The Perfect Tomato Salad.

Disclaimer: This first course is very heavily based on Chris Hastings' Hot and Hot Tomato Salad, but is not identical, and is therefore not called the Hot and Hot Tomato Salad. This is a bastardized version.

Now that we're through with the legalities. 

One of the best parts about the weather warming up is that the produce section explodes with fresh, delicious fruits and vegetables. Summer strawberries and okra are always my two favorite things - they're just so plump and juicy and wonderful. 

I'm not a particularly tomato-y person; I like them occasionally on burgers, but they usually end up being too mealy or bland for my taste. But this salad? This salad I like. 

This is simple and easy recipe will absolutely knock the socks off your dinner guests - you have my guarantee. I've seen it work many times. If you want this to be Whole 30 approved, nix the cheese, and you're there. If you want it to be vegetarian, skip the bacon. 

Ingredients: 
2-4 heirloom tomatoes (not regular tomatoes)
20-25 pieces fresh okra (and whatever ingredients you like to use to fry it) 
2-3 pieces of thick cut bacon, fried crispy
1 cob of sweet corn
1 package shelled edamame beans
Balsamic vinaigrette
1 package feta cheese
2 T sugar
Sald and pepper to taste

1. Boil your corn with a little sugar in the water, then start on frying your okra however you choose to do it. I use my mom's recipe which can be found here. When you're through frying, it should look like this. 

2. Fry your bacon so that it's very crispy (the crispiness of the okra and the bacon gives this dish a lot of texture). I actually cook bacon in my oven - I put it onto a foil-covered baking sheet, stick it in a cold oven, then pre-heat the oven to 425. Once it's finished pre-heating, I let it cook a couple of minutes longer, then we're done! No muss, no fuss. "Oven bacon" leaves your hands free to cook. 

Once it's cooked, give it a rough chop. 

3. Slice your tomatoes into half inch slices - a little thinner if you want to pile more tomato slices on top of each other. 

4. Begin assembling! Pile your slices on top of each other - toss on your okra, edamame (lightly salted), your freshly cut corn, crumbled bacon, and feta. Then drizzle a light coating of the vinaigrette - or, better yet, leave it off and let your guests add it themselves. 

Best enjoyed with great friends outside with a fabulous bottle of wine. 

Billboard Music Awards Red Carpet: Fetch or Wretch?

This event isn't really major - in fact, I had to stop and ask "Who is that?!" like 45 times during the show, but we did stumble upon it on TV last night. So I'm posting about it, because it's Monday and what better to ease us into our week than clothes? 

Fetch. 

Britney Spears. 

I'm changing the rules for our girl because her red carpet look was very bad, but THIS is what she looked like during her performance. 

BOW. DOWN. 

Zendaya.

I legit have no idea who this girl is or why she's famous. I *think* that she was a Disney Channel star of some sort? Regardless, I see her on the red carpet every time it's is rolled out, and she almost always knocks it out of the park. Some will say this look is too monochromatic, but I think she nailed it - she knows what works for her. She looks statuesque and fabulous. 

Ke$ha. 

...it physically pained me to type that stupid dollar sign. It also pained me to put her in the "best dressed" category - but I would wear every piece of this outfit, down to the shoes. There has certainly been a lot of controversy around this lady lately, and while there's no way I'm going to opine on that, I will say she's definitely succeeded in toning down her look to be taken more seriously. Jordan looked at me last night during her performance and said, "Why is this so solemn? Is she re-branding herself?" After I got over the fact that my husband knows what "re-branding" is, I had to agree - her publicist is doing a great job adjusting Ke$ha's image to reflect that she's got more to offer than glitter vomit and sweaty club remixes.  

As an aside, I had no idea she could actually sing. 

Laverne Cox.

A little grand for the Vegas red carpet at the Billboard Awards, but when someone is slaying in this manner, it doesn't matter. I don't mean to be politically incorrect, but this used to be a man, people. SHE IS SO FIERCE.

...and those four outfits are the only ones I liked. Now, on to the not-so-successful. 

Wretch.

Rihanna.

Girl, the 90's called and wants every single bit of this look back, right down to the mom hair. But you CRUSHED your performance and you normally get it right, so we'll give you a pass. 

Ariana Grande.

WAY too much going on with the cutouts, leather, and pattern. Ages her a decade. Too small a person to carry off that much dress. Hate the shoes. 

Nick Jonas. 

Looks like he grabbed four pieces off his bedroom floor and threw them on in the car on the way. Also, in every picture, those pants are doing something weird in the crotchal region. Also, it's too casual. 

Jessica Alba.

...why are you wearing black suede boots in the middle of May?? 

Idina Menzel.

It's almost right, but that dress gives her three boobs. 

Some Person I've Never Heard Of.

