Mimosas are a girl's best friend.

I’m not really a morning person so I’m a huge fan of the meal known as brunch. You don’t have to be up early to eat it, in fact anytime between 10:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. is a good time to serve brunch.

A few weekends ago I enjoyed the most spectacular brunch. My wonderful Godmother Connie prepared an absolutely fantastic brunch which served as my bridal shower.

My very favorite part of my bridal brunch, aside from being showered with love by friends and family, of course, was the mimosa bar. Yes, you read that right, a mimosa bar. Mimosas are pretty much the best part of any brunch. Drinking alcohol in the morning is typically frowned upon, but not when it’s brunch and it’s a mimosa.

In case you are not familiar with this delightful beverage, it is so very simple to make. A basic mimosa is comprised of orange juice and champagne. My Godmother really went all out for my special celebration and these were not your typical mimosas.

Set up in a most delightful tablescape were crystal champagne flutes with colorful swizzle sticks, three different kinds of sparkling adult beverages including Champagne, Prosecco and Moscato, seven different juices, plus multiple kinds of fruit for garnish.

When I’m rich and famous, I want to have brunch with a mimosa bar every single day! My Godmother had all sorts of beautiful flowers and tropical decorations in honor of my upcoming honeymoon in Key West, but she really outdid herself with the mimosa bar. If you plan to host a special brunch event anytime in the near future, I highly recommend making it extra special with fresh fruit, juices and champagne!

The dishes served for this brunch were also superb. Connie made delicious mini-frittatas as well as some out-of-this-world french toast casseroles. To top off the brunch menu we had mini crab and shrimp quiches as well as tropical desserts like key lime tarts and piña colada cupcakes.
Aside from the mimosas, of course, my favorite was the frittata. A frittata is basically a crustless quiche. Connie used a muffin pan to make the mini frittatas so they were a perfect serving size for each guest. This is another great tip if you are serving brunch for a crowd.

You could really take your favorite frittata recipe and make it in the muffin pan to create individual serving sizes. Connie used Food Network chef Ina Garten’s recipe which included proscuitto.

Below is a recipe I found for frittata that also sounds delicious from The Girl Who Ate Everything.Com.

Muffin Pan Brunch Frittata (Recipe from TheGirlWhoAteEverything.com)
Ingredients
• Nonstick vegetable oil cooking spray
• 8 large eggs
• 1/3 cup whole milk
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 4 ounces bacon, cooked and crumbled (you could use diced ham or cooked sausage here too)
• 1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan
• 1/4 cup chopped spinach leaves (you could use 2 Tablespoons of chopped basil or parsley here instead too)
• 1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Spray 2 mini muffin tins (each with 12 cups) with nonstick spray. Whisk the eggs, milk, pepper, and salt in a large bowl to blend well. Stir in the bacon, cheese, and spinach. Fill prepared muffin cups almost to the top with the egg mixture. Sprinkle tops with cheddar cheese. Bake until the egg mixture puffs and is just set in the center, about 8 to 10 minutes. The frittatas will be really puffy right out of the oven and will settle once removed from the oven.
Using a knife, run the edge of the knife around the edge and loosen the frittatas from the muffin cups and slide the frittatas onto a platter. Serve immediately.

Cheerful sweet pickles

If we get snowed in this winter, one thing we will not have a shortage of is pickles. I’ve made so many pickles this summer I feel like I might turn into a pickle. As I mentioned a few weeks ago, I have canned grape leaf pickles, spicy garlic dill pickles, fermented pickles and hot sriracha pickles. I’ve also done a few experimental pickling projects this summer.

A few weeks ago my friend Josh asked if I’d ever made pickled okra. I hadn’t and he gave me some to try. I recently read a really great article on okra from Our State magazine, the article mentioned eating okra raw. Now, I know okra is one of those love or hate foods for most. I like it fried and in gumbo, but eating it raw, I’m just not sure I’m that brave.

I’m actually not even sure I’m brave enough to eat it pickled, but Josh was so I gave it a shot. Josh so enjoyed my spicy sriracha pickles that I thought I would try pickling the okra with the same recipe. He said it is delicious and he’s already eaten almost an entire jar of them. I have to agree with his wife, however, who refers to whole okra as “alien fingers.” They did look rather intimidating and alien in the jar with the red sriracha brine.

Another pickling experiment I have been wanting to try for a while is a recipe called cheerful sweet pickles which I found in an old canning cookbook. Part of what intrigued me about the recipe is that you make it using those cucumbers which ripen under the vines before you see them and end up getting as large as footballs. I had several of these the other week and really didn’t want to waste them. The other intriguing part of this recipe is that it calls for Maraschino cherries.

The process for the pickles takes three days. On the first day, the large cucumbers are seeded, chopped into cubes, covered in salt and left to sit overnight. The next day, the cucumbers are covered in a brine of sugar, vinegar with cinnamon sticks and cloves. On the third day, Maraschino cherries and some red food coloring are added.

