Roasted Eggplant Soup - 0 Points

Back home and back in the kitchen! 'Tis the season for fresh vegetables. Nothing says Farmer's Market to me like a big pot of soup filling the kitchen with the earthy scents of summer. 

Roasted Eggplant Soup, adapted from Homemade Soups by Sunset Books
1 large eggplant
1 small onion
3 cups water
3 cubes chicken stock
2 tbs lemon
salt and pepper
1 tbs chipotle sauce

1. Place eggplant and unpeeled onion in a brownie sized baking pan. Bake in a 400F oven until vegetables are very tender (about 75 minutes). Let cool, then peel.
2. Blend vegetables, a portion at a time, in a food processor or blender until smooth. Transfer vegetable mixture to a 2 to 3-quart pan and blend in stock. Bring to boil over high heat; add lemon juice, chipotle sauce and season to taste with salt and pepper.
3. Garnish with chipotle sauce.
4. Yields 10, 0 point servings

Round Springs and Family Reunion

This will be my last vacation post and then it will be back to normal.

My mom used to tell me a story when I was little. There was a man who was driving his team of horses through the Ozark mountains. It was dark and shadowy along the road and something spooked the horses, causing them to run wildly down the road. Unable to regain control, the driver desperately jumped from the wagon just before it careened over a cliff and into a deep, round spring. The man returned to the scene the next morning and found no sign of his wagon or horses in the spring.  For days after he continued to return, but no fragment of wagon or hint of horse ever appeared. It wasn't until he came at night that he discovered his team - the ghostly image of them - perpetually repeating their desperate, deathly plunge. Today the spring is in a National park and the road is no longer open to traffic. However, if you should chose to jump the fence and venture to the moonlit spring, you too may be haunted by the lost wagon team.

That is legend. The truth is the Round Spring is a gorgeous spring that does in fact have a road running above it along the edge of a cliff. The spring is probably very deep, but scuba divers have never been able to find the bottom because the current is too strong.

One of my favorite things about visiting the spring is that you can usually see beaver and otters swimming in the spring and the stream that runs off it. No such luck this time, the unusual water activity we have had this year has caused the current to speed up and increased the amount of water flora.

The last part of my trip was my family reunion. Family reunions are high calorie fests - occasions for everyone to show off his/her best dish. And my family can cook for real!  Like Mom's barbecue pork...

First Cousin once removed chicken and dumplings...

Other FCOR's chess squares...

Second cousin's strawberry pie that would not focus for the life of me...

Aunt's trifle, cousin's pie, FCOR's cheese cake, Mom's lemon cake, and assorted others...

My hashbrown casserole...

And, finally, my plate...the last shot before my camera died. Salad, chicken and dumplings, lasagna, bbq pork, and hashbrown casserole.

And, yes, I did get some questions about why I was taking pictures of the food. I figured every family needs some crazies - I don't mind being the cousin who takes pictures of food :)

Central Dairy, Jefferson City Missouri

You may have been wondering if I was ever going to write about food again. Well, of course! In fact, I am going to write about some mind-blowing, world class food.

Jefferson City is the capital of Missouri. It is a lovely town of just fewer than 50,000 people. The capital building itself is impressive and it is fascinating to see where Lewis and Clark passed through on their famous exploration. Full as it is of history and entertainment, the very best thing about Jefferson City is Central Dairy.

Central Diary is the place my dad would get ice-cream as a kid. His whole life - no matter where we traveled- he always talked about Central Diary having the best ice-cream. And, honestly, he is right. You cannot get better quality for a better price than Central Diary. Even though it is now owned by Prairie Farms dairy instead of the family who established it many moons ago, the quality of the product has not suffered.

Okay, are you ready to see what I ordered? Well....here are the flavors from which I had to choose.

I chose to have a hot fudge Sunday with tiger tracks ice cream: golden ice cream loaded with chocolate coated cookies, decedent chocolate truffles, and stripes of fudge. The ice cream was every bit as delicious as it sounds. The hot fudge was thick, sweet, and perfectly heated. The nuts sprinkled on top were roasted pecans. It was heavenly. For $2.50. And, yes, that is a pint of ice cream.

My husband chose two scoops (aka a pint) of extreme moose tracks ice cream: dark chocolate ice-cream loaded with moose track fudge sprinkled with moose tracks fudge filled cups. It was out of this world good. You would think it might be a challenge to eat a pint of ice-cream in one sitting, but with a flavor that good - Stone had cleaned out his cup in under 10 minutes.

My only regret is that we were only stopping by Jefferson City and not staying for a longer visit. I could have done with a few more pints!

Osage Beach, Missouri

We drove a couple of hours north to visit with my dad's family. On our way, we passed through an area known as Lake of the Ozarks.

The lake is man made. It was created when the electric company built Bagnell Dam in 1929 and flooded a huge area, including the town in which my Grandma was raised..

 There are some fantastic pictures of the building of the dam if you click here.

The dam itself is very impressive and is surrounded by some beautiful wildlife.

The current from the turbines creates a large fishbowl. This enticing buffet attracts a bevy of heron.  