Who does she think she is? What the hell is she wearing? How did she move around? Does the skirt detach? Do you think she made the photographers wait until she got her face and hands arranged in that, "Leeeeewk at me I'm a bewwwwwwtifwel fissssh!" pose? Is the top sheer? Was the wig heavy? Does she know there's already a Lady Gaga?  

There were a lot more looks that I really didn't care for, but I genuinely didn't know who they were. Like, had never heard of them or their music.

Is that it's like to get old? 

See you tomorrow for the first episode of Bach-capping. 

5 Things: Reasons I Love Traveling with Jordan

This week, Jordan and I are at a beautiful resort hotel in Myrtle Beach, SC. He's doing some continuing education work, but we're still getting to spend lots of time together! Yesterday while the weather was cloudy, I stayed inside and watched Downton Abbey for about 4 hours. And I'm not even sorry. 

Most of the time when we travel, we're with people and/or only gone for the weekend. This is the first trip since our honeymoon where we've had several days in a row getting to relax and spend lots of time together, and I am gobbling it up. 

So, in honor of that, here are five things I love about traveling with my husband. 

1. He will eat anything. 

I don't mean he has low standards, I mean he'll try anything. Weird, cultural foods are his jam. He loves to try something new if the occasion calls for it, and that's one of my favorite things about him. Last night at dinner, he had the waiter choose for him (because he likes almost everything). The guy brought him salmon Rockefeller and he gobbled up every bite. I think the reason I like this quality in him so much is that it speaks to his low maintenance personality - he's just here to have a good time. 

2. He doesn't sweat the small stuff.

I am the planner in our marriage. I know what's happening, when, how long it will take to get there, what the attire is, who'll be there - I RSVP, send the gifts, and book the plane tickets. That is my role. But since this is his trip, I took a backseat and decided to just show up and go with it. True story: we drove here (a little over 5 hours), and about 30 minutes before we arrived, at 11:15 PM, I confirmed the hotel with Jordan. "Yeah, that's right," he said, "But text someone to make sure." (His entire dental office is also down here, so that's who he was getting confirmation from.) Turns out, we had the wrong hotel. I, of course, was basically bleeding into my brain stem that it was almost midnight and we didn't know where we were staying. But he was fine and we got it figured out within minutes. In the scheme of life, having every plan perfectly nailed down isn't that important. Jordan reminds me that we all have to loosen the hell up sometimes. 

(To be perfectly clear, I will still want to know what hotel we're staying in well before we arrive in the future. Just in case you're reading this, Jord.) 

3. He'll take pictures with me. 

I know that many men are pretty irritated the minute their wives pull out their cell phone and try to snap pictures. Rightfully so - I don't blame them. We take too many pictures. We can't help it. Though Jordan definitely has his limit (example: selfie, take a picture of me by myself, now take a picture with me again, oh wait my hair was doing something weird, etc.), he is almost always such a good sport about posing for as many pictures as I want to take. He says, "It may not be my favorite thing, but I'll want to remember this at some point." 

4. He is happy first thing in the morning. 

I don't know about you, but I am a groggy, nasty wreck first thing in the morning. I'm not one of those, "Don't talk to me before I've had my coffee," people, but it definitely takes me a second to get up and moving. Jordan, on the other hand, is happy right when he opens his eyes. For example, this morning he woke up, snuggled up to me, and started laughing at me because I'd put my pajama pants on backwards last night. #classic Even in the middle of the night if I have to get up for some reason, he's so pleasant and unbothered. This makes traveling a breeze - no grumpiness to fight through, just happiness. 

5. He is a big, curious nerd. 

Any of you who know Jordan personally know that he is a giant nerd. If we go to a park or zoo, he loves to read every SINGLE placard in the joint - all the details about the specific types of trees and/or animals. If we're stargazing, he loves to talk about star death. And if we're beach walking, like we were yesterday, he loves to search for shark teeth (for his dad) and identify every living creature we see along the way. It's a precious habit and always reminds me that stopping to be curious about the natural world pays off in fascinating little bits of information. 

SO let me go ahead and use all the cliches about him: "I love doing life with you!" "THIS guy." "So happy to be in a beautiful place with my favorite person." 

...but really, he is my favorite person. And I'm really glad we got married. 

My kids.

I'm not a mother, but I have approximately 160 kids. 

After I graduated college, I was placed in York, Alabama teaching middle school social studies. Despite living in Alabama my whole life, I'd never heard of York as long as I lived. But that's where I taught some of the greatest people I'll ever have the pleasure of knowing. 

I don't talk a lot about my experience with Teach For America - not in any depth, I mean. It's one of those things that's hard to sum up in a little pearl over dinner, or explain in depth to someone who hasn't lived it. I even have trouble articulating it well to my husband, who I met near the end of my two-year commitment. 

