Those beautiful, purple-black eggplants look so exotic sitting there in the produce case.  But the thought of cleaning, cutting and cooking an eggplant scares me a little bit.  If I brought an eggplant home from the farmer’s market today, would I know what to do with it?

There are several schools of thought regarding what is necessary in the preparation of an eggplant.  One  method suggests an eggplant needs to be cut lengthwise in thin slices and laid out on layers of paper towels in order to “sweat out” the moisture.  Not everyone agrees with that, so now I’m more confused than ever.

So, here’s the challenge.  Can anyone tell me in three easy steps, or less, how to clean, cut and prepare an eggplant?  What are your success stories?  What is the one thing you found to be a necessary step in the preparation of an eggplant?  Has anything really gone wrong when you’ve tried to just throw together an eggplant dish without following a strict recipe?    There are several recipes  for eggplant casseroles in my kitchen drawer that all sound delicious, but I have been hesitant to try any of them until I know how to begin the preparation.

With your help, I plan to overcome my fear of eggplant preparation, become an eggplant aficionado and spread the joy of eggplant cookery everywhere I go!

Our beautiful vegetable garden will be ready soon and, as usual, we planted way too many red potatoes because my whole family loves them. We enjoyed perfect gardening weather this summer so it looks like it will be a banner year for potatoes. My pitchfork is at the ready!

Red potatoes have a smooth, solid texture and nice, tender, edible skins, which makes them perfect for salads because they boil up without breaking up and you don’t need to peel them. I know most people have a preference for using specific potatoes in a given dish; like red potatoes for salads, “bakers” for baking, russet for whipped and maybe Yukon for smashing. Each potato has a unique quality that lends itself to different cooking methods.

Well, my family is becoming tired of traditional red potato salad already this summer, so that eliminates my number one use-it-up potato dish. Other than the cold potato salad that’s typically made for summer picnics, I’m curious just how many different or unusual potato salads there are for which red potatoes would be perfect. Because I will soon have an abundance of new red potatoes, are there methods and recipes that will help me use up my supply? Any recipe made with red potatoes like hot salads or casseroles or cold salads, would be welcome. It’s the end of summer and almost show time in my garden!

Okay, this is a trick question.  I really don’t have frozen corn any longer… I have bags of thawed corn. My freezer quit on me and I am left now with six bags of thawed whole kernel corn.  I cannot stomach the thought of boiling it up and just eating it as is.  That would just get monotonous and I’ll guarantee by about the second bag, I’d be throwing bags of corn out for the ducks to eat.  I have re-bagged the corn in tightly sealed zipper bags and it is in my refrigerator waiting for a brilliant solution.

There are some good fish or other seafood chowder recipes that I have used in the past, but many of them just don’t use enough corn.  I’ve also enjoyed some excellent corn casserole dishes at potlucks and have ordered Succotash at restaurants, but I don’t have the recipes.

There must be hundreds of ways to use my surplus of whole kernel corn, but when I look in the refrigerator, I panic and all reason seems to elude me!  Please help!

When we enter the months of hurricane season, we make sure our cupboards are stocked with non-perishable supplies of all sorts.  Unfortunately, my husband’s idea of a hurricane survival-kit is a case of Vienna Sausages.  As interesting as I find that concept, it isn’t something that I can really wrap my head around.  The thought of eating those little sausages for countless days while we wait for the power to come back on is a little unnerving, to say the least.  But, now that I have numerous cans of Vienna Sausages in my cupboard, I’m thinking I will need a way to cook and eat them.

I’ve seen a few recipes for appetizers using Vienna Sausages, or other types of little sausages, but I’m wondering if there isn’t some kind of recipe that is more of a main dish.  I’m having trouble picturing such a meal, but I hope you good folks will be so kind as to share any recipe you might have  for using this unique sausage product.  Thank you!

I really hadn’t given spinach a lot of thought, that is, until recently when I went on a low-carb diet.  In order to limit my carbohydrate intake,  I eliminated breads and pastas from my “okay to eat” list.  In doing so,  I eliminated a substantial amount of iron in my diet as well, because most breads and pastas are fortified with vitamins and iron.  About two weeks into my diet I started craving spinach.  Why?  Spinach is one of the best sources for iron.  And now because of my spinach cravings,  I  have a refrigerator full of bags of fresh spinach waiting to be eaten.

My spinach recipe repertoire is limited.  I make a nice fresh spinach salad with a little cucumber and diced onion topped with a light dressing.  I also make a side dish of spinach cooked in a skillet just until it wilts, with a little onion, garlic and a splash of chicken broth added.  But, aside from these generic recipes,  I don’t know how I can utilize all my spinach in new and interesting recipes.  I’d love to be able to use up a whole bag in a nice, big pot of soup or a real full-meal “comfort casserole”.

Are there some really exciting recipes out there that will use up large quantities of fresh spinach and satisfy my new craving for spinach? If the ideas are low-carb, then even better.

My neighbor just stopped by with a bag of cucumbers straight from his garden. Now there is absolutely nothing better than fresh, homegrown cucumbers that ripened straight on the vine. I love them just cut up with a little salt, or mixed with homegrown tomatoes and dressed with a little vinagrette as a simple summer salad.

But other than that, I’m just not sure what I can make with them and there are more of these delicious veggies sitting on my kitchen counter right now than we can eat in a week. Any thoughts? What are your favorite cucumber recipes? Leave a comment with your suggestions below.

Thanks,

Cucumber Fan Susanne

I went grocery shopping today and found a great buy one get two free deal on watermelons. I couldn’t resist and now have 3 large watermelons sitting on my kitchen counter. We started to eat the first one, and got through about half of it. Now I’m wondering what I’m supposed to do with the rest. Since they hold so much water, I’m sure freezing and then thawing them later on is out of the question. What else could I make with these yummy fruits? Does anyone have a recipe for a watermelon drink? (I think I’ve heard of a water melon cooler or lemonade before). I appreciate any tips or recipes you may have that use watermelon.

Susanne

Thanks to some smart coupon shopping, I was able to get packs of roasted sunflower seeds for 15 cents each and stocked up since we occasionally like to snack on them. Now that they are sitting in my pantry, I’ve been wondering what I can do with them other than just snacking on them plain.

Here are my ideas so far:

• Sprinkle the sunflower seeds on salads for some extra crunch.
• Add them to muffin batter. I think it would go really well with some pumpkin or cranberry muffins.
• Make some trail mix out of sunflower seeds, dried fruit and dry cereal.

I’d appreciate any other ideas and any recipes you may have that include sunflower seeds.

My husband is a southern boy, so there’s always a box of grits lurking in the pantry. I fix them on occasion with eggs or bacon and toast for breakfast. We had some this morning and for some reason it hit me that it might make a good component for lunch or dinner dishes too. I guess it is very similar to Polenta.

The first thing that comes to mind is of course shrimp and grits. I’ve had this savory low-country dish in restaurants before but have never tried to make it myself. Anyone have a good recipe for this?

Of course I’d love to hear any other recipes that include grits you’d like to share. Just enter them as a comment.

I love love love Papa John’s pizza. The texture of their crust is just perfect. I’ve tried just about any pizza crust recipe I could find, but still have not come up with anything that is even close to the same.  I just can’t get it to be as airy and chewy while still keeping that nice crust.

My pizza dough always ends up either being too dense or to crispy and dry. Do you have a pizza crust recipe you’d care to share? I’d love to be able to just whip one of these up at home whenever a bad Papa John’s Pizza craving hits.