Fourth of July Recipes

This is the perfect day of the year to reflect on the state of our country: so start this holiday by remembering the significance of the day, and by delivering the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag. Most of us learned it in school and other than at the beginning of a ball game, how often do we recite it and think about its meaning?
While standing at attention and facing a U.S.flag, with the right hand over the heart, recite the following words: I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Note: When not in uniform, men should remove any non-religious headdress with their right hand and hold it at the left shoulder, the hand being over the heart. Military in uniform should remain silent, face the flag, and render a salute.
With those words in our heads and our hearts, it’s time to party! And what is the Fourth of July without a barbecue.
Hot dogs and hamburgers are traditional on this day, but if you want to include something different, make it barbecue brisket. This recipe is made in the oven and leaves your pit free to cook other meats and vegetables. 
Cole slaw on the fourth is a given  and maybe a great summer tomato salad and the rest of the meal is cooked on the pit.  Depending on what other meats you choose, if any, the combination of roasting potatoes and seasoned vegetables go with everything. Get your vegetables at one of the local Farmer’s Market’s and you know you are serving your family the freshest produce available.
Everyone craves watermelon on the fourth, so pick out a ripe one and serve it ice cold.
Barbecue Brisket

• 4 to 5 pound beef brisket, trimmed
• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 3 tablespoons Worcestershire Sauce
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 tablespoon chili powder
• 2 tablespoon ground black pepper
• 1 tablespoon yellow mustard
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon cumin
• 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

Combine all ingredients and rub over the surface if the brisket. Wrap tightly in aluminum foil and place in a roasting pan. Refrigerate overnight allowing seasoning to marinate meat. Preheat oven to 300 degrees F. Poke a couple of holes in the foil. Cook for 4 hours. Remove from foil and let sit for about 10 minutes before carving. Slice thin.
Roasted Potatoes and Vegetables

• Cube potatoes as well as summer squash, eggplant, zucchini, sweet onion, tomatoes and mushrooms. Toss potatoes and vegetables in olive oil and season with fresh ground pepper, seasoned salt, and granulated garlic. Sprinkle dried rosemary or your favorite herb mixture over all and toss well to coat every piece. Pour into a perforated wok and place on the grill.  It is smart to hold back the tomatoes and mushrooms till the last ten minutes of grilling, as they do not need as much time to cook. Grill woks and grids are available at Sur la Table and Cook’s Warehouse.

Fourth of July Desserts

Desserts should be colorful on the 4th of July and guess what those colors should be? You guessed it, red, white and blue… It is very simple to achieve that goal and the following are two delicious recipes that everyone will love. The first dessert is an ice-cream cookie sandwich. This one is for the kids and the next is a delicious cheese cake with a nutty graham cracker crust and topped with strawberries, raspberries and blueberries.
Chocolate Cookie Ice Cream Sandwich

• 1 pint vanilla ice cream
• 1 pint strawberry ice cream
• 1 pint blueberry ice cream
• 1 box chocolate wafer cookies

The first tip for assembling the ice cream sandwich is to do it quickly. It can be made in stages over a few days, but each time it is out of the freezer, work quickly to avoid melting, and re-cover it tightly with plastic wrap before refreezing. Chocolate wafer cookies are perfect in size and shape for holding the confection together.
Start by softening the pint of strawberry ice cream. Depending on how thick you want the sandwich to be, determines how many tablespoons of ice cream to pile on the cookie: to repeat… work quickly. For a more stable sandwich, top the ice cream with another chocolate wafer. Roll the sides of each layer as you make them in red, white or blue non -perils, stars or jimmies. You can purchase these edible candies at Cake Art in Atlanta. Wrap in plastic and put in the freezer to harden. The next day or when the ice cream has hardened, repeat the process with the vanilla and then blueberry ice creams.

Fourth of July Cheesecake
Cut and place parchment paper in the bottom of a 9 inch spring form pan. Preheat the oven to 300 degrees. Easy to find the parchment  paper at Bed, Bath and Beyond.
 
Prepare the crust:

• 1 ½ C graham cracker crumbs
• 2 T sugar
• ¼ C finely chopped pecans
• 2 T flour
• 4 T melted butter
• Combine all ingredients and press crumbs into the bottom of the springform, edging the crust up the sides of the pan. Use the heel of your hand.