Sweet pickles are not usually my favorite, but these look so lovely I just couldn’t resist making some. The cookbook I used said they are great served with pork or roast or chopped and added to cream cheese to make a spread for sandwiches.

Here is the recipe:

Cheerful Sweet Pickles
• 9 cucumbers, yellow
• 1⁄2 cup salt
• 3 1⁄2 quarts water
• 1 pint vinegar
• 1 teaspoon whole cloves
•4 ounces maraschino cherries and juice
•2 teaspoons red food coloring

Directions: Peel, seed and cut cucumbers into cubes. Sprinkle cucumbers with salt and cover with water. Let stand overnight. In the morning heat to boiling and then drain. Loosely tie spices in cheesecloth and combine with sugar and vinegar. Heat to boiling. Pour over drained cucumbers and let stand overnight. The next morning heat to boiling and then simmer until cucumbers are tender - being careful not to overcook. Add cherries with juice and red food coloring. Ladle into hot, sterilized jars and seal at once. Process in boiling water bath (212 degrees) for five minutes.

Pickling experiments

Sriracha pickled okra

 A friend of mine asked me the other day if I had ever made pickled okra. I said I hadn't and he offered me some okra to give it a try.

Okra is one of the funny foods. People either love it or hate it. I love it fried or in a gumbo. This week I read a really great article about eating raw okra, but I just don't think I'm that brave.

To be honest, I'm not even sure I'm brave enough to eat it pickled, but I wanted to try it since my friend gave me the okra. I recently made a Sriracha pickle that was really good and my friend said he thought that might be good with the okra so that's what I did.

Since the okra skin is very thick I'm thinking they need to sit a while and pickle before we give them a try. I'll update when we see how they taste!

Sriracha pickled banana peppers

My friend also gave me an entire bag of fresh banana peppers so I thought, what the heck, let's pickle those too. I also think these need to sit a while before we give them a try.

Spicy Garlic Dill Pickles and Sriracha Pickled Okra

Fried squash

In the south, we fry stuff. I know that low fat, no gluten, no animal protein is all the rage these days and I applaud those of you making these healthy food choices.

I love fried stuff though. I love my deep fryer.

In the summer months fried squash is a favorite in our household. Sadly I didn't plant any squash this year, but I was given some and so I fried it up first thing!

Here's how you do it.

Slice your squash (or zucchini) as thin as you can. You may choose to use a mandolin to make them extra thin, but I don't use that myself. Whisk an egg in a bowl and place squash pieces into egg then pour enough milk to cover squash.

Put about two and half cups of flour and a 1/4 to 1/2 cup of cornmeal into a big ziplock bag. Sprinkle in a couple of pinches of salt and a grind or two of cracked black pepper.

A few at a time place your milk/egg coated squash into flour bag and shake shake shake! Place flour coated pieces on a plate. I think the secret is to let the flour coated squash sit for a few minutes before you fry it. It helps the breading to stick better.

Heat up your deep fryer (or a pan with canola oil) and slow (and carefully) fry squash a few at a time. As soon as you dip them out of fryer, place them on a paper towel lined plate and sprinkle with kosher salt.

Serve immediately! They are yum, yum, yummy! You can also use this same method to fry okra or fried green tomatoes.

Classic recipes make a comeback

I love to try new and different foods, but there’s something about old school classic recipes that are comforting. And every once in a while you may also run into a classic recipe you’ve never made before.

Last week I did just that. I was making out my weekly menu and grocery list and found my Mamma’s old Betty Crocker cookbook circa 1976. The book is quite useful if you’re a novice in the kitchen as it has lots of of helpful tips on basic food preparation.

In my search for a chicken dish to prepare I came across the recipe for chicken cacciatore. I have always heard of chicken cacciatore, but never made it myself so I thought I would give it a try.

The dish is comprised of lightly fried chicken simmered in a tomato sauce and served over either rice or pasta. We served ours on a bed of angel hair spaghetti. I also had some lovely squash and zucchini from my godfather’s garden which we sautéed in some olive oil with salt, pepper and a little Italian seasoning. It made for a nice accompaniment to the rich tomato sauce and chicken.

If you don’t have a copy of the Betty Crocker cookbook, you can find the recipe here. The newer

version of the recipe calls for fresh mushrooms though we followed the 1976 version which used canned mushrooms. My fiancé made a disapproving face at using canned mushrooms, but after they simmered for 45 minutes in the sauce, I’m really not sure you could tell the difference.

Another old favorite we enjoyed last week is what we always called hamburgers in a basket. I remember this recipe from my childhood though I hadn’t thought of it in years. My schedule has been hectic the last few weeks with rehearsals for the upcoming play I’m in and my dad graciously agreed to fix dinner so I could eat quickly after work and head to rehearsal. I remembered this old standby and he whipped it up for us.

