Author Archives: The Sugarlump

Rite Aid

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When my sister and I would visit our family in Kentucky in the summer as young kids, we had a bit of a ritual.  My cousins, my sister and I would make the long-awaited trip to….

RITE AID!

To the average person, that may not seem very exciting.  In fact, for many people it falls into the category of “errands,” thus making such a trip dull and uninteresting.

My cousins, my sister and I, however, lived for Rite Aid in the summer.  Papa would give us each $10 or $20 and take us to Rite Aid, where we really knew how to stretch a buck.

My sister, Eugene (who is 4 years younger than I am), and my cousin Kristen (who is 5 1/2 years younger than I am) were still pretty small when we would go to Rite Aid so they bought toys and bubbles and things.  My cousin Lauren (who is 2 ½ years younger than I am) and I, however, were quite serious about our purchases that would entertain us for the next three weeks.  We spent our money on…

OFFICE SUPPLIES!

Exciting, no?!

No?

Oh. Ok.  Well, Lauren and I thought it was exciting.

We would play “passport service,” a game we invented and probably spent hundreds, if not thousands, of hours playing when we were young.  To play passport service, we needed paper and index cards and pens and highlighters and hole-punchers and paper clips and lots of office-y things.  And gum.  We always left room in the budget for a package of bubblicious gum.  That was our one splurge.  Other than that, our purchases were strictly business.

You probably think I’m making this up, but I have evidence:

See how proudly we were displaying our Rite Aid bags? We were very serious and enthusiastic about Rite Aid.  Papa was just glad to have his polecats together.

Sadly, about 10 years ago, the Rite Aid went out in Burkesville.  We wore black for a month.

Not really, but we certainly took it hard.

There is currently a cowboy store in the former Rite Aid location and I can’t bring myself to go in there because I haven’t gotten over Rite Aid closing yet.

R.I.P. Burkesville Rite Aid.   Thanks for all of the good times and practical purchases.

Y’all come back now, ya hear?

Sugarlump

Scarlett and Her Chair

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This was my cats Scarlett’s chair at my parents’ house.  She has good taste in chairs as it was the most comfortable chair in the house, but unfortunately it did not face the TEE-v so people rarely sat in it. That was just fine with Scarlett.

She’s so cute when she’s sleeping.

“What about when I’m awake?” (frown)

She loved to sit up on the back cushion of this chair, which was very wide and soft.  It had a permanent slouch in the middle of the cushion from her sitting there so often.  I imagine she liked sitting there not only because it was comfortable, but also because she could observe all of us sitting in the family room and see through the door opening into the kitchen to keep tabs on the activity in there as well. This is very important to her as she insists that her contribution to the household is to secure the premises.  She’s not just a pretty face, ya know.

Because this was her favorite spot, I was a little bit nervous about how she would handle the move given that I was not taking her chair.  It did cross my mind to take the chair but a) it’s not mine to take as it is part of the seating arrangement in my parents’ family room, b) it’s an enormous chair and would be way over-scaled for my 980 square foot apartment, and c) it would be absurd to bring a large chair for a cat.

So as we settled into our new apartment, I waited to see where Scarlett would perch.  She quickly adopted one of my Aunt Anna’s chairs that I have in my apartment.  I am sure it is no coincidence that she chose the one where she can stare me down as I watch TV from the sofa as she simultaneously watches birds flitting around on my deck through the glass door.

She has really taken to this chair.

As it is a tight-back chair, it isn’t comfortable to sit on the top of the chair (I would imagine), so she just kicks back on the seat cushion like a raccoon.

“Hiiiiiiiiii.”

And looks regal.

“What now?”

Sometimes she falls asleep on the job.

“I heard that.” (stink-eye)

She’s really leaning into that armrest. Good thing it’s just her height.

While the chair is her usual hangout, she sometimes opts for the higher altitude of the back cushions on the sectional so she can see me if I’m at my desk or in the kitchen.  These are not nearly as soft as the cushion on the chair she loved so dearly at my parents’ house so she is making her way around the sectional, breaking in each of the pillows for me.  What would I do without her?

Livin’ large.

Y’all come back now, ya hear?

