Friday Flowers

I would love to have a pretty flower box in front of my house. In downtown Charleston there are window boxes on almost every street you walk down. I guess the good thing about not having one is you can enjoy them all day long and never have to maintain them. Do you have a flower box? What do you have planted?

Transfer of Grace

Transfer of Grace  is one of my favorite books of images from the Lowcountry. More moving than the photos are the words that accompany them.  The book speaks of this area and how it has been passed onto us. The land is shared with people, animals and weather. This area is ever changing... we should sit back and enjoy the area whenever possible.

My favorite quote from the book is: "The Lowcountry used to be a slow country. Its uniqueness depended on a certian pace, a lilt to life. Dogs could nap on dirt roads; grits weren't instant; conversations weren't measured in cell phone minutes. Killing time was never wasting time."

Spirits of the Lowcountry

Last night I went to Muse, one of my favorite wine bars in downtown Charleston. Of course I went for a glass of wine but the nice folks next to us recommended the concoction pictured above. This cocktail featured cayenne vodka, creme de cacao, and lots of basil. Spicy chocolate? Yes please!

We talked to the bartender about the current trend in "mixology" in Charleston. I won't disagree, in the past month I have tried the Blackberry Imperial Fizz at The Gin Joint and the Monkey Gland at the Husk. Who knew gin could taste so good?

What are your thought on fancy cocktails? Do you like to try something new, or do you stick with a trusty glass of wine?

Rainy Days

                                         kate spade boots, sperry duck boots, hunter rain boots

We are lucky to finally have some rain around here! Somehow rainy days always make me lust after cute rain shoes. I have a pair that I wear often, but I love the ones above. The yellow ones would be great at an oyster roast. Which ones would you pick? Do you have a pair rain boots?

Friday Flowers

Irises are sentimental because they were my maternal grandmother's favorite flower. Every time I see some I want to buy them. The irises are so delicate and open up perfectly. Don't the flowers remind you of the Brit's with their fascinators?

This morning I put them in a little julep cup that was given to us for our wedding. Did you know that toothpaste helps to polish silver? I did it this morning and it worked wonders. Do you have any secret cleaning tricks?

Birthday fun!

                                      

        Taking photos of pretty wrapping paper is underrated. Sweet, sweet friends.

Mmmm.... Lemon ice box pie. More on that later.

Mayhaw Jelly and Biscuits

A mayhaw is a fruit that grows in the swamps and bogs of South Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana and Texas. The fruit ripens in April and May, hence the name mayhaw. It's a mix between an apple and a berry, if you can imagine that.

My granddad was raised in Donalsonville, GA just a couple counties over from the annual Mayhaw Festival. A good friend travels to Donalsonville each year for a family reunion and I always beg her to  bring back a jar.  They claim to have the best jelly on earth, and I am here to tell you it is amazing.

                                      

You can eat it on everything from toast to hoecakes, but the best way is on a biscuit. Sadly, I do not have the biscuit making skills of my grandparents... I guess when I am there age I will have it down pat. Nathalie Dupree just came out with a new cookbook called Southern Biscuits which will hopefully give me a good start. Do you have a good biscuit recipe? What's your favorite kind of jam or jelly?

Yellow Meated Watermelon

What is this strange fruit? It may be orange but it's called is yellow meated watermelon. It looks like cantaloupe and tastes like sweet summer watermelon. My sister found it at a farmers market in Statesboro, GA and when she said it wouldn't be red on the inside I didn't believe her. From a girl who has been experimenting with red carrots and purple potatoes I guess I can't be too surprised. The watermelon somehow skipped any bad quality possible. It is sweeter than I expected, has hardly any seeds and makes a perfect snack.

I keep seeing new ways to try watermelon. From summer cocktails to chilled summer soups and salsa. I am dying to try something different. Have you attempted a new recipe this summer? Recommendations are welcome!

