Steak Oscar Then Crab Cakes - Both Semi-Failures

It’s hard to believe I built this meal this way but we had some asparagus in the fridge that needed to be used and Bev thought about Steak Oscar which sounded good to me.  I steamed the asparagus, nuked the crab meat just a little, and the steaks just got S&P for seasoning before cooking them reverse sear in a 225F oven then searing them in a smoking hot skillet.  I used the recipe for Easy Bearnaise Sauce from the “All Recipe” blog but I tried a short cut method by putting everything in a container and using the immersion blender to whip it up.

To assemble the dish, plate the steaks then top with asparagus, crab, and bearnaise.

Delicious Crab Cakes With Lump Crab Meat

Our son and UT graduate, Rhett, drove into Knoxville from his home in South Carolina to go to the UT/USC football game with some of his fraternity brothers this past weekend.  On Sunday, he and Beth came to down to our place for a short visit before heading home.

You may recall on my last post for Crab Imperial Stuffed Crappie And Shrimp that I stated “One of these days I'm going to turn loose of some of the kids inheritance and buy some jumbo lump crab meat.” 

Crab Imperial Stuffed Crappie And Shrimp

I’ve been wanting to make crab stuffed fish for some time and when I saw a recent recipe for stuffed flounder I decided now was a good time but using crappie rather than flounder.  I used a combination of several recipes to come up with the one below.  I once again used canned Chicken Of The Sea Crab Claw Meat.

Maryland Crab Cakes

Well, maybe not real Maryland crab cakes as Bev bought a couple cans of Chicken Of The Sea Crab Claw Meat on sale and we decided to turn one of them into crab cakes using our go-to recipe from the “Once Upon A Chef” blog.  I realize that the great crab cakes are made with lump and jumbo lump crab meat, but I just refuse to pay the very high prices for them ($36 for a pound for Chicken Of The Sea Lump at Walmart).

Crab Cakes and Low Country Boil For Four

Last summer we went to an outdoor concert at some people’s home and ran into a guy that I had worked with at Alcoa but had not seen in 20 years and I promised I would get us together in 2022 after hip surgery recovery and this was finally the day.  I wanted to have a seafood medley in the air-conditioned house but “the boss” wanted to have low country boil on the dock and she balked when I suggested we could make it in the air-conditioned kitchen – “it has to be done outside on the dock.”

Unfortunately, I got so busy visiting and cooking that I took only a couple of pics.

Upside Down Broiled Seafood Platter – Part 2

Since the crab cakes and onions were such a hit with the seafood meal, I thought they deserved a separate post.  But before I get to that, here is my Keto friendly breakfast the morning after the seafood meal.

Upside Down Broiled Seafood Platter

When I traveled to Pittsburgh, PA on business during my working days, one of my favorite restaurants was Poli’s, located a few miles east of center city in Squirrel Hill.  The restaurant opened in 1921 and closed in 2005 and when I ate there, it was always the broiled seafood platter.  It was the best I ever ate and I’ve often fantasized about being able to recreate it at home.

For this meal, I began with recipes from All Recipes and Mr. Food to get the basics – the originals can be found by clicking on the links.  I was going for something like this.

Maryland Crab Cakes

Thanks to our Sitka Salmon Shares, in our freezer, we had four Dungeness Crab halves and half of a snow crab and I had been wanting to make crab cakes.  When we invited our friends Laurie and David over for happy hour, we thought they would make a nice light meal along with some salad, steamed asparagus, and desserts that they brought.  I started thawing the crab the previous day and that morning I assembled my picking station and went to work.

Deviled Crab For Breakfast

One of my favorite parts of a restaurant seafood platter is the crab shell stuffed with deviled crab and I love crab cakes so when I saw some canned crabmeat on a recent store trip, I decided to make some deviled crab.  I wanted to make a big batch but since I’m cheap, I bought just a pound of $20/lb crab meat and a pound of $3/lb genuine imitation crabmeat.  Since Bev thought it was not crabby enough, I won’t bother to post the recipe but I made five individual servings and baked them but I forgot the pics.

After the five servings for supper, I still had a bunch left and decided to make it into cakes for breakfast and I used an English muffin sized ring to shape them.

On The Road For A Three Stop RV Club Rally – Day 3 - Trolley

On Tuesday, we decided to learn about Savannah by hopping aboard the Old Town Trolley for the very informative tour around the historic downtown areas.  Savannah (and the GA colony) was founded by General James Oglethorpe in 1733 and the city was laid out to contain 24 green area squares with houses and buildings around them (22 squares still remain).

