October 12, 2015

“In 1492 Columbus sailed the ocean blue. He had three ships and left from Spain; he sailed through sunshine, wind, and rain,” the old poem goes. Early Renaissance Spain was not known for good food, so Columbus was on a mission to find some great victuals. Have a look at what’s cooking in the kitchen for you this week: red beans and rice, fried chicken and signature potatoes, meatloaf with mashed potatoes and roasted cauliflower, creamy pesto chicken pasta, and barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boys!

What We’re Cooking for You This Week

Monday, October 12 — Happy Columbus Day!

Special made Louisiana red beans & rice with hot water cornbread. Our red beans come full of flavor, cooked in our own house made smoked ham hock stock. Well, believe it or don’t, beans helped save Western civilization. Not just the chick peas that Charlemagne ordered to be cultivated in the 9th century to help restore the war-ravaged land and peoples, but the beans explorers like Columbus brought back from the Americas in the 15th and 16th centuries. Beans became so popular because they proved so easily grown and stored. Yep. How do you think navy beans got their name? You’s guessed it, they were used on ships because they were great food sources that didn’t spoil. Join the great bean train of history and celebrate civilization with a bowl of our beans.

Tuesday, October 13

Fried chicken tenders with signature potatoes, okra and tomatoes, and a honey buttermilk biscuit. Lovingly bedded overnight in buttermilk and hot sauce, our chicken tenders come fabulously fried in a special flour recipe and served with our white cream gravy signature potatoes. Here’s the origins of the greasies: fried chicken first came from Scotland. No kidding. When enslaved folk from West Africa came to what would become the United States, they brought not just their music and religion, but recipes for fried chicken. And, they brought spices the Scots didn’t have (no surprise there). Well, it wasn’t long before fried chicken was a staple in the south. And, it keeps well, not quite as well as beans, but it keeps well. Of course, leave it to the Scots to fry things like sausage, ice cream, and Snicker bars — stay away from the haggis, though.

Wednesday, October 14

Meatloaf with mashed potatoes, roasted cauliflower, and creamy zucchini and spinach side. Our meatloaf is a wonderful mix of beef, bread crumbs, and chopped-to-bits veggies. Meatloaf is mom’s way of hiding things we don’t like in a ball of beef covered in a sweet and sour tomato sauce with Panola Gourmet Sauce. It’s like the ultimate gastronomical sneak attack, and mom’s a spy trying to trick us. Well, it works. I wonder if mom knows Krav Maga?

Thursday, October 15

Creamy chicken pesto sauce served on angel hair pasta.  Yes, it’s heavenly. Pesto sauce originated in the Liguria region around Genoa — basil, garlic, pine nuts, Parmesan cheese, and olive oil. Add some cream, which makes everything better, and some angel hair pasta. Voilá! You’ll find your way to Italy where they speak French with a southern American accent. Ah, the glocal economy!

Friday, October 16

Barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boy and a house salad. Take a half-size po-boy, hollow the bread to make a bread cave, stuff it with our own New Orleans style barbecued shrimp (prepped in loads of butter, white wine, and saucy spices), cover it with barbecue sauce, and grab the napkins. Over two thousand species of shrimp live all over the world from tiny finger-nail sized crustaceans to the big dogs of the shrimp world, the mantis shrimp (some reaching 26 inches long). And, they feed the ocean from all the different varieties of fish to the whales who use them for more than a shrimp cocktail appetizer. Join the rest of the planet by dining on some shrimp this Friday, you’ll feel part of the great web of life.

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Dessert Offerings This Week

Red velvet cake. This cake lives its name — lovely, velvety, deeply red with cream cheese icing, this cake will make you feel like you’re wearing a designer dress on the red carpet. It comes without the paparazzi, thank goodness.

Lavender scones with either lemon curd or strawberry shortcake or pumpkin peach scones. “Make each moment an occasion to live deeply, happily, in peace,” the great contemplative teacher Thich Nhat Hahn suggests. Learn how to live in the moment when you’re in the moment. Scones: the secret to living deeply and contemplatively.

Have a look: Stone House Eats Standard Menu!

Stone House Eats Bread Baked Daily

Drinks — Sweet & Unsweet Tea, Bottled Water, Housemade Lemonade, Coca-Cola, Diet Coke, Dr. Pepper, and Sprite

Lunch Served | 11am-2pm Monday—Friday

Lunch Special | $12 — Includes Daily Special & Drink

Sandwiches & Salads — Includes Tea or Bottled Water

Check Out What’s in the Fridge!

Let Us Cater Your Next Event!

You can find our house at 828 Julia Street in Rayville, Louisiana.

You can call us at (318) 267-4457.

Thanks for letting us serve you, and may God bless you richly as you sit at the table.

Famous Food Quotes

The well-known chef James Beard once remarked, “A gourmet who thinks of calories is like a tart who looks at her watch.” Well, sounds like permission to eat the fried chicken and have a fried Snicker bar with a fried ice cream chaser for dessert.

You are My Shama Lamma Ding Dong!

Otis Day and the Knights are in town singing some of their favorites. Makes us want to lift our hands up and shout! Have a look at what’s cooking for you at week’s end: a host of grilled chicken salads and barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boys!