Sugarlump

Sausage Gravy

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One of my favorite breakfast items is biscuits and sausage gravy.  And sausage, of course.   My granny makes a mean sausage gravy and I look forward to it when I visit.  Although I tried to make this breakfast for myself once (unsuccessfully because I couldn’t find the right sausage in the Northeast), I think I am going to limit myself to eating this only when I visit my grandparents for the sake of my hips and arteries.

It’s very important that you make this an irregular part of your life.  Yes, that’s right.  IR-regular.   I say this out of concern for your health.  But, nonetheless, it should be a part of your life even if it’s once every month/week/day or two.

It is CRITICAL that you begin with good ol’ country sausage.  By this I mean loosely packed and with a good amount of fat.  I would recommend Tennessee Pride, Ole South or Old Folks brands.   I would not recommend Jimmy Dean because it is too dense and lean and thus will not render enough fat for the gravy.

So, once you have proper country sausage (hot or mild, but hot if you are really serious about this), cut it into ½” patties and set ‘er in the skillet.  If you are intending to have 8 sausage patties to serve, cook 9.  I will explain this later.

My cousin Lauren was frying up the sausage this particular morning.

Cook them over medium-high heat until the meat is cooked through and the patties are nice and browned.

Meanwhile, have some homemade biscuits baking in the oven.

I was not present for the making of these biscuits, but I understand that there was lard involved.  That’s all I care to comment on the matter.

When the sausage is done, place the patties on a plate lined with several paper towels to absorb the excess grease.

If there is too much grease left in the skillet, drain it off.  I can’t give you an exact amount because I don’t know how much sausage you are cooking, but I would say for 8 sausage patties, you don’t want more than ¼ cup of grease to make your gravy.

Now, this is a VERY IMPORTANT step.  Break up the extra sausage patty into small crumbled pieces to add texture to the gravy.  You did make an extra didn’t you?

Next, with the desired amount of grease and the extra crumbled patty in your skillet, grab some milk and some flour (pronounced “flair” if you have a Southern accent).

Sprinkle in approximately the same amount of flour as there is grease in your pan and stir.  Let’s say ¼ cup since we are working with a ¼ cup of grease.

You may want to use a whisk so it doesn’t “lump up on you,” as my granny says.

Let this cook for a few minutes until the mixture is a nice golden brown.

Then add the milk.

How much?

Until it looks right.

That’s what my mammie (and it seems all Southern cooks) say because they don’t really go by measurements, they go by look and feel.

If you haven’t achieved that level of culinary expertise to know when it “looks right,” add about ½ cup of milk or enough until the mixture is fairly loose, but still has some body to it.  I’m not even sure what that description really means and I’m sure you don’t either, so here is a photo:

Then let it cook for about 5 minutes or until it has thickened, all the while stirring and scraping the skillet so it doesn’t burn.  You will know it has reached this stage when you can see the bottom of the skillet in the wake of your spoon/spatula.

The gravy should have a nice brown color to it.

Season it with a little salt as needed.  And pepper if for some strange reason you did not go for hot sausage.

Stunning.  Look at all of those brown bits. MMMMMMMMM.

Now the best part!

Fix yourself a sausage n’ biscuit (or 2) and a big ol’ glass of cold me-yulk:

Oh heavens.

My cousin Kristen had clearly lost her marbles and opted for blackberry jam with her sausage n’ biscuit instead of sausage gravy.

(why????????)

I’m all for sweet and savory but I just don’t know if I can get on board with this one.

Sausage and sausage gravy had such a good thing going…

Y’all come back now, ya hear?

Sugarlump

My Closet

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When I moved into my apartment, I was able to find a place for most things fairly quickly. Books go on the bookshelves, dishes go in the kitchen cabinets, sofa goes in the living room, cats go wherever they please, etc.

My clothes, however, were a different story.  I am fortunate that my small apartment has a good size bedroom closet.  The only problem is that it is set up for hanging space only. I’m sure the apartment was designed with the expectation that the tenant would bring a dresser or armoire, which most normal people have, but I do not yet own one.  Eventually, I hope to buy a really neat, antique armoire with shelf and drawer space, but that will take lots of searching and deliberating and may not happen for many months/years.

While I pondered this dilemma, my folded clothes, bags and shoes sat in boxes and even larger bags on my bedroom floor for about a week, which I found to be thoroughly irritating.