2017 Florida RV Trip, Days 26-27, Seafood, Pesky Pelican, Lynns, and Heading West

Our first stop on this gray Friday was at a Dail’s Seafood trailer on St. George Island who buys directly from the boats and sells their very fresh (he said the shrimp were swimming last night) seafood several dollars a pound cheaper than others.  I bought grouper, snapper, shrimp, shucked oysters, and crab cakes to the tune of $240 and packaged it in meal sized portions with water and froze for the trip home. 

Dungeness Crab Cakes & Game Meat - Feeding Myself Suppers – Part 2

Dungeness Crab Cakes

When the freezer failed and we had to touch everything, I discovered a two year old package of Dungeness Crab that I was sure would need to be trashed, but I decided to thaw it anyway.  To my surprise the flavor was still good but it was a little tough – so I chopped it into smaller pieces.  I looked around on line and found a simple recipe for crab cakes that included everything I had on-hand except celery and I adapted it for my 10 ounces of crab to get the recipe below.

Easy Meal Like Mom Might Make

Bev had bought a box of Members Mark Frozen Crab Cakes from Sam’s Club and they were taking up space in our freezer plus our neighbors had given us some fresh picked asparagus and we had some red potatoes that needed to be cooked.  This sounded like the ingredients of an decent easy meal and one like my mom might have made – no Sam’s back then, of course.

RV Trip Leg Two – Charleston, SC

I had previously posted about our first stop on this trip at Anchor Down RV Resort and from there we made a return trip to the KOA in Mt. Pleasant, SC, where we hosted a rally last year.  This re-visit was made because we enjoyed the area but mostly because SIL, Pat, couldn’t go last year.

We decided to stay in the same place as we liked being on the Mt. Pleasant side of Charleston and the things that area had to offer without going into or thru downtown Charleston.  There are some other nice campgrounds around but the nicer ones are south of town.

This is our site facing the nice boomerang shaped lake.

We ate two meals at one of our favorite places – Page’s Okra Grill – and these are shots of our breakfast meals.

Pat had the Raspberry Waffle ($5.25) which she thought was just okay.

Bev had TJ’s Hot Mess (a split biscuit with southern fried chicken breast topped with scrambled eggs, pepper jack cheese and sausage gravy all for $6) and she had a side of pimento cheese smothered home fries ($3).

I got an even better shot of hers last year.

I had the Shem’s Creek Omelet (three eggs with scallops, shrimp, and pepper jack cheese) with pimento cheese grits ($9.60).

Both of our meals were very good, just as last year, and we all think their fried chicken may be the best we’ve eaten.  While the food was the same, after a couple of big time write-ups, they were much busier.  I can't say I ate seafood for every meal but counting leftovers for some lunch and breakfast meals, I was well over 50%.

While I relaxed and dog sat, the girls visited two farmers markets, spent one day shopping in Mt. Pleasant, and two days shopping in downtown Charleston – I’d rather take a flogging.

We also got to spend a very pleasant evening with old college friends Doug and Marty, during which I showed them how I make grilled Oysters Rockefeller and they showed us how to make their delicious no-filler crab cakes.

We did drive over to check out the Oak Plantation Campground, which we thought was very nice then drove down to Kiawah Island, which I had always wanted to see, only to discover that the entire town is a gated community.  At least it was a nice little drive through the Live Oaks and pines.

We made the trip back home in one nine hour drive and while I was tired, I’m happy to report that we had no engine failures this time.

Photos can be enlarged by clicking on them.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by Almost Heaven South.

Larry

4/24 - 5/4/2015 event dates

A Day trip To Annapolis

THANKS TO ALL WHO HAVE SERVED IN OUR MILITARY

Eric and Ann had been wanting to drive down to Annapolis and since neither Bev nor I had been there, we thought it would be a fun thing to do while visiting with them.  In case you’re unfamiliar with the town, it’s the capital of Maryland, county seat of Anne Arundel  County, home of the US Naval Academy & St. John's College, capital of the United States from 1783-1784, sailing capital of the world, and all around quaint little town with a population of just 38,000+ situated on the Chesapeake Bay. 

And the fascinating part is that it’s all within easy walking distance, although they do have a continuously running shuttle system that helps with the further away parking garages.  This is a winter shot from the web with church circle bottom center, the state capital upper center and the govenors mansion between them on the left.