Filling

• 32 ozs. of cream cheese softened
• 1 ½ C sugar
• 4 large eggs
• 1 t. vanilla extract
• 1 C sour cream ( 8 oz. container)
• Beat the softened cream cheese on medium high for 2 minutes. Add sugar and beat for 4 additional minutes, continually scraping down the sides of the bowl. Incorporate eggs one at a time. Next add vanilla and sour cream. Mixture should be smooth with no lumps.
  Pour into spring form ,place in a baking tray with side, in case springform leaks and bake for 60 minutes until the middle ripples slightly. Remove from oven and let cake cool. Refrigerate for a minimum of 8 hours.

Fruit Topping

• 1 container raspberries
• 1 basket strawberries hulled
• 1 container blueberries
• 2 t blueberry or raspberry preserves
• Remove cake from refrigerator and spread 2 t preserves over top of cake. Do not remove spring form ring. Make your own design with blueberries and strawberries. Idea # 1: Place strawberries to make a five point star and fill middle with either blueberries or strawberries. Idea #2: Create a flag using blueberries as stars and rows of halved strawberries as stripes. Idea #3: Get creative!

Cold Summer Soups

You come home from a work feeling hot and sticky from the humidity and heat of the day and all you can think about is stepping in the shower, putting on some comfortable clothes and having a light cold dinner. What about a delicious cold soup. These recipes are quick and easy and fill the bill.
Visit one of the exciting Farmers Markets in your area of the city to get the freshest vegtables and fruits for these and all your recipes.
Tomato and Avocado Soup

• 1 lb. (about 4 tomatoes) tomatoes, chopped
• ¼ cup red onion, chopped
• ¼ cup seedless cucumber, chopped
• ¼ cup red bell pepper, chopped
• 1 clove garlic, chopped
• 2 T extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 T red wine vinegar
• 1 C water
• ¾ t salt
• ½ t cumin
• 1/8 t cayenne pepper
• 2 avocados, diced (about 2 cups)
• Combine all ingredients except avocado in a large bowl. Mash lightly with a potato masher, stir in 1 cup water, cover, and chill for at least 1 hour or up to 6. Stir in the avocado and serve immediately.

Cantaloupe Soup

• 1 lg., ripe cantaloupe
• 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
• 2 tbsp. lime juice
• Fresh mint sprigs
• 2 c. orange juice
• Remove seeds from melon and cube the pulp. Place pulp and cinnamon in the electric blender and puree. Combine orange and lime juices and stir into the puree. Chill and serve in chilled soup bowls or ½ of an avocado. Garnish with mint sprigs.

Fish in Papillote

If you have never cooked a piece of fish in paper, parchment or fata, or a brown bag or even in foil, then you are in for a treat as well as a new taste. This method is easy and its presentation unique.

En papillote is a method of cooking in which the food is put into a folded pouch or parcel and then baked or steamed. A parcel is typically made from folded parchment paper or fata paper, but other material such as a paper bag or aluminum foil can be used. The parcel holds in moisture to steam the food. Fata paper is a clear looking cellophane paper that can hold up to 400 degrees of heat.

The following is an additional delicious recipe for fish en papillote. Both recipes are similar and you can see that whatever combination of seafood you use is acceptable. Be creative and try different combos.

• One 4-ounce fresh red snapper filet, speckled trout, flounder or salmon
• 2 shrimp (21–25 count)(this is a medium size shrimp)
• 2 ounces jumbo lump crab meat
• 1 tomato slice
• large pat of butter
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• 2 fresh chives
• 12 leaves of basil

Use a piece of Fata paper 20 X 20 inches, brush with olive oil, and place in a small soup bowl to create a cup. Place a slice of tomato in the bottom of the paper cup. Top it with a small filet of fresh redfish (fold if necessary), the shrimp, and crabmeat. Add the  salt, pepper, and a few fresh chives and chervil leaves. Gather up the edges, twist, and secure them with a twist tie or a piece of string. Bake the paper pouch in a pre-heated 400ºF oven for about 15 minutes or until it’s hot all the way through. Remove the seafood package from the oven and serve it on a very hot plate. This will help the steam stay in the package on the way to the table. Grab a pair of scissors and cut the top off the paper, fold back, and enjoy.
You may also cook this dish in parchment paper  sealing it with  tight folds. If you choose Parchment paper cut the parchment into a large heart.
Fold the parchment in half over the fish. Beginning at the seam, make a small fold and press the crease. Make the next fold by folding the previous fold in half. Continue along the edges creating a continuing seam. When you get to the end, fold the last piece under the fish. Turn the fish over so the presentation side is facing up. Bake in a preheated over at 400 degrees for  fifteen minutes. The parchment  pouch should be puffed up and not leaking and beginning to brown slightly. Serve immediately.
 Start the meal with a cold soup. A cold tomato and avocado, soup which is always easy and quick to make is a great starter.. The fish is the star and  sides are stringbean and artichoke cassarole plus spears of potatoes roasted in the oven with rosemary and olive oil. Your guests go home with smiles on their faces.