This is actually a fairly cleaned up version of my room before I had shelving in the closet:

I like to be organized and for everything to be in its place so this was a bit challenging for me. I had to dig through boxes and piles of clothes to find an outfit for a meeting or Church or just any outfit that didn’t look ridiculous in public.

More boxes…

It probably would have been easier to find things if I had labeled the boxes…but that would have made the box situation far too manageable.

I perused the isles at Lowes, Home Depot and Bed Bath and Beyond, waiting for just the closet solution to jump out at me.  I didn’t want to spend a ton of money on some fancy system, but I also didn’t want something that was going to fall apart. A few days into my search, I found some simple, metal racks with 3 adjustable shelves.

There was a lot of assembly required…

The directions specified that this was a 2 person assembly job due to the dangerousness of the metal objects.

Somehow, I survived the assembly of 4 shelving units.

And this is what my closet looks like post shelf-lift:

This brings me joy.

I have fairly high ceilings so I actually put one of the shelving units on a high shelf for my “winter-ish” items that I don’t need to wear at this time since we are averaging 75 degrees in Nashville.

After testing the limits of the upholstered stools in my room by jumping on them in order to sling purses onto the top shelf, I decided it was probably a good idea to invest in a proper step-ladder to prevent any injuries to me or my upholstered stools.

Meet my new best friend:

Look at all of that glorious shelf space.

Clearly, I could use an internship at J. Crew where everything is folded perfectly, but I was just so happy to have shelf space that it appears I let it get the best of my folding skills.

One thing that irks me is that the shelves in the unit on the far right do not line up with the shelves in the other two units. This is not a mistake; I had to make them higher so my Uggs would fit underneath, but nonetheless it bothers me.  Maybe I should adjust the other two so they are higher?

I know, I need help.

Sadly, all of my shoes did not make it into the closet due to a lack of space.  Luckily, I brought along my trusty door-hanging shoe organizer from college that has 30 shoe slots.  I have been known to pack 50 pairs of shoes into this thing so I’m very glad to have it.  The alternative was to line up my shoes around the perimeter of my room, which would have kept me up at night.

While it would have been ideal to hang this on the back of my closet door, there is not enough depth between the door and the wall to accommodate the shoe rack. Thus, the shoe rack is hanging on the back of my bedroom door.  Not perfect, but at least my shoes are off the floor and can be hidden from sight when my door is open.

I am hoping that when I finally find the perfect armoire I can put a lot of my folded items in it and then use the metal racks in the closet for my shoes.

I can’t wait to find that armoire so I can worry about more important things like what color I’m going to paint my kitchen.

Y’all come back now, ya hear?

Sugarlump

The Garden: Progress Report #1

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For years and years, probably his whole life, my papa has had a big vegetable garden.  As he has gotten older and less able to do all of the physical work required to have a successful garden, he has reduced the number of things that he grows down to the bare essentials.  This year, he mentioned that he “might not fool with a garden” at all. I protested heavily.

Being the good papa that he is, and after some negotiating on my part, he agreed to go ahead and put out a garden this year since I will be driving up every few weeks to help him now that I live relatively close by.

I’m not really sure how much help I will be given that I am looking forward to this as a learning opportunity, but I suppose at the very least I can contribute manual labor.  I can’t wait to get my hands on the tiller.  Watch out.

Last weekend, I went up to Burkesville to visit and Papa, Lauren and I checked out the early stages of the garden.  Papa had already put out a few hardy things and he gave us a little tour.

This is the garden plot.

These are Texas super onions.

These are sweet candy onions.

And these are multipl-I-yan un-yuns.   My papa calls these “old-timey” onions because the original onions that these started from are very old.  If you save one of these onions (or several), let it dry and store it in a cold, dry place for the winter, the next year, you can plant it again and it literally multiplies into several onions.  You can do this again and again every year.  Thus, you never have to buy new seed.  It’s pretty amazing. Or, at least, I think it is.

There’s currently a shortage of rain in southern Kentucky (some might call it a drought) so the ground is harder than normal.  Hence, my papa had to use a pick to harvest some onions for supper.  It was pretty intense.

My family really likes onions.

We do, however, grow other vegetables as well.

