Hello! You may remember me. From September 2011 through October 2024 (with some short intermissions) I published this little blog, Big Food, Big Garden, Big Life in rural Mississippi. I need very much to get back to writing. And so I’m making an effort to be back. And what better to start posting than with
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We have a much older edition of this book. We keep it in the glove box. So as we left the Viking store in Greenwood–where you can get your very own Cuisinart counter-top pizza oven–Mr. Big Food took a look to discover where we might want to head next. Just imagine his delight when he
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Above, from left to right: my new sterling salt spoon resting in a salt cellar, two demitasse spoons of different sizes, a standard teaspoon Lightening isn’t right, but you get the idea. I did polish each piece before I took the picture. Really! Our first stop after we made the decent into the Mississippi Delta
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The Thompson House Bed & Breakfast in Leland, Mississippi. We’re breaking in a new Farm sitter this weekend. Left yesterday morning headed for Greenwood and the Viking Range store. Pretty sure the $20,000 six burner, two oven range will not fit in our kitchen. This is a good thing. Who wants to figure out where
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Mr. Big Food was an invited lecturer at the School of Ideas in Neuroscience–a week long summer school of sorts. Most of the participants were grad students and post-docs. The organizers had arranged for the group to walk to a joint on the river for beer and supper on the evening of the first day.
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It was a pleasant visit, except for the coming and going (and the taxi drivers which we will come to). Mr. Big Food was occupied all day every day, I think 10 to 5 or so, from Monday through Monday, with a free (hardly) day on Friday. From my travel journal: “Found a nice shaded
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When in New Orleans… It was quite good. I would not have expected otherwise at Galatoire’s. Unfortunately, the shrimp in remoulade was over cooked. A disappointment which disappeared as soon as the dozen oysters Rockefeller were placed on the table. If I’m remembering correctly, we had oysters three times. All delicious, though for my money
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This was interesting. Thought I’d pass it along. From ThinkingWest, “A Crash Course in Western Church Architecture.“ The design of a traditional cathedral is theologically based and instructive in the Faith. Though beautiful, its construction is not arbitrary – it wasn’t arranged simply to look pretty. The layout, artwork, statues, and stained glass windows all
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Originally published March 31, 2020. Thought it was appropriate for Veterans’ Day. A friend of Mr. Big Food’s Dad drove through Georgetown, Texas the other day and shared these photos with friends. Mr. Big Food’s Dad passed them along, and I thought you might enjoy them as well. He says: It was both, eerie and
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Big event yesterday! For the last couple of years our Village has put on a Trade Day (a fall festival). Mind–this is not Town (population ~2000), this is Village (pop. ~100). Strange as it sounds, Village is the county seat. Long, long time readers will recall that in 2013 the County Courthouse burnt almost to
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Ahh. The olden days. Came across this from September 2019. Made me smile. Here’s the background. As part of his day job, Mr. Big Food and I had been going to the Alabama Philosophical Society annual meetings, held at Pensacola Beach, for a few years. In 2018 he arranged to have a one day session
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Today is the first day of the month and I must go to two banks. Today is the Friday before State’s opening home game. Today is Starkvegas Errand Friday and there are additions to the usual list. On the bright side, the tank is 1/2 full so I don’t need to stop for gas. I
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The road to town takes us through a cotton field. After all of these years we’ve become quite the experts on how well the crop is doing at various times of the year. We note when it’s late being planted, anxiously await the first blossoms, and know fall has arrived when Mr. Cotton Farmer begins
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We took our company for a drive yesterday afternoon. Traveled mostly gravel roads and didn’t pass a single vehicle on them. Of course, it was Sunday and approximately 100˚ so that’s really no surprise. You can’t see it very well but the place still had clothes and furniture in it. Unfortunately, none of us had
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This is rural America at its finest. I promise. Friend of the blog, JoBeth went to get some corn. Read all about it.
It’s not unusual for us to go to Tupelo, but we always go for a reason, and do pretty much the same things while we’re there. In all of these years, we’ve never taken a regulation day-trip to Tupelo. So yesterday we did. Just before we took off, Mr. Big Food got some leftover turkey
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I mentioned that Town is going to be voting on a proposal to implement a 2% tourism tax on hotels, motels, Air B&Bs, and places that serve prepared foods, i.e., restaurants. Town has one semi-seedy little motel and no Air B&Bs so it’s a tax on Town’s restaurants which will be passed along as a
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At the far end is the train station, to which our hotel, The Scandic Grand Central, is attached. Across from the station’s plaza is the Center City Mall–complete with groceries in the bottom floor and food court on top. Center City encompasses the area south and east of the train station to the harbor, where
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