Travels in the South

Welcome my friends to another week of Travels in the South.  This week, we are talking about my dad again.  He gives me so much material – snorts and rolls with piggy laughter.  Dad loves finger foods and peanut butter and food and pretzels and food.  Well you get the ideal – daddy loves food.  And who could blame him, right?  I myself LOVE food of any kind in any way.

Well mom went shopping the other day and found these awesome treats for him – an entire container of peanut buttered pretzels for $1.00 – what a bargain!  Now you would think with the price low they might be stale or icky.  They were not.  Daddy ate them grinning the entire time making weird noises.  I think he liked them.

 

Travels in the South

Oh my friends.  This week daddy said he died and went to heaven.  I don’t think he actually died and went to heaven but he had that look on his face like he was somewhere far, far away from all of us here at the Hotel Thompson.  Heck, I think he was even smiling.  It was a strange time for sure.

You see there’s two things that dad really loves.  One is Utz potato chips.  Have you ever had any of them before?  Delicious.  And I can say that first hoof because he has shared with me when he’s had his Utz chips.  Nice of him huh?  The second thing he loves is Butterfingers.  That’s the top of his all time love of chocolate.  Now these days, he doesn’t get much of either one.  Cause you know he and mom are trying to be healthier.

But mom found something that she just knew daddy would – how did she say this?  Have kittens over.  Which was weird because I still haven’t see any kittens.

But here you go, two of dad’s favorites rolled up in one delicious combination.  Daddy says if you see them in a store near you, don’t just buy ‘a’ bag.  Buy a dozen or more.  Yes, you will thank him later – snorts with piggy laughter.

 

Mom/Dad Went to Court!

The Olde Courthouse Tavern that is – snorts with piggy laughter.  This is Wednesday so welcome to Travels in the South my friends.  Mom/dad heard about this fabulous restaurant that is a couple of towns over from us called the Olde Courthouse Tavern.  They met some friends and visited it a while back and I’ll tell you something, their food porn pictures made my little tummy rumble with excitement.  I’m actually going to have to break up this restaurant in a couple of weeks – there was way too many yum yum’s to share.  So today, we are going to start with some appetizers.

Dad is a sucker for fried cauliflower.  At this point in his life, if this is the only way that mom can get dad to eat his veggies, so be it – snorts with piggy laughter.  The restaurant cuts up cauliflower, batters it (of course here in the south you should learn by now we batter and fry anything and everything) and fry until golden brown.  They serve the fried cauliflower with a creamy horseradish sauce on the side.  Of course, mom/dad asked for extra sauce.  Now again, dad has had his share of fried cauliflower over the years so the question is how did this rank with him?  Between grunts of yum and rumblings of I can’t get enough, dad said that the restaurant scored BIG time on this appetizer.  Dad said it was some of the best fried cauliflower that he has had in some time.  Mom was surprised as well.  The bites were cut small enough for one bite and the horseradish sauce had just enough kick to say hello without setting your mouth on fire.  Both mom/dad loved it!

❤

Anywhere that mom goes and sees pretzels, she has to try them.  This restaurant has traditional salt pretzels served with beer cheese sauce, one of mom’s favorites.  Mom is pretty picky when it comes to her pretzels.  If she is going to indulge in any bread product, it better be good.  What did mom say about these?  She loved them!  The pretzels had just enough salt – they weren’t overpowered like some can be that you immediately need water and they had enough salt where you could taste the salt.  The beer cheese was creamy and really added to the pretzels.  Even dad couldn’t keep his hands off these pretzels.  So score two out of three so far.

❤

Now for the onion rings.  Out of the three appetizers, everyone agreed that the onion rings were the least favorite.  Don’t get them wrong.  They were tasty and crunchy.  They looked as fantastic as they tasted.  However, they just didn’t have the same pizazz that the other two appetizers had.  Yes they would get them again but they wouldn’t be at the top of mom/dad’s list.  Now join us next week to check out some entrees that everyone enjoyed – you don’t want to miss it!

 

 

 

 

Shopping Around the World

This month we are highlighting appetizers or snacks.  

This gives us so many choices to pick from and it was really hard for us to pick one.  But after I thought long and hard about it, I had to go with dad’s crack.  Snorts – no not that kind of crack.  Dad actually has a snack treat that we call crack.  Why crack?  Because he can’t keep his hands out of the container when mom fixes it – snorts with piggy laughter.  And when mom makes this, she fixes a whole bunch because it goes fast.  You can use it as a snack or bring it to a party.  So now, all of you can fix it and get hooked to on it.  Enjoy my friends.

Dad’s Crack

1 bag of short pretzels (dad prefers these but you can use any kind of pretzel you want).  For a bag of pretzels, we pay $1.29

2 bags of peanut butter morsels.  You find these on the baking aisle.  We paid $1.50 for each bag on this shopping trip.

