Cookbook-1; Chef-0

ZOOOOOOOMMMM…  That’s the sad sound of a deadline whizzing past my head.  April 7th was the day I was to have all the Magnolia Table recipes officially wrapped up in a neat little bow, preferably each accompanied by pretty pictures and an eloquent blog.  It was a lovely fantasy.  Unfortunately, I was no better at predicting global pandemics than the current White House administration, so alas, was equally unprepared for a long term hunker-down.  Then again, my reward to myself when I finished this project was supposed to be a trip to Waco to check out the Silos, Magnolia Market, the bakery, the hotel, and all things Joanna Gaines.  Since there is no traveling happening for awhile, I’m just going to place this “failure” in the Disguised Blessings folder, and keep plugging away at her amazing recipes until the world reopens!

I planned to celebrate wrapping up with a big “Finale Recipe Roundup”, full of fanfare, but since there is still a lot more left to cook, how about I just tell you about the last meal I prepared before the clock struck midnight on April 6th?  It was a doozy!

You’ve heard of KFC?  Popeye’s?  Maybe Church’s Chicken?  Just SOME of the places no one is allowed go right now!  So when I had a hankering for good ol’ Southern cooking, I had to look no further than my freezer and the cookbook I’ve been staring at for over a year.  Fried Chicken, Jo-Jo’s Biscuits, mashed potatoes and gravy, and homemade creamed corn made up an extravagant quarantine meal that was almost as good as eating from the red and white bucket.  If only there had been a Magnolia recipe for coleslaw with way too much sugar, my life would have been complete!

I have mentioned a time or three how little I enjoy the act of deep frying, but nothing compares to crispy, juicy, golden brown chicken.  It’s worth the mess!  And the abject terror…  To serve along with your standard 8-piece meal, Jo suggested an unusual sauce, Poppy Seed Jam.  When all the black poppy seeds floated to the top of the honey/citrus mixture, I can’t say it looked very appetizing.  When I drizzled it over the hot chicken, it suddenly didn’t matter!

What else could a girl want after all those calories?  Why, even MORE calories, of course!  Strawberry Shortcake and Whipped Cream fit the bill, with the added benefit of getting me one recipe closer to book completion.  Technically I’d already made the whipped cream a dozen times this year, but this is no time to argue semantics!!  I counted it, and checked it off the list.  

This version of shortcake called for using Jo-Jo’s Biscuits (a throwback to Recipe #1!) so I came full circle, making them at both the Alpha and the Omega of the Magnolia Table journey.  Ok, the quasi-Omega…  I really like these biscuits for breakfast, with dinner, covered in honey or strawberry jam, or even buried under sausage gravy.  As it turns out, where I don’t love them is in strawberry shortcake.  There is nowhere near enough sugar to qualify a biscuit as a cake substitute!  Overall I have to give this recipe a solid 5, since it’s so stripped down: just topped with plain whipped cream (which I jazzed up with hazelnut extract) and berries simply macerated in sugar.  I’m not sure what bells and whistles I was expecting, but I just hoped for more complex flavors.

So there you have it!  Though I didn’t quite make the finish line, I made a heck of a run at it.  107 recipes down, 33 to go.  The silver lining in all this?  Look what showed up in the mail today!