Gooey Butter Cake

Hello, everyone. 

Gooey Butter Cake has always seemed like a cousin of Lemon Bars: a base that's more dry and a gooey top. 

It's a standard of Duke's Bakery in Alton, Illinois, where on Sunday morning after church the cars line up down the block as people pick up their  breakfast. The butter vanilla scent fills the kitchen while it bakes.

The Great Rivers museum

Hello, everyone. Continuing on yesterday's topic, we visited the museum at the amazingly large lock and dam setup near where Lewis and Clark prepared for their survey of the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. Yesterday's post showed a beautiful native shrub in the parking area. Today I will mention a few of the things inside.

This display shows the purpose of lock and dam systems. This one is on the Mississippi, but there are many others around the world. It is always interesting to see a barge and tug group go through the locks.

Beautiful native flowers

Hello, everyone. We visited a museum on the famous Mississippi River recently. I may have another post or two about it. This post is to share with y'all the beautiful native plants growing on the grounds outside.

I believe I have seen plants like this at the web site of Plant Delights nursery.

Peach pie makings

 Hello, everyone.

While we were visiting family, I found a farm stand with fresh, Illinois peaches for sale.  Nabbed a nice bag of them, quick.

To make pie, they needed to be peeled...and I had never tried that before.

Following instructions on various web sites and Youtube videos, I cut a cross in the bottom of the fruit. Then I put them into boiling water for just a few seconds (if you've peeled tomatoes, this is the same game) and then put the now scalded peaches into a bowl of ice water to shock them and stop the cooking.  Then I used a knife to pull the skin away from the flesh of the fruit. Sliced the peeled peaches and put them into a bowl to macerate with some sugar.

These are the peels and pits after the peaches were peeled. It's a surprisingly small pile for a bag of 8 or 10 peaches.

These are the sliced peaches, with about a half cup of sugar to bring out the juice, waiting until time to be put into the pie shell.

This was the first of two pies that got made during our visit. The second pie, not pictured, was Granny Smith apples.

I love making pies. The grandchildren liked eating them for breakfast, too. 

Native plant, but not in South Texas

Hello, everyone.

When we were in Illinois, I was struck by this plant we saw at Pere Marquette State Park.

This is a mayapple.  Actually, either a pair or the start of a clump! This was along the walking path on a hill.

It's possible that mayapples grow in East Texas, but down here there is neither enough water nor, I suspect, enough winter chilling.

Just for pretty: a flower

Hello, everyone.

This is a wild columbine that we saw at Pere Marquette State Park, outside of Alton, Illinois, in June.

It's a low-growing plant, like most columbines. It needs regular water and woodsy soil.

Progress is happening on various projects, but nothing to write about just yet.  And a new baby quilt has been begun. (Yay!)

Clouds

Hello, everyone.

Happy Fourth of July to all my American readers. I am not of a mind to run out to stores today, as it's a day to be grateful in my opinion.

On another subject,  I was "strolling" through photos and noticed that cloud pictures aren't something that has come up around here. I've always been partial to a nifty looking cloud. Sometimes, I've even had a camera on hand to record the once-off shape and shade of the cloud that caught my attention.

Seen about 4:30 PM in south Texas (spring? summer? I forget)

Onrushing hailstorm in April of 2012

From a Mississippi ferry near Alton, Illinois

Looking back toward Pamplona in late May, 2014.
 These clouds proceeded to drop rain and ice bits on us a little while later.

On Ocala National Forest, Florida, in 2015. The tickiest place I have ever been.
With pretty poufs of clouds overhead.

More on Grafton, Illinois

Hello, everyone.

Thanks to DH's great photo, a little more info on the Beazley Fish Market:

Fried Buffalo Sandwich!

Mine had a side of coleslaw, because I wanted to try adding the
coleslaw into the sandwich, a la Memphis barbecue. (It was good!)

DH had the pure and simple fish, tartar sauce, and bread.

And now I expect that there will be a stampede of hungry people arriving in Grafton, looking for Beazley's and lining up for those sandwiches. (My personal fave is the carp sandwich, as the buffalo has a tough bit of skin in the middle which the carp lacks. They both taste wonderful!)