What We’re Cooking for You at Week’s End

Thursday, October 8 — Grilled Chicken Express

Grilled chicken on our house salad with house or ranch dressing, a grilled chicken and bacon ranch salad, or a chipotle ranch grilled chicken and bacon salad. The first salad is nice — we call it “Shama.’ The second is naughty and nice — we call it “Lama.” The third one, well, it’s spicy, naughty, and nice — we call it “Ding Dong.” Come join Otis and put the “Ooo mau, mau, oh, oh, ih, oh” back into your smile. You’ll be singing your way down the street.

Friday, October 9

Barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boy and a house salad. Take a half-size po-boy, hollow the bread to make a bread cave, stuff it with our own New Orleans style barbecued shrimp (prepped in loads of butter, white wine, and saucy spices), cover it with barbecue sauce, and grab the napkins. Though Otis Day and the Knights were a fictional band created for the classic movie Animal House, the songs they sang came from real folks. Believe or don’t, the Isley Brothers wrote “Shout!” And, in a real interesting twist, a youngish Memphis blues guitarist played bass in the band: Robert Cray. Makes us wanna shout ’cause he needs to be playing the electric guitar. This has absolutely nothing to do with shrimp, so you’ll have to come by for some on Friday!

Hey! I can dance! Watch me do the mashed potato! Watch me do the twist!

Have a look: Stone House Eats Standard Menu!

Stone House Eats Bread Baked Daily

Drinks — Sweet & Unsweet Tea, Bottled Water, Housemade Lemonade, Coca-Cola, Diet Coke, Dr. Pepper, and Sprite

Lunch Served | 11am-2pm Monday—Friday

Lunch Special | $12 — Includes Daily Special & Drink

Sandwiches & Salads — Includes Tea or Bottled Water

Check Out What’s in the Fridge!

Let Us Cater Your Next Event!

You can find our house at 828 Julia Street in Rayville, Louisiana.

You can call us at (318) 267-4457.

Thanks for letting us serve you, and may God bless you richly as you sit at the table.

Famous Bacon Quotes

Humorist Mark Twain suggested some healthy eating advice: “Part of the secret of a success in life is to eat what you like and let the food fight it out inside.”

Photo Credit: “Durban Dancing Shrimp,” Creative Commons.

October 5, 2015 Menu

“Wise men say, only fools rush in, but I can’t help falling in love with you,” Elvis sang about pork chop sandwiches. Have a look at what’s cooking in the kitchen for you this week: red beans and rice, fried pork chops and mama’s rice, pulled pork sandwiches with apple slaw, grilled chicken salads, and barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boys!

What We’re Cooking for You This Week

Monday, October 5

Special made Louisiana red beans & rice with hot water cornbread. Our red beans come full of flavor, cooked in our own house made smoked ham hock stock. Well, our old friend Reg Dwight had a thing for beans, and, yes, he sang a song about them: “Say, Candy and Ronnie, have you seen them yet, but they’re so spaced out, Beanie and the Jets. Oh but they’re weird and they’re wonderful, oh Beanie she’s really keen, she’s got electric boots a mohair suit. You know I read it in a magazine…B-B-B-Beanie and the Jets.” Put on your platform shoes, your feathery boa, and some funky glasses — it’s Monday, bring in the beans — Elton John will be here.

Tuesday, October 6

Fried pork chops with mama’s rice, roasted broccoli, and a honey buttermilk biscuit. Blissfully slumbering overnight in a special saucy boudoir of buttermilk and seasonings, these pork chops will ceremoniously swim with their special flour bathing suits in a big pot of hot grease. It makes for the stuff of legends. Of course, Elvis wore pork chops, well, not these fried beauties, but he definitely had some on his face. And, he was the king. These pork chops won’t crown you, but they’ll certainly help you feel legendary. Yep. So will banana and peanut butter sandwiches, but that’s another story.

Wednesday, October 7

Pulled pork sandwiches with apple cole slaw. Slow cooked pork, pulled to tender pieces, house made barbecue sauce, and jalapeño mayonnaise form a porkalicious sandwich that simply makes your week better. Davy Crockett, king of the wild frontier, helper of the souls in the Alamo, and generally-good-guy, famously remarked: “Fame is like a shaved pig with a greased tail, and it is only after it has slipped through the hands of some thousands, that some fellow, by mere chance, holds on to it!” Well, you won’t have any trouble holding these sandwiches, but they will be messy kind of delicious that keeps calling your name — and, they just might make you famous.

Thursday, October 8 — Grilled Chicken Express

Grilled chicken on our house salad with house or ranch dressing, a grilled chicken and bacon ranch salad, or a chipotle ranch grilled chicken and bacon salad. The first salad is nice. The second is naughty and nice. The third one, well, it’s spicy, naughty, and nice. Sounds like the kinds of salads that make for memories. Jeff Foxworthy observes, “If you have a complete set of salad bowls and they all say Kool Whip on the side, you might be a redneck.” Get out the set of Kool Whip bowls — nice, naughty and nice, and spicy, naughty, and nice have come to town.