You simply make out hamburger patties and put them in a foil packet topped with sliced potatoes, onions, green pepper and carrots. Season liberally with salt, pepper, garlic powder or any other preferred seasoning. Close up the foil packet, place packets on a baking sheet and cook for one hour in a 375-degree oven. It’s not fancy, but let me tell you, it’s delicious and simple to prepare.

You can always jazz it up with some different seasonings if you prefer. I would probably add a dash or two of Tony Cachere’s Creole Seasoning if I were making it.

Reprinted from Kitsey's Kitchen at The Yadkin Ripple.

In a real pickle

Homemade Grape Leaf Pickles

Who doesn't like a pickle? Ok, well, I'm sure there are some who don't, but that's OK, more for us!

Summertime is in full swing and my cucumber vines are producing like crazy. I'm pretty excited about it because I love to can pickles.

This year I am growing a regular green pickling cucumber as well as a white cucumber. Both of these varieties look great in jars.

My biggest problem is making sure to check the vines thoroughly every day, otherwise I end up with a cucumber the size of a zucchini and too large to can. I have had quite a few that were almost too big, but I hated to waste them so I sliced them into spears to can.

So far this year I have made several different kinds of pickles and at the rate my vines are producing, I'll probably make a few more kinds before summer is over. I have made a few batches of a spicy dill pickle, grape leaf pickles and I tried a Sriracha pickle as well.

I prefer salty, sour and spicy pickles. I'm not a sweet pickle fan, but my Dad does like bread and butter pickles so I will probably make a batch of those for him. The spicy dill pickle is really simple to make and the recipe is actual for a small batch so it's great if you just have a few cucumbers from your own garden or the local farmers market. You can always increase the recipe to make a larger batch. 

This year I'm also attempting to make some pickles the really old fashioned way — in a stone crock. My Mamma bought this crock at an auction a number of years ago and it has been sitting in our basement every since. Last year, at my friend's suggestion, I made a jar of fermented pickles. They were very different, but delicious and fermented foods are supposed to be very good for you. I'm hoping my pickles fermented in the crock will turnout well.

Grape leaf pickles are my personal favorite, but that wasn't always the case. I remember as a child we always canned green beans, tomatoes, stuffed peppers and pickles every summer. We normally just made dill pickles or sweet pickles, but one year Mamma wanted to make grape leaf pickles. Everything my Mamma ever cooked or prepared was normally delicious, but something didn't go well with the pickles and they were terrible. It was a family joke for a long time. A few years after that, I tried some grape leaf pickles that my cousin had made and they were delicious. Now they are one of my favorites.

I couldn't find a recipe online that I liked for the grape leaf pickles so I dug out all of our cookbooks from area churches to find one. The recipe is super simple. Put two grape leafs and a few grapes in jar then pack with cucumbers (I did some jars of whole and some sliced.) Make a brine with 10 cups water, 2 cups vinegar and 1 cup pickling salt. Heat to near boiling. Pour hot brine over pickles in jars Gentle shake jars to remove air bubbles. Top with heated lids (bring lids to boil in a small pan of hot water) and then add rim to jar. Put jars in a near boiling water bath for 5 minutes. Carefully remove jars from water (you can buy a special tool to lift jars out with) and place on a rack to cool. You will hear the lids make a popping noise when they seal. I would let the pickles pickle for at least three to four months before eating.

Grape leaf pickles do tend to be on the salty side and not everyone likes them. My dad and fiancé

Spicy Garlic Dill Pickles

both dislike them, but my great Uncle Ken and I love them so I made a special batch this year. I was particularly proud of the labels I made for my jars. I found a picture of my Mamma and me when we were canning pickles a few years ago and printed that out to use as the label for the jars.

Speaking of labels, if you like to can and give your canned goods away as gifts, there are tons of free label templates you can find online to make your canned gifts look really nice. Add ribbons or other extras to make them even more special. Most people realize the time and effort it takes to can and it's not something a lot of people do anymore so most will consider a home canned gift a very special treat.

Taking time to breathe

This morning I watched a video tutorial on a meditative breathing technique. It made me realize something very sad. I don't take time in my life to breathe.

We have to breathe to live, obviously, but I do find myself in the middle of the workday, stressed about a deadline or other work related thing, and I realize I am literally holding my breath.

Not only am I not taking time during the day to do some deep breathing, I'm even holding my breath for some unknown reason. Wow. Very big revelation and it's something I'm probably not alone in.

Our lives are so busy and most of us are running around trying to get to work, picking up kids from school, fixing dinner and all the other stuff of life, but are we truly breathing and nourishing our bodies with the breath of life?

I'm moving breathing to the top of my to-do list.

And a huge thank you to China Brooks for her wonderful insights on her YouTube channel, live Periscope feeds and her blog!