Where you can find me

I am currently writing in a few places and plan on posting those articles on this blog. If you miss me in one place, you can find me in another. My current URL's are:
Examiner.com
http://www.examiner.com/x-27290-Buckhead-Cooking-Examiner

Examiner.com
http://www.examiner.com/x-47779-Sandy-Springs-Examiner

Examiner.com
http://www.examiner.com/x-55008-Seafood-Industry-Examiner

AssociatedContent.com
http://www.associatedcontent.com/user/772052/lynda_mahana.html

HBO Series TREME-Another Review

Last night I watched the third episode of the new HBO series Treme. My original objections were premature, I admit. Sadly, I must stay with my original negative feelings about the show but now for totally different reasons. If you have never lived in New Orleans and if you don’t know the culture of the city, you are missing the meaning of half the dialogue and to know and understand it, is what makes this series exciting.

The music is killer and when I heard A Certain Girl by Ernie K-doe, a song I grew up with, I got excited. To see Dr. John perform was great and even to watch the Mardi Gras Indians due their rap was interesting. If a producer of the show happens to read this, please let us hear some Benny Spellman, Clarence “Frogman” Henry, The Meters, “Who Shot the La La “ Morgan, some Irma Thomas and oh yes, much more Ernie K-doe!

The thing is…you have or had to have lived there. The New Orleans culture is so different than any place else: not to mention, and very important… the innuendo is being lost on anyone not from there, as well as the reference to songs, musicians, politicians, visuals. You must be aware of these things to fully understand what these people are going through and why this disaster has affected them in the manner in which they act and think. By the way, I did not miss the class distinction in the diatribe between Davis and his neighbors.

Excluding those who have an association with the city, in my opinion the storyline does not have enough action to keep a general viewer tuned in week after week. And with the addition of not having a clue what the characters are referring, to, TREME doesn’t have a shot.

I realize it was renewed for a second season after only one episode, which is unheard of. The numbers it pulled were huge after its first showing. I figure it was because every person who either lives there or who has had any association with the city, ever, is watching it….me included!

I have been wrong before. Maybe the music will be enough. Time will tell………

HBO Series TREME-Follow up Review

A couple of days ago I wrote a passionate but negative review of the new HBO series TREME. Since that time the feedback I have received did not agree at all with my opinions of the show. In fact I was referred to as an elitist, unfair and narrow minded. No matter how I have tried to justify my thinking, my detractors have been very vocal. In fact my own children, all now adults, all born in New Orleans made our weekly Friday night dinner quite lively, expounding their views on the show and telling me I was way off base!
Comments from readers stated everything from: I may have employed blacks, but certainly never lived among them, so how could I possibly understand their dialogue….to the Mardi Gras Indians are part of the fabric of New Orleans. I say go back and reread my review. At no time did I say anything condescending about the Indians or for that matter anything about the blacks, other than I did not understand the dialogue of the show during the first five minutes..
I was told to get off my high horse! The basic premise of my review was that the show was narrow in scope and that it did not portray other segments of the population that experienced the catastrophe of Katrina in many of the same ways. I think one of my comments sums it up, and I quote, “I think if there is anything to be agreed upon, it’s that the show affects people on a personal level, especially if they know New Orleans on a personal level.”
I cry “UNCLE!” I will give it another look see. After all, as I have been told numerous times, it was only the first. I can only hope the show producers portray the others I speak about at some point, so that its viewers can get a broader accounting of what the inhabitants of this great city went through and for some, are still.

New HBO Series-TREME--Very Dissapointing!

