lorraine scramble and cake

Brunch with my family:

Lorraine Scramble:

• Eggs, Spinach, Bacon, Feta, Basil (Optional), Half & Half, Salt & Pepper
• Blanch the spinach (handful per serving), shock with cold water, and squeeze all the water out as best you can. Cook the bacon nice and crisp (one half strip per serving), and drain the fat on kitchen towels. Mix your eggs (2 or more per person) with a bit of half and half, stir together so that all of the yolks are broken. Chop the cooked and pressed spinach, crumble the bacon, and crumble a lump of feta. Heat a small amount of olive oil in a large frying pan, add the eggs, and gently scrape the bottom frequently (every ten or twenty seconds) and thoroughly, picking up large sheets of scrambled eggs. When the eggs are nearly done, add the spinach and bacon, then right before serving add the feta. Put a little chiffonade'd basil on top when serving if you're feeling fancy.

Grandma Reshore's Church Supper Pound Cake:

• The cake: 2 sticks of butter (originally "good quality margarine"), 2 cups cake flour, 2 cups sugar, 5 eggs, 1 tsp vanilla and 1 tsp salt.
• Cream the butter and sugar together. Add eggs, then flour. The original recipe calls for adding one egg, then some flour, and so on, but it's probably not necessary. Add the vanilla and salt, mix in. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan, and bake at 325 degrees for 45 minutes to one hour, testing with toothpicks.
• Icing: Mix half a can of frozen lemonade with some powdered sugar (1 cup? The recipe doesn't say.) and pour over the cake when cooled. Use as much as seems like a good idea.
• This cake is actually really good. I'm not into pound cake, and would probably never make it, but now, well... I might!

more

Grilled sausage, arugula salad with green garlic & lemon vinaigrette, toasted pan au levain. Yum.

easy stuff and an original recipe

Roasted Carrots with Chile and Olive Oil

• Take a bunch of carrots, drizzle with olive oil, and roast at 425 until they reach your desired doneness. (10-20 min)

Sauteed Spinach with Green Garlic

• Good spinach, washed extremely well, sauteed with one stalk of minced green garlic.

Fried Farm Egg on Rye

• Duh.

Apple, Golden Carrot, and Rutabaga soup with Smoked Duck sausage.

• You'll need: Carrots, Apples, Rutabagas, Sausages, Garlic, an Onion, Cream or Half and Half, White Wine (Optional)

• Peel and dice roughly one large carrot (4 small carrots?), two medium apples, one medium rutabaga (4 very small rutabagas?), and one medium onion. Chop your sausages (I used two, and you could use any kind of smoked sausage that you like, although Andouille would probably overpower the soup) into whatever size chunks you think you'll like - I did it in a 1/2" dice. Mince a single clove of garlic.
• Brown the chopped sausage in a big pot with some olive oil, then remove and add your onion. Use a little water or white wine to deglaze if things start sticking too much. When the onion is translucent, add one clove of minced or smashed or whole garlic and then your diced vegetables. Adding some butter in here couldn't hurt, but it isn't required. Sautee the vegetables for around ten minutes over medium-low heat, then deglaze with some wine if you have it, add a bay leaf, and add three or four cups of water or stock. Let this cook roughly 40 minutes, add some thyme and salt, and puree. Stir in a glug or two or half and half or cream, add your browned sausage, and stir until heated through. 
• Serve with freshly ground pepper, some nice bread, and a salad if you feel like it. This recipe is a prime candidate for doubling, as it makes between three and four servings.