Disappointing Sunday......

That is the overall theme for the dinner that I created on my project for Sunday.  Disappointing.  I had to meal plan for the week and grocery shop in the morning.  In the afternoon, I went to an open house to look at a 13 acre farm.  Why you ask?  Well I am thinking about Mrs. Wilkes' again and how she in the day had boarders.  I was thinking.... what if I had folks stay with me in a farm setting and provide meals for them?  I am thinking about the kind old retired gent that perhaps is a widower however still enjoys playing in a garden but doesn't want to care for a big place or worry about inside chores and meals.  Those are the kinds of thoughts that dining at Mrs. Wilkes' and cooking through her book have me pondering.

The open house gave me a lot to think about.  I'll be chewing on it a while.  But what was interesting was when I got home and walked into my home, I was appreciative with what I had in my own home.  I looked around my kitchen and decided I needed to get to work as I had quite a bit to do to make a 6 p.m. dinner time goal.  I also invited my Mom over for dinner and was excited that she could be a taste tester for me.

The first recipe I worked was the Corn Bread and Corn Bread Muffins.  I had to make a double batch because half of it was going to be used for the Corn Bread Stuffing.  I used the recipe in the 2001 cookbook to follow.  Florrie Simpson Leach, Mrs. Wilkes' longest serving cook, claims this recipe as her specialty.  Now when I read that I thought, these have to be good.  I bet Florrie herself checked this recipe to make sure it was right!

Putting it together was easy it had me mixing the dry ingredients separately and then adding the liquid.  I also put the batter into cupcake holders and the rest into a 8 X 8 baker to use for the stuffing.  When these came out of the oven they looked good!

Next to get ready was the Corn Bread Dressing.  As I looked at the ingredients, I noticed it called for 3 hard boiled eggs chopped.  So I wanted to get the eggs boiled.  A confession.  I think I have boiled eggs before, but couldn't remember how to do it, so I had to Google that.  I also learned that Tom doesn't boil eggs, but he sure knows how to eat them.  So he was no help.  I found a website that broke it all down for me and followed the instructions.  Let eggs get to room temperature, put them in cold water.  Bring to rolling boil, take off stove, cover and let stand for 20 minutes for extra large eggs.  All of that was easy.  Now, peeling the eggs were  not.  Tom helped me with that but said that they should of cooked a little longer and it wouldn't of been so hard.  But when I cut them open, they looked perfect to me.  Maybe the eggs were too fresh?  Do you have any idea?  I peeled them in cool running water and also let them sit in a pan of cold water for 10 minutes before I started to peel them.

I also had to prepare 2 cups of crumpled toast crumbs for the dressing.  I decided to take white bread and run 8 slices through my toaster.  Then I crumpled the bread up with my hands and added it to the crumbled corn bread.  Then I cheated and bought chicken stock at the store.  It called for 4 1/2 cups of stock to be heated up and then poured into dry mixture, cover and let sit for 10 minutes.  While that was going on, I finished the eggs, chopping the celery, green pepper and onion.  After letting it set, I mixed the rest of the ingredients together and put in my 9 X 13 baker to bake for 30 to 40 minutes.

Finally I am ready to work on the Roast Pork.  When I went to the store, Tom helped me pick out the pork roast to use.  Recipe called for 4-5 lb roast and we found the roasts to be 3.75 lbs.  I rinsed and dried the roast and then rubbed it with salt, pepper and paprika.  I put it in my stone roaster and added 2 cups of water, covered and put in the oven for 1 1/2 hours.  This is where I become disappointed.  After cooking I wanted to make sure it was done, so I did a temperature check.  I also had to google what is the correct temperature for cooked pork (160 degrees).  After checking, it wasn't done.  Then I put it back in the oven.  When I got to the correct temperature, I cut into the roast and it was still red.  So back into the oven it went.  This put me over my time limit to serve dinner at 6.  I told everyone to sit down and work on the salad, muffins and dressing until the roast was done.  Here are my photos to share:

I was excited to have my Mom over and serve her some Mrs. Wilkes' cooking, but when the roast was finally done, it wasn't pretty or tasty.  Cooking a roast in the oven, I give myself a big fat D-.  Once it was done, I didn't like the texture or the fattiness of the meat.  Next roast would be cooked in the crock pot.
Mom, Tom and Jacob all had some of the meat and Tom was the only one that went for seconds.  I took like two bites of it and was no longer interested. 

Everyone liked the corn bread muffins.  The texture was good and smoothering them with real butter was better.  I wish that they would of been a little sweeter.  The corn bread dressing was also disappointing.  The texture was excellent.  It looked really good, but taste was just OK.  It needed additional seasoning to jazz it up.  Perhaps I am just too used to Stove Top Stuffing to appreciate a more bland version.  Again, everyone liked the stuffing but I wanted it to taste better. 

We enjoyed the dinner overall and my Mom realized how much work I was doing to pull off this meal.  Everyone helped clean up the kitchen and then we rewarded ourselves with a couple of games of Euchre and the evening ended well with Mom and I winning both rounds!