Recipes

It seems that blogs with recipes are very popular.  Welllll, I have some recipes from my family and my husband's family which those of you reading this might enjoy.

However!!  I am NOT giving out the recipe for the famous Iron Mountain Inn chocolate chip cookies!  Guests have wheedled, begged, bribed all to no avail.  This recipe is only going to passed along to my granddaughter when I am on my deathbed!

My granddaughter enjoys helping me make these cookies especially since her dad really enjoys eating them. Whenever I visit, I have to take some along because the ones I make with the local flour, eggs, and other ingredients just don't taste the same as the ones I make back home at the Inn.

Here are a stack of them.  They won't last long once guests arrive.  In fact, those guests who have visited before, head directly to the cookie jar, don't even pass Go, just want the freshly baked cookies to start their visit at the Iron Mountain Inn B&B.

On the other hand, I do have some recipes which I am delighted to share.  My great-grandmother's cook, Maude, is one.  She was known to spend her days up to her elbows in flour and sugar.  But one of the unique recipes which has been handed down is how to cook fresh green beans.

First you get a big pot of boiling water with a little salt in it.  Then you snap off the ends of the string less beans.  No cutting off the ends, that changes the beans in some way according to the recipe.  Then you plop the beans in the boiling water and add a little baking soda.  This helps keep them green even when they are cooked a little more than al dente.

Now comes the unique part...you must skim the scum off the surface of the water with a sterling silver spoon!  Nothing else works quite as well.  I know, I've tried.

Once the beans are cooked to a crispness of your liking, drain them and then pouring ice over them to keep them from cooking any longer.  This is if you aren't serving them right away, hot from the pot!  Of course, if you live in Estes Park, CO, hot from the pot isn't very hot at 9,000'!   I've been with friends and we stood around the stove eating directly from the pot to have slightly warm food!

The beans are very good as is.  Or add some unsalted butter to them.  Add some herbs such as a little  basil or oregano.  That's the beauty of cooking....you never have to eat or prepare the same food twice in a row.  In fact...you could go through life never eating the same thing twice!  After all, every cook does something just a little different.  I compare it to Bach, Beethoven and the Beetles.  They all took the same notes, but look at what each of them did with them!  Sure aren't the same!

Now, are you going to try this method of cooking green beans?

Fireworks Display

Tonight at the Iron Mountain Inn B&B in Butler, TN, we had a fireworks display courtesy of the gentlemen staying the chalet.

They are here to upgrade the cell phone towers to 4G - not sure which company, but maybe they will bring in a tower or two for ATT since we don't get any signal from that service.

I'd post a picture of the fireworks - they were magnificent mortars which echoed and reechoed around the mountains., but I dropped my Nikon and it has been sent in for repair.

The small particles from the boom rained down on the cars and people watching!  Like the patter of gentle rain.  We had had a rain storm last night so the forest was wet and the roof on the Inn is metal.  Hopefully we won't have any sparks to start a forest fire!  I never allow fireworks unless it has rained and the trees are wet.  But the smaller fireworks I set off have never created the "rain".

Guests at the Inn and I stayed here on this front porch.  The fireworks were set off inside an old horse watering trough since it was a more stable surface than the gravel of the driveway.  Once I did have some fireworks tip and people were running out of the way!  I learned and now everyone must stay on the porch!

Safety first!

We often do fireworks for proposals, weddings, anniversaries and "just because".  They are legal in Tennessee all year round, but I've never done any as big and loud as these!  WOW!

Community Helping Others

Tuesday and Thursday a group of seniors meets at a local church in Mountain City, TN to stretch under the direction of Phil.

While we were warming up this morning, some of the church members brought in boxes and boxes of donated food from the local markets.  This is distributed into boxes on a long table awaiting the arrival of those who need help feeding their families.

During the hour we were stretching, at least 10 families were able to receive boxes containing bread, canned goods, packaged items and bottles of juices.  Although it might not be considered the most healthy diet since there were no fresh vegetables or fruits, it will help the families until their gardens begin to produce later in the spring and summer.

And this is another of the wonderful things about this small rural mountain community...almost everyone has a garden and when they begin to produce those who have too much share with those who live in town, or rent and so do not have access to their own gardens.

Neighbors helping neighbors, the American way.  Why can't politicians think like small town neighbors?  But I guess politicians have to think about how to keep getting reelected and what they can get for their constituents.  Of course, some of the boondoggles Congress sets for themselves make me think we should "throw the bums out" as Yogi Berra might have said.  But we don't, we complain and keep electing the same people over and over so the citizens have no one to blame but themselves.

Good eats =- Good company

Just wanted to pass along a recipe I found in the Home and Away Cookbook put out by ETSU staff and friends.  It's a weighty tome...probably a pound or more, but so chock full of interesting information and fabulous recipes, well worth the heft.  And the price is very reasonable!

