Post #500 - Brand New Local Cookbook - Athens Eats

Welcome to the 500th post of my blog! Over the past 2.5 years my cookbook collection has ebbed and flowed to a somewhat manageable amount of 888 books. Of course in the same time span I have sold 425 books and donated another 140 books. After this entry the updates will probably not post in the usual 3 day time period - I am starting to cut back on my book buying (storage is an issue!) but as long as there is a cookbook that catches my fancy, I will be there to purchase it!

Athens Eats: Recipes from the Classic City, published in 2016. This cookbook was 8 years in the making - all proceeds benefit AIDS Athens. The recipes were collected from AIDS Athens volunteers, local restaurants, chefs and musicians.

Appetizers (Started and Party Food) jump starts the recipes with a smoked salmon tartare, crab cakes with a remoulade sauce, chickpea fritters, crawfish beignets, Valdalia onion & artichoke dip, REM's stuffed mushrooms (cream cheese stuffing), a rosemary & artichoke dip, Savannah crab spread, shiitake egg rolls with a miso vinaigrette and Bulldog bites (sausage, cheese & Bisquick). Up next are Soups and Chili (Classic & New) which consist of a vegetarian lentil soup, poblano corn chowder, a chilled carrot soup, veggie chili and from Widespread Panic - Four Corners soup (chicken, corn, potatoes & coconut milk).

Moving onto Main Dishes (with Meat), we are offered adobo roasted chicken, lamb, green beans & potato salad with mint pesto, beef pies, turkey eggplant Parmesan, panko crusted lamb chops, an egg casserole, oats & bacon meatloaf, orange zest pork chops, crab stuffed chicken and Koosha stuffed squash (lamb & tomatoes are in the filling) , while Main Dishes (with Seafood) dishes out salmon with a fennel tomato salad, salmon & grits, planked salmon with arugula vinaigrette, a calamari salad and shrimp breakfast burritos.

There are Main Dishes (with Vegetables) ~ a green apple & Brussels sprouts salad, eggplant casserole and pasta puttanesca, plus a few Side Dishes (Good on Their Own) ~ collards,  a corn salad and fried okra.

Some of the options in Breads (and Biscuits) include beer bread, hoe cakes, Irish soda bread, a blackberry & banana nut bread and homemade doggie biscuits, with Desserts (Familiar & New) featuring bananas Foster ice cream, chocolate pecan pie, cracker scrunchies (toffee made with saltine crackers), low fat cream cheese brownies, green tomato pie, zucchini cake, a redneck cheesecake tart (chocolate chip cookie dough, cream cheese, condensed milk & cherry pie filling), buttermilk pound cake and a vegan chocolate raspberry cake.

This being Athens, we end with a few Drinks ~ sangria, strawberry lemonade and the cosmopeepleton (simply add a marshmallow peep of your choosing to a cosmopolitan).