Grilled Flank Steak with Peaches

We continued our farmer's market inspired "farm to fork" dinner tonight with grilled flank steak accompanied with grilled peaches and crispy potatoes.  I love the idea of grilling fruit and while I have done it for dessert before, I had never tried it as a side dish.  So glad we did!

Summer Supper: Grilled Mountain Trout with Succotash

Tonight's dinner was the perfect North Carolina farm to fork meal (well, in my humble opinion at least).  90% of the meal was purchased from our local farmer's market and the local seafood shop that gets their farm raised Rainbow Trout just up the mountain.  It was fresh, healthy and absolutely delicious.

Southern Sideboard Logo

I have had the most fun working on branding The Southern Sideboard.  Jamie with Fresh Lavender Designs created my logo and I am thrilled with the results.  It encompasses inspiration from my parents:  the name comes from my mother's love of entertaining (which I clearly embrace) and the logo from my father's love for the outdoor sporting life.  It was love at first sight!

Boat Trash

Y'all, I cannot begin to tell you how quiet it is around our house without the kids.  In 7 years, I have never been without them for this long - a weekend yes, but not a whole week.  Well, once when my father died but that can't really count.  So while we are having a great time catching up with each other, friends and tackling projects, I am going to be ready to welcome them home.

Sierra Nevada Brewery

We left the kiddos at Granddaddy and Gigi's home on Saturday and embarked on a kid-free week.  Our first order of business was a visit to Asheville to see the newly opened Sierra Nevada brewery.  I now know why the beer is so expenive - this place was amazing!!!!

Cold Mountain

There are a lot of fun things going on in our corner of the world that I cannot wait to share.  First and foremost, is my father-in-law's new home on Cold Mountain.

Cold Mountain is located an hour west of Asheville near the towns of Canton and Waynesville.  If you are a civil war enthusiast, you may recall the name from the critically acclamied novel written by Charles Frazier.  If not, you may recall that Hollywood butchered the story into a film starring Jude Law, Nicole Kidman and Renee Zelwegger (who went on to win an Oscar for her role as Ruby).

My father-in-law closed on his 4 acre farm house in January and has been hard at work with renovations. While there is still a ways to go, it is finally in a stage to accompany guests.  So we loaded up the car and headed up the mountain for a looksee and, to our delight, the drive was just under two hours.  If you have never driven through Western North Carolina, you really don't know what you are missing.

Here is a glimpse of our weekend fun.

Heck of a front yard....complete with pear trees, apple tree, grapes and blueberry bushes.

Which my boys turned into a kickball field.

A wrap around porch is the perfect setting for shucking corn purchased from a neighbor.

Of course we hit up the Waynesville Mast General Store.  I can neither confirm nor deny that a whoopie cushion was bought and that my husband was the victim.

Shocker, somebody went fishing.

And after a fun weekend, we left the boys for a week with their Granddaddy and Gigi.  It is soooo quiet without them but we are managing.

Have a great week!
xoxo,
TSS

Happy Blogiversary!

Two years ago today, I embarked on this fun little blog.  We have some exciting developments to unveil in the coming days but in the meantime, here is a walk down memory lane with the very first post.

http://southernsideboard.blogspot.com/2013/07/welcome.html?m=0

Thank you for reading!

Xoxo,
TSS

Lemonade Bar with Homemade Lemonade

There are several staples we keep onhand in the house in the summertime:  namely, Coca Cola (a nod to my home state of Georgia), Cheerwine (a nod to my adopted home, North Carolina) -both of which are purchased in glass bottles though rarely consumed - sweet tea and lemonade.  

I am sucker for pink lemonade - I just think it is special though I have no idea why.  So as I was cleaning up from the 4th of July soiree we hosted with our neighbors last weekend, I decided to turn our bar into an indoor lemonade stand.

These days, the house is filled with the friends coming and going for playdates galore.  And with the dog days of summer sitting squarely on our backs, I find a cold glass of lemonade is a sweet and refreshing way to wet the wee one's whistle.  I keep a batch of regular and pink chilled at all times.

HOMEMEADE LEMONADE

1 1/2 cups sugar

1/2 cup boiling water

2 teaspoons grated lemon rind

1 1/2 cups fresh lemon juice

5 cups cold water

Stir together sugar and 1/2 cup boiling water until sugar dissolves.  Stir in rind, juice and 5 cups of cold water.  Chill 8 hours.  Garnish with lemon and/or mint if desired.

Yields 8 cups

HOMEMADE PINK LEMONADE

1 cup sugar

10 cups water

1 cup lemon juice

1/4 cup grenadine

1/2 pint fresh raspberries or strawberries (optional)

Cook sugar and1 cup water in a saucepan, stirring constantly, until sugar dissolves.  Cool; pour into a large container.  Stir in remaining 9 cups water, lemon juice, grenadine and the raspberries/strawberries if desired.  Chill 2 hours.

Yields 3 quarts

Cheers!

xoxo,

TSS

Happy Birthday America Sing Along and Parade

I love my sweet little town.  My husband grew up here and I adore having our kids retrace their Daddy's footsteps by making the same memories in the same locations.

Every year our local library hosts a Happy Birthday America sing along and parade.  This year's marshalls were players from our local minor league baseball team and their beloved mascot, Conrad the Crawdad.  A mini train was also on hand but the John Deere tractor rides stole the show.  Look closely, it is nothing more than dollys put together and carved out barrells.  Sadly, there was a weight limit and I could not particpate but I did have fun on the mini train.  haha

So without further ado,  here is a slice of Americana from my corner of the world.

Once home, I got to work on the food for our annual neighborhood 4th of July party.  Stay tuned for the recipe.

I like big butts and I cannot lie!

Hint:  slow cooker, on a bed of onions with....

Tell me if you can guess what this is???

Happy 4th of July fasting!!!
xoxo,
TSS