Friday, October 9

Barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boy and a house salad. Take a half-size po-boy, hollow the bread to make a bread cave, stuff it with our own New Orleans style barbecued shrimp (prepped in loads of butter, white wine, and saucy spices), cover it with barbecue sauce, and grab the napkins. Robert Smith and The Cure sang, “Monday you can fall apart. Tuesday, Wednesday break my heart. Thursday doesn’t even start. It’s Friday I’m in love.” Well, believe it or don’t, he loved the shrimp, not some cheeky girl. Of course, you can see it in his wild, just-stuck-my-finger-in-a-light-socket hair, the pasty makeup, and the bright red lipstick. Shrimp lovers are, well, an interesting lot.

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Dessert Offerings This Week

Doberge cake. Adapted from the Hungarian Dobos torte, this multilayered sponge cake with chocolate pudding (and sometimes lemon) and ganache, originated in New Orleans at a bakery run by a nice woman named Beulah Ledner in the 1930’s. Ours is not exactly like hers (it only has six layers), but it sure is good. Ms. Beulah continued making cakes until she retired at age 87. Funnily enough, it makes us rethink that old hymn, “Beulah Land” — we wonder if it has chocolate pudding layers with sponge cake.

Lavender scones with either lemon curd or strawberry shortcake or pumpkin peach scones. “Be civil to all; sociable to many; familiar with few; friend to one; enemy to none,” Ben Franklin told his drinking buddies down the pub. Only thing, he was talking about scones — he did not want to miss one. Yes, he was.

Have a look: Stone House Eats Standard Menu!

Stone House Eats Bread Baked Daily

Drinks — Sweet & Unsweet Tea, Bottled Water, Housemade Lemonade, Coca-Cola, Diet Coke, Dr. Pepper, and Sprite

Lunch Served | 11am-2pm Monday—Friday

Lunch Special | $12 — Includes Daily Special & Drink

Sandwiches & Salads — Includes Tea or Bottled Water

Check Out What’s in the Fridge!

Let Us Cater Your Next Event!

You can find our house at 828 Julia Street in Rayville, Louisiana.

You can call us at (318) 267-4457.

Thanks for letting us serve you, and may God bless you richly as you sit at the table.

Famous Bacon Quotes

Chef Anne Burrell gives some wonderful cooking advice: “I always use my ‘Holy Trinity’ which is salt, olive oil and bacon. My motto is, ‘bacon always makes it better.’ I try to use bacon and pork products whenever I can.” Preach on, dear sister, preach on.

Beef, It’s What’s for Lunch

Sam Elliott called, they’re retooling the “Beef, it’s what’s for supper” campaign. Now, it’s “Beef, it’s keeping America big and big.” We don’t think it’s going to work, but we’ve got some great workings in the kitchen at week’s end: hamburger steaks and mashed potatoes and barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boys! 

What We’re Cooking for You at Week’s End

Thursday, October 1

Hamburger steaks, mashed potatoes, gravy, and pan-fried cabbage. Who is cooler with a big mustache and familiar grin that our friend Sam Elliott? He loves beef, and his handlebar mustache is dropping by the house to get soaked in some gravy. He won’t look as cool, but he’ll still sound great when he says, “I don’t want to be known as a sex symbol. There’s a great stigma that goes with that tag. I want to be a Sam Elliott, eater of beef.” Well, with gravy on your mustache, the sexy thing is out the window.

Friday, October 2

Barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boy and a house salad. Take a half-size po-boy, hollow the bread to make a bread cave, stuff it with our own New Orleans style barbecued shrimp (prepped in loads of butter, white wine, and saucy spices), cover it with barbecue sauce, and grab the napkins. Aristotle once observed, “In all things of nature there is something of the marvelous.” Well, he was right about these gulf shrimp we are cooking just for you. And, it reminds us of a much later philosopher of the 20th century named Billy Crystal who said, “Darling, you look maahhvalous, simply maahvalous.” Obviously, he’d eaten the shrimp.

“The Marvelous Sauce,” Jehan Georges Vibert, c. 1890.

Have a look: Stone House Eats Standard Menu!

Stone House Eats Bread Baked Daily

Drinks — Sweet & Unsweet Tea, Bottled Water, Coca-Cola, Diet Coke, Dr. Pepper, and Sprite

Lunch Served | 11am-2pm Monday—Friday

Lunch Special | $12 — Includes Daily Special & Drink

Sandwiches & Salads — Includes Drink

Check Out What’s in the Fridge!

Let Us Cater Your Next Event!

You can find our house at 828 Julia Street in Rayville, Louisiana.

You can call us at (318) 267-4457.

Thanks for letting us serve you, and may God bless you richly as you sit at the table.

Famous Food Quotes

Ben Franklin, tired of the critics of Poor Richard’s Almanack, quipped, “Good sense is a thing all need, few have, and none think they want.”

Photo Credit: “The Marvelous Sauce,” Jehan Georges Vibert, c. 1890, Creative Commons.org.