This is my shot of Main Street (click here for map) which runs from church circle in the center of town down to the water at the City Dock and it is made up of nice shops and good sounding restaurants.

A shot back up the hill from the web.

It is a clean and enjoyable place to visit and I especially enjoyed seeing the Midshipmen and women walked around in their white uniforms with their crisply ironed lines and everything just so – a real pleasant contrast to the look of most college students.

This is the dock area at the bottom of the hill.

Since we’d had a big breakfast, we decided on a mid-afternoon meal at the well-known and obviously popular Jimmy Cantler’s Riverside Inn located a couple of miles east of town on the water. 

The restaurant appears to have been a home that was turned into a restaurant and we had to wait about an hour to get a seat - at least we could wait down by the water in the shade and watch them sort the crabs.

The inside dining area was a large room with picnic tables lined up – sorry about the blur. 

Since it was well known and very busy, we were expecting outstanding food and knew it would be pricy, but while the second part was true, Bev and I were very disappointed with the food while Ann and Eric enjoyed theirs – Bev had a lump crabmeat sandwich. 

For $20, I got two smaller than expected deep fried Maryland backfin crab cakes, French fries, and slaw.  The slaw and fries were both good (I don’t think either were homemade) but I believe we make much better crab cakes.  I might have expected disappointment had I ordered BBQ ribs from a crab house, but not when getting a crab dish.

I won’t cover the rest of the meals but would sure not go there again and I was surprised it was so popular – part of the crowd may have been due to the recent opening of crab season and they served many trays of them at $65/dozen – the couple beside us was having them and advised the price was a bit steep.

In spite of the meal experience, it was still a very nice way to spend an afternoon and save for knee pain and a pretty hot day, I would like to have spent more time walking around Annapolis, including the USNA - I would definitely go back, but on a cooler day and maybe during the week.

All photos can be enlarged by clicking on them.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by Almost Heaven South.

One year ago:  Bojangles Leftovers For Breakfast

Two years ago: Breakfast From The Frig

Larry

5/19/12  event date

An Un-Cajun Is On The Loose

A year ago, Bev and I made a trip to NOLA and brought back several items so we could make the local cuisine at home, but each time I’d mention it, she’d rather have something else.  When son Rhett, who I know likes Cajun, stopped off for a couple of days on his way from Ft. Knox to his new assignment at Ft. Bragg, I decided it was now or maybe never.

I believed I had some crawfish tails, gator bites and boudin which I’d planned to turn into crawfish pie, gator cakes, and boudin balls.  I’d saved a recipe for the crawfish pie from Katherine over at Smoky Mountain Kitchen, a recipe for deep-fried  boudin balls from About.com, and planned to use my crab cake recipe with different spices for the gator cakes.

I’m sure you’ve heard the term “the best laid plans…”, when I went to the freezer I found the tails and boudin, but not the gator bites, finding some gator sausage instead – no problem as it would be grilled sausage rather than gator cakes and my job just got easier. 

So I turned to boudin and the recipe says remove the casing and crumble, then form into balls. 

I removed the casing from one of three and it crumbled like dry rice and would not form a ball, patty, or anything else. 

I considered adding and egg or other binder, but decided to just grill the other two along with the sausage – my job got easier yet.

We ate them while the pie baked and I’d made up a couple of sauces using a 50/50 mix of Big Bob Gibson’s Mustard Sauce and mayo and doing the same thing with some homemade mustard sauce I had - they weren't half bad.  This was our first time for boudin and Rhett and I both really liked it – preferring it to the gator sausage.  This was the mild and it was still pretty spicy - I can only imagine the spicier version was a flamer.

Earlier. I’d made the pie filling and just had to heat it up, fill the crust, and bake.  I tried to follow Katherine’s recipe to the letter, but I ended up with more of an etouffee in a pie crust and the more I baked it, the soupier it became. Check Katherine's site for what it's supposed to look like.

Several possibilities for this – perhaps I didn’t cook enough of the water from the veggies, or I didn’t reduce the sauce by half after adding the shrimp stock and cream, or my tails were not packed it fat and even though I drained them, they still added water. 

Like many recipes, even though you follow it, there’s a feel or look to the dish and you know when it’s right – just as I will next time.

Bev wasn’t interested in any of the NOLA dishes but Rhett and I both thought the crawfish pie was delicious and perhaps I’ll cook up some rice to put under the leftovers.  I'll make it again and maybe arrange for a lesson from Katherine in the meantime.