This is lettuce, looking a little thirsty.

And these are brussel sprouts, which my papa planted upon my request.  My granny was displeased about these being added to the garden because apparently they get worms in them.  I’m not really sure what to do about that but I’m sure my papa will have a solution.  Did I mention my papa was an Ag teacher?

Also, that blue Croc is my cousin Lauren’s shoe.  I had a full picture of her standing in the garden but she threatened my life if I included it in this post because she did not feel that she had on her best look.

These little boogers are beets.  I will not be eating these.

This is the barn next to the garden.  I like barns.  I can’t wait to have my own one day.  I am pretty sure it will be black like this one.

On a side note, I would like to confess at this time that I have eaten Chik-fil-A three times in the past week because they are everywhere in Nashville and they were nowhere in Boston.  I’m just making up for lost time.

Hopefully once my papa’s garden is producing food, there will be less Chik-fil-A and more butter beans and hot peppers in my life.   But I do love me some Chik-fil-A.

More to come as we plant beans and peppers and tomatoes and other stuff after the threat of frost has passed.

Y’all come back now, ya hear?

Sugarlump

It’s Official

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It’s official: I’m a Tennessean.

Yesterday, I got my TIN-ne-see driver’s license.   When I walked into the DMV, there were about 15 or 20 people in the waiting area so I figured things would go pretty quickly.

I walked up to the desk and told the woman I would like to get a Tennessee license.  I had read about the required paperwork online prior to my visit and believed that I was adequately prepared with my birth certificate, current Massachusetts license, car insurance, front page of my lease, and my social security number.

Apparently I needed the LAST page of my lease with both signatures, not the front one.  The lady informed me that this was no big deal and requested that I have my apartment office fax over the last page of the lease.

So I stepped out to call the apartment office and requested that they fax over the correct papers.  What’s that? They don’t fax leases? Oh.  You have to come into the apartment office to pick up a copy of the lease personally.  Bummer.

I walked out of the DMV and drove 10 minutes back to my apartment, asked the nice lady to make me a copy of the signed pages of my lease and in 10 minutes I was on my way back to the DMV.  Sure that I had lost my place in line, I went back to the woman at the desk and requested a new number.  She asked to see my original ticket number and then promptly handed it back to me and said:

“You’re fih-ne.”  As in, my number had not yet been called.

Wonderful!  I didn’t lose my place in line.  Surely it will just be a few more minutes.

Or hours.

2 hours later, after checking my email, the news, and people.com on my phone 93 times, my number was called.

Things went fairly quickly after that.  I barely could see the third column for the eye test, but I passed.

As the woman was giving me back all of my paperwork, I asked her if she would be giving me my Massachusetts license back.  She smiled and this is what I thought she said:

“We keep the old ones, but we’re about to give you a ten-cent one.”

I smiled politely and said, “Oh ok!”  (What? A ten-cent license?)

Reflecting on this exchange as I was waiting to have my picture taken, it occurred to me that she actually said “a Tennessee license.”  (Duh.)   I guess I haven’t completely mastered the accent yet.

Thoroughly famished, I left the DMV beaming like I had won the lottery, with my “ten-cent” license in hand.

Today, I psyched myself up for going to get my Tennessee registration and license plate.  I decided to eat lunch BEFORE embarking on this journey, which I expected to be even more of a process than getting my license.

I went to get my oil changed, then to have an emissions test done, and finally headed to the county clerk’s office for my registration and license plate.

I walked into the office and there was no one in line.  There was hope for an afternoon of productivity.  The nice lady, Wilma, called me up to her station and requested my paperwork, which thankfully this time I had in its entirety.

The whole ordeal took about 5 minutes and I mentioned to Wilma that I was pleasantly surprised by how quick and painless this process was.  I told her that I had been to the DMV yesterday and before I could tell her how many hours I had spent there, she chuckled and said:

“Did you bring your lunch?  Man, I dread goin’ over there.”

I laughed and told her I will definitely pack a snack next time.

She chuckled some more and then typed a few things.  And then chuckled.  And then chuckled some more.  And then a little bit more.  She handed me back my paperwork.  Chuckle.  Chuckle.  Apparently Wilma thought I was a hoot.

I liked Wilma.