September 28, 2015 Menu

“Once in your life, you find her, someone who turns your heart around, next thing you know you’re closing down the town,” sang Christopher Cross. Have we got some food that will turn your heart around — have a looksee for what’s cooking in the kitchen for you this week: red beans and rice, sampler Tuesday, chicken carbonara, hamburger steaks and mashed potatoes, and barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boys! 

What We’re Cooking for You This Week

Monday, September 28

Special made Louisiana red beans & rice with hot water cornbread. Our red beans come full of flavor, cooked in our own house made smoked ham hock stock. “Red rover, red rover, let red beans come over.” Believe it or not, this silly song we sang as children really stands as the foundation of our society. Yep. We’re always inviting someone to come over, to be part of our holding-hands-chain — to be part of what makes us really human. We sing, we dance, we run, and we invite folks to come by for some good food. Yep. Beans are the foundation building blocks of society.

Tuesday, September 29 — Sampler Tuesday

Check out our sampler salad, sampler sandwich, or sampler wrap. This is “everything and the kitchen sink” day — with a salad, a sandwich, or a wrap. The sampler sandwich comes rolling into town on our fresh house made bread. Our house made pimento cheese, toasted, comes with our own chicken salad, some bacon, and just a little dab of salad with our house dressing. It’s big, it’s messy, and it’s delicious — and, you can put it in a wrap. Samuel Johnson once said, “When a man is tired of sampler sandwiches, he is tired of life; for there is in sampler sandwiches all that life can afford.” Well, he wasn’t really talking about sampler sandwiches, he was talking about London — but it might as well be our sampler sandwiches. They’ve got it all, too.

Wednesday, September 30

Chicken carbonara, house salad, and house bread. Bow tie pasta swims in a creamy white sauce with lots of good friends — oven-roasted chicken breast, mushrooms, garden fresh veggies, and green onions. The British Broadcasting Service (BBC) reluctantly admits: “On April 1st, 1957, a BBC news program ended with a three minute segment about a Spaghetti farm in Switzerland. In the segment, spaghetti (not being a popular dish in England at the time) was said to grow on trees. Many people believed the report and called the BBC to ask how to grow their own spaghetti tree. The response: ‘Place a sprig of spaghetti in a tin of tomato sauce and hope for the best.'” Well, pasta doesn’t grow on trees, but it sure would be cool if it did — it would feel like some silly Dr. Suess story where we wander through the spangly spaghetti forest with the Lorax nicely nibbling on oodles of noodles on the much-marched marinara trail.

Thursday, October 1

Hamburger steaks, mashed potatoes, gravy, and pan-fried cabbage. Life, well, it’s good with beef, gravy, and potatoes. Some folks are just “meat and potatoes” kinds of folks. Can’t you just see Bette Davis when she remarked, “To fulfill a dream, to be allowed to sweat over lonely labor, to be given a chance to create, is the meat and potatoes of life. The money is the gravy”? Changes the way we think about meat and potatoes, doesn’t it?

Friday, October 2

Barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boy and a house salad. Take a half-size po-boy, hollow the bread to make a bread cave, stuff it with our own New Orleans style barbecued shrimp (prepped in loads of butter, white wine, and saucy spices), cover it with barbecue sauce, and grab the napkins. Player, that 1970’s yacht rock of a band, sang a song about shrimp, yes they did: “Shrimpy come back, any kind of fool could see, there was something in everything about you. Shrimpy come back, you can blame it all on me; I was wrong, and I just can’t live without you.” Lots of nights, the band would wail away by the seashore, looking for those lost crustacean cuties. They had a serious food problem.

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Dessert Offerings This Week

Chocolate pie. Someone once recognized that chocolate comes from cocoa. Cocoa, they postulated, is a tree. Therefore, chocolate is salad, they concluded. Well, the syllogism doesn’t really work, but come on by anyway and let our chocolate pie help you into the salad days of life.

Lavender scones with either lemon curd or strawberry shortcake or pumpkin peach scones. Muriel Barbery rightly notes in The Elegance of the Hedgehog, “When tea becomes ritual, it takes its place at the heart of our ability to see greatness in small things.” Yes, add some scones, the natural friend of tea, to your daily ritual to tune your life to the music and the rhythm of the spheres. Scones have that kind of mojo.

Have a look: Stone House Eats Standard Menu!

Stone House Eats Bread Baked Daily

Drinks — Sweet & Unsweet Tea, Bottled Water

Lunch Served | 11am-2pm Monday—Friday

Lunch Special | $12 — Includes Daily Special & Drink

Sandwiches & Salads — Includes Drink

We’ve got Coca-Cola, Diet Coke, Dr. Pepper, and Sprite, now!

Check Out What’s in the Fridge!

Let Us Cater Your Next Event!

You can find our house at 828 Julia Street in Rayville, Louisiana.

You can call us at (318) 267-4457.

Thanks for letting us serve you, and may God bless you richly as you sit at the table.

Famous Food Quotes

“In France, cooking is a serious art form and a national sport,” Julia Child once observed. Well, Julia had it right, but not only in France. Play on, dear friends, play on — cook, create, and play.

Gumbo Dance

Well, we’ve just about made it to Friday! Check what we’ve got cooking for you at week’s end: gumbo and barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boys! 

