Oh Darlings, this week has been a flurry of activity!  What with getting ready for Halloween (almost done with Eric’s costume!) and all our other events.  Crystal and I took some time to breathe deep and enjoy a night out with our wonderful friend Kathryn, who just finished the 3 Day Walk for Cancer (20 miles per day!)  Our destination – The Atlanta Botanical Gardens.  Now, I have lived in Atlanta on and off since 1992 and have never been here.  Oh, what I’ve been missing!  And Kathryn chose this night so we could watch the Chefs Pumpkin Carving Contest.  Kevin Gillespie of this season’s Top Chef was one of the competitors (we saw him in the lobby after the challenge and he looked beat).  But there was so much more than that to see.  Custom Scarecrows dotted the landscape with their spooky and funny personalities.  I have just got to share with you.

First one up – A giant panda with a giant cupcake!

A dragon made from recycled cans

“Will work for food”

Me, with the cooking crow lady

Very hungry pumpkin baby

Pumpkins all laid out for carving

Part of the Henry Moore Exhibit

My favorite photo of the evening
One pink lady’s slipper

One of the pumpkin entries

Trophy?

What does any of this have to do with cooking? Well, not a whole lot. But we did see Kevin Gillespie from Top Chef and lots of those scarecrows involved food or cooking (Atlantans love to eat!)  We girls just wandered around, catching up with each other and getting to know Kat’s friend Gabrielle.

I arrived home after 9pm – Eric was just winding down from his workday.  Neither of us had eaten. What’s for dinner?  I’ll tell you what’s for dinner – pappardelle and boar ragu, that’s what.

Remember my advice about a stocked pantry?  We were sitting down to a gourmet dinner in less than 15 minutes.

Today – making lunches with Lisa at her Cabbagetown Market – come say hi!

xoox, Patti

UPDATE: Read more about our Pie Off at my friend Mr. Tim’s blog

Happy Sunday, Darlings.  Saturday was so wonderful. Just a perfect day.  I got up early to make my sweet potato pie for the neighborhood pie off. Eric got up very soon after (on a Saturday!)  There was a park dedication across the street from our house with a cookout and live music, as well as the pie off at Tim and Becky’s house.  The pie off is well loved by our neighborhood and this was the second annual. Becky made everything look so beautiful and the pies were so spectacular that every photo was fab.  Let’s share:

BBQ on the park

Waiting for the contest to start
(there I am in the green sweater and pink scarf)<

Pies awaiting judgement

The categories were sweet and savory

Miss Becky’s Incredible Key Lime Pie

My darling boys, Taruan & Chioke, enjoying pie<

Our bestie, Jeff, who would kill me if he knew I put his photo up – Shhh.

Someone liked my pie!

Kids love pie

This is still such a new contest that all the rules and regulations are still being set. When I first brought my pie to Tim and Becky’s house, I was told to write the type of pie on a card so no one would know who made it.  Then it was decided to have a “Parade of Pies” for all the contestants.  Um….wouldn’t everyone know who we were if were parading with our pies? Lol. I love our little small town neighborhood that lives under the guise of being “big city.”  Today we were all Mayberry.

Yesterday was a favorite type of day. Scheduled to make cookies with my friend Dawn and her little one, Megan.

But best laid plans – Dawn had a family emergency and could not make it.  I had just put together the sugar cookie dough for our afternoon.  Hmmmm….we had folks coming over for movie night and I had a bundle of candy, snacks and popcorn.  How about one more treat?

I saw online where someone had made finger cookies. So cute. I only wish I can remember where I saw it so I could give them credit.

Anyhoo, I shaped the dough into fingers and topped the fingernails with raspberry jam. Don’t they look cool?

Ohhh, spooky!

Tray full of spooky!

I baked them at what I thought would be the appropriate time and temperature, but they took longer than I expected. A lot longer.  And how did I not expect them to expand like crazy? Like any cookie would.  What I ended up with was what Miss DeVore called “Monster Fingers”.  Or “Ogre Fingers” – I like that one, too.

Oh! You would like to see a picture of the finished product? Well, ok.

Even scarier Monster Fingers

So, my advice to you, if you choose to make these, is use very small pieces of dough.  Roll them very long and skinny and they should look more like people fingers. But monster fingers are fun.

Last night at movie night we previewed Drag Me To Hell from Sam Raimi. Campy, funny and sometimes scary.  There were 10 of us nibbling on Halloween Candy, Swedish Fish, Twizzlers, Monster Fingers, Cajun Trail Mix and of course, Popcorn.  A fun night was had by all.

