English: Breakfast with bread, butter, jam, fried eggs, bacon, tomato, orange juice and coffee. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

There at the white with red stripe enamel table and red leatherette chairs, our granddaddy sat with us, playing Checkers or Blackjack, never for money and always for fun. Daddy Evans always looked happy.

When I was around nine or 10 years old, he and I were playing Blackjack at that kitchen table one time. I held 19 in my hand. Still, just for fun, I asked for another card, taking that wild child-like chance, to reach the magic number, 21. That time, Daddy Evans dealt out an Ace. We both laughed and smiled.

The little General Electric refrigerator sat behind us, cooling things, like milk in real glass bottles, Meadow Gold, pure, and cold, the way glass bottles keep milk so deliciously cold. That little refrigerator had legs and a rectangular body and something round on top.

It was shaped liked a person, holding many good things, like the milk in glass bottles and real butter. Our granddad liked real butter, not margarine.

Mama Evans, Daddy Evans’ wife (our paternal grandmother) made real homemade bread, in a long oval-shaped wooden bowl. That bowl is still in our family.

It was so warm and inviting, smelling that bread baking. Our favorite time was when the bread was just out of the oven, with the butter softened already, at room temperature. That warm homemade bread with butter melting…just imagine it. It’s almost too good to be true, isn’t it?

But we put the soft real butter on Mama Evans’ homemade bread, just the right texture. Mama Evans cut the bread in thick slices, but not too thick, for the real butter. Such a completely wonderful memory, that warm bread, just out of the oven, with melting butter.

You could sit at the white enamel table with the red stripe and see out the kitchen window, where glorious pine trees stood and the roses Mama Evans loved, in so many colors…in a round garden, when it was spring or summer, years later. I remember the holidays most, when we went to our grandparents’ for Thanksgiving or Christmas. Mama and Daddy Evans loved the wild outdoors and the cultivated outdoors too. Daddy Evans built a miniature log cabin for Mama Evans, near their place. It was our place, too. They loved us. The little cabin was so delicate and pretty and subtle, like our Mama Evans, but strong and sturdy too, like our Daddy Evans.

Mama and Daddy Evans’ home, in Oxford, Alabama, was so wonderful, with knotted-pine paneling in the den and one pale green bedroom, with an eggshell-white, hand-crocheted, bedspread. The Singer sewing machine sat in the pastel yellow bedroom. The sewing machine wasn’t electric. Mama Evans used her foot to make it go. One time, Mama Evans made me a pink corduroy jumper and matching blouse. Another time, she made homemade cookies, when it was my turn to bring cookies to my Brownies (before Girl Scouts) meeting.

Every morning at our grandparent’s home, coffee perked from a shiny silver-like electric coffee pot, so elegant…with a long, curved spout, the aroma of coffee filling the rooms, which had real wood floors. Mama Evans collected elegant teacups.

Daddy Evans liked creamer in his coffee, later. We took turns spooning the powdery creamer into Daddy Evans’ hot coffee, watching that creamer dissolve, into peace and happiness and wild contentment.

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Magpie (Photo credit: Sergey Yeliseev)

Yesterday I bragged about that delicious Edward’s Lemon Meringue Pie, but when I looked that pie up today, the Edward’s pie I found on-line had a graham cracker crust. Yesterday’s pie had a flaky flour baked crust. So now I don’t know what brand of pie I ate, but it was very, very good.

Let’s not get bogged down in too many details, because lots of us like or don’t like different desserts. I just wanted you to find a good slice of Lemon Meringue Pie if you’re okay with it. Personally, I prefer baked flour kinds of crusts over graham cracker crusts. If it was possible, I would to go the store and buy bags of crusts for snacks. Especially fruit cobbler crusts with all the juicy fruit flavors and don’t you just love cobblers? Maybe not, but summer is here and there will be cobblers and pies for events and whatever.

Pies go way back, according to Food Timeline. There’s the lemon curd filling in the baked crust with the light fluffy meringue topping. The Food Timeline website said the name “pie” may have come from the word “Magpie,” which is a kind of bird that hoards a variety of things and chatters, too.

