Tee's Kitchen - Keeping Cool Regarding Summer Foods

Today I'm talking with Christi at Tee’s Kitchen.

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00:00
You're listening to A Tiny Homestead, the podcast comprised entirely of conversations with homesteaders, cottage food producers, and crafters, and topics adjacent. I'm your host, Mary Lewis.  A Tiny Homestead podcast is sponsored by Homegrown Collective, a free to use farm to table platform, emphasizing local connections with ability to sell online, buy, sell, trade in local garden groups, and help us grow a new food system.  You can find them at homegrowncollective.org. Today I'm talking with Christi.

00:27
at Tee's Kitchen in Louisiana. And Christi was a guest on my podcast back, I think, in March.  And it was cold and snowy and gross, and we're rolling into summer.  So Christi and I are going to talk about some  less hot,  cooler summer dishes that we can maybe introduce people to so they can make their electric bill go down.  Good morning, Christi. How are you? Good morning. I'm great. I'm so excited to be back on. I had so much fun. had

00:56
Such a great conversation the last time.  We did and I listened to it this morning because I was like, what exactly did we talk about? And I was like, oh my God, I still love this lady. She's fantastic.  Oh, I feel the same way about you. Thank you. Good.  I just I make so many new friends who I probably will never meet through the podcast. And my husband says, so what new friend did you make today? love that. I'm like, oh, well, do you really want to know? And he's like,

01:25
Kind of?  And I give him the short version. He's like, I'm so glad that you have people that you get to talk with all over the place. He said, because  you need that. I'm like, I do. I really do need that. So it's wonderful. you're in Louisiana. We're rolling into summer. We're not quite there yet, according to the calendar, but it's literally a week or so away.  And  we've had some really hot days so far here this spring in Minnesota. I'm guessing  Louisiana hasn't been any different.

01:55
Louisiana has been really, really hot.  We're approaching 100 degrees here and it's just,  the humidity is insane. So it's pretty hot here.  So it's summer here as far as I'm concerned. Okay.  So how do you combat that when it comes to feeding your family? I have lots of ideas, but I want to hear yours first.  Well, we,  you know, we, we try to grill outside, but then again, it's very hot. We always have to have a fan going.

02:25
Um, so I try to do meals that I don't have to  use my oven as much, or if I have to use my oven, it's like a shorter period of time. Um, because it just, it gets really, really hot in my house. We do a lot of like,  uh, rice cooker meals. do,  uh,  one pan sheet pan meals. Sometimes I use my air fryer, but I don't like to use it for, it's not big enough for the whole family.  Um, yeah, we grill just simple quick meals, I would say.

02:55
Okay, well, let's back up just a titch. The first thing I would tell anybody right now in the climate that we're all living in, meaning weather  and government, is if you don't know how to cook, it's a really good idea to start learning how to cook. It's also a really good idea to start maybe learning how to grow something, even if it's just herbs  in a pot  beside your doorstep, because

03:24
I am, I don't want to talk politics, I do not, but  we're in a kind of iffy,  bouncy, chaotic world right now. And  one of the things that makes me sane is that I know how to cook  and I have a garden.  So cooking is not hard. I swear to God, people, it's not.  It's time and intention. And you don't have to start out making a gourmet meal. can.

03:50
You can make a grilled cheese sandwich with two slices of bread, some butter and some cheese you love. And  it's  super easy. And then once you get that accomplished, you can make scrambled eggs and you can boil eggs for  egg salad sandwiches.  There are really simple things that you can do to start the steps to learning to cook. And I don't, I don't want to like force this down people's throats, but

04:17
but cooking is such a vital skill for everybody to learn.  Secondly,  one of the things that we do around here is we do a lot of salads, like just lettuce,  sweet peppers, cucumbers, tomatoes,  know, that kind of stuff, because it's cold food on a hot day.  And you can throw  some shredded chicken or some ham that's been sliced up or

04:47
If you're into steak, you can take steak that you've already cooked from dinner the night before, slice it really thin and put that on your salad if you want meat in your salad. Yes,  absolutely. Yeah, we try to do a lot of that to my husband.  I will be honest, gardening is not one of my strong suits, but I can take, my husband is great at that and he runs the garden.  And so I just, whatever he, he harvests, I'm good at cooking up. So I agree with that. We do a lot of, you know, salads and.

