Sunday, March 21, 2010

Okra

While we are on the subject of love/hate relationships (see my red clay post!) I will share my relationship with okra. I adore fried okra, crispy and golden and green. I adore pickled okra- the way those little white seeds pop and squeak when you bite them. I adore okra fritters.

I think boiled okra is one of the nastiest concoctions that anyone ever considered eating. Stewed okra and tomatoes? Nope. Okra in gumbo? It is a necessity for good gumbo flavor and thickness, but I pick it out. How backwards is that? I put it in the gumbo and vegetable soup all the time for flavor and as a thickener, but won't actually chew it up and eat it. It is purely a textural issue that just isn't there with fried and pickled pods. It's the slime factor- the technical word is mucilage. Mucilage is defined as "mucus like". No thanks.

I just can't get past it.

I also like to grow okra, they are neat looking plants with beautiful flowers. They are a member of the hibiscus family- hibiscus esculentus if you are into Latin, which I am. Thanks to you Mrs. Kendrick, my 8th grade Latin teacher- I didn't appreciate you then as we were conjugating verbs in Latin, but I pay homage to you now. Vita Somnium!




Okra is easy to grow in the hot humid southern summers and once it is established it doesn't need much help from you. Very satisfying. When the okra patch is in full swing you will have okra running out of your ears. I make these fritters when I have pickled enough.

Back to the fried okra. I adore eating it- but I hate making it. It makes such a huge mess you wonder if it is even worth the trouble. It is, but when I am in a hurry or just not in the mood to clean the kitchen all night, I make these okra fritters.
If you don't have any okra they are also good with frozen or drained canned corn. If you don't have any corn, then shame on you, just make them with the onions. If you don't even have an onion, just forget it and have frozen pizza. These are homey and country but company loves them too. If I need "comfort food" I make these with a pot of butterbeans or blackeyed peas. Put the fritters on a  plate, ladle over a helping of butterbeans or peas and top with a heaping spoonful of chow-chow.

Okra Fritters


  • 3/4 cup corn meal
  • 1/4 cup flour
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1tsp baking powder
  • 1 egg
  • 1/2 tsp pepper
  • 3/4 - 1 cup buttermilk, depending on how you are cooking them
  • 1/4 cup chopped onions
  • 2 cups somewhat thinly sliced fresh okra- (the frozen kind is generally cut too thick for these to turn out right)

  1. Combine everything but the onions and okra  in a bowl.
  2. Add okra and onions, stir to combine.
  3. If you want them to be thicker and more "frittery"- like hush puppies- mix your batter thick (less buttermilk) and heat about 1/2" of oil in a skillet and drop by 1/4 cup measures in to the hot oil.
  4. If you want them to be flatter then mix your batter more thinly (more buttermilk)and cook like pancakes in just a bit of fat until the edges get nice and crunchy/crispy. This is my favorite way, especially if you use bacon fat to cook them!

Thursday, March 18, 2010

Garden Update March 18th, 2010

From Garden Update March 18th, 2010

Red Clay. Excellent water retainer and full of nutrients. Some plants that need good drainage do not grow well in clay. Sticks to and builds up on shoes, shovels and tires. Stains everything it touches. I have a love/hate relationship with red clay. It is awful and wonderful and will always remind me of home.

From Garden Update March 18th, 2010

Good Dirt. Tons of organic matter. Drains quickly and doesn't hold moisture for very long.

From Garden Update March 18th, 2010

Nanny berries. (Goat Manure) Very rich in nutrients, won't burn plants like chicken manure can.

From Garden Update March 18th, 2010

Red Clay + Good Dirt + Nanny Berries + Tiller = Plant Bliss.

From Garden Update March 18th, 2010

Start of the new perennial bed. Iris, heirloom and English roses, phlox, several salvias and agastaches and all sorts of other lovelies.

From Garden Update March 18th, 2010

Another view of the perennial bed. Please avert your eyes from the propane tank and the well pump with the gradoo blanket tucked around it so it won't freeze. They will be camouflaged in short order.

From Garden Update March 18th, 2010

Start of the mint bed- cultivar "Kentucky Colonel". It isn't the strongest grower, but it is sweet and smooth, not coarse or funky like some mints can be. I need lots for mint tea and mint limeade.

From Garden Update March 18th, 2010

I do not generally like growing traditional rows of vegetables- I prefer the kitchen garden with raised beds of flowers and herbs and veggies all jumbled together. We are going to grow a few rows because the order they bring to our universe makes Kevin happy. If I am going to put up (can/preserve) tomatoes and green beans (like I hope to do) I also need more than my raised beds will produce. These rows will be for squash, green beans, tomatoes and melons. Oh, and okra! We all love pickled okra. And Okra Fritters. Man, do I love okra fritters. Most of the yumminess of fried okra without the mess.

From Garden Update March 18th, 2010

Here is our pile of Good Dirt with Pearl standing guard. She likes this vantage point and is going to be sad and confused when it is all gone.

From Garden Update March 18th, 2010

Thank heavens for this tractor with the bucket for moving the Good Dirt- it has saved many backs. Thank you, Kubota tractor!