So there I was thinking about Lemon Meringue Pie when, of all things, Magpies came up. Of course, I looked up “Magpies” and learned they are not always popular birds. All sorts of bad things can be said about Magpies the birds. Magpies are opportunistic and chatter-y and some say arrogant. (One church-going man just yesterday called me a “troublemaker,” so maybe I’m a Magpie to him. I do have Magpie moments, for sure).

Anyway, I was starting to have a real bad dip in my self-esteem. It’s not like I sit around thinking about how wonderful I am. If I do slip up and think maybe my piggy toes are okay, then it’s time to feel guilty and get ready for a smack-down. Even Jesus wouldn’t let people call Him good and so none of that. It’s too risky.

So after I scavenged around to learn more about those iffy Magpies, I learned a few good things (thank goodness!) from a website by Claire Thomas, a wildlife adviser from across the pond at http://www.repb.org.uk. Ms. Thomas pointed out that while Magpies do eat all sorts of foods (even roadkill) wherever they find food and they do raucously chatter and chat arrogantly sometimes, they are also quite versatile and bold and adaptable, capable of serving as scavengers and scavengers clean up, don’t they? Nobody else sitting there was going to clean up that church baby’s poopy diaper, were they?

Ms. Thomas also noted that Magpies can be quirky and quirky doesn’t have to be bad , does it? Maybe quirky means we get to Hula-Hoop in the K-mart parking lot once in a while.

Most importantly, over where she lives in the United Kingdom, Ms. Thomas wrote that Magpies can be seen sitting atop the heads of cattle or sheep, where the black and white birds eat the pesky, even life-threatening, maggots and insects off the heads of the sheep and cattle. The gentle animals, the wildlife adviser said, have nothing to fear from the Magpie. They get obliviously protected while the Magpie enjoys a tasty snack.

Everybody knows a well-intentioned woman or a well-intentioned mom would do the same if she has to, so she and her family can live. Don’t mess with a Magpie and don’t criticize a woman with good intentions or a heart hangin’ on. Just call her Maggie and keep your name-calling to yourself.

Sometimes a troubled but God-fearing woman does what she has to do to get by and eats the food she has to eat and sometimes she does without and that’s all okay, as long as she doesn’t act like Jezebel or steal another woman’s man while he’s out actin’ stupid. So leave a God-fearing, striving woman alone if you can’t or won’t help her. Just leave her alone and let her live and take care of her children and herself. Back off, Buster!

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English: Picture of Fazoli’s sign. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A recent visit to Fazoli’s in Cleveland, Tennessee was a pleasant paradox of fast fine dining.

It felt like eating in an expensive uptown restaurant and from the abundant family table at the same time.

The service was impeccable. A professional but friendly female associate asked me for my order, which was two slices of pepperoni pizza and a drink from the Freestyle Coca-Cola machine. There’s a lot of freedom with the eating experience at Fazoli’s, since you can mix your own soft drinks and try variations of pasta dishes ranging from pizza to baked ziti.

Other delectable menu items that let Fazoli’s “say it with pasta” range from chicken broccoli penne to Cherry Chicken salad. For dessert, there are flavors of Italian lemon ice, turtle cheesecake and more. The chocolate layer cake looked moist, dense and decadent.

That day, what I noticed most about my delicious pizza was the incredible crust–possibly one of the best pizza crusts I’ve ever tried. Somehow, Fazoli’s managed to create a strikingly good pizza difference with an upper crust that was light and fluffy and a bottom crust that was lightly crispy and golden. The pepperoni itself was deliciously meaty and salty, like cured meats are, but it was not too greasy.

When I ordered lunch that day, the lady associate went out of her way to make things better. She gave me a number for my order and offered me a warm garlic bread stick while I waited until she brought the food to the table. She wrapped the bread in paper and gave it to me with encouraging words. (I took two of the bread sticks home and warmed one up for breakfast this morning).

That day at Fazoli’s, I sat down with a copy of the Chattanooga Times Free Press in a relaxed atmosphere where I found good food that was Italian, fast and fresh, with romantic music in the background.