What We’re Cooking for You at Week’s End

Thursday, September 24

Gumbo and rice. We make our gumbo with a dark roux, chicken, sausage, and the trinity of bell pepper, onion, and celery. Oh, Grandpa Justin would add sauterne wine, a cup or two or three, and so do we. A guy named Bob Merrill wrote a little ditty originally called “Gumbo Italiano” about a girl from south Louisiana who returns to Italy wanting to introduce some new things, like gumbo. Thing is, gumbo wasn’t as popular as the mambo, a dance that originated in 1930’s Cuba. So, our old friend Rosemary Clooney croons in her unique style, “Hey mambo! Mambo italiano!” and a song was born. Around here, though, we’d much rather sing and dance about gumbo — it will make you “happy in the feets.”

Friday, September 25

Barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boy and a house salad. Take a half-size po-boy, hollow the bread to make a bread cave, stuff it with our own New Orleans style barbecued shrimp (prepped in loads of butter, white wine, and saucy spices), cover it with barbecue sauce, and grab the napkins. Come to find out our Australian friends have an odd sense of humor. To make the idea of the locusts that seasonally swarm in huge numbers being used as a food source more appealing, the Aussies call them “sky prawns.” No kidding. They must have shrimp blimps down there, too. But, I’ll just bet they’re watching things like Aussie football, natures creatures only found in Australia, and The Man from Snowy River. No sky prawn pilots around here, just good old fashioned gulf shrimp.

Square dance gone wild over gumbo. Yep.

 

Have a look: Stone House Eats Standard Menu!

Stone House Eats Bread Baked Daily

Drinks — Sweet & Unsweet Tea, Bottled Water

Lunch Served | 11am-2pm Monday—Friday

Lunch Special | $12 — Includes Daily Special & Drink

Sandwiches & Salads — Includes Drink

We’ve got Coca-Cola, Diet Coke, Dr. Pepper, and Sprite, now!

Check Out What’s in the Fridge!

Let Us Cater Your Next Event!

You can find our house at 828 Julia Street in Rayville, Louisiana.

You can call us at (318) 267-4457.

Thanks for letting us serve you, and may God bless you richly as you sit at the table.

Famous Food Quotes

M. F. K. Fisher wrote in The Art of Eating that “[Breadbaking is] one of those almost hypnotic businesses, like a dance from some ancient ceremony. It leaves you filled with one of the world’s sweetest smells…there is no chiropractic treatment, no Yoga exercise, no hour of meditation in a music-throbbing chapel that will leave you emptier of bad thoughts than this homely ceremony of making bread.” Holy cow, bread really is the healingly hypnotic stuff of heaven.

Photo Credit: “Square Dance Gone Wild in North Carolina,” Creative Commons.org.

September 21, 2015 Menu

“I hear that train a-comin’, it’s comin’ round the bend, and I ain’t seen sunshine in…I don’t know when,” sang Johnny Cash. Have we got some sunshine for you — have a gander a what’s cooking in the kitchen for you this week: fried chicken with signature potatoes, shrimp cannelloni, gumbo, and barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boys! 

What We’re Cooking for You This Week

Monday, September 21

Special made Louisiana red beans & rice with hot water cornbread. Our red beans come full of flavor, cooked in our own house made smoked ham hock stock. Some Native American tribes use rattles made from gourds or turtle shells for children’s toys, but mostly they were used in ceremonies. These rattles were a symbol of music, spirituality, dance and medicine for most of these tribal folk. What makes the rattle, well, rattle? Sometimes small rocks, but most tribes, especially those in the Southwest, used beans. Yep. There you have it — beans, the rattling power behind culture.

Tuesday, September 22

Fried chicken tenders with signature potatoes, roasted seasonal vegetables, and a honey buttermilk biscuit. Lovingly bedded overnight in buttermilk and hot sauce, our chicken tenders come fabulously fried in a special flour recipe and served with our white cream gravy signature potatoes. “The sun goes down, the blues come around and the choice is black and white. Low down and lonesome and high as a kite. When you can’t win for losing, you know it’s just not right. It’s a headache tomorrow, or a heartache tonight,” sang Mickey Gilley once upon a time. Somebody stole his fried chicken, and it gave him a serious fit of the blues. Fried chicken, yes, it can cure the blues, and it won’t give you a headache or heartache, just a full tummy.

For our crispy fried chicken, why not try the fried chicken on a house salad ($12), in a bacon chicken wrap ($12), or on a sandwich ($12)!

Wednesday, September 23

Shrimp cannelloni with a fresh red sauce base and a creamy béchamel sauce covering. Look, there’s nothing better than fresh pasta, fresh ricotta, fresh spinach, and gulf shrimp lovingly prepped into this amazing dish called cannelloni. In Italian, cannelloni means “large reed.” We’ve slightly redefined it: use this cannelloni like a large reed or pole vault to get you through hump day and into Friday. You can do it, just grab the cannelloni and start vaulting your way to the weekend.

