The Blue Willow Inn

I've had a busy week this week. Starting early Tuesday morning, I went to Fat Boy's Farmers Market and bought some fresh vegetables. I was looking for Slocomb tomatoes, but they are not in yet, so I bought some Florida tomatoes. I also bought some fresh squash, green beans, Vidalia onions, and cucumbers. On the way home, the HOT sign was flashing at Golden Donuts, so my car just veered into the drive-thru. I consumed three in the car....well four. They always give you an extra one to eat on the way home. That will come back to haunt me as you will learn later.

When I arrived home, I decided to start right in to cook. I didn't want to just stew the squash with onions, so I started looking for a recipe. Several years ago, I picked up a copy of "The Blue Willow Inn Cookbook" at a school book sale as a gift for my sister, Jane. I liked it so much that when I found another copy I bought one for myself. I was not familiar with the Blue Willow Restaurant, but read about it in the cookbook and on the Internet. The restaurant and inn are located in Social Circle, Georgia, and I certainly plan to go there soon. I have enjoyed reading the stories in the book, but have used none of the recipes until I started to cook. In case you're interested, the book is listed at Amazon.com for purchase.

I located a recipe for squash casserole and decided to try it and I'm so glad I did. The recipe called for sour cream, onion, butter Ritz crackers and cheese, plus two more ingredients that I won't list here. Since all the recipes I use were developed by other people, I have struggled with the idea of including recipes in my blog, but something just didn't seem right about that, but I couldn't put my finger on exactly why it didn't seem right. Then one day, I heard a discussion on Martha Stewart Radio about this very topic. The chef revealed that a blog follower was annoyed at the idea of buying a book just for one recipe when the chef refused to print a certain recipe in her blog. The chef helped to clarify my thinking by saying that the author of the book could only make many for her efforts if people bought the book, and that if other people published the recipes, then there would be no need for people to buy the book. The Blue Willow Inn Cookbook is available at Amazon.com. You might want to pick it up.

The next day I used a banana pudding recipe from the same book. For the first time I made banana pudding without using Jello Instant Pudding. I never would have believed that it would take so long for the ingredients to thicken while cooking on medium heat. It must have taken 20 - 30 minutes. A couple of times I was tempted to increase the heat, but resisted. The pudding was perfect. I will use this recipe again. Personally, I like everything about banana pudding except the bananas. I just sort of eat around those.

I'll be back later this week to let you know about the damage done by the doughnuts and high-calorie meals I prepared last week.