinegar and salt and pepper in small saucepan. Bring to boil and simmer till reduced by half. Cool.  Remove foil and cook another 3 hours, basting with sorghum syrup mixture.

Thanks Linton Hopkins and Enjoy!

Cooking For Allergies

Today I had a great cook date for a new client. She contacted me after receiving results from her ALCAT test, showing what foods to avoid because of allergic reactions. The results sheet shows all the intolerances, but also gives a recommend 4-day rotation diet with a list for each day of food items that can be incorporated.

Each day has a column of foods, oils and spices that should be eaten for a particular day. So I set about developing menus, two meals for each day. Today I prepared for her eight meals, with two servings of each meal.

This was a fun and interesting challenge, kind of like being on Chopped! Each day's food could only use certain oils and spices, and each day had a limited number of proteins to choose from. For example, one day's choice was pork, and the spice choices included coffee and cocoa. So, I made a rub with coffee and cocoa and it was great!

I had to make a "recipe" for each meal to make sure I kept it all straight. Granted, some of the recipes had only three ingredients, given the restrictions. But all in all, the food turned out great. The thought came to me more than once that great food doesn't have to be complicated, just use high quality ingredients and a little creativity!

Here are some pics from today:

Pecan Roasted Salmon with White Rice

Basil Chicken with Wild Rice

Buffalo Meatballs with Roasted White Potatoes

August, Where Did You Go?

Time really does fly when you're having fun. And August has been an especially fun month for me. Busy with really great dinner parties with repeat clients and some new clients. New weekly meal clients have come on board, and I'm loving every minute of it!

August started out with a trip to Washington, DC for the national conference of the United States Personal Chef Association. I took some really good classes and met terrific new chef friends.

One of the classes was a garnishing skills class where we took ordinary foods and turned them into art. Well, our instructors turned them in to art, and we tried.

Fish From A Lemon

Leaves From Squash

And our Atlanta Chapter won Chapter Of The Year!

The last night, I had the most amazing meal at a restaurant called Jaleo with some fellow personal chefs. If you go to DC, try it! We had the chef's tasting menu, 18 courses of small plates, each more scrumptious than the last. Delicious!

And August is not over....still lots on the schedule for the remaining days.Yay!

Lexington Barbecue

On a recent trip to Greensboro, North Carolina, my husband and I knew we wanted to have barbecue on the way home. I've had the Lexington style barbecue many times in Greensboro at a place called Stamey's, but I pushed to try barbecue in Lexington, North Carolina since it would be on our route home.

We went to a place called Lexington Barbecue in Lexington, North Carolina. This would give us the Lexington style barbecue for sure. If you're not familiar, this style of barbecue uses only the pork shoulder and has a very, very thin sauce made of ketchup, vinegar, pepper and probably water. It's very, very thin. There are no ribs, your only choice of meat is chopped, sliced, or roughly chopped.

The slaw I'm convinced is made of simply finely chopped cabbage that's left to sit in this same sauce until the cabbage is soft. And when you have a barbecue sandwich, you put the slaw on top of the meat. That's just how it's done.

With Slaw

The menu also of course had Cheerwine, and the sandwiches and almost everything included the slaw. The food was really good, our waitress was extremely friendly. The hush puppies were excellent! I had to request unsweetened tea (of course, sweet tea was the norm).

Lexington Barbecue is on Business I-85 which branches off Interstate 85. I would definitely recommend it as a place to try authentic Lexington style barbecue.

Cheerwine