I am considering changing my

ways. Just "considering" at this point, just thinking about

it. I'm nowhere near ready to make a decision. So let's talk about the

way I do it and perhaps that will help me to decide if I will seek to

know more cookery organization.

First off, there are no menus.

Not since my first year of marriage when I didn't know how to cook beans.

Beans or anything else for that matter, except biscuits. Learned biscuits

in fourth-grade 4-H. I make an awesome biscuit to this day with lots of

variations from my basic non-existent recipe. Yep, it's a memory thing

and I never measure.

So how do I cook? With no menus?

The same way I write or draw or decorate. I use whatever is on hand. "Whatever

is on hand" usually means whatever was on special the last few times

I was at the grocery. You guessed it, I will not pay prime price for anything.

So, it's meal time and I go

to the pantry, freezer or refrigerator about 30 minutes to an hour before

time to eat, shuffle this or that around, and come out with whatever strikes

my fancy. In doing so, I came up with an awesome potato soup just a few

weeks ago.

I had cubed ham in the freezer,

left over from baking a smoked ham a couple of weeks back. There were

potatoes in the pantry begging to be cooked. There were several cans of

cream of mushroom soup on the shelf.

Onions were in the bottom drawer

of the refrigerator. I pulled out a few baby carrots to chop, and a stalk

of celery as well. That's when I saw the sour cream. I decided it would

become the "secret" ingredient for my potato soup. I threw everything

together as it felt right, no measuring, and let it all simmer for an

about 45 minutes.

Then I fried the lacy corn

bread, another one of my specialties. It took years to get the hang of

it, but now I can hang my lace out with the best of them.

That brings me back once more,

to all those folks who have real systems. Their own systems may serve

them just fine but I have a system of sorts, too.

Organization is not at the

center of it, but some darn good vittles find their way out of whatever

it is that does center me, so I don't think I'm going do any major changing

anytime soon.

Maybe at another time, on another

day, I will reconsider. For now, I feel creative and I hear my kitchen

calling. And by the way, I probably have not thrown out more than five

specially created concoctions from nothing (nothing meaning throwing things

together without a plan) in all my years of cooking.

In fact, as the years go by

I am learning to like me and all my ways more and more. And my lacy cornbread?

I like it so much I'm willing to share.

Lacy Cornbread Recipe

Stir water and self-rising

cornmeal mix together. For years I used White Lily, but last year I discovered

Three Rivers, which is awesome! Don' ask, I already told you I don't measure.

Just get a two cup measuring cup if that comforts you and pour maybe three-fourths

of a cup of cornmeal mix in it. Now add water very slowly, at a trickle,

directly from the faucet. Stir as you add the water. You are going for

something close to the consistency of tomato juice.

Heat a large black iron skillet.

Nothing else will do. Pour in Canola oil to cover the pan, just to cover

it. If you tilt the pan, the oil should gently slide to the side. The

trick is to have just enough oil in the pan that the cornbread will sizzle

when you pour in a miserly dollop that spreads out no smaller in circumference

than a coffee cup top and no bigger than the saucer.

Brown it on one side on medium

high heat, then flip and brown the other side. You will master the art

the day that the outer edges want to fall off if you are not very careful

as you turn the bread and the inner center is not at all mushy anymore.

You can fry three to four pieces

at the time and you must add a tad more oil between each frying. Don't

let the little crispies stay in the pan between fryings or they will burn

and smoke up the house. Once you get the hang of it, you will never look

for the cracker box again when having soup. Or peas. Or beans. Or turnips.

Plus, if you are lucky, you

will begin to appreciate the secrets of those of us who grew up on cornbread

and whatever vegetables we "put up" for the year. Making do

with the grocery store specials and whatever I still put up from the garden

each year, is just downright fun, so I say, why spoil a perfectly good

system?

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