The "fish bowl" is filled not only with your average river fish, but also the 6-8 foot monster fish who feed on the smaller, trapped fish. We did our best to get a picture of one of them; it was at least 6 1/2 feet long. (Do not get too excited fishermen; it is forbidden to fish this close to the dam.)

Of course, most people do not visit Lake of the Ozarks to look at the dam. The lake is fantastic for boating and other water sports; there are several top notch golf resorts; and the streets are lined with fabulous cheesy stores and attractions.

The best attraction, in my opinion, is Osage Beach Premium Outlets - one of the largest outlet malls in the United States of America. There was no possible way for me to get great pictures and go into a shopping frenzy - so please bear with me. (I have to admit, my frenzy yielded only clothing and toys for my nephew. Is it a frenzy if you are buying presents?)

Of all the things I saw at the Osage Beach, this next one brought the biggest smile to my face. I have to believe this marriage is going to last. After all, when you take your wife shopping on your honeymoon, that has to be true love.

 

Alley Springs Mill, Missouri

If you Google images of Alley Springs Mill, you will have about a gazillion results. You can also find pictures of Alley on calendars, puzzles, post cards, and in coffee table books.

My parents moved back to Missouri a couple of years ago. Since Alley Springs Mill is just half an hour from their home, it is my mother's favorite place to take visitors.

I always enjoy trips to Alley with my mom because she has great stories of childhood church picnics around the mill. The water- which is freezing cold - was very inviting to boisterous youngsters on hot summer days.

There will be no swimming in Alley Springs at the moment, since the incredible amount of water that the Midwest has seen this year has the water deep and the current very, very fast.

Although I have visited Alley infrequently due to my continent hopping childhood, I always manage to see some sort of wildlife while I am there. I was quite unhappy to find a giant snake curled up on a rock next to me on one visit. This time I was very lucky and happened upon a giant snapping turtle. He is hard to see, but I promise he is there.

Any beautiful place is always a joy to share with those you love. The best part of Alley Springs Mill was sharing it with my family.



Ozark National Scenic Riverways and not Welch Springs

The small town (population 548) in which my parents live is surrounded by the Mark Twain National Forrest in the Ozark Mountains. Meandering through those mountains are two rivers: the Current and the Jack's Fork. Those rivers and their surrounding attractions are known as the Ozark National Scenic Riverways.

Stone and I took a drive down highway 19 to highway KK to highway K (all of the roads here are numbers or letters) in an attempt to visit Welch Springs, the home of a sanatorium during the days when America was plagued by tuberculosis. The roads are very lovely and very, very curvy.

When we arrived at Welch Springs, we discovered two things. First, we should have worn hiking shoes; the sanatorium is a 1/2 mile hike from the parking area. Second, we should have dipped ourselves in bug spray; there are ten million mosquitoes at the Welch Springs parking area and they all wanted us. We took this picture, got back in the car, and came back to Mom and Dad's house.

We weren't too upset about missing out on our original goal, because we enjoyed some beautiful views on our drive.  For example, here is the Current River wandering through a valley.

And here is an overlook of some of the Ozark Mountains.

And here I am, jut being goofey.

The best part of the drive was the reward at the end - a hamburger grilled by my dad.

A little help please; I have been checking out your great blogs but haven't been able to leave any comments since coming to my parents. I can't figure out what the issue is. Anytime I try to leave a comment, I am asked to log in to Blogger. When I do log in, it takes me back to the comment page and ... asks me to log in. It is an endless circle. Any ideas what is happening and how I might fix it? 

Loretta Lynn's Ranch, Hurricane Mills, Tennessee

Stone and I took the long way to my parents house yesterday. The fastest way from Murfreesboro to the Missouri Ozarks is through Paducah, Kentucky. For some reason, our GPS and Nashville traffic conspired to make the Paducah route very unappealing, so we chose the longer way through Jackson, Tennessee.

Just outside of Jackson is a sign advertising Loretta Lynn's Ranch. My husband has always talked about visiting the Ranch. Stone has been a fan of Loretta Lynn since he was a little boy listening to her sing on his mom's LP's. So, when I saw that we were about to pass the Hurricane Mill's exit, and I happened to be driving, I decided to take a side trip.

Now, if at this point you are thinking, "Who is Loretta Lynn?" here is a video of one of her songs. This happens to be my husband's favorite - a newer song, produced by Jack White.

After meeting Loretta's daughter in the gift shop, we took a tour of the Ranch. We started out at a replica of Loretta's childhood home in Butcher Hollow, Kentucky.

After the house, we toured a model of a coal mine. Loretta Lynn's father farmed during the day and worked in the mines at night to support his family. He was in charge of blasting; one of the most dangerous jobs. Loretta Lynn paid tribute to him in her famous song.

Next was a tour of Loretta's house. She has since moved to another house behind this one, but it was here that her children grew up.

It is a beautiful house. It is also one of the most famous haunted houses in Tennessee, if you believe in that kind of thing. Apparently, the Travel Channel does.

We ended by walking around and enjoying the beautiful surroundings of Hurricane Mills. Loretta Lynn bought not just the house but the whole town. It is a very lovely place.

We look forward to going back again when we have time to explore the museum.