From Garden Update March 18th, 2010

This uninspiring little sticks are blueberries and blackberries. The angle of the photo makes them look very close together, but they are actually fairly spread out. I can almost taste those fresh blueberries now! We planted 2 each of Alapaha, Brightwell, Powderblue, Climax and Tiftblue so that we would could have berries ripening over a longer period of time- we can also decide which are our favorites and plant more of those.

From Garden Update March 18th, 2010

Asparagus "Jersey Knight". We planted two asparagus beds last year- 25 plants in each bed. They need a few years before you can really start harvesting them- the root systems need to build up so they can produce over many years.

From Garden Update March 18th, 2010

Asparagus "Purple Passion". It is taking some serious willpower on my part not to harvest these. I love Spring.

Bad Dog Pearl.

Poor Pearl. She thinks her name is Bad Dog Pearl. Every time I go out the door, I find something else she has destroyed. If I have ever touched it, she thinks it is hers, my gloves in particular. Even if I have pruned a branch and thrown it on the ground she creeps in and grabs it and retires to a comfortable spot to chew on it. In the rare case that I actually catch her doing something naughty, I admonish her with a "Bad Dog". If I don't actually catch her I count to ten, tell myself she is a puppy and that she will grow out of it.

I have been gardening, and not too long ago I planted potatoes in one of our raised beds. Yesterday, I was adding a new perennial bed in front of the raised bed garden and saw THIS.

From Bad Dog Pearl!

My potato bed. With one corner DUG UP. I called Pearl to confront her, because Daisy is not generally a digger.

From Bad Dog Pearl!

Still ran Dingo--Yellow-Dog Dingo--always hungry, grinning like a rat-trap, never getting nearer, never getting farther,--ran after Kangaroo. Note the very muddy forelegs. Hmmm. Suspicious.

From Bad Dog Pearl!

Me: "Pearl, did you do this?"
Pearl: "No way!! How could you accuse me of such a thing?"

From Bad Dog Pearl!

Me: "Are you sure?" "Your paws are very muddy."
Pearl: "I promise! I am wounded by your lack of trust in me."

From Bad Dog Pearl!

Pearl: "I think Daisy did it!"

From Bad Dog Pearl!

Daisy: My legs are pristinely clean. I cannot say they are spotless. I would never stoop to digging in the dirt. 'Humph!' Just 'Humph!' and no more. Like the camel.

Pearl: "DAISY did it- I am sure of it!"

From Bad Dog Pearl!

(No caption needed here)**

From Bad Dog Pearl!

Me: (looking at Pearl, eyebrow raised, hands on hips.)"Wellll?"
Pearl: "Umm, maybe I did dig just a little.....but the dirt was so soft and wonderfully friable!"

From Bad Dog Pearl!

Me: (still looking at Pearl, eyebrow raised, hands on hips.)
Pearl: "I am really, really, terribly sorry." "Honest."

From Bad Dog Pearl!

Pearl: "Am I forgiven now?"
Me: (exasperated sigh, smile) "Good dog, Pearl."

** No animals were harmed in the making of this post. Believe it or not, this is their daily ritual of chasing each other back and forth across the yard "playfighting" and teeth rarely make contact.

Sunday, March 14, 2010

We have to stand a little rain

The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band sings "If we're ever gonna see a rainbow, we have to stand a little rain."

We have stood about 5 inches of rain in the last 3 days, so I guess we get to see a double rainbow! It had been raining off and on most of the day. It was getting late and the sky turned an odd color- I went outside and saw a really vibrant double rainbow. The second one was starting to fade before I could find my camera, then realize I didn't have my card in it, go find the card and then finally take the photo. Such is my life lately!

Bear Hunt 2007

This is an old post- not sure how it didn't get published....


March 28, 2007

We had a fantastic day today!

Part of Kevin's job includes monitoring the black bear population in his area and he invited us to go with him and some of the other biologists on a "bear hunt". What we found was something I never thought I would see in the wild!

This particular female bear that they were watching was located on a Wildlife Management Area near Warner Robins and Perry, GA. She had been previously fitted with a radio collar and she was due to have cubs this year. Her signal had been in one place for some time, which indicated that she had probably had her cubs, so we went in with the telemetry equipment and followed the signal until the mother bear was spotted in a heavy thicket. Black bears are not as aggressive as grizzly bears and tend to leave the area when humans approach. She moved away from the immediate area and we were able to go in and discovered two cubs.

They were both females, and they still had milk on their mouths from nursing. We were able to inspect the cubs, assign them numbers and weigh them. Both Isabelle and Rosemary were able to hold one; they wore gloves to prevent human scent from getting onto the cubs. They were about 4 weeks old and one had just opened it’s eyes, the second one had not. They weighed about 3 pounds each and reminded me of large puppies, except their toes and claws were very prominent and seemed too big for their little bodies. I could have stayed for a long time and watched them snuffling around, but we left quickly so that the mother bear would come back.


























We don't get snow very often, and when we do we take lots of pictures. Here are a few of ours. Here is the house.... Pearl loved it!





 The slide sculpture at the Rock Ranch.....
And the chicken house- all the chickens stayed inside- they wanted nothing to do with it!