Hoecakes and Strawberry Shortcake...

It's been a busy week  Working all week.  There's that retirement thing I NEED to talk about again!

Toni, my nephew, has been staying with us.  The slave labor we have provided has been returned in kind by Toni and Andrew cooking dinner each night.

We've had poke salad and fresh garden salad.  We've had pork ribs, pork pasta and pulled barbecued pork.  We had pasta with cheese and corn, baked potatoes, zucchini, hoecakes and fresh strawberries with cake.  Not all at one meal and not in this combination but through out this week after we labored and moved Toni's storage items to the shop.

Toni taught me a  few tricks about cooking he has picked up in his world travels and I taught Andrew and Toni some old cooking tricks handed down for generations.

Andrew thought I was talking dirty when I asked if they wanted Hoecakes with their greens.  I showed the guys how to make them.  THEN I googled the name.  By golly, I had it right.  I made them the same way Paula Deen did.  The recipe wasn't written down but stored in my head as it has been for generations.

Toni shared how they cooked pork ribs quickly in Guam and I demonstrated how to make glaze for a cake. Andrew made the cake, I made the glaze, Toni dressed and cut the berries while Cool Whip made the topping.  I think this looks better than Paula Deen's.

My two best kept secrets in the kitchen are spraying the cake pan with olive oil and using sugar instead of flour to coat the pan.  The cake still turns loose and you  have a little caramel on the bottom. The second secret was from Uncle Grover who cooked in the Army and afterwards cooked in a restaurant for years. Drop the pan. Repeatedly. That's the secret. Drop the pan to settle the big air bubbles from the cake. This allows the cake to rise evenly.

So after a long hot exhausting day a meal cooked together just makes you feel like you are home. Then there's game time after the table cleared.  I have forgotten I had a tv.

Oh, and eat your heart out, Paula Deen!