Home At Last! with Patty Gironda

My role on Superbowl Sunday is to ensure that the Superbowl kitchen runs smoothly and sends out timely dishes of proper Superbowl finger foods. The ridiculous rise in cost for a bag of chicken wings caused a change-up in our 2013 menu and a new tradition of "Superbowl Nachos" was born. This year I got busy early and put up my own "canned" jalepenos. I also take issue with many of the canned varieties of jalepenos at the grocery store. They, too, are expensive and packed in too much vinegar. Everything synced up with my new love of canning. What began as a way to preserve fresh fruits that weren't being used up fast enough has turned into a fun hobby! We just opened my first pint of fresh jalepenos and sampled the first slice. So, here's to a great Superbowl in New Orleans! and to my own Superbowl Nachos!  

My updated modern trifle using yogurt and whipped cream with homemade blueberries and salted almonds was a perfect beginning for 2013! Out with the old, in with the new!

The 2011 Coweta County Fair presented by our county's Kiwanis clubs has officially opened and visitors are pouring in. Corn dogs, smoked Kielbasa, cotton candy, and even banana pudding were a few of the fairs foods I spotted or enjoyed! Crowds were light Saturday afternoon but the beautiful weather promised a spectacular night under the midway lights!

I'm sitting here about to enjoy a glass of Pinot Noir-staring at a photo from last night's dinner. It evokes everything I love about Louisiana cooking and triggers many happy food memories from my life in New Orleans. This particular recipe triggers memories of a favorite restaurant in the late 70's-early 80's, The River Bend Restaurant. It sat almost at the corner of Carrollton and St. Charles Avenues and offered really wonderful Italian-inspired dishes using local ingredients! One of my favorites was the crisp lightly-breaded calamari with a wonderful dipping sauce of butter, lemon and plenty of garlic! The pasta dishes were creamy and well-balanced like my crawfish pasta picture featured here! I made this pasta in the most traditional NOLA fashion! Olive oil, butter, cream, freshly-squeezed lemon juice, garlic and plenty of plump Beaudreaux crawfish! I blended a young asiago cheese with an aged parmesan for a sinfully satisfying pasta experience! This easy ...

I am often asked to exchange links and very seldom find reasons to respond. But yesterday I received a request to download a free trial of SnapIt and my curiosity got the better of me. I regularly use my PrintScreen function  but this software promised features that would save some tedious steps. . . if it work - as described.  So I gave it a shot! I am loving the ease of the tool-can only imagine how much fun I am going to have with it! My brain is racing imagining all the applications where this will be extremely time-saving and productive tool. My Coweta County Fair photo was snapped right from the county website. I didn't check but I am fairly certain it was a flash file.  I saved the screen shot as a jpeg file-inserted the jpeg in the timeline of my editor for our local county television show. (INFOCoweta).  I was pleased that I was able to accomplish both tasks quickly using the same fi...

About five years ago we taped an episode of Home At Last! at Villa La Grotta in San Guistino Valdarno in the heart of Tuscany! Our friends made a beautiful stuffed turkey breast with Mortadella and Provolone Cheese. The results were georgeous and delicious. Claudia also created roasted potatoes with olive oil and they serve as the inspiration behind our roasted breakfast potatoes that are on the menu this weekend at Casa Bella Bed and Breakfast . I've created these for many years now but made them my own with the addition of a crunchy bread crumb made from our leftover breads and my own seasoning blend. They are delicately topped with a little Asiago cheese. Biscuit and Bread Crumbs Homemade Seasoning Blend Potatoes Tossed with Olive Oil and Kosher Salt

Today's taping of Home At Last! showcased one of Ron's favorite chicken dishes. Mediterranean Chicken with Grapes, or Chicken Veronique as it is sometimes called. Preferring red grapes to green, and globe reds to seedless red-I have really made it my own with the addition of fig balsamic. I shared my easy homemade Fig Balsamic recipe, 3 cups of 15-year old Balsamic vinegar and 1 cup canned figs. I cooked figs over the summer, added a scant 1/4 cup of sugar, before processing the jars in boiling water for about 1o minutes. They were so perfect for the recipe and made an excellent fig balsamic. The mixture reduced on a low heat for about thirty minutes, creating a rich, almost-syrup like balsamic. Making chicken stock from leftover trimmings of skinless chicken is another easy way to recycle in the kitchen. I made a bouquet garni bag of herbs. . .bay leaf, sage, and celery leaf. Into a large pot of water, I added chunks of chicken breast, carrot and celery chunks, fresh gar...

When asked by Santa this year what I wanted for Christmas, I was at a complete loss. What I truly wanted; one more Christmas with my friend Char, I knew I would never receive. I found myself feeling sorry for myself for a few days. . . missing her FRIENDSHIP! her SENSE OF HUMOR and her CHILDLIKE WONDER at this special time of the year. Finally out of my funk, I told my hubbie, I KNEW WHAT I WANTED. We decided to go shopping together and made a night of it. We drove along . . .reminiscing about our favorite Christmases with family and friends and finally making plans for the next two days of celebration. We planned our Christmas dinner -one that we would cook together. We found a few pounds of chestnuts to roast in honor of Ron's family tradition of chestnuts at the holidays. I pulled out a small, pretty little fake tree and a some favorite decorations; including one from Char and suddenly I was filled with the Christmas spirit. We enjoyed a Christmas Eve breakfas...

Don't let the pretty blue color fool you. . .this sauce packs plenty of heat!  This has proved to be so popular with my hubby, he's making me dinner, these days.  Roasted Chicken Wings with Fruit-flavored hot sauce, crispy fresh celery with my own recipe for Blue Cheese Dressing!  So, as the holidays loom, Ron and I will marinate our cornish hens in a milder version of this blueberry sauce and offer the bottle to those at the table who can handle the heat! Happy Thanksgiving, y'all!

It's great to be King. . . I imagine. This is my son, Shane, and he makes really great pizza. By the way, he is a "self-proclaimed" king. . .In his defense, his Pizza Marguerita is really delicious and my favorite - which in my book qualifies him to be king. I have discovered conflicting accounts of how this pizza came into being but most of the stories include kings and queens so we are going to stick with what makes the story work. In one version, King Ferdinand was said to dress up as a commoner to enjoy a delicious slice of this Neopolitan delight-banned by his queen. In another version, a baker created the pizza in celebration of Queen Margherita's visit to Naples. Thankfully, the popularity of this pizza has spread through-out Italy and is available in just about every pizzaria.