As a former New Orleanian, I really was anxious to watch it and looked forward to viewing with much anticipation. Unfortunately, unless the coming episodes change dramatically, I will not be watching it too many more times.
I understand the premise. I also understand that the main purpose of a TV show is to entertain and the focus of TREME is to show how the catastrophe of Katrina changed peoples’ lives showcasing a cross section of the population. In my opinion, the focus is way too narrow and in some cases focuses on some, way too much.
During the first five minutes of the episode, which normally would attract the viewers attention, to continue watching…..I couldn’t even understand what the actors were saying.
Although, a large majority of those affected during Katrina were black, it seems you are discounting the fact that there are thousands that lost everything in every racial and socio economic group across the board. Additionally, if I am not wrong, to me you are trying to portray only your definition of the middle classes through the entire theme. The character who ran a bar and is trying to resurrect his Mardi Gras Indian group, to give and take him back to some semblance of a normal life: the John Goodman character who really tells it like it is with no pretentiousness, , as they say in New Orleans” is where it’s at!” But the black musician, who may be a fine actor, is a boring and a useless character to the theme. How does a character like the disc jockey, which is a dope smoking, thief degenerate, garner such a prominent role?
Spike Lee only showed the degenerate of the New Orleans population. The New Orleans population is much more then you deem the middle class to be. What about the lawyer friend of mine in his forties who shot himself in his devastated home because after Katrina he had no more clients? How did his wife and children cope? Lots of stories like that. What about the men and women who started groups like the Horizon Initiative to work with big business and city officials to help build the city? What about the fact that that alcohol sales went through the roof for years after, cause so many couldn’t deal at all with losing everything.
A friend lived on one of the two million dollar streets in the city lost her house. How did people like these cope? Don’t you think those people should be represented in your story as well?
TREME is only one small area of the city. What a disservice you are doing to the city but most of all to your viewers to lead them to believe that what you are putting out there is what it is all about…is where it’s at……because it isn’t!

New Orleans Saints Fans

Today I received a great email from a very close friend in New Orleans. I am positive she would not mind if I shared her words with you. Just as it is so very hard to describe the culture of New Orleans to someone, it is just as hard to explain a New Orleans Saints fan. Her email is pretty right on!
Hi Lynda,
Tommy checks Facebook and showed me your menu for the game tomorrow. You and your guests will feast.

I have not heard one negative thing about this glorious ride that the Saints’ success has given New Orleans and all of the Saints fans. The games are so much fun and you hug and kiss all the people you sit with. You do high fives and jump and strut and yell. I don’t know how any people will be at work Monday.

One of my coworkers lives on Minnesota Ave in Kenner. A news team was knocking on doors to see if there were any Minnesota fans living on Minnesota Ave. Her neighbor said that could not find any.

It’s a great time! I think about my daddy and yours. I’m sure the Saints fans are marching in heaven!

Go Saints!

Love,
Joe Ann

Wednesdays with Mahjong

I look forward to Wednesdays. I go to one of four of my friends houses each Wednesday and I am assured of fun and laughter… friendship…and very good food!
I first began playing Mahjong in my twenties. The girls I played with were some of my closest friends and with their husbands and mine, often socialized on the weekends.
I have started playing again forty years later and I am enjoying it immensely. We start at eleven and end at three. We stop for lunch and all the girls are very good cooks. I would recommend this game to you no matter what your age and for those who live close, I would love to teach you how to play. I think you would love it.
Mahjong is a game for four players that originated in China. As explained by Wikipedia, the game was imported to the U.S.in the 1920s. The first mahjong sets sold in the U.S. were sold by Abercrombie & Fitch starting in 1920. It became a success in New York, and the owner of the company, Ezra Fitch, sent emissaries to Chinese villages to buy every set of mahjong they could find. Abercrombie & Fitch sold a total of 12,000 sets.
Also in 1920, Joseph Babcock published his book Rules of Mah-Jongg, also known as the "red book". This was the earliest version of mahjong known in America. Babcock had learned mahjong while living in China. Babcock's rules simplified the game to make it easier for Americans to take up, and his version was common through the mahjong fad of the 1920s. Later, when the 1920s fad died out, many of Babcock's simplifications were abandoned.
While mahjong was accepted by U.S. players of all ethnic backgrounds during the Babcock era, many consider the modern American version a Jewish game, as many American mahjong players are of Jewish descent. The National Mahjong League was founded by Jewish players and is considered a Jewish organization. In addition, players usually use the American game as a family-friendly social activity, not as gambling.
In recent years, a second organization has formed, the American Mah Jongg Association. The AMJA currently hosts tournaments all across North America, with their signature event being at the Trump Casino Resort in Atlantic City.