Thursday, September 24

Gumbo and rice. We make our gumbo with a dark roux, chicken, sausage, and the trinity of bell pepper, onion, and celery. Oh, Grandpa Justin would add sauterne wine, a cup or two or three, and so do we. Who knows where that word gumbo originated? Some say it’s from West African languages, either Bantu (quingombo) or Umbundu (ochinggômbo) or Tshiluba (chinggômbô), all words in those respective languages for “okra.” Others say it’s Choctaw for the ground sassafras leaves (kombo) which we call filé. Call us crazy, but those words all look pretty similar no matter the continent of origin. And, at any rate, a rose by any other name would smell as sweet — and gumbo, by any name, tastes just as good.

Friday, September 25

Barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boy and a house salad. Take a half-size po-boy, hollow the bread to make a bread cave, stuff it with our own New Orleans style barbecued shrimp (prepped in loads of butter, white wine, and saucy spices), cover it with barbecue sauce, and grab the napkins. “It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s…a shrimp blimp!” Apparently our crafty crustacean comrades built themselves a blimp for watching sporting activities. It’s powered by a bean fusion (yes, fusion) reactor, can travel just about anywhere, and broadcasts not only sports, but a variety of shows. Shrimp don’t even need TV’s to receive the signal the shrimp blimp produces because they’ve got their own built in HD antennae. Broadcasting now is Mcmillian and Wife — they have a thing for whodunnit series. Next week they’ll be watching Quincy M.E. Of course, they only have one channel, so it’s sports or serial watching of whodunnits. Who knew their ganglia nerve cells were large enough to make something like that happen? Maybe it’s a hive mind or some such crazy thing.

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Dessert Offerings This Week

Carrot cake cupcakes with cream cheese icing. These little gems are small versions of our larger carrot cake. You know, carrots provide great sources of vitamins and minerals, particularly vitamin K. Here’s your science lesson for the day: vitamin K helps with blood, bones, and vascular health. So, have a cupcake today and improve your health, thanks to carrots. Who knew? Well, Bugs Bunny did, for one.

Chocolate pie. Creamy and delicious with a flaky crust, this chocolate pie will absolutely help you handle those chocolate cravings. Someone once said, “Put ‘Eat Chocolate’ at the top of your list of things to do today. That way, at least you’ll get one thing done.” Well, chocolate can help you in time management — the one really helpful trick all those time management books mistakenly omit. Crazy. Get something done today and feel better about your work: eat chocolate pie.

Lavender scones with either lemon curd or strawberry shortcake or pumpkin peach scones. Alexander McCall Smith observed in The Unbearable Lightness of Scones, “How often have I noticed or, indeed, listened to him? We talk, but do I actually listen, or is our conversation mainly a question of my waiting for him to stop and for it to be my turn to say something? For how many of us is that what conversation means — the setting up of our lines?” Have a scone or two, drink some coffee or tea with friends, and really listen to each other. Scones could change the world.

Have a look: Stone House Eats Standard Menu!

Stone House Eats Bread Baked Daily

Drinks — Sweet & Unsweet Tea, Bottled Water

Lunch Served | 11am-2pm Monday—Friday

Lunch Special | $12 — Includes Daily Special & Drink

Sandwiches & Salads — Includes Drink

We’ve got Coca-Cola, Diet Coke, Dr. Pepper, and Sprite, now!

Check Out What’s in the Fridge!

Let Us Cater Your Next Event!

You can find our house at 828 Julia Street in Rayville, Louisiana.

You can call us at (318) 267-4457.

Thanks for letting us serve you, and may God bless you richly as you sit at the table.

Famous Food Quotes

From the The Picayune’s Creole Cook Book of 1901 we read these great words: “Gumbo, of all other products of the New Orleans cuisine, represents a most distinctive type of the evolution of good cookery under the hands of the famous Creole Cuisinieres of old New Orleans.” Distinctive, evolutionary, and famous…well, that’s gumbo for you.

September 14, 2015 Menu

“O-ho the Wells Fargo Wagon is a-comin’ down the street,
Oh please let it be for me!” folks come singing. The Stone House Eats wagon is rolling some good eats your way! Drop by the house for some fried pork chops, shrimp on fried grits, gumbo, and barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boys. 

What We’re Cooking for You This Week

Tuesday, September 15

Fried pork chops, creamy polenta, green peas with pearl onions, & honey buttermilk biscuits. Blissfully slumbering overnight in a special saucy boudoir of buttermilk and seasonings, these pork chops will ceremoniously swim with their special flour bathing suits in a big pot of hot grease. Mamie Eisenhower interestingly observed, “Ike runs the country, and I turn the pork chops.” Hey, everybody knows where they fit in the world when they eat pork chops (even if they no longer fit into their jeans). Pork is power and order and good old fashioned greasy goodness.

Wednesday, September 16

Shrimp prepared in a luscious, fresh sauce served over fried grits. Well, the mudbugs’ glamorous cousin finds more glory in this delicious dish. Lao Tzu famously remarked, “Do the difficult things while they are easy and do the great things while they are small. A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.” Of course, he was echoed by a 18th century poet named Robert Herrick who penned, “Gather ye rosebuds while ye may, old time is still a flyin’.” Which is to say, gather ye fried grits while ye may, the journey of a thousand tastes begins with a single shrimp. Yep.

