A Taste of Maine

Today's post is brought to you thanks to an extended vacation and an old family recipe.


Still haven't done much cooking. That may be the best part of vacation.

Not really. For me, the best part of this vacation was the long walks with Fenway on the beach every night. For most of the summer, dogs are barred from the beach, but every night from 6 - 8 they are allowed on leash. My silly dog who hates HATES getting his feet wet, and balks at walking in the rain, LOVES the beach. All he has to hear is me say, "Fenny, want to go to the beach?" and his tail starts wagging and his face breaks into a grin. From the moment we exit the car, he is yanking me toward the water. It's funny to watch him approach the water and then dance out of the way of the incoming waves.

Do we really have to leave?

I took this video of him charging ahead of me. He loves to sniff the seaweed.

SO on to food.  Since I'm talking Maine and seafood and beaches, I thought I would share a favorite recipe from a few years ago.

One of our favorite places to eat a casual meal while we're here is the Maine Diner.  I had a wonderful lobster roll for lunch there, but my favorite dish to get is their lobster pie.

The first time I ordered it, I was anticipating something along the lines of of chicken pot pie but with lobster. It turned out not to be nothing at all like that, but it was so much better.


After my first bite, I turned to my husband and said, "This tastes like Sam's fish."

Sam was an elderly man who cooked for my husband's even more elderly mother and aunt back when we were first married. They lived on a gorgeous estate on Cape Cod - 2 sisters and Sam and his wife.

My husband LOVED Sam's fish, so with my newlywed enthusiasm, I tried everything I could think of to replicate it. I bought every type of bread crumbs I could find, but the response was always, "Good, but not like Sam's."

Finally, in desperation, I told Sam my sad tale. He laughed and took me into the pantry where he shared his secret crust - Ritz crackers and butter. Yup. That was all. He'd smash the crackers, mix with melted butter, and layer onto the fish. So simple, but SO tasty. My marriage was safe!


So when I took that first bite of lobster pie this summer, and it tasted like lobster with Sam's crust, I was highly suspicious that I knew the special family recipe. In the name of research, I went into the gift shop and bought a cookbook of diner recipes which included the lobster pie. Sure enough - Ritz crackers and butter!

My Friday night dinner!

It was very good. Yum.

I haven't made Sam's fish in many years (in the name of low cholesterol and all that jazz), but after we returned home, I decided to give it a try for old times sake (and to post here). So without further ado - the 4 step fish recipe.

1. Smash the Ritz crackers. I do it in a baggie with an ice cream scoop.
2. Melt butter in microwave and mix in the cracker crumbs.
3. Spread on the fish (I used haddock. Sam always used sole.)
4. Bake. You can broil briefly at the end if you feel the need to brown the crumbs, but be careful!

Enjoy!

I'm curious. Have any of you ever made this?


As you can probably tell from the photo above, the lobster pie uses fresh lobster rather than haddock and they cook it in a mini casserole dish. So.much.goodness.

I'll leave you with some more photos of my favorite beach,

 And these from the Marginal Way.

No-Cooking Friday...Plus a Mini Vacation

Missy Tippens

Okay, I admit it. I was at the beach last week, and I only cooked one or two meals. Both of which were boring and the usual stuff I've already posted here multiple times. The rest of the time we either ate sandwiches or leftovers or ate out. Sooo...

I'm just going to share a few beach photos from Orange Beach, Alabama, so you can feel as if you've had a little vacation. :)

This is the night we arrived. We stayed in a different condo this time. Here was the beautiful view...

Here's the peaceful view from the balcony the next day...

Pour you a cup of coffee and enjoy a morning of waves lapping against the sand with the cry of seagulls to relax you... 

Of course, you need a little fun time down at the water. Enjoy the warm sand and the waves...

Oh, and since I write romance, I had to share this. Someone wrote this huge love letter on the beach one night! :)

Our last evening there, telling the beach goodbye for another year...

Oh! I do have a shot of food! While there, we usually try to eat at Lambert's Cafe--"Home of the Throwed Rolls." :) Hot, gigantic, wonderful yeast rolls tossed across the room to you. :) My kids made great catches this year. I won't share stories of all the years the bread went awry. :)

We had a wonderful vacation. Now back to real life. (big sigh) So, what's your favorite vacation spot?

www.missytippens.com

Cast Iron Cooking (again), civilization and the Southern Oregon Coast

Hello, everybody! The Fresh Pioneer is back and I have updates to my cast iron cooking post.  Let's just say nobody starved but we sure were glad to get back to civilization. I don't mean the picture below. That's where we live. 