05:17
We have like fresh cucumbers and tomatoes and just, try to use what's in the garden and try not, you're right. I think  the thing most people think is that  to cook for their family, it has to be this big extravagant meal. And it really doesn't, especially in the summertime. Like at night, we, I just find that we don't, we don't require as much food. Like a lot of times when you're hot and you've been working outside all day, you're, you're not that hungry at night. So the  simpler meals, the simple, as simple as you can make it.

05:47
the better in my opinion.  Yeah, we're the same way here. Like  when I was raising my four kids, I mean, basically they're all adults now and three of them live different places.  But when they were young, the kids didn't want to eat heavy food in the summer. They wanted light things. They wanted  juice. They wanted popsicles. They wanted ice cream. They wanted stuff that was cold  and quick. Right. So

06:12
So I used to do cold pasta salads because they could eat just a little bowl of that and the carbs and the protein in the pasta salad would keep them, you know, full. Right. I love a good pasta salad.  Oh, I do too. I wish my husband liked pasta salads. He does not.  The only one he likes is a tortellini salad that I make  and I will share  it real quick because it's easy. You get frozen tortellini's at the store.

06:42
That's the start. And you cook your torolinis in boiling water for like, I think it takes seven minutes from frozen. And you drain them and you put them into a Tupperware bowl or you can even put them in a stainless steel bowl. It doesn't matter. And then you can put in whatever veggies you want. We do onion, diced onion, diced sweet pepper,  and artichoke hearts if I have them.

07:10
And then you basically put like a garlic, herb, seasoning, whatever brand you want to use. And you stir that together. put like a pinch of salt, a little bit of black pepper, and you stir that all together. And then you add in probably half a cup of olive oil and half a cup of balsamic vinegar and you stir it again. That's tortellini salad. And it stays good for like three or four days in the fridge. It's never in the fridge for days in my house because it's gone.

07:38
We eat it. It's yummy.  And it's just that little bit of tang and it's got the cheese and the cheese tortellini. So you've got protein, you've got carbs.  It will fuel you if you're going to go out at like, you know, afternoon for some reason to do something  because it's got all the things that your body needs to keep going. Yeah. That sounds delicious. I'm going to have to try that one.

08:03
Yeah, it's one of my favorite things to make in the summertime because I'm never bored with it. You know, we have it probably six, seven times  over the summer. I can't do it more than that because I would be sick of it. But that's a lot of times in one summer to have the same meal, but it really does  hit all the buttons for  being hungry in the summer. Right, right. Yeah, that sounds delicious. And the other thing is that I try to make the tortellinis first thing in the morning before the house gets hot.

08:32
Because you can make that ahead of time in the morning. You can make the tortellinis and stick them in a bowl in the fridge covered and they're fine until you want to throw the salad together. Yeah, that's a great idea.  I know that also will help a lot is like, you know, repurposing meals that you already have and  that way you don't have to heat up your kitchen, you know, or like you said, making things ahead of time and then, you know, conserving all that energy. That way you don't have to use your AC so much, you know.

08:59
Here in Louisiana, our air condition is constantly running,  but you know, I know it's not that way everywhere.  Yeah, when my kids were young, we didn't have air conditioning in the house. So if I had to cook something that was going to throw heat in the house in the summertime, I always did it at like six o'clock in the morning because I was up anyway. Right. Yeah, good idea. Because the last thing you want to be doing is throwing heat into your house between five and eight o'clock at night.

09:28
Yes,  absolutely.  Because I like to be cold at night.  Yeah, I like my sheets and my pillowcases to be cold when I climb in. I don't mind if they warm up, but I like them cold. Me too. Other things that we can do in the summertime regarding food.  Oh, fruit salads are fine for dinner. Yeah, why not? Yep. And Greek yogurt. Greek yogurt.

09:55
the honey, the strawberry, the cherry, whatever sweet flavors you like.  Greek yogurt is fabulous in fruit salads. Yes,  I actually had that last night for  like a snack. I was around eight o'clock and I got hungry and I said,  I think I'm going to have some yogurt. And it just, was perfect. I put a little bit of honey and  a little bit of  like coconut flakes and some nuts in there. And it was like the perfect little snack late at night.  Yeah. The other thing that's really good is freezing grapes.

