Recipes for a Porch Party

How about a Porch Party? Invite some friends over, turn on a fan to discourage mosquitoes, pass some cool beverages and serve toasted pecans and a tortilla dip that will disappear in a hurry. Other necessary ingredients for a successful porch or deck party include hearty laughter and true stories. Okay, mostly true.

Toasted Pecans
Get some of your Fall pecans from the freezer and make this marvelous treat, long a requisite for any Southern wedding, tea or reception of any type. These make great gifts. A friend sends them to her son in the Navy. He shares them, thus increasing his popularity aboard ship.

1 stick butter
4 tsp. Worchestershire
4 cups pecans
1 Tab. garlic salt
1/2 tsp. Tabasco

Melt butter in 11 x 14 sheet cake pan in 300 degree oven.
Add other ingredients and pecans, mixing well. Toast for about 30 minutes, stirring occasionally during toasting to evenly season nuts. Watch carefully, for they can burn quickly. Dry on paper towels. Mighty good.

Husband D. and I often send our far-away friends several pounds of cracked pecans when the season has been a prolific one. You'd think we had sent them big money!
Pecans. Southern manna.

Tortilla Dip (quite easy)

1 6-oz. can ripe olives chopped
1 4-0z. can green chilies, chopped
4 green onions with tops, chopped
3 large ripe tomatoes, peeled and chopped
3 Tab. salad oil
1 1/2 Tab. vinegar
1 1/2 tsp. garlic salt

Mix olives, chilies, onion, tomatoes. Add oil, vinegar and garlic salt. Stir, chill, serve with chips. A Teach for America young man from California who lived with us for a while said this dip reminded him of home. A good recommendation. (recipe from friend Jeannie)


This past week was very productive in the kitchen. Made and canned strawberry preserves; blueberry-pineapple dessert topping; bread-and-butter pickles; and spices pickled beets. I like doing it: makes me feel like one of the pioneer women my ancestors were.

A Troll in the Refrigerator

Ugly and demented, the unseen troll who must live nearby targeted my house last week, using his malevolent powers to make our refrigerator's shelves topple one upon the other, squshing half a lemon pie and upsetting a stack of leftovers. The thingies that support the shelves broke.

Off to the nearest store, 15 miles away, husband D. and I go. Gotta' have a frig and freezer. Heck, we had strawberry sherbet (delicious) in the freezer. Certainly couldn't let that Southern delicacy thaw and ruin.

Arrived at an appliance store. Found the style we liked. Talked to young man on sales floor. Said young man: "This style comes in several colors. Which would you like?"

I: "Certainly not harvest gold again."

He: "Huh? Harvest gold? I don't know that style."

I: "It's a color. You know, like avocado green."

He: "Huh?"

As I thought about those two enormously popular colors , I realized they reflected a life style of perky young housewives in bright red lipstick, below-the-knee-dresses and standing erectly in their spike heels as they happily mopped their kitchen floor. That's what the advertisers showed.

Remember those ads? Who were those women able to take time from kitchen mopping to have their pictures taken for the popular womens' magazine of the day? Working in high heels? Huh?

My harvest gold refrigerator will be delegated to other duties as soon as D. finishes his carpentry work. The new one, about two inches taller than old harvest gold, must fit in a cabinet space designed for the hot model of 32 years ago. Tearing out a kitchen cabinet and rebuilding it will take a few days. Just enough time for my new double door white refrigerator to arrive.

Believe I'll dress up, get the mop out, and have D. take my picture as I mop my kitchen. That'll be a new picture for our new fridge door.