Pizza has always been one of our go-to dishes—which is to say we’re always looking to do it differently because we eat it too much. On our last trip to Portland, our friend Jeff suggested that we try making the pizza in our cast iron skillet. The crust has come out crunchier, the pizza hotter and more formed, and the bottom of the pie crisp. Awesome idea.

Here’s tonight’s dinner: homemade meatballs and onions and my take on my Nana’s sauce with some mozzarella. Briana assembled the pizza. Her and I have a fundamental disagreement on pizza assembly, so she allows me to prep everything and I allow her to finish the pie. In short, Briana values loads of ingredients while I prefer to top my pies sparingly. No need to go into the finer points of the debate here, but it’s needless to say that whoever assembles that night, we both love the final product. And so would you.

We miss Portland a lot, one thing we always do when we go back to visit is have a huge meal at Clyde Common (it’s where we met). The other thing is we make sure to pick up some coffee from Stumptown and meat from Olympic Provisions to bring back home with us. Both of these things we order online on a regular basis, but it’s pretty wonderful to open our suitcase after a long flight, smell the coffee, unpack the meats and put them in our fridge knowing we’ll be enjoying these treats for a while.

There is a chain of stores down in the South called Dirt Cheap. We had been once or twice finding deals like one dollar shoes, five dollar ties and so on. Like visiting a Waffle House, I am now convinced that Dirt Cheap is one of those Southern “slices of life” that everyone needs to see. The people-watching here would make even the worst WalMart feel like you’re walking through a Neiman Marcus, seriously. So, when we do go we never stay too long or expect to find too much. That all changed this week when we stopped by to look for shoes. I walked inside the store and in the middle of a mess of broken furniture it’s sitting there, a white Eames rocker, all alone, waiting for me. We quickly snatched up the $99.00 chair and then found out it was 50% off of that price. 

We’re still trying to figure out the best place for our newest Eames chair. However, Dirt Cheap will be a stop we make much more often. 

Our friend’s, Miles (who is a great chef) and Gimena (who is a great food lover), have a really nice little site dedicated to food in Mobile, AL. We’ve been using it to find new places to grocery shop and eat. If you live here or are visiting this is definitely the best site to use. They also have a map of restaurants they love around the world that is great for wherever you are.

Click the title and enjoy their site!

We first found the West Tampa Sandwich Shop when we were in the city back in February to see the Yankee’s first spring training game of the season. Just north of downtown Tampa this shop has an unassuming storefront, plastic tablecloths, photos of politicians and athletes lining the walls, and AMAZING sandwiches. The staff, a multi-generation Cuban family that knows what they’re doing, is friendly and fast. You’ll be surrounded by regulars (aka Florida retirees) who you’ll hear debating everything from politics to baseball. For us this adds up to heaven.

We shared a couple media noches, empanadas (get the one with cheese and guava), cafe con leche and a mango juice; all for around $17.00. Even though we were stuffed we actually felt like we should order more food because it was all so delicious and cheap. In September we made a trip back to see the final Yankees game of the season at Tropicana (yes, we love the Yankees) so we HAD to make two stops, for dinner and breakfast. It was still as good and as cheap as we remembered. This place is probably one of our favorite things about Tampa and we’ll always revisit when we find ourselves in the city.

Every good Southern girl knows how to make a damn good pecan pie. And while Briana is not a Southern girl, she can make pecan pie with the best of them. Nothing crazy going on here, just pecans, vanilla, sugar, bourbon, and eggs.

It’s a great way to finish any meal, or the perfect snack after a run.

Briana’s Pecan Pie (it’s a mishmash of about recipes she’s tried and like this best)

1 3/4 Cup Pecan Halves

3/4 Cup Dark Corn Syrup

1 Tablespoon Molasses

2 Tablespoons Kentucky Bourbon

1/2 Packed Dark Brown Sugar

4 Tablespoons Butter

1 Teaspoon Vanilla Extract

3 Large Eggs

1. Prepare pie dough as instructed.

2. Preheat over to 425 degrees F. Use dough to line 9-inch pie plate; make a fancy looking edge. Refrigerate or freeze until firm, about 10 minutes.

3. Line pie shell with foil, fill with pie weights and bake 15 mins. Remove foil and weights and bake for another 5. Cool on wire rack and turn over down to 350 degrees.

4. Chop 1 cup pecans.

5. In large bowl, with whisk, mix corn syrup, molasses, bourbon, brown sugar, melted butter, vanilla and eggs until blended. Stir in chopped pecans. 

6. Pour filling into cool pie shell. Add leftover whole pecans to top of pie. Bake until filling is set around the edges but center jiggles a little, around 50 minutes. Cool for at least an hour. EAT!

The packed dance floor at 9:30AM.

The town of Pont Breaux. 

One of our favorite weekends since moving to the deep south was definitely the one we spent in Cajun country. Lafayette and Pont Breaux, LA were two of the most foreign feeling towns I have ever experienced in the States. We were greeted everywhere in French, or technically French Cajun, and deep marbled accents. Our first day started with zydeco brunch at the famous Cafe Des Ami in Pont Breaux, where by 9:30AM the dance floor was packed and the tiny tables were covered in delicious food. Andrew ordered the Eggs Begnaud which was two eggs with a gilled biscuit and crawfish etouffée. I had the Eggs Des Amis, eggs with a biscuit and grilled boudin patty. Andrew definitely won with an incredible etouffée that I had no idea could make for such an incredible breakfast. We watched people dance as we ate and then wandered the tiny town. 