Marquette Park, Grafton, and the mighty Mississippi

Hello, everyone.

We did a little driving, both to see relatives and to see some sights.

It seems to break into three or four subjects, at least that there are pictures of. Today I thought I'd talk about Marquette Park, in southern Illinois, the nearby town of Grafton, and of course the mighty Mississippi.

In the early spring, once the ice on the river breaks, there is a blessing of the fleet at the feet of Our Lady of the Waters. Fittingly, she looks out over the waters and the fishermen, tugboat pilots, recreational boaters, and whoever else floats on the Mississippi and Missouri rivers. This orientation of the statue makes photography somewhat challenging. I shot the photo from the opposite side of the river, while briefly stopped on the River Road (Illinois state highway 3, I think) and the clouds were somewhat lowering and the mist was trying to start falling again. Zoom is my friend.

Our Lady of the Waters

 On our first morning in the area we drove up to Pere Marquette State Park, which is up the River Road from the Pere Marquette memorial statue at the side of the road, and did a little walking. This time we walked the Goat Cliff Trail and connected to some other trail near the top and followed that one down to the visitor's center and parking lot.

Cave along one of the trails at Marquette State Park

 From one of the viewing points, we looked down and saw some duck blinds in the river.

We were pretty sure this was a duck blind. Just thinking about hiding in that cold, cold
water under the cover for hours in duck season makes me cold.

Driving along the River Road--large tree-covered blob in river is a new island that has formed from drifting mud.

After our walk, we were hungry, and since it was not the wrong day of the week, stopped at the famous Beasley Fish Market in Grafton for fried buffalo (fish, not mammal) sandwiches.

This is THE place to get a fried fish sandwich. I prefer carp to buffalo (no tough skin inside the curled up fish)
but either has a fine flavor!

Not pictured, because I can't figure out where the photo file went, we had arrived in the area before reasonable check-in time the day before, and along with taking the top photo of Our Lady of the Waters, we'd gone to the Grafton Winery for a little taste. They had a fine warm dip that we'd never tasted before. Spinach and artichoke, with creamy cheeses and maybe some garlic. Really good on soft pita wedges!

Happy New Year

Hello, everyone.

This old picture, and recent news accounts about Mississippi flooding, brought memories to mind:

Piasa bird (early 2000's renewal)

This is the Piasa bird. The people of the Alton, Illinois area put this local sight onto tee shirts and other things--and when the paint fades out, someone crawls up there to renew the picture.

The Piasa bird has been on the cliffs overlooking the mighty Mississippi since Pere Marquette came through in his little flotilla of canoes. Likely it was quite old even then. The local folks are so attached to it that, when the original cliffside was wrecked in building a riverside road, they restored the bird to another, nearby, cliffside. Occasionally someone will get silly about the risk of falling and put up a wooden billboard with the Piasa bird in the area. It is neither worthy of the local people nor of the Piasa bird art to do this, in my opinion.

The Victorian/Edwardian enthusiasm for lovely stories about things of interest--think of George Washington's thrown quarter here--also has affected the Piasa bird. A local paper in the very early years of the 20th century, or the late years of the 19th century, published a long article about Chief
Quatoga, the self sacrificing Indian chief who died saving the Illini from the Piasa bird. (Well, I think it was the Illini tribe--but it's been years since I read the article.) Apparently the local Indians had engaged war, bloody warfare without end or mercy, and the Piasa bird had become an eater of the fallen warriors (and noncombatant villagers) to the extent that Quatoga had to hunt the Piasa bird down. The brave warrior Quatoga died in his successful attempt to rid the area of the man-eating menace. It would be really interesting if we could find out the folkloric roots behind this tale, and get some idea of the actual age of the Piasa bird on the cliffs of southern Illinois.

There is an old--very old--map of the Mississippi which shows the Piasa bird in approximately where it is now. I think that this map is either one made by Marquette or copied from his notes. But I don't have any image of it, nor any further information about it.

If you should go to the southern Illinois-eastern Missouri area of the United States, you should drive down the Great River Road past Alton and the other towns along the Mississippi area and see the Piasa bird for yourself.