Trick or Treat on Honoli'i

Oh my goodness... what a fun night we had last night. Our friends Maria and Ric hosted their annual Halloween Party and it was a doozy. Great food, fun costumes and lots of dancing under t he disco ball! I prepared breadstick "bones" to dip in marinara "blood" and a roasted pumpkin, beet, onion and wild rice salad. Maria made some awesome pulled pork with coleslaw and beans and everyone brought delightful additions to the menu... some were scary! Since pictures can tell a thousand words... I will let you see for yourself here how much fun we had:

Our Hosts, the Dairy Queen and the Milkman

Winner for "best costume"

One Year Ago Today

It was one year ago today that we were here in Hilo for the closing on our house. We needed some furniture and our local furniture store Koehnen's in downtown Hilo was featuring a real deal. If you came in a costume, you got 25% off of your purchase. So, for a small investment of a costume, we were able to save several thousand dollars. We went to Wal-Mart to find a costume and there was only one adult costume left and it was even missing the hat. It was "Big Daddy" a New Orleans Parade style costume in purple crushed velvet. I had brought along a little headband with devil ears on it and Wes had a beautiful lei that was presented to us by our real estate agent when we landed in Hilo, so we had a costume! Hence Big Bad Daddy Devil was born. This year he is going to be a Dalmatian. Here are some pictures from that day one year ago. It seems like a very long time considering all that has happened in the last year.

Spooky Image

Wes in his new chair, which is used every night!

Our salesman ringing up the sale

Next post... this year's Halloween Party!

Show and Tell Fridays

Most fridays I do what we did in elementary school on Fridays... I have "show and tell" where I spotlight a favorite blog of mine and then using the "links" from that blog, wander around the internet and sharing with you what I have found. This is an actual class picture of my 4th grade class. Can you find me? Probably not unless you knew me then.

Today I am starting with a beautiful blog, full of eye candy from the top of Mauna Kea mountain. It is done by Tom, an astronomer and fellow FBI Blogger who came here from the UK.

Tom's Blog is one you are going to enjoy seeing. He gets fabulous sunsets and sunrises up there on top of the clouds and his viewers benefit from his many sleepless nights. So click away and enjoy his photography! From Tom's blog roll I found Alice and her rather amazing blog:

A Thousand Monkeys and a Camera. Alice comes all the way from Chattanooga, Tennessee, a place I used to visit when we lived in Atlanta. I have even stayed in the funky Chattanooga Choo Choo Hotel there, made up or rail cars and cabooses. I also love the very state of the art Tennessee Aquarium, which in my opinion is the best aquarium in a land locked state. Another interesting thing about Alice is that I see she lists links of a few towns on her site and one of them is Huntley, IL, which was a few miles from our house in Sleepy Hollow, IL ! So, for whatever reason we have a geography link of sorts. And then I also see that she is a supporter of the Matthew Shepard Foundation three more cheers for the girl! Me too! And then I see she is a lefty like me and she also does food porn... come on now how did I just happen to click on someone with whom I have so much in common? Kismet I suppose. Make sure and click on her food porn page while you are visiting!

And so who did Alice lead me to? Go ask Alice! Sorry, I could not resist. Alice led me to:

101 Cookbooks, a site which I have visited before and really do like, so get a load of this page about Holloween Food ideas there! Hedi has some really good ones, like Roasted Pumpkin Salad and Thai-Spiced Pumpkin Soup. Those two sound really wonderful to me. I do have a friend, Damon Tucker who does not like pumpkin one little bit. I discovered this when I posted about making Pumpkin Ravioli! Heidi Swanson lives in San Francisco (where I lived before moving to Hawaii) and started her blog when she came to the realization that she had over 100 cookbooks and just kept buying them, but making her same repertoire of recipes for daily life. She decided to stop buying cookbooks and start opening her cookbooks and trying new recipes and ideas. She was however unsuccessful at not buying cookbooks ... I can totally relate here... but she did cut back. For our benefit,. Heidi did start cooking from her library and since 2003 she has been blogging about her adventures in the food world.

And so that is our three random blogs for Show and Tell Friday! I hope you enjoy them as much as I did.

Fried Okra

This one is for Keith, my friend from Georgia who is working on the mainland. I miss him!

Last night's supper was in the style of comfort food. At the farmer's market yesterday I picked up some tender and velvety okra, so dinner was centered on that. I do okra in several styles, but last night I opted for the simple southern style (recipe below) I learned living in coastal South Carolina, which could have been the entry point for okra into our nation's food system, though some claim it was New Orleans. Wherever it came into our country, we know that it is a delicious addition to our American menus.

Brief history of OKRA: Okra's lineage started on the banks of t he nile where it grew wild. The egyptians cultivated this relative of the Hollyhock, cotton and hibiscus. Eventually the seeds made their way throughout Africa and the middle East.

It was prized as a vegetable and the dried seeds were used as a substitute for coffee... no I am not going to try that! Because of the slave trade, okra made its way to America via the Caribbean. About the same time (early 1700's) it also was noted as having made it to Europe. Okra is probably most famous as a thickening agent in gumbo but there are many ways to prepare and utilize this vegetable.

Okra grows year round in tropical climates and must be picked 3-4 days after the flower develops or the fruit becomes tough and fibrous, but then it can be used for making paper and ropes. I have grown the red variety and I am partial to it.

It only takes 60 days from seed to fruit and once an okra plant is established it can supply okra for a family's needs. While I love fried okra and pickled okra

many of my favorite recipes for okra are from Northern India. You can also grill it and use it as the base for a variety of stews centered around North African and Turkish cuisines.

Last night I prepared it in the simple southern tradition, though there are even many variations on this theme, some use only cornmeal others add flour, seasonings etc. I have even thought of doing a coconut breading for it someday. Here is last nights rendition:

Fried Okra with Smoked Sea Salt

8-10 Okra pods 3-5" in length

1/2 cup buttermilk

2 eggs beaten with a fork or whisk

reserved buttermilk

1 cup flour for dredging

1/2 cup yellow cornmeal or polenta

1/2 cup all purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon black pepper

1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1 tablespoon raw sugar

1/2 teaspoon sea salt

1 cup of peanut or canola oil

Smoked Sea Salt or medium grained salt

Cut okra into 1/2 inch slices

soak in buttermilk for 20 minutes

Strain, reserving buttermilk for breading

Mix eggs & buttermilk till incorporated

Stir together the cornmeal flour mixture

Preheat oil in a frying pan to 350 degrees

Dredge okra in flour in small batches

Dip okra in egg mixture

Dip okra in cornmeal/flour mixture and drop into hot oil. Turn after the bottom appears to be golden brown.

Remove with a spider or screened spoon and drain on paper towels. Salt immediately and serve while warm and crispy.

Here is our dinner from last night, grilled pork chops, mashed potatoes, grilled local corn and fried okra. Stay tuned for another okra recipe soon.

Wordless Wednesdays Gooey Double Chocolate Brownies with Toffee