As for the remaining very crumbly boudin, you guessed it – scrambled eggs.  I just sautéed it in a little oil, added 4 eggs beaten with a little cream and hot sauce, scrambled moist and served with the leftover gator sausage which I’d split lengthwise and heated cut-side down in a skillet and added to a croissant with some of the mustard sauce.

Now this was my kind of Cajun food and Rhett's comment was "yep, I'm definitely a fan of boudin."

All photos can be enlarged by clicking on them.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by Almost Heaven South.

One year ago:  New Orleans Trip – Almost Over

Two years ago: A Little Fun In The Sun

Larry

Salmon Cakes

I’d seen this recipe when Mary at One Perfect Bite published it and put it on my try-list then Diane at Voice In The Garden published it, but I was ready.  Just the previous night, we had grilled a whole sockeye salmon filet and ate less than half so we had the remainder lounging around in the fridge awaiting this recipe.

Since we had more than enough, we invited Bev’s sister and neighbor Pat to join us for dinner on the dock.

The recipe is available on the other sites, but I decided to post the ingredients list to show how we made it (in parenthesis ) – joint effort between Bev and I.  First I had 10 oz of salmon, so I scaled everything up to match.

1/2 pound fresh salmon (10 oz.)
4 tablespoons unsalted butter (5 tbsp salted butter)

¾ cup small-diced red onion (1 cup of our sweet white onion)

1 ½ cups small-diced celery (1 ¾ cups)

½ cup small-diced red bell pepper (5/8 cup of our Sante Fe Chili)

½ cup small-diced yellow bell pepper (5/8 cup of our Sante Fe Chili)

¼ cup minced fresh flat-leaf parsley (1/3 cup)

1 tablespoon capers, drained (1 ¼ tbsp.)

¼ teaspoon hot sauce (1/3 tsp)

½ teaspoon Worcestershire sauce (5/8 tsp)

1 ½ teaspoons crab boil seasoning (1 tsp Zatarains Pro Boil)

3 slices stale bread, crusts removed (1 cup store bought bread crumbs)

½ cup good mayonnaise (5/8 cup Dukes)

2 teaspoons Dijon mustard (2 ½ tsp)

2 extra-large eggs, lightly beaten (3 eggs)

½ tsp salt (zero)

½ tsp black pepper (1/2 tsp)

Bev did the veggie prep by removing the ribs and seeds from the peppers then chopping everything together in the food processor and it made them just right.  Since my salmon already had a good coat of Emeril’s Essence on it, I reduced the crab boil addition.  Also since the crab boil was real salty, I decided to wait until the veggies were done to add salt and they didn’t need any, then I tasted again after mixing everything and it still required no additional salt. I went ahead with a third egg, but then I ended up with a mix that was too wet, so I’ll stick with 2 next time.  We just used the veggies we had from the garden and they all worked fine so we were able to make the dish without a trip to the store.

Before the entree, we began the meal with a Caprese Salad using a recipe from Pioneer Woman via tastykitchen.com.

We've had this a few times and although it was tasty, we like other salads much better.  While the whole basil leafs make for a nice presentation, I believe it would be tastier and easier to eat to chiffanade the basil and build as a tomato slice-basil-cheese then repeat ending with whole basil like Bev did. 

Not able to pass up a taste test opportunity, I cooked one  cake with a Panko coating and one without then I added some remoulade to mine again for a taste test.  Here’s my plate with included some Blue Ribbon green beans cooked with a ham hock and some of our potatoes.

Just as the previous posters found, we all thought the crab cakes were delicious - even Bev who had said earlier that they contained too much other stuff that would overwhelm the salmon.  I liked them equally well with or without the sauce.  This is now the go-to recipe for salmon cakes and sure beats the canned salmon, oats, egg, and onion, topped with ketchup, version I grew up on.  With three strong endorsements now, you may want to give these a try if you like salmon cakes.

Since we have varieties of blueberries that bear at staggered times, we are still getting lots so Bev decided to whip up a little dessert of blueberry turnovers.  She used this recipe from Giada Di Laurentis.
Blueberry and Mascarpone Turnovers

Ingredients

1/2 cup mascarpone cheese, at room temperature

2 tablespoons sugar, plus extra for sprinkling

1/2 teaspoon cornstarch

1 teaspoon lemon juice

1 teaspoon lemon zest

1/3 cup fresh or frozen and thawed blueberries (Bev used 1/2 cup)

2 (9-inch) refrigerated pie crusts (Bev used 1 sheet of refrigerated pie dough)

1 egg, beaten

Vegetable oil, for frying

Directions

Special equipment: a 3 1/2-inch round cookie cutter

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Set aside.

