Author: sswagler
Lady Pea Hummus by Dinner.
Carey Thommason of Dinner. in Crestline Village did the chef demo today at The Market at Pepper Place. Carey made Lady Pea Hummus, which I missed tasting because I was sweating next door at Ignite Cycle. However, I know Carey's food is great, and I couldn't resist making a batch for my family's Sunday dinner. I [...]
Fox 6 Books: August
Here's what I brought to WBRC Fox 6 on August 6, and there's truly something for everyone--a memoir (with recipes and a link to much more), a surprisingly awesome book about grammar, mesmerizing short stories and a romp of a novel. Enjoy! From Scratch is a memoir from actress Tembi Locke. It's also a love story with [...]
Fresh, Bright Flavors at the Wildflower Cafe
Over the years, Wildflower Café has become a dining destination in Mentone, which is, of course, its own awesome destination atop Lookout Mountain. I traveled to Mentone recently for Alabama NewsCenter to spotlight this unique restaurant. You can read the entire story here. Café owner Laura Catherine Moon (just “Moon” to everyone she knows and [...]
Soul Food Saturdays and Tasty Thursdays
I went to Soul Food Saturday at Arlington House this past Saturday and loved every delicious minute of it. Pork wings and braised collards and perfect mac and cheese. Sweet tea and some chocolate cake made the visit complete. Here's some info from the home's website: Arlington is a fine example of Greek Revival architecture [...]
Art Alive!
AIDS Alabama brings together local artists to create art and opportunities through an art auction with a real-time twist. AIDS Alabama does serious work, but the fundraisers this organization puts on tend to be lots of fun. On the heels of April’s successful Dining Out for Life, when AIDS Alabama teamed up with local restaurants [...]
(Leftover) Barbecue and Sheep Milk Fresca Quesadillas
I was at the farmers' market at Pepper Place on Saturday, wanting tomatoes and peaches and hesitating about buying anything with all the leftovers still in my fridge from our 4th of July family dinner. Then Ana Kelly, owner of Dayspring Dairy suggested quesadillas made with our leftover Full Moon Bar-B-Que pulled chicken and sliced [...]
Fox 6 Books: July
Here's what I brought to WBRC Fox 6 on July 2. These vacation-ready must-reads include a LOL trip around the world, a thriller from Down Under, an important story of self-invention and some easy-to-pick-up, easy-to-pick-up-later short stories. Less by Andrew Sean Greer is laugh-out-loud funny and poignant and important all at the same time. This Pulitzer Prize-winning novel is [...]
Automatic Hit
It’s easy to think of Automatic Seafood & Oysters as a singular kind of place: It looks and feels like nothing else in Birmingham, and the menu is filled with adventurous approaches to familiar (and perhaps unfamiliar) foods. But what really makes it special are a few important partnerships: between local and regional suppliers and [...]
Fox 6 Books: June
Here's what I brought to WBRC Fox 6 on June 5. These beach-ready reads include some inventive historical fiction and all will inform and entertain and take you places you didn’t expect—from the marshes of the North Carolina coast to the Oklahoma prairie, from Victorian-era London to frontier Illinois in the 1800s. Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia [...]
Prost! Brät Brot is Back!
The biergarten has become a gartenbar, but those awesome pretzels remain. was popular from the start. The Magic City’s first German biergarten opened about a year ago to rave reviews and consistent crowds but then took a cold-weather hiatus to make a few changes. It reopened on April 23 and very quickly became popular again. I [...]