10:24
Frozen grapes are delicious. Who knew? Oh yeah. Great idea.  My family loves fruits. boy,  I'm not so much of a fruit fan, believe it or not, but my boys love fruits. They love that.  And we recently started, I found this  someone on social media and she started making this,  she did different versions of it, but it's like a homemade Gatorade. So like an electrolyte drink  and my family is hooked on it. So we've been buying like the fresh fruits and

10:54
We'll make different versions of it. And it's just, man, it's so hydrating and you know, it feels, it's so good after a long day being outside or just, mean, you don't even have to go outside to be hot here in Louisiana, but it's just like the perfect little drink. we're hooked on that too. Yeah. And let's not forget sweet tea.  I  am,  I am a Yankee at heart, Christie. I grew up in Maine. I live in Minnesota, always have lived in Northern tier States. Okay.  But  sweet tea is the best freaking.

11:23
hydration when you've been outside working and you're thirsty right now. If you have sweet tea in your refrigerator, you pound a 12 ounce glass of that, you're going to feel better. believe it. Would you believe that I am not a fan of sweet tea? What? I know. Like I will drink hot tea, not in the summer, but I drink hot tea, but I do not like sweet tea. I know it's crazy. Huh? Well, I'm taking your Southern card away. No, you can take it. I get it.

11:52
No, it's one thing that I just don't like. I never liked it. And my family really like we don't, we never make it. My little one likes it, but I know it's so not Southern of me. Well, I used to hate ice cream and I was, I got accused of being un-American for it. So go fig. Um, my son started making iced, not iced coffee, um, cold brew coffee, like two summers ago. I thought the cold brew coffee was a

12:20
a good way to screw up a perfectly good coffee  until he made it  and he was like, you have to try this. It's really good. And I was all ready to hate it because I just wasn't a fan of cold coffee.  And we happened to have actual half and half in the house at the time.  And so he made  the simple syrup,  the boiling water and sugar.  And we had half and half in the house and he made me a cold brew coffee.

12:50
with Simple Syrup and half and half in it and handed it to me.  I have loved cold brew coffee ever since.  I'm a huge fan of coffee, but yeah, cold brew. Like I'll drink my one cup of hot coffee in the morning. That's just how I wake up.  But in the afternoons, I always reach for cold brew.  And we actually have this local, she's a friend of mine.  She does,  she has a little food truck where she does cold brew and  regular coffee.

13:18
And every now and then she'll sell her big jugs of the coffee and she'll come and she'll deliver it for me. She'll put it in a little refrigerator outside on my back porch  and she'll come and she'll deliver it. And I just, I pay her and it's like the best little treat, but she has like several flavors and it's like my little guilty pleasure.  Well, that's awesome that, that, that you have that available to you.  Um,  once my son got me hooked on this, we were at, um,

13:47
a caribou cabin, not the ones where you can go in and sit, but where you just drive through. And they had a vanilla sweet cream cold brew on offer.  And I was like, I'm going to try it. I'm going to put on my girl, big girl panties. I'm going to try, try bot, botan, know, got from somewhere else.  Cold brew.  And I ordered a small one because I really didn't think I would like it. And I figured my husband would drink it if I didn't.

14:13
And I tasted that one and I was like, oh my God, we have to put vanilla in the cold brew at home now. That's like my favorite flavor with cold brew is like vanilla, sometimes cinnamon. good. Yeah. And the thing that's wonderful about all the things that you can get out in the world at the store or a restaurant or a coffee shop is that you can actually replicate it at home. Absolutely. Yes, you can. So, um, and then.

14:42
The other thing that I wanted to bring up in this whole food discussion,  I've been thinking about this for like four days now,  is  money is tight for a lot of people  and things are so expensive right now, especially food, which drives me insane. You should not have to starve when you're making the same amount of money you've always been making. It's not right.  But  if you learn to cook,

15:10
You can feed more people  on  less money. And that's really important right now. I mean, we just made a turkey.  It was like a mock turkey, um, pot pie last night for dinner, but it's just,  it's, um,  onion diced up celery, diced up carrot,  cooked up ground turkey  in like a turkey gravy. And you put it in a glass baking dish.

