I’ve shared so many of my Grandmother’s recipes here that I’m a bit worries my cousins are going to hunt me down for giving away family secrets. Well, I would be worried except that my cousins and I all feel the same way about our Grandmother… that she was the warmest, kindest, most loving woman on the planet and that if we can be just a little bit like her in our lives, we’ll be doing things right.
Somehow she made all of her children and her grandchildren believe that we were her absolute most favorite (and, you know what, I bet we ALL were.) She was forever sewing something for a friend, or cooking something delicious for one of us, or making up something fun for us to do together.
My cousin, Amy, gave us the most wonderful Christmas gift a couple of years ago…she painstakingly typed up and bound all of Grandmother’s recipes into a cookbook of sorts.I use it every week at least once, and I’d bet they do, too (if they haven’t memorized the recipes yet.) Grandmother has some Louisiana roots, which is why a bunch of her best recipes have a creole/New Orleans flair.
Her recipe for Crawfish Elegante’ is a super delicious, very versatile dish that can be made ahead, frozen, and eaten in a variety of ways. It’s perfect for spring when crawfish are in season, but also pretty great whenever as you can get frozen peeled crawfish at the store. Here, I’m sharing it as a dip with toasted New Orleans French Bread, but it’s also great over rice as a main dish OR as a filling for puff pastries. We also had it as a catfish topping this same night, and as my cousin Virginia would say “it didn’t suck.” 
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Every week, I’m going to try to share a story of hospitality, a fun party that I’ve hosted or attended, or just wisdom from other folks about what it means to provide a warm welcome.
The fellas in our house have a serious sweet tooth around, say, 10pm. They always want just a little taste of chocolate, and sometimes they squirrel away tootsie rolls, Oreos, or whatever little snack they can to munch on while everyone else is tucked in bed. We had a brand new carton of Blue Bell vanilla ice cream and a bag of pecans, so it just seemed right to make a batch of fudgey, gooey brownies that would be perfect for sundaes before I went away to the Southern Foodways Alliance Food & Media event last weekend…. as a little thank you for making sure my little guy didn’t miss me TOO much.
OH y’all… on weekends like we’ve had, I feel like a little daffodil peeking out of my leaves and praying for more warmth and sunshine. I LOVE winter, but gosh, when the sun is warm and bright after some grey, cold weeks, I just can’t help but get excited for spring. Yesterday it was so gorgeous and Wagner and I were having so much fun being outside, I called my friend Lauren to come over for a drink on the porch. She couldn’t make it, but I had made a batch of a punch that is JUST RIGHT for warm, sunshiney days, so I had a little sip by myself. 
