Month: July 2006

Av and I signed up for a share in an organic farm. Meaning…every week now we’re getting a box full of vegetables:

I really like going to farmers markets, and buying locally whenever I can, so us doing this just makes me feel good. This week, our box from the farm included a dozen beautiful eggs plus bell peppers, tomatoes, yellow onion, new potatoes, cucumbers, beets, beans, corn, and an eggplant! That will keep us busy for a while.

We’re not health-food people, but I have started to take more interest in what’s available. Our milk comes from Wright Dairy in Alexandria – they don’t use any growth hormones on their milk cows. And I try to look for free-range chickens and grass-fed beef, too. Nothing crazy, I’m just trying to be more…aware, I guess.

The other day, I found the 100 Mile Diet. It’s where you make the intention of eating food that has come from no more than 100 miles from where you live. Very interesting.

I also found our state’s Farmers Market Authority website, where they list not only farmers markets, but roadside stands and you-pick operations by county. Hmmm…..

I’d been wanting to visit Tuskegee for a really long time, and this weekend, Av and I went there after we left our friends in Selma.

Here are some pictures from the Tuskegee University campus:

Tuskegee was founded in 1881 and the first teacher was Dr. Booker T. Washington, who served the school until he died in 1915.

This is the Rosenwald Center. Booker T. Washington and Julius Rosenwald (President of Sears) got to be good friends, and Rosenwald served on the board of directors from 1912 until he died. Rosenwald gave a lot of money to the school, and even started a program to endow other schools in the South for black children.

Also on campus is the George Washington Carver museum – he taught at Tuskegee and is best known as the scientist who found hundreds of uses for the peanut. This is what my WPA book says about Carver:

Although now (1940) an old man, Dr. Carver is still actively engaged in carrying on research and scientific investigations. The honors he has received have not changed him; he is still the simple kindly man who came to Tuskegee more than 40 years ago. He never takes a vacation, and refuses salary increases, saying that the school needs the money. Never seeking honor for himself, Dr. Carver simply says, “G-d told me how.”

This is a monument showing Booker T. Washington that is titled “Lifting the Veil” – it is inscribed, “he lifted the veil of ignorance from his people and pointed the way to progress through education and industry.”

This is ‘The Oaks’ which was the home of Booker T. Washington. It’s open for tours (we’ll go soon) and is run by the National Park Service.

…and *this* is Grey Columns. Isn’t it magnificent??!!

The University president lives here now. It was built in 1857 and has a really interesting history (I found it here): when a Union general was given orders to burn Tuskegee to the ground, one of the officers found out that his frat brother at Yale, Ed Varner (whose family owned Grey Columns), was at the home tending to wounds he had received. It was because of this connection that the town was spared.
(My WPA book says they were classmates at Harvard, and “apologizing, he ordered his men from the yard and then spent some time in a renewal of the old acquaintance.”)

We had a *spectacular* time this weekend. It was wonderful for about a million different reasons, but one reason in particular is in the picture above. We had been invited to a special event, and at the luncheon, just guess who came and sat down right next to me?? Kathryn Tucker Windham. Oh, yes!

Well, I was just thrilled beyond belief.

When I introduced myself, I told her that like thousands of Alabama schoolchildren, I grew up reading her books. Was she ever so sweet and gracious! If I hadn’t been so star-struck, I would have asked her about her interest in Julia Tutwiler and two million other things, but at the moment I was just taking it in that I was having lunch with KTW! We wound up talking about her writing career, that Av grew up right across the street from one of her friends, and watermelons!

Needless to say, I have been a fan of hers since I was in elementary school and her books were read aloud to us (and since then, I’ve gone to see her do storytellings – and book signings). Sooo exciting to have lunch with her!

One of the days we were in Selma, we had lunch at Mac’s Fish Camp. It’s about five miles out of town (directions here) on the Alabama River, and was *excellent*!

It’s a fish camp, after all, so it was no-frills…

Here’s the interior – oilcloth red-checked tablecloths, plastic high school chairs…

…and taxidermy on display:

I had oysters and they were some of the best ever! Av had fish and it was super-good, too.

The gentleman who runs the restaurant was really nice and we chatted for a couple of minutes. Here’s a pic of the river. Ah, spanish moss! Love it.

This was our first stay at the Hampton Inn in Selma. Before, we’ve stayed at the historic St. James Hotel, which is right on the Alabama River – but since we were in town for a special event, we stayed at the same hotel as most of the other guests.

This Hampton seems like a newer one, and we had a good stay.

When I was a Freshman in college, my boyfriend and I would visit his dad and new step-mother, and one day she served us the yummiest lemon icebox pie ever. It was cold and lemony and just the thing right in the middle of summer. I asked her for the recipe, and it was so simple – just four ingredients and no baking (no eggs)! Especially during the summer (it was 95* yesterday), who wants to be an ingredient snob with a pie that takes all of five minutes to make!? I make this every summer and everybody always loves it:

Ingredients:
8 oz. Cool Whip
1 can condensed milk
1 can frozen lemonade
1 graham cracker crust

…it’s so easy – just put the Cool Whip in the KitchenAid bowl, then the condensed milk, then start adding the lemonade until it’s just the right amount of lemony flavor (I usually use the entire container).

Pour it into the pie crust and freeze overnight (keep it stored in the freezer – it’s not hard to cut through).
So good!!