But as I said, it's the recipes in the book that make it especially interesting to me.  I've tried a few and one of my favorites, as well as a favorite each time I've served it at the Iron Mountain Inn B&B, is

Fire Roasted Red Pepper Soup

2 cloves garlic
½ cup sweet onion
2 tbls olive oil
1 ½ cups chicken stock
1 cup white wine
1 cup fresh basil
1  14 oz jar roasted red peppers pureed
1   8 oz can sweetened condensed milk
1  8 oz carton half and half

Saute garlic and onion in olive oil until tender.  Add chicken stock, reduce mixture by half.  Add wine and reduce again by half. Add basil and pureed peppers, salt and pepper to taste.  Heat for 5 minutes over low heat.  Remove from heat and blend mixture thoroughly in blender.  Return to low heat and add sweetened condensed milk and half and half. Re-season and simmer again for 5 minutes before serving.

Enjoy!

Let me know how you like it when you try it!

Come, share the magic of the mountains where every season has a reason to visit

Gas Prices

I went to town today although I really didn't want to.  But found a bill for Sprint hidden on my desk that I needed to pay as it was due TODAY.  Tried to pay online, but since I had cancelled the service, there was no way to reach a live person or even something remotely possible to pay online.

This meant I had to drive 25 miles each way to pay a $57.25 bill in order NOT to be charged all kinds of late fees, interest, etc.  But since I was there, I noticed that Walmart's gas was still $3.33 so I pulled up to the pump. It probably took me all of 3 minutes to see the price posted high above the station, pull to a pump, get out of my car and insert my WalMart card to save 5 cents per gallon.

But when I went to pump the gas...instead of being $3.28 (getting my 5 cent discount) it was $3.40!  I inquired of the attendant who was just coming out of the office as to the  discrepancy of the sign overhead and the price at the pump.

She walked over and looked up..."Oh, the price just changed." And so...in the blink of an eye, I was paying 10 cents more per gallon than I would have if I'd been there moments before.  It's one thing to have it change at midnight when no one is there, but the change in the middle of the afternoon when they haven't had a delivery...that's WalMart robbery!  Back to Food City for their 15 cents per gallon discount when you purchase items in their store.  Food City has better quality produce and meats than WalMart any day.

I'm especially aware of the price of gas since my Grand Cherokee Jeep with 4 wheel drive gets horrible gas mileage!  I bought it a year and a half ago because we'd had a couple of very bad winters and I thought I should get 4 wheel drive...then last year...no snow.  However, I have been glad to have it this winter!  And winter isn't over so it may be good again before the spring arrives.  But getting only 17 mpg is not the way I want a car to run.

But!  it sounded like spring this morning....I heard the song of birds!  It was such a wonderful sound to wake up to it made my day bright and cheery...until I got to WalMart.

HOUSEWORK

As an innkeeper and owner of 2 vacation rentals, I do a lot of housework!  Of course, I do have help, Carolyn and Val, but I try to do more myself...saves some money and also I catch things which they might overlook.

But today I had a case of toilet paper which needed to be put waaay up high on a shelf in the laundry room.  I don't like climbing on ladders and for this I'd have to get up and down up and down, so I opted to take my "claws" and one by one put the rolls onto the shelf.

The first ones didn't want to stand up - they just wanted to roll.  Oops!  But then I got the first two stacked and it was easy to continue to stacking the rest.  I learned that by clipping the little edge, I could stack them quite easily.  Then getting them down...I can just knock one into my hands.

Toilets need cleaning from top to bottom.  I think I have found a new product called Monofil which kills germs, fungi and infections for up to 30 days!  The product bonds to the surfaces and just needs wiping with vinegar and water or warm soapy water between the rebonding.  I'm looking forward to using this product to keep my properties germ free for longer period of time.

Kitchens.  By the time the dishes are rinse and put into the dishwasher and the leftovers are back in the frig...does one have left over left overs?  Last night I decided no.  But the floor needs to be mopped...how does it get so sticky and dirty in just one day of cooking?

Bedrooms: I love crisp clean sheets stretched tightly across the bed.  If I was really really rich, I'd have clean crisp sheets each and every day.  However, in my quarters, since I only sleep on one side of the bed as the cats take up the other side, I just flipped the sheets so I have clean ones and get two weeks out of one set of sheets.  the guests get beds made up every day and clean sheets on the third day as we try to be as green as possible.  Clean towels if the dirty ones are left on the floor.

When beds are freshly made, rugs are vacuumed, dressers are dusted and pictures are wiped down...the rooms and baths look so nice I enjoy just standing and admiring my handi-housework!  And when guests comment on how fresh and new things look, I smile.  thanks, guests.