15:39
and then you put biscuits on top. So they make like a biscuit on top and a dumpling on the bottom of the biscuit. Just made that last night and it was like, I don't know, three bucks a person a plate. You can't get that anywhere else already made at that price. Oh no, even, you know, we don't, my family doesn't really eat out a whole bunch. We cook at home, but like, you know, if we have to go to even like a fast food restaurant, I was shocked when we went to a fast food restaurant. I'm like,

16:08
What  happened to the prices? This is insane.  So, I mean, you're much cheaper eating at home. Yeah, and if you're lucky enough to have a membership to like Sam's or Costco and you happen to know how to cook, again, you're going to save yourself a whole lot more money. But the other thing that you can do is every grocery store on earth, well, not on earth, in America,  has flyers that they send out every week.

16:35
with what are called lost leader prices to get people in the stores. And you can plan your weekly meals around those lost leader items. Yeah. And lost leader items are usually stuff that they have too much inventory of and they're trying to move.  Or it's something that's around a holiday, like July 4th is coming up in a month or so. And they will have their ground beef marked down. They'll have their hamburger buns marked down.  Pickles, because that's what people eat for July 4th.

17:05
Yeah. And hot dogs.  I won't eat a hot dog, Kristy. I can't. I can't do it.  I have looked at what's in them. I'm like, no, that's gross. I'm not doing it.  I know. We usually do the same thing. well,  my  boys, hunt and fish. So most of what we have in the freezer is, you know, seafood, fish or whatever that they've caught  or, you know, deer or hog or whatever.

17:30
But we'll go,  we always watch the sales, especially the meat sales. we'll go like we just went,  they had the pork butts on sale for like 99 cents a pound. So we went, we bought them and we cut them up ourselves and  vacuum seal them and then freeze them. And then you have several meals, you know, off of that. So yeah, you just have to be smart about it. And like I said, watch those sales and like we're about to get corn, like we'll get

17:57
fresh corn from a local guy. It's the sweetest corn ever.  And we just take a date and we get two big bushels.  They put them in a crawfish sack. So we say  two crawfish sacks.  we just take a date and the whole family just, process our corn and then we have corn for the entire year.  know? Do you process it in the house or do you cook it outside?  So it gets, we have, it's really hot and there's a lot of flies. So.

18:23
We'll do it outside if we can, if it's really hot, we'll just do it in the house and then I clean up after because it's just unbearable and the flies are terrible. You know, when you start.  bet your house smells amazing while you're doing this.  It does. We love that fresh corn. There's nothing like it. My boys will like eat it while I'm cutting it off the cob. They'll just,  they'll eat it.  Oh yeah. It's so good.  I'm not a big corn fan. I don't eat a lot of it, but that

18:51
Every summer we try to get at least six or seven years from a local grower and we basically husk it in the kitchen because the husk smells good when you pull it off too. Yes. And then we throw it in some boiling water for a couple of minutes and we have melted butter, not stick butter, we melt butter and we just drizzle the melted butter over the top and we eat it and that's like a, it's like Christmas in July.

19:20
No, it's like the best. As a matter of fact,  he told me to call him. I was like, all right, I'm ready for my corn. said, text me June 10th and you can come pick up. So I need to text him today and  go get my corn.  Yeah. And you're like a month or so ahead of us here in the Northern States. Right now,  I'm just real thankful that the tomato plants have bloomers on them.  Yeah. See, we've been harvesting tomatoes for a couple of weeks now. yeah.

19:48
And then usually it gets so hot, like by July the bugs take over and it's just unbearable.  And then, you know, your tomatoes aren't pretty anymore. So we pick them early. Yeah. We don't have as bad a mosquito problem where I am as it sounds like you have.  And we don't have too many hornworms here either, which is really nice because the house we used to live in, the side yard garden we had,  we would have these great big hornworms every year we'd have to pick off.  I know they're terrible.