A few minutes later, I walked out the proud owner of a Tennessee license plate and registration.

So it’s official, I’m now a TIN-ne-see-yan.

Y’all come back now, ya hear?

Sugarlump

Butter Beans

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Whenever I visit my grandparents in Kentucky, there is always a lot of food involved.  Delicious.  Country.  Food.

My favorite kind of food that my grandmothers prepare is homegrown beans.  I love love love them, especially topped with fresh diced onion and jalapeno pepper, which also come from my papa’s garden.   If there are beans and cornbread on the table, there’s really no point in preparing anything else for me because all I’m interested in are those two items.

This past weekend, my granny made me some butter beans, which are speckled lima beans.  And as my whole family knows, I love me some butter beans.

Last Christmas, we were all working our way around the kitchen to fill up our plates with food and when I got to the butter beans, I said “I love me some butter beans.”  I didn’t realize that my whole family had heard me trying on my country accent for size, but they all started to crack up, especially my Aunt Vickie.  We still laugh about it now every time we have beans.

My love for butter beans runs so deep that I even tried to grow them in Boston last summer.

This is what they look like dried (as seed):

And this is what they look like as they begin to grow as shown in a picture of my garden last summer:

Now, as I mentioned, these I tried to grow in Boston, in a yard that had about 10 square feet of full day sun, imported soil, and a growing season about a month too short.  They are pretty pitiful.  In Kentucky, however, my papa’s bean plants grow to be about 8 feet tall and are so dense that they form a canopy between rows.

My yield was about 47 beans last summer.

My papa’s yield was probably 2047 beans last summer.

My solution to my gardening challenges?

Move South.

I have since moved to Nashville, TN and am driving up to Kentucky every few weeks to help my papa with his garden.   No joke.  I’m very serious about butter beans.

I have high hopes for the butter bean crop this year.

I love me some butter beans.

Y’all come back now, ya hear?

Sugarlump

Granny’s Chocolate Pie

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This is one of my granny’s specialties.

My granny is a great baker and while the rest of my family thinks her pecan pie and her butterscotch pie are unrivaled, I would take her chocolate pie over those two any day.

She makes a chocolate pie every time I come to visit and I always look forward to it.  There’s just nothing else quite like it.

When I make her chocolate pie, I ignore the meringue because that just dilutes the wonderful, rich chocolate.  But for those who are serious about pretty pies, I have included the meringue in the recipe.

While the pie is not that hard to make, there are a few tricks that are critical.  It just so happens that these tricks are not listed in my granny’s recipe as submitted to a local cookbook.  Though some people leave out ingredients and steps so no one can steal their thunder, I don’t think this was intentional on my granny’s part.  She has just made this pie so many times in her life that I bet she didn’t even realize some of the things that she does that make it just so.

Consequently, I had to make the pie with her several times before I had all of the right steps and ingredients.  I have notes scribbled all over the recipe in the cookbook.  One thing that she does is make 1 ½ times the recipe ingredients for a fuller pie.  So, for the sake of simplicity, I have listed the ingredients as she and I always make them instead of trying to remember to multiply all of the measurements by 1 ½.  Brilliant, right?

She taught me to make this pie several years ago and then she later taught my cousin.  Wouldn’t you know that she has changed the recipe in the last year?

She added cornstarch, which I think makes it too thick and robs it of its velvety goodness.  Apparently, there is also cream of tartar and marshmallow fluff in the meringue. This was news to me, but I don’t make the meringue anyway, so I’m not going to get all worked up about it.

Here is what you will need:

Ingredients:

9” pie crust

1 ½ cups sugar

3 ½ tbsp. all-purpose flour

1 ½ cups milk (best made with whole milk)

4 ½ tbsp. cocoa powder

Smidgen of salt

5 eggs, separated

2 tbsp. butter

1 tsp. vanilla

Pinch of cream of tartar

3 tbsp. marshmallow creme

I forgot to pull out the marshmallow creme for the picture.  Sorry about that.  Also, the sugar and flour seem to be a little shy as they hide behind the cornstarch that I would recommend you not use.  I should also note at this point that my granny does not put any salt in the pie, but I feel like just the tiniest amount really boosts the chocolate-y-ness.