In a small bowl, mix together the cheese, sugar, cornstarch, lemon juice, and lemon zest until smooth. Stir in the blueberries.

Using a 3 1/2-inch round cookie cutter, cut the pie dough into 12 circles. Place the dough on the prepared baking sheet. Using a pastry brush, lightly brush the edges of the dough with the beaten egg. Place about 1 1/2 teaspoons of the cheese mixture in the center of the dough. Fold the dough in half to enclose the filling and pinch the edges to seal. Using the tines of a fork, gently crimp the sealed edges. Refrigerate for 10 minutes.

While the pastry is chilling: In a large heavy-bottomed saucepan, pour enough oil to fill the pan about a third of the way. Heat over medium heat until a deep-frying thermometer inserted in the oil reaches 375 degrees F. (If you don't have a thermometer a cube of bread will brown in about 3 minutes.) Fry the turnovers for 1 to 1 1/2 minutes until golden. Drain on paper towels and sprinkle with sugar while still hot. Cool for at least 10 minutes before serving.

I was cooking in the semi dark and had no device to tell me the oil temp so I’m not sure what it was but here they are cooking on the grill side burner.  Note the dark spot in the center from laying on the pan bottom – next time I’ll deep fry they to eliminate that.

Rather than let them cool, we topped with some good vanilla ice cream let over from our dock dinner party and they were very good.

Just another nice evening at the dock and I only had to go for two swims to cool off although the water temp feels the warmest I’ve ever seen it – more like diving into a warm bath.  It takes a dive down about 5’ to hit some cooler water.

All photos can be enlarged by clicking on them.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by Almost Heaven South.

One year ago:   A BBQ Send-Off

Larry

Surf & Turf At The Lake

Friends Laura & Dave (Big Daddy Dave) and Laurie’s sister Bonnie and brother-in-law Bill, visiting from St. Louis, came over for dinner at the lake and we decided on a poor man’s surf & turf meal.

We started with crab cakes using a recipe we’d tried before as a taste test and enjoyed from Judy at Free Crab Cake Recipes.  I made them up that morning using the terrific Maine crab we'd brought back from our May trip, covered and stored them in the fridge, then about an hour before cooking, I removed them to warm up a little - a mistake as I had trouble keeping them together.  I preheated the pan, coated the cakes in panko, and fried until golden brown in Canola oil. 

We served them on a bed of sautéed spinach topped with some grated parmesan then topped the crab cake with Mary’s Remoulade and once again, they were delicious - I took two shots and they were both blurry but here's one that Laurie took .

The next dish was a Green Bean, Tomato, and Mozzarella Salad using this recipe from Food.com.

Ingredients

2 cups fresh green beans, cooked til tender

8 ounces mozzarella cheese, cubed (we used fresh)

1/2 cup Italian dressing

4 tomatoes, cut up

1/3 cup chopped fresh basil 

Directions

Mix all ingredients together and chill for an hour before serving.

Bev made it using some of our green and yellow filet beans, basil, and tomatoes (Yellow Brandywine, Cherokee Purple, and Green Zebra).  It was a different kind of salad for me but I thought it was delicious and would definitely serve it again. 

For the main course, it was grilled pork tenderloin, grilled shrimp, and small potatoes boiled then fried in butter.  For the tenderloin, after trimming, I brined it for 7 hours in this brine:

1 ½ cup water

½ cup orange juice

¾ cup brown sugar

¼ cup Kosher salt 

I removed it from the brine an hour before cooking and gave it a coating of Head Country Championship Seasoning.  I grilled them indirect to a temp of 120*, then moved to direct heat and took them to 140*, turning and basting several  times with a Maple Ancho Glaze from John Dawson over at Patio Daddio BBQ.  After a 10 minute rest, I sliced and served with some additional basting sauce. I got too busy cooking and forgot to take pictures and didn’t have a designated photographer.

I thought it was cooked just right but for the second sweet dish in a row, it just didn’t match up with my taste.  Had I not added the additional glaze to the sliced meat it may have worked fine for me, based on the leftovers I had the next day for breakfast. 

