Lazy W Marie

Carpeing all the diems in semi-rural Oklahoma...xoxo

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Chicken Caesar Po’ Boys and a Glitzy Grimy Cafe

   Okay you guys, last night our supper was another Nawlins-inspired recipe, something (sort of) healthy and high in protein so we could feel better about polishing off those Pecan Pralines. YUM. This meal was neither complicated nor terribly original, not really even Cajun, but for Handsome and me it will always evoke good memories of a special meal in our favorite city.

   The place where we grabbed this meal is called Angeli’s on Decatur. Like most spots in the Quarter, it is very, very old. It boasts exposed beams and peeling paint, happily chaotic gallery walls made up of mostly Mardi Gras images, and over-sized mirrors. Late each evening, one plainly painted wall in the dining room is the screen for playing old projected movies. How cool is that? But my favorite part is what hangs from the ceiling…

   Multiple disco balls and star shaped, glittered lanterns strung up in constellations all over the room deny the age and shabbiness of the cafe. This much careless, happy contrast pleases me deep in my belly, and I plan to copy it pronto, Tonto.
   Okay, here is the food… Handsome ate his in Po’ Boy form; I ate mine as a breadless salad; and soon we both pushed away our plates, stuffed. But not too stuffed for another Praline. Duh.
This is a recipe approximation… All you do is…
  • Season and grill some boneless-skinless chicken breasts then chop them into bite sized pieces…
  • Then in a large skillet, heat up some olive oil for re-warming the chicken I had grilled mine earlier in the day and cooled them, to avoid the heat of the evening…
  • Along with the chopped chicken, add to the skillet a third of a bottle of Caesar salad dressing and stir it all up, heat it through, etc. This worried me at first but it doesn’t burn at all. And it smelled delish, baby. The aroma drew Handsome in from the green room during an episode of Storage Wars. This is a big deal, you guys.
  • Split, butter, and toast a simple French bread loaf. Layer it with ribbons of cold romaine lettuce and then top with the hot, dressed chopped chicken. I added to my salad a handful of cherry tomatoes from our garden! No extra salad dressing needed, because the chicken was so moist and flavorful.
  • We also ended up adding Parmesan cheese to our respective plates, the super classy kind that comes in a green plastic can. Because we are very high falootin folks.
   That’s it! We loved this even more than the original and will end up adding it to the main menu rotation around here. I’m excited about having a satisfying, nourishing meal that has this kind of emotional value, you know?
   What are you cooking this week? What memories does it evoke?
“Memory is always faulty. Emotions are always true.” ~Anonymous
Gently Wrap and Preserve Your Best Emotions
xoxoxo  

New Orleans Style Pecan Pralines

   After any trip to an unusual place, but especially after every trip to New Orleans, I come home full of cravings and ideas and this insatiable desire to adapt those things to my own to my home. Or my home to that town, or whatever. The urge covers everything from recipes to decorating ideas and (of course) gardening. Once in a while I get lucky and discover some foreign treasure that both Handsome and I would like to enjoy again, as is the case with Pecan Pralines.

   Last week in New Orleans, while strolling somewhere between downtown and the French Quarter, we followed our noses past the raw sewage (an unfortunate fact of life in some parts) and into a heavenly cloud of butter and sugar and toasted pecans and other wonderful fragrances. We cruised a glass front case that had been stocked with every imaginable variation of praline possibly known to man. We watched someone making the pralines fresh. And then we sampled tiny little crumbs offered by a temptress in a cotton apron, both of us staidly acting as if we still might not actually buy anything.

L O L

   So anyway, ten minutes and eighteen dollars later we emerged from the store with a box full of various candies, sealed with a pretty little foil sticker. I may or may not have felt panicky over the long walk back to the hotel. Will they melt in the box? What if we get mugged? I feel faint, I think my blood sugar is low. We better stop and eat all of these right now, just in case of all that. I definitely said most of this out loud.


   I am fairly certain my husband took a deeper breath than he actually needed, and he purposefully did not make eye contact with me.


   We each ate one praline as we walked through the skinny, bricked streets lined with book stores and art galleries. None of the other pralines melted. We certainly did not get mugged. And my blood sugar has not been low once since that heavenly day. That is how powerfully sweet these things are.

   I was shocked and delighted that Handsome liked this delicacy enough to want more. So when we got home I suggested he look up some recipes, and within a few minutes we had agreed on the first one to try. You can find it by clicking on this link.  It is perfect. PERFECT. I do not need to try any more.

   

   If you own a candy thermometer; if you can gather six basic pantry supplies; and if you have half an hour to spend in the kitchen then another half an hour to let these firm up, then you too can have New Orleans style Pecan Pralines. I pinky promise you this. I am not really known for my candy making skills, but I must say that this was super easy. It was even easier than making cookies, and much faster. Go figure, since it hails from the Big Easy, right?

   The photo above was taken immediately after I spooned the hot mixture onto waxed paper. The pralines look extra dark, almost like chocolate no-bake cookies, but that changes.