Summer Reading

If you like to read the book before you see the movie you have about a month before this one comes out. This is a fabulous story of courage and ambition and will be put in the class of great southern novels with the likes of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil and The Prince of Tides. This book is perfect for lazy days at the beach or pool this summer. 


Can't stop thinking about the nook color. What are your thoughts on reading electronically?

Savannah Bee

                                      

The sign says Tupelo Honey, and they weren't kidding. Savannah Bee Company opened their Charleston store this year and you can find everything from beauty products to specialty honeys made for cheese, grilling,  or sweet tea. Not only is the shop beautiful but it smells amazing. You are given the opportunity to sample every honey they offer. My favorite is the sourwood and it tastes great with granny smith apples and goat cheese. I can't wait to go back and shop!

Friday Flowers

My aunts and grandmother gathered aqua mason jars from antique shops for over a year for my wedding. They found these gems in little places from South Georgia to the North Carolina mountains. We ended up using them for my rehearsal dinner and I wouldn't have it any other way. My sister and I went to the farmers market and bought $30 worth of flowers and put them together. We added mint in the arrangement for some greenery and it smelled amazing. As much as I love mint, I never thought to put it in a flower arrangement. We had 10 arrangements of different sizes and it was so affordable.

Last night I got a couple zinnias from Thackeray Farms. With so many left over mason jars I decided to recreate the arrangement. I am afraid to prune my mint back too much, otherwise I would have added some. These simple little flowers will add a ray of sunshine to the weekend. What is your favorite flower?

Farm Fresh Cobbler

Tonight I baked cobbler using my grandmother's recipe. The blueberries are from Sweet Blue's Berry Farm in Hollywood mixed with blueberry goat cheese from Burden Creek Dairy farm on John's Island.

batter:

1 cup all purpose flour

1 cup sugar

1 cup milk 

1 stick of butter

blueberry mixture:

2 cups of blueberries

2 tablespoons of goat cheese

Heat blueberries on the stove until they are tender and mix in goat cheese. Pour the blueberry mix into a baking dish. Add the batter on top of the blueberries. Bake at 350 for 45 minutes. The batter will rise to the top and become golden brown. Sprinkle sugar on top and broil on low until the sugar crystalizes. 

Enjoy with ice cream or milk!

Old Bluffton

Coburn's Liquor Store, circa 1939 is the oldest liquor store in the state of South Carolina. On the heels of the national repeal of prohibition moonshiners and folks from Hilton Head would come to Coburn's to buy liquor for the weekend. Janie Coburn said the red dot used to stand for hours of operation - sun up to sun down. J.F. and Janie Coburn kept a pistol under the counter because people would wake them up to buy a bottle of liquor and you never knew who would show up.  


Murray Sease of Shine on Art painted the quaint liquor store and when I saw it in the Society of Bluffton Artists  gallery I knew couldn't live without it. After my mom and I bought the painting, we went for a glass of champagne at Vineyard 55. Dad drove up on his new Harley and we talked about our dear friend Graham Bullock. Graham passed his motorcycle on to my dad and wrote of this liquor store in his old newspaper the Bluffton Eccentric. He reminds us to cherish the days we have with one another as well as the heirloom establishments we have in our town. Our part of the world is a rapidly changing one, sometimes we need to sit back with a glass of wine and appreciate our surroundings. 

Porch Parties

Inspired by the book Porch Parites I made a Spiked Arnold Palmer when I came home tonight. The recipe is hard to screw up, with equal parts sweet tea vodka and lemonade. It feels like home when you add a sprig of mint from your garden for garnish. What makes this the perfect southern summertime cocktail: the sweet tea, the lemonade or the mint?

Coastal Treasures

"I have heard it said that an inoculation to the sights and smells of the Carolina Lowcountry is an almost irreversible antidote to the charms of other landscapes, other alien geographies. You can be moved profoundly by other vistas, by other oceans, by soaring mountain ranges, but you can never be seduced.”  Pat Conroy