BBQ, Internet Lies, Meadow Muffins

This is a Famous Dave's Corn Muffin....

This is my sad corn muffin...

Have you eaten at Famous Dave's BBQ? Have you eaten a cornbread muffin from Famous Dave's? If the answer is no, stop what your doing right now and go eat a corn bread muffin from Famous Dave's!

If you have, then you will understand my deep disappointment. There is one "copycat" recipes I want and it is this corn bread muffin. I keep looking online only to find the same recipe that claims to be this heavenly muffin minus it's jalapeno honey glaze. (Apparently the restaurant does not serve the jalapeno glaze, just a honey butter glaze.) I even found a post from a gentleman boasting to have gotten the recipe from a Famous Dave's restaurant manager. LIES I TELL YOU... LIES!

I spent the better part of my afternoon hunting down the different types of corn meal need as well as actually baking the muffins. The entire time I was so excited about the prospect of recreating these little gems in my very own kitchen. Just think, I would be a hit at pitch-ins, summer BBQs, Christmas dinner, housewives will beg me for the recipe, Trick-or-treaters will propel their plastic jack-o-lanterns in my door screaming for muffins in lieu of candy! BWAHAHAHAHAHA. Sorry...where was I, oh yes....muffin recipe.

I sought out the ingredients. I read the recipe 4 times. I baked the muffins. I did exactly as the recipe said. No stone unturned. All done with complete accuracy.

Final verdict....The muffins taste like crap! No...cow pies, cowplop, dung, fertilizer, guano, manure, meadow muffin, night soil, ordure, poop!

I guess Muffins are like many things...relative. I'm exaggerating, they were not that bad, but in comparison they were awful...I was so disgusted with their lack of "Famous Dave'sishness" that I chucked them in the waste bin.

hmpf.

Working the Before and in Progress

After moving in with the boyfriend, a wonderful guy, but a true "guy" in every sense. We're talking football, white walls, huge TV, leather sofas, meat and potatoes, and a general lack of interest in decor. I guess thank goodness is in order otherwise he would not be said boyfriend of mine rather boyfriend to Steve or Paul...but I digress.

Boyfriend purchased a house that was home to a 90 year old woman. Boyfriend was just fine with the 90 year old woman's curtains. Since my mother is Madame Sews A lot, it would stand to reason that I was not OK with the 90 year old woman's window treatments. With a little help from mama (free fabric and mad sewing skills) and some inspiration from Erika at Urban Grace the room is slowly starting to look like something. Hopefully something nice. I think I've settled on a paint color and will update you with photos accordingly.

NOTE: (If you look at the inspiration photo you will see the window appears to be in a fancy shmancy home. My window is not so fancy and once again mom er Madame Sews A Lot has a great solution for my lack of fancy window trim. Eventually I will install a shelf over the window moulding that will frame the top and house some of my dishes that are rarely used.)

Thanks mom!

Before (YIKES!)

RIP Patrick...oh and trust me, this clip is better with subtitles

Garden Smack Down 09 Round-up

Round this up NSGH .... My plate says it all!!!

Tomatoes...............check

Basil........................check

Green beans...........check

The pasta dish, courtesy of Martha Stewart is very yummy....and of course a simple caprese salad.

Truth be told, I have 4 huge broccoli plants and nothing but a bunch of teeth marks from rabbits and beetles...not even one floret. I have to much basil, way to many tomatoes (I'll be taking a them into work tomorrow), I have a few runt corn cobs and runt cantaloupe. All in all if I had to rely on my garden for food I'd eat nothing but basil, tomatoes, and green beans.

I think I've learned some things and have some ideas for next summers garden. I certainly will be planting more herbs and will definitely be planting some of those awesome gourds (I think you carved that star in the gourd) from the Not So Glamours Housewife's garden...Kudos and beans and disease to you!

How Many Pillows Are Too Many Pillows...

Sometimes I fear I may turn into a pillow freak and end up like this...





Thank you IKEA for your uber cheep "Alvine Flora Cushion"!

It's State Fair Season Once Again!

The one time of year you can find Martha Stewart domestic divas and the leader of Hells Angels all congregating in the same place. I saw award winning sugar cookies, I saw world class horses, I saw a woman with a tattoo of a devils tail creeping out of her shorts. (I don't think we need to examine where it started.)

Here is a little photo essay for you, and my many apologies about devil woman, I swear it was as if my camera said "Do it...they will never believe you if you don't...DO IT"!



First we have tobacco...it is Kentucky folks. I only wish someone would grow some Tomaco.
Farmall, not a John Deere but still a sweet ride.

I'll take one of each please!

Left thigh...that's all I'm saying...

I always hated balloon animals, imagine my abhorrence for a balloon farm.

Just when I thought it couldn't get any better than this blue ribbon winner...
it does...................oh MJ.

And now for what is sure to be my favorite part of the Kentucky State Fair....the ugly lamp contest!

This last photo doesn't really seem like a typical state fair pic, but this little dragon fly was hanging around the lilly pond at the Fair Grounds. I think I may enter him next year in the photography exhibition...not because I will win, but because it cost us freaking $22.00 just to get in! If you are an exhibitor you get in free.