So, here we go:

Bake off the pie shell according to the package instructions.  Or, if you would like to blind bake a homemade crust, knock yourself out.

Meanwhile, combine dry ingredients in the pot that will be the top half of your double boiler.

Separate eggs.  Set egg whites aside for meringue.

Combine half of milk and yolks…

…and whisk until completely incorporated (i.e. no yolk bits that could cause lumps in the pie.  Your granny will be very upset if you are not careful about this. Trust me, I speak from experience.)

Now here is some tricky business that my granny does not have written down anywhere, but it is the secret to having a smooth pie filling: pour egg and milk mixture through a strainer into dry mixture.

Because we told Granny to sit down as we prepared the pie so we could try to make it ourselves, there was a lot of back seat driving.  Apparently, we weren’t straining the eggs correctly…..but the pie turned out fine.

Assure your grandma that you’ve got things under control and then add the other half of the milk through the strainer.

And then give it a big ol’ stir to let the ingredients get to know each other.

Then put the mixture on the stove and stir. I should mention that my granny has a bizarre pot (pictured) that I believe was once part of a pressure cooker that somehow functions similarly to a double boiler so we always use this to make pie fillings.  One less thing to clean.

Now, you may want to start out with a whisk to make sure all of the ingredients incorporate, but then switch to a spoon and stir the mixture over medium-low heat constantly until the mixture has thickened.  Be sure to scrape the bottom of the pot gently so thickened parts don’t stick to the bottom of the pot and burn.

If you are impatient when it comes to eating chocolate like I am, you may think the filling is done when the mixture has a little bit of body to it, but you would be incorrect.  The mixture is not adequately thickened until you can see the bottom of the pot for a few seconds in the wake of your spoon when you scrape it against the pot.

As the mixture begins to thicken, you may add the butter and vanilla for a nice touch of richness because the chocolate is not rich enough already. Ha.

Continue cooking until the mixture achieves the viscosity described above.

Let cool a bit and then pour into baked pie shell.

Let pie cool completely before preparing meringue.  Or just let it cool until it’s just warm and eat a slice without any of that silly meringue.  Suit yourself.

Please lick the pot as you wait. It would be a sin to let any chocolate go to waste.

My cousins, sister and I have licked many a chocolate pie pot in our days.  We were caught chocolate-handedwhen this photo was taken a few years ago.

If you elect to make a sky-high meringue as my cousin Lauren did, beat the egg whites with a pinch of cream of tartar on high until they form peaks when you pull the whisk out.  Then, add marshmallow creme 1 tablespoon at a time.

I forgot to take a picture of this step because I was still licking the pot.

Next, using a spatula, make your meringue real purty on the pie.  Then bake it in a 400 degree oven until the meringue peaks start to brown.

Let pie cool and then devour.

Even though I promptly slid the meringue off my pie when I ate a piece, I have to admit that my cousin did a lovely job with the meringue.

Please enjoy.

Y’all come back now, ya hear?

Sugarlump

Driving to Burkesville

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Welcome to Cumberland County.

This is my (very dirty) car, Chino, sitting in my grandparents’ driveway in Kentucky.

Why is this noteworthy?

Well, let me tell you.

I’ve never been able to just drive to my grandparents’ houses in Burkesville, Kentucky.  Having lived in the Northeast and about 1000 miles from my grandparents my whole life, any visit involved at least one plane ride (usually 2) and then a 2 ½ hour drive from the airport in either Louisville or Nashville to rural Kentucky.

Now that I live in Nashville, I can drive up to visit and be there in 2 ½ hours.  It’s glorious.

The blue Jeep, Azul, is my cousin Lauren’s.  Since this is Chino’s first time in Kentucky, he and Azul had never met and they are just tickled to death (a favorite Southern saying) to finally be together as family.

Naturally, as soon as I arrived in Burkesville, we had to eat.  We went to one of my favorite little spots on the square in town: Annie Ruby’s.

Now, Annie Ruby’s is in the location that was formerly Smith Pharmacy.  My papa thinks it had been open since the town was founded in 1810.  He said that when he was little a single ice cream cone was a nickel and a double was 10 cents.  My parents used to go there as kids for ice cream and orangeades, which they could purchase for something like a quarter. This was pretty amazing (even back then) since it took 2 fresh, sweet oranges to produce enough juice for this specialty.