This Friday, my 8th graders from the 2011-2012 school year will graduate high school. It's so hard to believe that four years have passed, and that those 13 and 14 year olds are now 17 and 18 year olds. I'll be in South Carolina that week on a trip with Jordan, so in lieu of making it to their graduation, I drove to York this past weekend and hugged their necks. 

It is really easily to get self-congratulatory when talking about Teach For America. On its face, the program looks prestigious on a resume and is something recognizable to say that you're doing after college. It is hard, hard work - likely the hardest work a person will ever do - to teach in a failing school district. People consider it an "accomplishment" to have done so.

But the truth is, there are career teachers who show up to work every day in classrooms like the ones I taught in - not for two years, but for thirty. And the students who fill those classrooms and defy statistics by graduating high school and going on to college - THAT is an accomplishment. THAT is something a person deserves congratulations for - yes, indeed, they do. 

When I went to York on Saturday, every single kid I saw is graduating high school and attending college. And many of the ones I didn't get to see are, too. They worked so very hard, made great grades, and will graduate with every bit of prestige and honor they deserve. The odds were against them, and it didn't matter. They crushed it. My heart is bursting. 

There are, of course, students who chose to drop out for one reason or another, and it is those students who have been truly failed by education in this country. Those students will now move through the world without a high school degree, when a four-year college or technical degree is not just an asset, but a requirement, to find gainful employment -- those are the students for whom we should all be in prayer, as we should be in prayer for our governments and systems that see them slip through the cracks each year, unnoticed, unmourned, and underserved. It's not in me to place the blame for something like that on the shoulders of my kids. Can't really do that. 

If you're reading this post, you probably don't know my kids. You most likely never will. So let me introduce them to you: they are hysterical, they are sharp as tacks, with wittiness and genuine comedy chops that would bowl you over. They are resilient - some came to school hungry, or with devastating family issues, or worse - and fought through it to get an education. They are kind and supportive of one another and of me, when I was their teacher. Their dreams span across becoming legislators to Army police officer, welders, forensic analysts, attorneys, doctors, nurses, athletes and musicians. They will knock you dead with their fabulousness.  

There are few that I love more fervently and intensely than I love my students. I could never be more proud of anyone, until I have children of my own, than these wonderful people. 

Below is a picture of my precious kids at their 8th grade graduation from York West End Junior High School. I can't WAIT to see their photos from their "real" graduation this Friday. Their grades, their plans, their hopes, their triumphs - they are spectacular. I was just glad to be their backup dancer. 

Congratulations to the class of 2016 - there's nothing I wouldn't do for you. Love y'all so, so much. 

Some Thoughts on Downton Abbey

Hi, I'm Mary Catherine, and I'm late to the party. 

I just started watching Downton Abbey a couple of weeks ago. I've already burned through season one and am about midway through season two. Here are some thoughts so far. (No spoilers, don't worry.) 

  • Cora Crawley's voice is so annoying that I can barely watch this show. Elizabeth McGovern's complete refusal to open her mouth any wider than the height of a raisin is infuriating beyond words. I did a long rant on Snapchat a few days ago about this, and it seems a lot of people agree. 
  • The clothes are just magnificent. I like that the wardrobe department made the choice to let us see outfits over and over again, instead of treating the characters as though they have bottomless wardrobes. I like that we see dresses repeated. 
  • I get that Mary and Edith hate each other, but DAMN they're so mean to each other in season one! Woof. 
  • I love the love story between Anna and Mr. Bates, but they're such a physical mis-match that it's kind of unbelievable to me. I don't know why I feel that way. But I do. 
  • Otherwise, they've done such a good job casting people who physically represent the roles they play. One look at any of these folks and you know whether they're aristocracy or servants; heroes or villains. 
  • Matthew Crawley's character went from cringe-worthy to romantic hero in a matter of episodes. Kind of impressive. 
  • Not that I expected any different, but Maggie Smith is for sure the best part of the show. 
  • Thomas and Mrs. O'Brien are almost too evil. It's like comically evil at this point.
  • Lady Sybil is so beautiful it's distracting. That girl has a face like a Christmas ornament. 
  • There are moments that are so soap opera-y and cheesy that it's hard to watch sometimes. Like at the end of a scene when a character will say something very cryptic and then the music will swell and it will cut to another scene. This is like watching Days of our Lives, which I've never watched, but you get the point. 
  • I wish someone had done a tally of how many times Lady Mary's hand flies to cover her mouth as she breaks down in tears. Spoiler: it's a lot. 
  • Besides being eye candy with its gorgeous landscapes and period dress, Downton Abbey is interesting as a bit of historical fiction. I'd honestly never considered what happened to families in the upper echelon of society during wartime.   
  • Even if this show devolves into ridiculousness, as least it's pretty to watch. 

What do you think? Have you watched it? Is it worth sticking with?