MLK Jr. Day Love

I love MLK Jr. Day.

1. What's being celebrated is wholly clear to all, and I couldn't be more excited about celebrating constructive social change, civil rights, all those who fought for them (with, of course, a deserved focus on MLK Jr.).
2. Nothing is expected of me on this holiday. I celebrate it where, with whom, and doing what I choose.
3. It involves no rampant consumerism. Actually, no consumerism whatsoever that I know of.
   
4. It comes at a time in the calendar following holidays which don't fit criteria 1 - 3 and thus is a much needed holiday treat.
   

This year, I celebrated by, among other things, cooking-- particularly by playing with corn-meal-based sides.

The main was a hearty seafood gumbo:



And we ate that shit all weekend long. Good thing it was good.

For dessert, a caramel cake which I never photographed. This, oddly enough, was the base dish out of which the rest of the menus grew. There's nothing decidedly southern about caramel cake, but it seemed appropriate to the South-- it drew me there for some reason.

And then, of course, the experiments with corn-meal-based sides...

Pretty but too sweet:

Bitter greens with cornmeal dumplings 1.

Ugly and too slimy for Kenneth:

Bitter greens with cornmeal dumplings 2.

Nobody argues with fried:

Delicious cornmeal fritters.
Quoth Kenneth, "These remind me of cereal, and that's a good thing."

All in all, a nice long weekend.