My cousins, sister and I had a summer ritual at Smith Pharmacy when we were growing up where we would go sit at the old-timey fountain and order coke floats after a long day in the office (more on this later).  They had the BEST old school vanilla ice cream that was sort of a creamy yellow and then they would pour over the fountain coke to create the perfect ice cream to coke ratio.  This sounds pretty basic, but there’s quite an art to making a coke float.  Trust me, I’m a coke float connoisseur.

While we were devastated when Smith’s pharmacy went out a little while back, we were so excited to learn that Annie Ruby’s would be opening with good food and with the fountain.  It’s the same fountain that was in Smith’s and they do a darn good job with the coke float.  Their curry chicken salad is also pretty delicious if you want something to go with that coke float.  Actually, maybe eat the sandwich first and then savor the coke float.

Annie Ruby’s is known for “tomato pie,” which I’m sure is delightful, but unfortunately I’m some sort of genetic mutant and do not like tomatoes.  As my granny says, “what a shame” because my papa grows a whole mess of tomatoes that the rest of my family lives for.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve worked up a craving for a coke float.

Y’all come back now, ya hear?

Sugarlump

Packages

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I love putting together packages for people, especially when it is not for a special occasion, but rather to say “thank you” or “I’m thinking of you” or “I hope you feel better” or “congratulations” or “happy Tuesday” or “I think you’re alright”.

One of my favorite things to wrap up is food, which is no surprise because I love food.  Mostly I love the eating of it, but I do like to bake and cook as well.

So what better way to combine my passions than to bake something, do some heavy sampling (just for the safety of its recipients, of course), and then wrap it up with some cellophane, a pretty bow and a tag.

I’m also a huge fan of making gift baskets filled with mason jars of soups and such because they exude a homemade vibe, are timeless, very durable and also reusable for years and years.   In summary, they are very pretty and practical (and I’m slightly obsessed).

This morning I baked some peanut butter chocolate chip cookies for a “thank you for inviting me to supper” package.  I intended to capture the step-by-step preparation of these lovely things with my camera to include a recipe, but realized as I was adding the last ingredient that I forgot to take pictures.  I will try to do better next time.

Here are the cookies as they cool on the baking sheet for a moment:

And here they are all wrapped up purty-like:

In addition to making the package look nice, I always like to put a little tag or sticker (handwritten for a nice homemade touch) to inform the recipients of what they are about to put in their mouths.  I do this especially when there are controversial ingredients such as peanut butter, nuts, or oatmeal.  I might even add raisins to that list because I can’t tell you how many times I have bitten into a cookie thinking it was chocolate chip (my favorite) and quickly discovered that it was some sort of devilish raisin nonsense (my not favorite).

It is my conviction that cookies shall not contain raisins just as cornbread shall not contain sugar.  Amen.

Now that we have that settled, I will get back to the point.

Even though I love putting together an unexpected package, I do enjoy wrapping up gift boxes for holidays, birthdays and other occasions.  Here’s a gift I wrapped recently for a friend’s birthday:

I found the peacock paper at Homegoods and the ribbon I ordered from the ribbon factory.  While a great paper sets the tone, I think a nice, sharp bow really finishes a beautiful present.  I learned this from my Aunt Anna, who was the queen of gift-wrapping.

My Aunt Anna (we called her “A-Nana” which I will explain in a future post) passed away in early 2011, but she was quite the gift-wrapper.  She always wrapped gifts in beautiful paper with big bows and, for Christmas, she often added a little ornament or accessory to the bow.  These packages were so beautiful that you almost didn’t want to unwrap them.  I said almost.  There was always a thoughtful gift inside, so you had to unwrap it.

To have your wrapping likened to Aunt Anna’s is a big honor and level of distinction in our family.  You have arrived on the wrapping scene if some says your gift-wrapping work looks like “An Aunt Anna Package.”   Over the last few years, a few people have received this praise and we continue this tradition of wrapping excellence in her memory.

I love you and miss you, Aunt Anna.  You were such an elegant lady who did everything with great care.  You are an inspiration to me and I think of you every time I wrap a package.

Y’all come back now, ya hear?

Sugarlump