We had three snack stations so no one had to wait

More snacks and party favors

Today, we are off to the neighborhood Pie Contest, in which I am entering a Sweet Potato Pie. Yum. I will report back on all the pie-y goodness.

Make your Saturday count!

xoxo, Patti

There are times in our lives that are defining, life changing.  I was so lucky to witness one such moment yesterday at Kathianne’s.  After she and I sat down to the most satisfying lunch of luscious split pea soup (my favorite!) and yummy rosemary cheese biscuits, her husband arrived home.  Now, I did not know that her husband was a trauma surgeon, our friendship is that new.  But trauma surgeon he is and he had come home to check his final test scores that would determine their future.

The yummiest lunch

I am thrilled to report that I was fortunate to catch their special event on film. But the doctor is private and would prefer not to have his photo online. Understandable.

I quickly took my leave so they could start celebrating. A million congrats to you both.

Time to get home – so much to do!  It was Mrs. Walker’s birthday and I could not let the day pass without baking her a cake.  I decided on a chocolate mayonnaise cake with seven minute frosting.  Super tasty!

The recipe for you:

Chocolate Mayonnaise Cake
Adapted from The Red Hat Society Cookbook
2 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 cup granulated sugar
4 heaping tsp cocoa
1 cup mayonnaise
1 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350F.  For the cake, sift the flour with the baking soda.  In a large bowl combine the sugar, cocoa, mayonnaise, milk, vanilla, and flour mixture. Pour the batter into two 8 inch greased round cake pans.  Bake for 25 minutes. Cool

Time for the frosting.  I used Paula Deen’s recipe found here.  It is fantastic

And now some photos:

ready to frost! remember to use parchment paper under your
cake plate so you don’t have icing everywhere!

Like this

Halfway there

Good to go!

My frosting skills are getting better. They are still very homespun, but what can you do?  Well, if I ever want to go to Carnegie Hall, the answer is “practice, practice, practice….”

Frosting completed, I happily walked my cake next door to a very surprised Mrs. Walker.  And not a moment too soon, either!  Just after I arrived, Mrs. Walker’s daughter Cheryl, grandson and great grandbabies drove up.  I was tickled to share in one of their special moments as Cheryl’s granddaughter (who couldn’t have been all of 4 years old), sang Happy Birthday.  It was adorable.

And again, I quickly took my leave so they could celebrate as a family.  I’m getting good at this.

And for my own special moment for the day? Besides getting to be a veritable fly on the wall for everyone else’s magical times?  It came that night as Eric whisked me off to Sotto Sotto, a very high end restaurant here in Atlanta.  In the small and romantic room, we dined on sweetbreads with trumpet mushrooms, fungi risotto with black truffles, tortelli di mele – raviolis with sausage, apple and sage, and an amazing special of tagliatelle with lamb ragu. We shared the stories of the day, held hands and gazed in each other’s eyes.

The special moments are everywhere. Take a second to absorb it all.

Happy Friday, Darlings!

xoxo, Patti

You know when you get super involved and the time passes just like that?  Last night was like that.  It was Wednesday, and that means our weekly get together with Miss DeVore.  So many things have happened to both of us recently that we grabbed a glass of Chardonnay and got to gabbing.  The sweet potatoes were baking in the oven while I seared a pork tenderloin and put some broccoli in the same pan with wine and butter and just let it cook all together.  Then I set out to make a sweet potato pie with a ginger snap crust while Diane took a look at my site for editing purposes.

How was dinner? Well, pretty darn tasty except for the fact that I didn’t remember about pictures until after we were finished eating.  We inhaled this dinner and gabbed some more.

Miss DeVore was loving the mashed sweet potatoes.  Mashed is my favorite way to enjoy them.  Bake them, scoop them, put plenty of butter, cream and salt in them and enjoy.

The pie?  Well, it tasted just fine, but the crust was soggy on the bottom even though I had prebaked it first.  It was also my first trial for the Pie Off on Saturday, which I plan to enter – if I can get the crust right.

It was an exciting night – new developments for both Miss DeVore and me and…..what’s all that racket in the back yard?

I walked to the back door and Mrs. Walker was giving one of her sons the devil.  I asked her if she was okay and she held up a mop and showed me where  the handle had broken off – “I broke this on his butt!” was all the explanation she gave regarding her adult son, who had just sped off in his car.

Two lessons learned here – don’t forget the photos for my readers and DON’T mess with Mrs. Walker. She’ll get you.  I’m so happy she’s my neighbor. She’s the greatest.

And – it’s her birthday today! I am going to make her a birthday pie and take it over with some champagne.

Go out and have a gabfest with your besties. Just don’t forget the pie is in the oven.

xoxo, Patti