Turning Heads in the South

  Well, as yall know, we have been enjoying a lot of cabbage this winter. These two beautiful specimens were what our friend Sam grew. Notice how they dwarf our large cutting knife. Sam said each of these cabbages weighed in at nine pounds!! We don't know how he grows them, but they are very dense and sweet. Perfect for anything you've got in mind to fix for supper.  

  We make a variety of slaws, or use the cabbage in soups and stews. We made a wonderful cabbage roll casserole, but didn't make them into rolls; just added all the ingredients and chopped the cabbage, then added it to the mix. We've smothered them and steamed them,...did I mention smothered and boiled etc. Cabbage is so good and so healthy. Almost forgot to mention that along with four huge cabbages, he sent along some packages of his Andouille and smoked turkey necks that either found, or will find their way into a dish that's loaded with the bounty of these wonderful cabbages. God has blest Sam with some really great talents and also a very giving nature. We are truly grateful for his friendship...and a lot of the time, it's around supper time that we are especially thankful. 

   The other day we were surprised to receive a bag of brussel sprouts, along with another 2 heads of cabbage from our neighbor, Jean aka "TurkeyNeck". 

I am not sure why, but I have never known anyone who has grown them and didn't even know we could grow them right here in our neighborhood.  It just aint a veggie that my Cajun family or friends, to my knowledge, ever grew.

   I like brussel sprouts and have on occasion bought them to cook here at home, or whenever I've found them in a cafeteria or buffet, I put them on my plate. I just honestly never thought about growing them. 

   When our young neighbor, Jean, dropped them off , I just hadda walk back with him, 'cause I had never seen them growing or had a clue what they looked like when they did.  Looking at his garden, I immediately knew that they would be a great addition to our small garden, since they grow straight up and don't need much room, and the ones he had were bearing like crazy.  He only had 4 plants, but they were each over 3 feet tall and covered with growing sprouts. 

 I barely got them in the door before Peggy started peeling them and getting them ready for the oven. (Ya gotta take off the tough outer layers or they'll be bitter...and she trims off more of the stem.)

As she processed them, she tossed them in a pan of olive oil.

She lightly salted them, sprinkled with some black pepper and granulated garlic powder, tossed them around in the pan 'til shiny (evenly coated) and ready for the oven. (Notice her compost bucket...more news about that later on another post.)

You may note the pan fresh from the oven looks a little sparse?? Not to worry; this will not happen to you.

That's because after smelling them cooking for about an hour at 350 degrees, as soon as they came out the oven we started snacking on them until we remembered the fracking camera; too late, AGAIN. So, like the adage about, when life hands you lemons...well, down here in Sunny South Louisiana, we've been handed huge heads of cabbage and tiny heads of cabbage. Ya think we are gonna make lemonade? Oh heck no!