2 boxes of movie theater sized Reeses Pieces (you know the kind they showed in the movie E.T – ha)  These were $1.00 each in the store

Optional – a bag of toasted coconut.  Sometimes dad likes this and other times he doesn’t.  A bag of coconut costs $2.49 in the store.

Now, first up.  If you are going to do the coconut you need to do this first.  Put the coconut on a tray and stick it in the oven.  Mom puts it under the broiler for a few minutes.  Keep an eye on it because it will burn quickly.  Toast the coconut and then set it aside to cool.

While your coconut is cooling, get a BIG bowl.  Yep the bigger the better in this case.  Pour in your entire bag of pretzels followed by your Reeses Pieces and peanut butter morsels.  When your coconut is cool, throw it into the party as well.  Then stir everything together and make sure it is nicely mingled.  Mom then packages the crack into individual containers for dad’s destruction.

So you see, it’s an easy snack that goes a long way and peeps love it!  The final cost for this snack is less than $9.00 (with coconut) and that should last either a couple of weeks,  one night at a party or two days with dad – snorts.  And never fear, if you don’t like peanut butter, just substitute items for what you do love.  For example any kind of chocolate candy and any kind of baking morsels.  Happy crack my friends.

 

 

Shopping Around the World

Thanks to everyone for another great edition of Shopping Around the World last month.  It’s so awesome to see the various prices around the world – and the pictures with recipes!

This month we have a suggestion from my cousin Sammy on highlighting cookies or other sweets for December.  Is there a special treat that you fix only around the Christmas holidays?  A certain cookie to share?  It does not have to be five items or less this month.  Share your recipe and picture of your sweet items.

This time of the year mom loves to fix what she has always called reindeer noses.  Now they have been called other things like yummy, pure grace, delicious, Rolo droppings, etc.  Snorts with piggy laughter.  It doesn’t matter what you call them because you will absolutely love them.  AND they are so easy to make.  You will need:  1 bag of pecan halves (prices range on this – the bag I bought was $8.99); 1 bag of Rolo caramels in milk chocolate candies ($4.00) ; and 1 bag of small pretzels ($1.50 on sale).  Total paid around $14.50 for some priceless candy 🙂

Turn your oven on to around 250-300 degrees.  While that is pre-heating, start taking all of the aggravating pretty foils off of the Rolo caramels in milk chocolates.  Yes you can be like my mommy and eat some for all of that painstaking foil removal.  Then, put some parchment paper on a baking pan.  Add a bunch of small pretzels and top with one Rolo each.  Now, here is the tricky part.  You don’t want to put so many on the baking pan that when you pull it out of the oven you don’t have time to top them with the pecan half.  You see they will cool fast and you want that finishing touch – trust me.  Okay so now you have your pan planned out.  Place it in the hot oven for around 5 minutes until the Rolo melts all over the pretzel.  Once that happens, remove the pan and quickly add a 1/2 of pecan to the top squishing it down in the chocolate.  mmm – just thinking about it.

Let these cool before trying one.  Trust me on this – daddy found out the hard way.  Once they are cool, put in a air tight container and share… or not 🙂

 

Daddy and Houdini’s Treats

Sometimes I wonder if my dad was dropped on his too many times as a small human.  Really I do.  As always, I’m getting ahead of myself.  I will explain the situation that happened here at the Hotel Thompson and then I will let YOU be the judge of my dad’s craziness.  Sound fair?

Over the weekend, mom/dad went to Petsmart for the little guy here Houdini.  He needed some treats and plus they wanted to look at any clothes that were marked down after Halloween – score to both 🙂

So mom sees these treats that are put out by Kong.  They are peanut butter filled pretzels.  They look amazing so she bought Houdini a bag.  Fast forward that they finally get back home to the Hotel Thompson and mom opens the bag.  They smell delicious – almost like real human treats.  Amazing huh?  So she shares this news with daddy.

What happens next is where the ‘dad was dropped on his head too much as a small human’ part comes to play.  You watch the video and see what YOU think. I’m going to my room to get the number to mental health.  I think someone in this family needs a vacation – snorts.

 

Bacon and Eggs – Which Do You Prefer?

I know – that title probably threw you for a minute.  But knowing me, you *know* I can’t be that serious as to ‘real’ bacon on eggs, right?  Snorts.

I have my version of bacon and eggs.  I would like to know which one do you prefer.  Here are your two choices:

 

Choice 1 – Bacon and eggs cookies 🙂

These delicious morsels are sugar cookies with a white frosting to look like egg whites, yellow M&M for an egg yolk and two pretzels for bacon.  Yummy looking huh?

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OR ————————– OR —————————– OR —————————

Choice 2 – Bacon and eggs ME

This is bacon in its rawest form – snort giggles – with eggs. I think I was around 6 weeks old here when mommy took this picture.  Never fear, those eggs didn’t get wasted after she took the picture.  She scrambled them up for me for dinner and they were delicious! 🙂