Sort of civilized.

                                       
                                          Sort of not when it's 106 and above! (Someone asked me if this was real temp or heat index. I don't know what that means. It's the temperature. I guess in some areas the temperature isn't really the temperature but much hotter? Yuck. I'll stick with our 100-110F in the summer.)

 I love vacations. I really do. I like planning and plotting and packing and getting the kids all prepped with studying the sights we'll see. But then by the time we come home, we all feel like this.
                                                                     DONE.

 So, after a good twelve hours (no, it doesn't really take that long but we wandered a bit to get there  and small people have small bladders, so lots of stops) we made it to our first destination, a campground on the coast, way down south, nearly to California. (I love these shoes. My friend sent them to me from Texas because they're teal. ha! My favorite color.)
                                     
I already talked about the yurt, so here is our cast iron cooking action. Waffles, a sandwich, a pan heating for hashbrowns, and a hot dog. (Can't remember who was eating a hot dog for breakfast. Probably the picky eater of the bunch.) The kids loved cooking their own food but it did require a lot of supervision. We didn't want anyone branded.
                                                    
My mom has a home on the coast a few hours from there and she brought us this cast iron oven and these berries from their property. YUMMY. So glad they weren't in Arizona! But like us, with the summer heat you look for cooler climes. (This shot is of blueberries, marionberries, raspberries, strawberries, and a gold raspberry hybrid.)
                                                    
And that recipe worked! It was absolutely delicious! Berry buckle for the win.
                                         
We spent the first week in the camp, on Eel Lake, with the Dunes in the other direction. There's a whole long story about getting lost there at sunset but I won't bore you with that.

(stateparks.com I had my own pictures but... well... that story is coming up)

Let me just say... never separate! Even if a five year old is discovered to be holding only one of his shoes and you let the faster people walk ahead because the five year old holding your hand is slower and it's really lovely with the frogs croaking and the sun setting and the breeze on your sunburn. There's a reason people die in the Sahara and a reason you do not take three hours to stop wandering and start yelling.  Enough said. Moving on!
                                         
After that, I told my husband I needed a day to sit on the beach and drink coffee while the kids played in the tide pools. So I did. He, of course, scaled the cliffs and I pretended not to notice (and worry).
                                              
Living in the land of tumbleweeds and 100F temps, I forgot how normal it is to see rhododendrons and other water-loving plants just growing naturally. And moss. And ferns. It was a feast for the eyes. Ahhhh.
                                    
Our town has a few big trees in the main park. But in the forest they're everywhere. The kids get a kick out of them every time.
                                                      
Speaking of flora, we had to stop at the Darlingtonia Preserve. (That link is the wiki article. So interesting.) My kids think I'm crazy but I keep insisting these carnivorous cobra lilies are cool. I mean, giant pitcher plants that are only found in a few places in the world? YES, we have to stop and look! Also, they remind me of Little Shop of Horrors, so they make me smile.
                                                                  
We tried to throw in a few kids but they fought back.
                                      
So, we finally said good bye to the yurt (some of us were more happy than others) and headed up the coast to Florence. There's a seafood chain there called Mo's.

It's loud, crowded and full of tourists. And we love it.

Remember we'd been living off  s'mores and grilled cheese sandwiches...
                                                    
Slumgullion was like food from heaven. We were ALL SO HAPPY not to be camping. OK, maybe the little kids would have preferred marshmallows for lunch but the rest of us were thrilled.
                                    
There are a lot of commercial fisherman, right alongside some funny people who dock their pirate boats. I've never wanted a pirate ship, but it's apparently a thing. We met the sweetest older couple who sold their home after retirement and... built a pirate ship to sail up and down the coast. Funny!
                              
Once we made it to the beach house, we hit the farmer's markets. Wow, these onions are much bigger than ours. But not as sweet.
                                           
I was loving civilization but my hair wasn't loving the humidity. Good thing I brought my hairdressers! They're spendy, but worth it.

We met up with some friends and they took us crabbing. We caught lots of crabs... and none were big enough to keep. Which was probably good since I don't think my kids would have eaten them anyway. but it was super fun and ended with ice cream!

At low tide we walked down and gathered mussels for paella (recipe in the link, it's delicious!) We also found a purple starfish! The last few years there haven't been any starfish because of a virus that swept the coast so we were thrilled to see them on the rocks!

