Creole Stuffed Artichokes

I frequently wonder about my ancestors, the native Americans, and other “first peoples” and picture them deciding to try eating certain things.  Artichokes are high on that list.  They just don’t cry out “EAT ME” and even if you’re a culinary extrovert and willing to give anything a go, they have pretty vicious thorns on…

Greens O’Gratin

One thing about a long-running food blog … there are only so many quintessentially Irish dishes you can make for St. Patrick’s Day year after year, particularly when you aren’t all that Irish.  I’m also waging a protracted campaign to use up my winter greens before the beds need to be turned for tomatoes and…

Pork Chops with Satsuma-Horseradish Marmalade

You’ve heard me say it — Satsumas are one of my favorite parts of the holiday season.  Ripening on southern trees between Thanksgiving and Christmas, they are thoroughly seasonal, but refreshingly light and fruity in between gravy-covered meals.  Tonight, alongside a nice Satsuma mulled cider, we had lovely thick pork chops with a spicy Satsuma…

Scotch Eggs on Night Watch

Not going to lie, these would be THE BOMB as far as night watch food goes, and so I had intended them.  Then night watch started early and never ended.  We were planning to make a leisurely passage from Lake Pontchartrain to Dauphin Island off Mobile Bay, anchoring briefly before sundown at an interim barrier…

Black-and-Blue Beef Salad

If you are the type of pirate who gets a periodic craving for a good piece of beef but a warm steak loses its appeal in the summer heat, this recipe might be just your thing. “Black and blue” is the designation for a steak charred black on the outside but still raw on the…

Hot Cross Buns for Easter

Happy Good Friday to you!  Lent is almost over (we should all have given up pandemics…) and the resurrection is upon us, so time for a warming, homey, traditional holiday recipe.  Hot cross buns are typically British.  A wonderful nautical bit of lore: The Widow’s Son pub in Bromley-by-Bow had a Royal Navy sailor hang…

Eggs Sardou

I alluded ever so vaguely to it two weeks ago … Caroline brushed up closer last week with making bread, because there is none to buy.  But this week we have to acknowledge full-on: things are a MESS for those not already sequestered in a floating home where non-cohabitants have at least an anchor line-and-chain’s…

Pressure Cooker Beef Short Ribs

Sometimes a crew just  needs meat and potatoes, ya know?  And no better cut than short ribs for flavor, well marbled and bone-in, but that’s IF you have a good long time to braise them until they fall off the bone.  Tonight I did not have that time.  We had a great afternoon sail and…

Curried Chicken and Greens

Well.  After all my whimpering last week about how not-carefree the year had been, as I prepared my lucky peas for New Year’s Day, I turned the corner into the new year with a resolution to simply incorporate a little more paradise wherever I can.  So for a beautiful southern winter day and a late…

Gingerbread Crew

If there is one thing the internet has done, it’s to bring home the fact that, with 6+ billion of us on this planet (most of us with smart phones), there is very little new under the sun.  That said, I just had the opportunity to wonder if I was the first person in the…