   A couple of hours later they were sturdy, flat bottomed, and that believable golden pecan color that makes me miss my Grandma Stubbs.
   As I write this, the time is 2:46 p.m. I have already eaten two pralines since lunchtime, and my blood sugar levels would probably give a hummingbird the shakes. That weird but wonderful sensation is the only thing ensuring that my husband will have pralines to eat when he gets home from the Commish. It also means I will never be making this recipe while he is out of town, because basically I don’t trust myself.
   More Nawlins stories and inspiration to come, I just had to share this with you guys real quick.

Eat dessert first.
xoxoxo

A Sweet Wakeup in Louisiana

   Too excited for this New Orleans getaway to wait until the next morning, we said goodbye to the farm after dinnertime on Sunday. We armed ourselves with a giant French vanilla cappuccino, an even bigger Dr. Pepper slushie, and a bag of cheesy Bugles then did justice to some excellent road trip music by singing along and performing for each one like American Idol hopefuls. Sort of. We drove all night, stopping once for food and fuel and twice for quick if cramped naps. The tethers of daily life and recent stressors gradually loosened their grip, but the brutality of a marathon road trip was unkind to our tired bodies.
   Very early Monday morning, just as I was really waking up in the passenger seat, stretching and yawning and noticing my need for a good face scrubbing and swig of mouthwash, the beauty of Louisiana unfolded around our rental car. Handsome was still focused on efficiency, still driving and battling the aging GPS machine. Still distracting me with his good looks. The early morning fog was clearing in small efforts as the sun rose. Magnolia trees bigger than most houses, cypress trees old and elegant around every bend, and thick ivy covering hard surfaces as if they were secrets in need of protection. Everything was familiar and exciting. Such a strange thing to feel like you are coming home to a place you have never lived.
   Then rural scenery gave way to a small town where Handsome had apparently found us a breakfast surprise. We both had been craving donuts for about two weeks and had agreed that at some point we would indulge for our anniversary. What better place than Louisiana, on our way to our favorite city?
   He wordlessly pulled our rental car into the parking lot of “Shipley’s Famous Donuts,” where the great flavor debate was already firing away in my head. You can have any flavor you want, but not every flavor you want, I was hating myself for telling myself. My husband has a way of providing surprises, both big and small, in a way that proves he listens and wants desperately to show his love but also does not want to talk about it. So I only gushed over the thrill of early morning donuts for approximately eight and a half minutes. Then I let it go. Because I am nothing if not in control of myself.
   Inside the low, glass front building a woman behind the counter was laughing with a small group of customers, probably regulars, and making the sweet donut air even sweeter with her southern accent. She greeted us brightly with that perfect, cozy drawl and stood sideways so we could feast our eyes on the library of colorful pastries behind her. I remember noticing that the whole place was fully unadorned, not so much as a silk flower or scrap of fabric or framed photo was anywhere to be seen, but that was perfect. The east facing glass building must be almost always flooded with sunlight and a view of nearby gardens, and that wall of color and texture behind the counter is all anyone could really look at anyway.
   We struggled with our donut selections, filled our hands with either coffee or chocolate milk, and sat down at a scrupulously clean formica table for two. The whole place was scrubbed to shining, actually. I ate my monstrous apple fritter witout any runner’s guilt whatsoever. That thing was as heavy as a grapefruit, you guys. It was rich and buttery, overflowing with apple pieces, and had such a glaze on it that it literally crunched then oozed when I sank my teeth in. In seconds all ten of my greedy fingers were crusted with the sticky evidence of the indulgence.
   As Handsome and I ate and flirted with each other, the table of regulars maintainted their laughing, amiable pocket of the room. Huddled around their gleaming formica table as if it provided heat on a cold night, they smiled at each other and made a slow breakfast of friendsip. The woman behind the counter tended to drive-through customers and seemed to love every one of them with equal sincerity. 
   Then an impeccably dressed elderly black man entered the shop and was greeted magnificently by the woman, “Mornin Reverend!”  He responded with a grand bow and warm, booming salutation back to her. The table of regulars also nodded or waved at him affectionately. The gentleman collected his steaming coffee in a porcelain mug instad of a styrofoam cup, and he took that and a small stack of glazed donuts and sat down at a corner table near us. From this table, for the next fifteen minutes that we stayed and probably much longer, he held court.
   One by one, men came in off the street and made a beeline to the gentleman, hats removed and clutched in their hands, sometimes patronizing the donut shop but not always, every time gracious and hushed in their approach. Part of me wanted very much to hear their conversations, but most of me was satisfied just to witness the ritual.
   We polished off our sugary breakfasts, thrilled to be so near the end of a long drive and so near the beginning of another New Orleans adventure. As Handsome pulled our rental car out of that clean, crescent shaped little parking lot, huge droplets of condensation rolled down the windshield and allowed sunlight to blind me. I relished the warm morning and tried to memorize every detail of the neighboring houses and gardens. We left that small town and climbed back onto the Interstate, driving south between forests and farmlands. Trading Oklahoma for Louisiana and hopefully gaining some lushness of spirit in the process.
   And then, just like that, the long, raw night of travel and undercover escape was forgotten. My left hand on is right thigh, we were refreshed and singing love songs again.