Stop by Fazoli’s for something familiar and something different all at once. Bring a friend or your family for a good and wholesome night out.

At Fazoli’s, even the red and white take-out cups encourage us to eat well and get along too. As one bright message suggested, one simple caring question like “do you still like the color blue?” might lead to a peaceful meal. It’s a start.

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A stainless steel gravy boat. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

White gravy, ladled generously on top of biscuits, skillet-fried steak, chicken or pork chops (or take your pick of ideas) is tasty, easy-to-prepare food.

We should (that word!) really be eating green salad or broccoli, something healthy, for the main meal. We should concentrate on water and vegetables like the prophet Daniel and good gracious to anybody who can do that all the time!

White gravy is one version of bechamel sauce. According to foodtimeline.org, basic bechamel sauce was named after a charming politician who was a smooth operator.

The food history website lists entire books about sauces, including “The Sauce Bible: Guide to the Saucier’s Craft” by David Paul Larousse.

Here in the South, we call this one sauce “white gravy” and it’s delicious.

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English: Raw material for coleslaw This crop of white cabbage is being harvested. Looking seaward from the sea wall. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Over at Cameron’s Restaurant in Cleveland, Tennessee you can find food your mama warmed up for you with love and light or maybe duty and distraction, but that’s okay.

There are so many dishes to choose from, everything from salad and strawberries to butterfly shrimp and “Cleveland’s Biggest Biscuit,” so don’t worry about leavin’ hungry.

But if you go to Cameron’s on a Friday night, you might leave crazy if you don’t try the deep-fried catfish and the coleslaw. Make sure you let the sweet milk from the coleslaw run underneath the crispy catfish and put one bite on the fork so the flavors mix together. You’ll get the perfect-to-the-teeth texture and the outlandishly good sugary-salty taste to your distinguishing palate.

Cameron’s, located at 140 Dooley Street, opens the Catfish Bar Fridays, 5-8 p.m. The restaurant, decorated hodgepodge and friendly as a good family reunion, starts early Monday through Sunday. The doors open at 5 a.m. every single day except Sunday, then try 7 a.m. Weekdays the doors are open until 2 p.m., Saturdays ’til 1 p.m. and Sunday until 2 p.m.

People can watch television, play the lottery or listen to the jukebox.

Here’s a side from foodtimeline.org.  Many historians agree that the Dutch brought coleslaw to America when they brought over cabbage seeds and settled in the New Netherlands which became New York State. The Dutch grew cabbages along the Hudson River and when somebody thought up mayonnaise in the 18th century, we had the ingredients for coleslaw, which literally means “cabbage salad” from the Dutch word “koolsla.” The Dutch added mayo and spices and maybe some vinegar and served the side dish cold.

It’s not easy to find a real good dish of coleslaw, but I found one at Cameron’s one Friday night in February to go with that catfish and it’s all you can eat.

Here in the South, we especially like coleslaw with barbecue or catfish like the deep-fried treat at Cameron’s. Stop on over at Cameron’s. Carry-outs are welcome. They gave me extra Sprite with ice to go.

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A bowl of tomato soup (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The vegetable soup needed a little something.  What about a little sugar?  It worked.  That soup was good enough for Goldilocks. 

If you like soup and like to cook, there are so many places to find soup recipes like verygoodrecipes.com, mealplanningmom.wordpress.com or adollopofcream.blogspot.com and many more. Also you can open good cans of soup from the grocery store.

If it’s okay, try clear wine glasses. They have them at the Dollar Tree.   Ice cubes are pretty in the glass and the black tea and orange pekoe tea with that lovely mahogany color.  The warm soup in a pretty bowl.  There’s a whole set of dishes with a two elegant blue stripes, or another color, for a really good price at the Habitat ReStore.

It’s not really that inviting to eat alone but it helps to put the soup in the lovely bowl with the lovely tea.  A shaft of light may fall onto the missing chair place.

You may notice the green beans and carrots and peas and potatoes all delicate in just the right tomato-tasting broth.  Sometimes the hunger really goes away. 

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