While we found that all cajun food is pretty amazing, and insanely filling, our other big highlight of the trip was stopping off at Don’s to pick up 20 pounds of homemade Boudin. Ok, we were bringing half of that back for some friends of ours, but I can’t wait to start cooking it at home and think of what an amazing weekend we spent the Lafayette. This is somewhere I’d love to go back to and experience again and again. I’ll just maybe eat less next time. 

Since moving to Mobile we’ve been cooking even more than we did in Portland. The food scene here is pretty sad and always leaves us wanting. We miss having fresh, interesting food where chefs feel free to experiment and use quality local ingredients. It’s even been hard for us to find fresh seafood which was a shock considering the Gulf of Mexico is a 30 minute drive. 

The upside to all this though is that our cooking has gotten even better than before. We’ve learned to work with what’s available and make some great new dishes. We’ve started making and canning our own pickles, BBQ, jellies, and chow chow. We’ve even been able to recreate some of our favorites from places we’ve frequented, like Clyde Common. So all is not lost and luckily, we love to cook. 

Justin Townes Earle playing in Billy Reid’s warehouse.

We found ourselves lucky enough to be invited to Billy Reid’s annual Shindig in the small town of Florence, AL. Billy is a world famous fashion designer who is headquartered there. This quiet little place is just south of Tennessee and nestled in the Tennessee Vally along the river. Right adjacent to Florence is Mussel Shoals, where the world renowned Mussel Shoals recording studio is located. 

Our first night we made our way into the back warehouse of Billy’s headquarters and found booze, bands and Bravo TV filming the action. We wandered among some of the best dressed people we’ve seen since coming to the south taking everything in. We heard some amazing music and Billy even got up on stage to play before the night ended. The next day we decided to go out on our own driving through the Tennessee Vally in search of local milk to make our own cheese. After hours of driving we came back to Florence empty handed. We cleaned up so we could attend the Oxford American’s Alabama Music Series at the famous Mussel Shoals theater. During the show I got a text from one of our friends who invited us to the Shindig asking if we wanted to see Justin Townes Earle (yep, Steve Earle’s son) play a secret show. Of course we jumped at the chance and we went back to BR’s warehouse to watch a candle-lit acoustic show with about 100 other people. It was amazing. 

It was a weekend of amazing music, people, clothes and scenery that we loved. We can’t wait to back to the Shindig next year!

We haven’t been making, let alone posting, much dessert recently, but we made some mozzarella cheese this past weekend and couldn’t help but eat it with some fresh strawberries. The berries have been sitting with some balsamic vinegar and a little sugar. Other than that it’s pretty simple.

Accompanied by a glass of rye whiskey.

Seaside, Florida is a small town on the Emerald Coast about two hours from Mobile, AL. It was used as the set of the “Truman Show” and when you visit you can totally understand. We wandered the town for a little while walking by the white clap-board homes, cute bookshops and a block long string of airstream converted food-carts. 

There are a few cute restaurants that are gulf side here and we opted for a small one-level shack that had fresh gulf oysters. Gulf oysters aren’t as delicious as oysters from say, PEI, but our environment clearly made up for it. We sat on a little patio with a bottle of reasonably-priced bubbles and a dozen freshly shucked oysters. After we finished our food we took our bottle down to the beach and laid in the sun finishing it. It was a wonderful, easy going day that made the two hour drive and slightly lackluster oysters worth it!

Another take on the same salmon dish (Briana has declared it her favorite salmon ever, which I take great pleasure in, her being from the Northwest). Parsley and mustard cover the salmon, and the tomato salsa is the same as before (tomato, black pepper, pineapple, onions, herbs). In addition we tossed some avocado on top and grabbed some farm-fresh corn, which is peaking much earlier than we Northerners are used to. Briana tossed the corn in goat cheese, herbs, and butter.

In addition, Briana requested I put my bartending skills to the test; she gave me a drink name and asked that I make something with what we had in our home bar. So, for the first time, we present “The Captain’s Pet Penguin.” Gin, lime and grapefruit juices, egg whites, and orange marmalade. Garnished with bitters and grapefruit peel.

All in all, we’ve been eating pretty darn well.

Super-easy and healthy have been the keywords around the household lately; a recent trip back to Portland found us both wishing we didn’t eat quite as much there. Salmon is so easy to make and I’ve always loved the simple approach to it. Rice and a fruit salad on the side and you have a meal.

The salmon is covered in a basil and mustard butter and broiled, the salad is red onions, tomatoes, and pineapple with a fair bit of black pepper (pineapple and black pepper is one of my favorite under-rated matches).

Simple and easy.

It’s been a little bit since we’ve made something that was presentable on the interwebs, but I hope today makes it worth the wait. You get to see our dinner, but I got to enjoy one of the best bites of food I’ve had since moving south.

Mussels frites in a basil and garlic cream sauce. Homemade fries to dip in the sauce, and later (not shown), out of the oven came some white bread that had been aging in the fridge for two days. Dipping this slightly tangy and sour bread into the salty, creamy, garlicky broth was one of the most divine bites I’ve eaten.

The only thing we were missing was delicious white wine or port to wash everything down.

Bread seems so difficult until you get your hands messy. Then you realize the only reason you don’t make all your bread at home is because you didn’t plan your week better and you’re impatient and you want it now. Or you’re just too scared. It’s easy and delicious.

This particular loaf is a mutt. We ran out of bread flour while I was making it, so there’s all-purpous, wheat, and dark rye in there as well. And a bit of honey.