Thursday, September 17

Gumbo. Just one little word with so much meaning, love, and flavor. We make our gumbo with a dark roux, chicken, sausage, and the trinity of bell pepper, onion, and celery. Oh, Grandpa Justin would add sauterne wine, a cup or two or three, and so do we. If gumbo doesn’t make the world go round, it sure helps grease that spinning Catherine wheel of a universe where we live. Who knew pork chops and gumbo held the secret keys to order in the universe?

Friday, September 18

Barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boy and a house salad. Take a half-size po-boy, hollow the bread to make a bread cave, stuff it with our own New Orleans style barbecued shrimp (prepped in loads of butter, white wine, and saucy spices), cover it with barbecue sauce, and grab the napkins. Rupert Holmes once sang a song about rediscovering love, but it originally started as a bit of crooning to our favorite crustaceans: “If you like corn, shrimp, and po-boys, and catching fish in the rain, if you’re not into whole grains, if you have half a brain, if you like making noise at midnight with the loons of the cape, I’m the love that you’ve looked for, eat with me, and escape.” There it is, the origins of yacht rock. Singing and eating and eating and singing on a boat or near the sea or with a bee in a bonnet and a Shakespearean sonnet.

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Dessert Offerings This Week

Chocolate delight. Made like our lemon delight with a light pecan and flour crust, instead of using a lemon curd, we use a chocolatey sauce that will get you all kinds of happy. The Starlight Vocal Band had a thing for chocolate: “Thinkin’ of you’s workin’ up my appetite, looking forward to a little chocolate delight. Rubbin’ sticks and stones together make the sparks ignite, and the thought of eating you is getting so exciting. Dark chocolate in flight, chocolate delight, chocolate delight.” Then, some crazy producer said a love song about chocolate wouldn’t sell…and, the rest, well, Ron Burgundy and his boys made it famous.

White chocolate bread pudding with mixed berries. Can you feel the thunder rolling, can you see the lightning flash? White chocolate bread pudding will ignite your senses so well, you’ll see vapor trails. And, no it’s not hallucinations brought on by chocolate and sugar overload. 

Double chocolate scones strawberry shortcake style (fresh whipped cream and fresh strawberries). Wrigley had it right, double is better. If double dutch makes jump rope better and Double Trouble is a great backup band and double or nothing raises the stakes, then double chocolate scones can double your chocolate dosage in a meaningful and life-changing way. Just don’t give any to your trusty canine companions.

Have a look: Stone House Eats Standard Menu!

Stone House Eats Bread Baked Daily

Drinks — Sweet & Unsweet Tea, Bottled Water

Lunch Served | 11am-2pm Monday—Friday

Lunch Special | $12 — Includes Daily Special & Drink

Sandwiches & Salads — Includes Drink

We’ve got Coca-Cola, Diet Coke, Dr. Pepper, and Sprite, now!

Let Us Cater Your Next Event!

You can find our house at 828 Julia Street in Rayville, Louisiana.

You can call us at (318) 267-4457.

Thanks for letting us serve you, and may God bless you richly as you sit at the table.

Famous Food Quotes

As Pythagoras plucked his early Greek guitar and pondered his theorem on triangles, he mused, “There is geometry in the humming of the strings. There is music in the spacing of the spheres.” Leave it to some Greek thinker to take all the fun out of guitar music by talking about geometry.

Happy Monday!

Is there really such a thing as a “Happy Monday?” Sorry to ramble philosophical as you dig into your morning coffee, trying to steel yourself for the week ahead of you. It’ll be fantastic, especially if you’ve got some great grub to help you. The rest of the menu for this week is coming later today!

What We’re Cooking for You This Happy Monday

Monday, September 14 — To Go Orders Only Today!

Special made Louisiana red beans & rice with hot water cornbread. Our red beans come full of flavor, cooked in our own house made pork stock. Once upon a time, we had some friends who got pregnant. When they saw the sonogram, the little, growing baby looked like a bean. So, whenever they referred to the in utero child, they called him “The Bean.” “The Bean” emerged into this bright, beautiful world, and they named him Soy. He’s got two brothers named Red and Green and a new little dumpling of love baby sister named Butter. When introduced to folks, the parents ask, “Do you know our beans?” It could happen.

Have a look: Stone House Eats Standard Menu!

Stone House Eats Bread Baked Daily

Drinks — Sweet & Unsweet Tea, Bottled Water

Lunch Served | 11am-2pm Monday—Friday

Lunch Special | $12 — Includes Daily Special & Drink

Sandwiches & Salads — Includes Drink

We’ve got Coca-Cola, Diet Coke, Dr. Pepper, and Sprite, now!

Check Out What’s in the Fridge!

Let Us Cater Your Next Event!

You can find our house at 828 Julia Street in Rayville, Louisiana.

You can call us at (318) 267-4457.

Thanks for letting us serve you, and may God bless you richly as you sit at the table.

Famous Food Quotes

Someone silly once said, “My friend think’s he’s smart, and he said onions are the only food that makes you cry. So I threw a coconut at his face.” Whoops.

Photo Credit: “Delivery Bike, Parkend,” Creative Commons.

