Apparently, Francois Hollande’s hair is worth a small car. Believe it or don’t, the news across the Atlantic is how much the president of France spends on his haircuts ($11,000 per month). We guess there’s nothing else happening in France. Here’s what we’ve got cooking for you as summer slowly moves to a finish: Chicken cacciatore on angel hair pasta, curry chicken salad, pan-fried pork loin chop with mana’s rice, and shrimp étouffée.
What We’re Cooking for You This Week
Tuesday, August 9
Chicken cacciatore on angel hair pasta with fresh marinara sauce. Lightly floured with parmesan and bread crumbs our chicken is breast pan-fried in butter with a crushed plum tomatoes, fresh mushrooms, and fresh red peppers sauce served on a bed of angel hair pasta. Our old friend Harper Lee penned in To Kill a Mockingbird, “Summer was on the way; Jem and I awaited it with impatience. Summer was our best season: it was sleeping on the back screened porch in cots, or trying to sleep in the tree house; summer was everything good to eat; it was a thousand colors in a parched landscape; but most of all, summer was Dill.” If Ms. Lee had said, “…most of all, summer was fresh tomatoes,” we might agree with her. She got all the other stuff right, though. Our chicken cacciatore gets all the other stuff right, too, and it has fresh tomato marinara. Yep.
Wednesday, August 10
Curry chicken salad on house salad, in a large, fresh tomato, in a wrap, or on a sandwich. A special recipe of curry chicken made of roasted chicken breast, a few veggies, some dried fruit, and a flavorful curry can be added to our house salad, placed in a cored fresh tomato, put in a wrap, or placed on our fresh bread. Author Deb Caletti observes in Honey, Baby, Sweetheart, “Summer, after all, is a time when wonderful things can happen to quiet people. For those few months, you’re not required to be who everyone thinks you are, and that cut-grass smell in the air and the chance to dive into the deep end of a pool give you a courage you don’t have the rest of the year. You can be grateful and easy, with no eyes on you, and no past. Summer just opens the door and lets you out.” Well, wow. It sounds like a rally cry as the summer fades like a dappled sunset: “Let the quiet people arise, jump into the deep end of the pool, and make a big cannonball splash in a grateful and easy way.” That’s it, the last big cannonball of summer. This curry chicken will give you that kind of quiet courage.
Thursday, August 11
Pan-fried pork loin with mama’s rice and roasted broccoli. We’ll pan-fry a lovely piece of marinated pork loin just right, add it to mama’s rice and roasted broccoli, and we’ve got a great Thursday meal. E.B. White wrote in one of our childhood favorites, Charlotte’s Web, “The crickets felt it was their duty to warn everybody that summertime cannot last for ever. Even on the most beautiful days in the whole year — the days when summer is changing into autumn — the crickets spread the rumor of sadness and change.” Funny. We don’t remember all that. But we do remember Templeton the fat rat, lovely Charlotte, and “Some Pig.” Yep. This pork loin should have a lovely spider spinning “Some Pig” tales about it. Come join us for a wonderful launch into the ebbing weekends of summer — Wilbur will be leading the parade.
Friday, August 12
Shrimp étouffée with rice ($15). Shrimp lovingly cooked with the tasty trinity veggies in a light roux with lots of parsley and delectable Cajun spices in a delicious sauce served over Louisiana rice will make you boogie up and down the street. “All in all, it was a never to be forgotten summer — one of those summers which come seldom into any life,” writes L.M. Montgomery in Anne’s House of Dreams, “but leave a rich heritage of beautiful memories in their going — one of those summers which, in a fortunate combination of delightful weather, delightful friends and delightful doing, come as near to perfection as anything can come in this world.” Delightful, delightful, and delightful come as near to perfection — sounds a little like our shrimp étouffée, that wonderful invite to last days of summer.
For a little more info on $11,000 haircuts, click here…you know, just in case you want to join Holland’s Hair Club for Men.
Stone House Eats Bread Baked Daily
Lunch Served | 11am-2pm Tuesday — Friday
Thanks for letting us serve you, and may God bless you richly as you sit at the table.
Famous Quotes
Natalie Babbitt writes in Tuck Everlasting, “The first week of August hangs at the very top of summer, the top of the live-long year, like the highest seat of a Ferris wheel when it pauses in its turning. The weeks that come before are only a climb from balmy spring, and those that follow a drop to the chill of autumn, but the first week of August is motionless, and hot. It is curiously silent, too, with blank white dawns and glaring noons, and sunsets smeared with too much color.” Hot, motionless, sitting perched on high for the last bit of fun before we slowly descend into the rigors of fall. Yep. She totally got it.
The Stone House Stove 