While the pork was resting, I grilled the shrimp using our normal process of: spray with Pam, sprinkle with Emeril’s Essence, and baste several times with butter while grilling over high heat to ensure flare-ups and the charring this creates. They were served with a small ramekin of melted butter and seemed to be a hit with everyone.

For bread it was drop cheese biscuits using the recipe from Red Lobster and they were very good as always – plus very easy to make.  She added about 1 1/2 tbsp of minced fresh parsley to the dough as well as 1/2 tbsp to the butter for the top.  They can also be made as rolled and cut biscuits, but these are much easier.

Here’s the disappointing shot of my plate but by this point I was just ready to eat and not too worried about presentation - sorry about that.

We finished the meal off with delicious brownies and ice cream brought by Laurie and Dave.

Laurie got much better shots than I did so please hop over to Big Daddy Dave's blog for a look at them.

I know this is long, but I have to mention Bev's Sangria which she made to taste from white wine, peaches, limes, lemons, blueberries, simple syrup, peach brandy, and vodka.  It was a little sweet for me but Bill and Bev sure seemed to like it - Bev liked it a little too much.

All-in-all it was a very nice and liesurely evening helped in part by preparing and serving each course before moving on to preparing the next one - although I did have the pork cooking indirect while we ate the salad.  It's always fun to meet new people and while it was very hot, being on at the lake and under high preformance fans made it fairly comfortable.

All photos can be enlarged by clicking on them.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by Almost Heaven South.

One year ago:  Berry And Peach Breakfast And Tomato Juice

Larry

Roasted Red Pepper Crab Quiche - No Frittata

I made a tour around the grounds yesterday and other than a few small tree limbs and some washing from the 4 1/2" rain, we seem to have made it through Wednesdays storms okay. I feel bad for those that sustained damage and especially those who lost loved ones - the planet seems to be waking up.

We made a potato crusted dish some time back and every time I mention it Bev comments that it was too bland. I’ve seen several lately on the blogs I read and began thinking about how to overcome Bev’s objection. When Katherine over at Smoky Mountain Café posted hers a while back and commented that crabmeat could be used, an ideal was born.

I remembered the crab meat I still had in the freezer from our seafood shop-a-thon, the recent crab cakes we’ve made, and the burrito I made from leftover stuffed crab, and a quiche was born. I began with a half recipe of Cathy’s Fire Roasted Pepper Crab Cakes over at Wives With Knives.

This is the crust I had planned and will make sometime, but Bev did not want the extra carbs, so we compromised on a frittata.

For the crust: (If I had made it)
3 cups frozen hash browns, thawed and drained
½ stick melted butter
½ tsp Old Bay
1/8 tsp each salt and pepper

For the filling: (I made it like this)
- 2/3 pound crabmeat
- 2 green onions, small dice
- ½ tablespoon chopped fresh parsley
- ½ tablespoon chopped fresh cilantro
- ¾ teaspoons Old Bay seasoning, divided
- ¼ cup jarred roasted peppers, diced
- ¼ cup mayonnaise
- ¾ cup half and half
- 4 chopped asparagus spears – just because I had them
- 1 cup shredded cheddar
- 3 large eggs, beaten
- Several dashes of Tabasco Habanero Sauce - Bev added more to hers
- Salt and pepper to taste

Directions:
In a 10” porcelin skillet with a little butter and olive oil, I sautéed the veggies, crab, herbs, and half of the Old Bay until the asparagus was a little tender.

Then I added the cheese and allowed it to begin to soften.

In a bowl I whisked together the remaining ingredients and poured them over the items in the pan and stirred around for a couple of minutes to get things evenly distributed.

I reduced the heat to low and cooked until the bottom was set, then put it under the broiler to finish.  Here's the finished product after the addition of just a little grated parmesan.

It was roll your eyes back delicious and Bev whipped up a salad using our garden salad greens, radishes, spinach, and green onion plus some other stuff and topped it with homemade 1000 Island and it was just about as good. 

Real men definitely eat quiche (or fritatta), even for supper - here's my plate.

Bev loved it and I'm so happy to be moving beyond being just a recipe follower - the next time I'll make individual ones and put a potato crust in mine.  Also, it was almost too moist so I'll reduce the milk to 1/2 cup.  Tune in a few days for the rest of the pound of crab.

I know I'm in the minority, but I'm sure glad this wedding is over.  I don't know whether the media wore me out more with it or the Charlie Sheen debacle :-).

All photos can be enlarged by clicking on them.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by Almost Heaven South.

One year ago:  Taters and Eggs

Larry