September 8, 2015 Menu

“Ohhhhklahoma where the wind comes sweeping down the plain!” Let that old Okie wind blow you down our street for some fab food. What’s cooking in the kitchen for you this week: fried chicken with roasted sweet potatoes, overnight brisket, chipotle salads and wraps, and barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boys! 

What We’re Cooking for You This Week

Tuesday, September 8

Fried chicken tenders with roasted sweet potatoes, speckled butter beans, and a honey buttermilk biscuit. Chicken tenders lovingly bedded overnight in buttermilk and hot sauce come famously fried in a special flour recipe and served with roasted sweet potatoes and speckled butter beans — oh, and some cream gravy. Down and out? Coasting on fumes? Need a little help from your friends? Fried chicken is the answer. It’s what John, Paul, George and Ringo sang, “Do you need anybody? I just want chicken to love…I get by with a little help from my friends.” Who knew fried chicken had the power? No crazy Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band uniforms, here, though. Just good, helpful, love-from-your-friends fried chicken.

For our crispy fried chicken, why not try the fried chicken on a house salad ($12), in a bacon chicken wrap ($12), or on a sandwich ($12)!

Wednesday, September 9

Overnight Brisket, baked garlic cheese grits, roasted broccoli, and a buttermilk biscuit. The stuff of legends, our overnight brisket, slow-cooked in a special blend of spices and dark beer, will cheer your tummy and your table. “Come and listen to my story ’bout a man named Jed, a poor mountaineer, barely kept his family fed. And then one day he was shootin’ at some food, and up through the ground came a-bubblin’ crude. Oil that is, black gold, Texas tea.” Jed didn’t like oil, though, he fancied himself a cattleman. He was crazy himself about some beef. What most folks don’t know is that Jed wanted to move to Oklahoma  to raise cattle and sing show tunes (“O-K-L-A-H-O-M-A, Oklahoma!”), but Jethro and Elly May had stars in their eyes, so they ended up in Beverly Hills. Granny didn’t like four-legged beef or two-legged stars, it’s why she was always so irascible. And, that Jane Hathaway drove her nuts, too.

Thursday, September 10

Chipotle ranch grilled chicken and bacon salad. Add a little zest to your life late in the week: try any of our salads with our house made chipotle ranch dressing. You’re not fully ready to face the weekend unless you’re zestfully ready. Yep.

Friday, September 11

Barbecued shrimp stuffed po-boy and a house salad. Take a half-size po-boy, hollow the bread to make a bread cave, stuff it with our own New Orleans style barbecued shrimp (prepped in loads of butter, white wine, and saucy spices), cover it with barbecue sauce, and grab the napkins. Few folks know old Christopher Cross was a shrimp man. Yep. That “Sailing” song, it’s really about shrimp po-boys. “Well it’s not far down to paradise, at least’s not for me, if the shrimp is right you can sail away and find tranquility. Oh the po-boy can do miracles, just you wait and see, believe me. It’s not far to never, never land….” Granny bailed on Beverly Hills and the Clampets. She hiked her skirts, put on one of those totally fashionable 1920’s bathing suits, and joined Christopher Cross on his boat aptly named “Shrimp Excess.” She’s drinking cocktails with Chris and eating shrimp po-boys, a heapin’ helping of hillbilly hospitality heaving ho across the waves. She likes those old bathing suits because she can wear her boots. And, that’s the rest of Jed’s story….

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Dessert Offerings This Week

Layered carrot cake with cream cheese icing. “Carrots!” Then Anne Shirley bashed Gilbert Blythe (who was too blithe for his own good) with a chalk board over the head in Anne of Green Gables. After lots of teasing and flirting and mooning, they get married. But, she won’t make carrot cake for the love of her life. Nopey.

White chocolate bread pudding with berries. Look, this stuff is so good presidential candidates have their tours travel through Richland Parish. Apparently, this pudding helps them do well in the polls and debates. Who knew? This pudding is recharging democracy. 

Lavender scones with either lemon curd or strawberry shortcake. When the doctor told him his cholesterol was too high, old Ben Franklin replied, “Time is an scone that cures all diseases.” “Lay off the scones and wine, anyway, old man,” the doctor instructed, “and let your vices die before you.” We’re not really supposed to know that conversation, patient confidentiality and all.

Have a look: Stone House Eats Standard Menu!

Stone House Eats Bread Baked Daily

Drinks — Sweet & Unsweet Tea, Bottled Water

Lunch Served | 11am-2pm Monday—Friday

Lunch Special | $12 — Includes Daily Special & Drink

Sandwiches & Salads — Includes Drink

We’ve got Coca-Cola, Diet Coke, Dr. Pepper, and Sprite, now!

Check Out What’s in the Fridge!

Let Us Cater Your Next Event!

You can find our house at 828 Julia Street in Rayville, Louisiana.

You can call us at (318) 267-4457.

Thanks for letting us serve you, and may God bless you richly as you sit at the table.

Famous Food Quotes

As he breakfasted with his pupils over olives, bread, cheese, and fruit, Plato presciently remarked, “One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors.” Thus he goaded them into voting for fools like Pericles. One wonders what Plato was thinking. Maybe the cheese was bad.