We also steamed at enjoyed them straight, but you can imagine a few of the kids preferred hot dogs. And that was fine as long as I didn't have to build a fire! (Unless it was on the beach. Then I was up for it.)

We also went clamming but I don't have any pictures of that because at this point, I fell into Yaquina Bay. It wasn't too bad. Nice and warm. I decided to go with it and swim toward the bank until I realized MY PHONE was in my pocket. Ah well... Luckily I'd been sending pictures to a private album on facebook so I had a few. 

We thought we might travel up north even farther after the week in the beach house but I was tired. Actually, I wanted to come home after two days. I missed my desk, my coffee just the way I like it, my kitchen. I've become a homebody. Even though the yurt was doable and the beach house (we've been there before) was lovely.... it's just not home. The kids are already planning the next trip (maybe to Lake Louise in Banff National Park in Calgary?) but I'm content in my little town... even if it is 90F at 8AM. 

 Until next time!

 BOOKS! 
My newest release, These Sheltering Walls!

Coming July 30th, Only Through Love!

Cast Iron Cooking, Yurts, and Campfires

Hello, everybody! I hope everyone had a fabulous Fourth of July! Something we love to do on those summer nights on the beach is to get a pack of industrial glow sticks for the kids. We head down in the dark and they can play tag in the pitch blackness... because they're wearing a brightly colored glow stick we can keep track of them, and they can find each other!

        These aren't the party sticks that fade out after a few hours. They're military grade and you can read by the light they produce. Great for camping!
 Now, I mention camping because not all of this trip is in a lovely beach house overlooking the sea. Oh, no... I have a few family members who prefer (why, WHY?) camping. Now, I can't quite make myself go all out camping (too much of that when I was a child!) but I can do a week in a
yurt .  (Click the link to read more.)

photo courtesy of Oregon State Parks

They're sort of a glorified tent and can be a great option for people who prefer... I don't know... a BED? And some HEAT? And a way to keep the bugs from crawling up into your blankets?

photo courtesy of Oregon State Parks

Some yurts are just gorgeous and even have showers. (*sob*) but these are part of the state park system and right on the beach so... no glamorous magazine yurts for us. Inside there are some beds and it's generally a place that children think is the coolest thing EVER but the mom is wondering how she'll cook when, although there's electricity, you aren't allowed to use it for cooking. That brings us back to cast iron. Remember the last post?

I finally learned that my pans shouldn't look like this.

Or this... Still upside down, too.

But like this! Ta-dah! Now, I'll get to the larger cast iron cooking in a bit, but first I have to mention this awesome thing I saw on my new favorite facebook page, Cast Iron Cooking.

Westlandcamping.com

 PIE IRONS. I'd never heard of such a thing. A lot of people have. A lot of people haven't. It seems regional. I'd like to say it's a Southern thing, since my Southern friends knew what I was talking about, but around here, nobody had. But I'm only guessing because my friend from Michigan knew what they were, too. Here's a video of someone making grilled cheese and ham sandwiches if you want to make yourself really hungry! As far as I can tell, you cane make pretty much ANYTHING in these. Fruit pies, nutella stuffed waffles, grilled sandwiches, puff pastries, hash browns and ham, chicken pot pie, fried eggs, a flaky apple pie, etc.

Sold by RomeIndustries.com

So, I ordered a few waffle irons (mine have long handles but I couldn't find a good picture), a few sandwich irons and a large round one for pizza. How fun is this? No more living on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (with a side of sand). I'll be sure to let you know how it goes. But some recipes I'm going to use can be found here. (WARNING: that's a Pinterest link. Danger ahead. Time suck can be averted by not clicking!)
So, these can all be made in a skillet over a fire.

 I'll be making blueberry cobbler. Recipe is here.

Pizza nachos. Recipe is here.

Peach pie with cinnamon crust. Recipe is here.

Breakfast fritatta. Recipe is here.

And so many more. The camp is right on a lake, and the ocean is just the other direction, so I'm assuming there will be some fish to fry, too. :) I'm not a fryer, though, so I'll leave that up to hubby.  I' sure there will be some flubs and some inedible messes, but I'm hoping to really learn some great campfire recipes. And if not, by the time our week in a yurt is over and we're headed to the beach house, we'll all be MUCH thinner. And crankier. And every so much more appreciative of a stove.

Until next time, my friends! And don't forget, just one more week until Only Through Love releases! I'm biting my nails while I hang out on the beach. It's like waiting for a baby! *deep breaths* Until next time!