20:18
Kids loved it. The boys thought they were really cool. I know it looks really creepy,  yeah, hate whenever I see those I'm like,  They can destroy a whole plant.  Yeah, the issue we run into here is blight. We get blight on our tomatoes. We finally learned that if you cut the stems, the leaves off the bottom of the plant when it's first growing,  that helps because they're not touching the ground. But we do end up with blight on our cucumbers. And we still haven't figured out a solution for that beyond

20:49
trimming the cucumber vines back a little bit. it's all  trial and error when you garden because  no one starts out knowing anything about anything. all learning. Exactly. Yeah. I know my husband still like one year he'll have, you know, some of his plants do really well. And then the next year he's like, I don't know what's going on. I don't know what happened. It's just like, yeah, it's trial and error.

21:17
So back to  summer food real quick, because I always do this. get off on tangents that are adjacent to what we're talking about.  other thing about summer food is that you don't have to eat dinner food at dinner time.  If you want dinner in the morning, you can have dinner food in the morning. If you want breakfast food for dinner, you can do that too.  There are  no rules in the summertime. If you just want to grab a watermelon from your local grower or at the store or wherever,

21:46
cut that thing up, throw it in a bowl and just eat watermelon all day. You can do that too, it's fine. Absolutely, rules do not apply in the summer.  No, no. And  I actually like winter far better than I do summer, which is funny because winters can be pretty brutal  here.  But in the wintertime, if you're cold,  you can put on more layers. In the summertime, you can't be any more naked than naked. Absolutely, yeah. And when you get to being, you know, I'm in my 40s and...

22:14
I don't like to be hot anymore. I don't like to sweat like I did when I was younger. I'm like, I don't know what happened. It seems hotter.  I never liked sweating. Even when I was like six, it would get hot and I'd be like, can we please go somewhere where there's water I can be in?  No, I know. And my mom's like, you are in water, you're sweating. I'm like, no, that's not the same. And you know it. And I was like six, you know? Mm hmm.  Mm hmm. Yes.  Way too hot.

22:42
But I figured you would know about some keeping cool foods because you are in  one of the hottest states of the United States, I think, in the summertime. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. We have to do a lot of quick meals. And like I said, just, you know, sometimes we'll just even if like on a Sunday, I like to do that too. Like I'll cook a big meal and then we can have leftovers. so for the, you know, during the week, we'll have the leftovers or I'll take like if I cook a roast on a Sunday,  I'll

23:11
find different ways to use it throughout the week. know, like we'll use, we'll do like,  we'll turn it into like a, almost like a  pulled pork sandwich, or if you have beef, you know, add some barbecue sauce, put it on a bun, or  I'll put it into a taco, or I'll just have it with a salad. And so, you know, that helps too, to where you don't even have to cook anything, you know, just warm it up. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And the other thing, I mean,  you have a local source for meat, because you guys hunt.

23:39
But the other thing that you can do is you can go and get  like five pounds of ground burger.  You can cook that all up in the same day and freeze it in quart size Ziploc bags.  then all you have to do is thaw it out,  warm it up, put whatever you want in it, barbecue sauce or whatever thing you want to do,  put that over hamburger buns and it's basically a sloppy job. Yeah, absolutely.  And then you're not heating up your house.

24:06
five nights a week, you're heating up your house in the morning on Saturday or Sunday morning. Yes,  yes.  So, and I'm just, I'm trying to come up with ideas because not everybody knows this stuff, especially if they don't cook.  And last resort,  if you're, if you've got stuff going on and you know you're going to be busy at dinnertime, one of the easiest things to do  is get some sliced cheese,  some

24:34
sliced ham or sliced turkey or pastrami or roast beef or whatever at your deli at the store you like  and just slap together some cold sandwiches. You can eat them on the run.  Oh yeah.  We do that. Like  we used to go, we call them Vicky sandwiches.  family friend of ours, we used to go to the beach and she would make them and send them with us.  And  she would just take like a French bread and she would buy the, you know, the, the nice deli meat and.

25:04
She would put like some nice cheese on there and lettuce and tomato and wrap them up real tight. And we keep them in the cooler and we'd bring them with us when we went to the beach. And it was like the best little treat. Like it was, we,  we thought we were so fancy cause it was better than just sliced bread, you know?  Um, but yeah. So I say,  I am a sandwich  fan. I can eat a sandwich every day. So that doesn't bother me at all to eat that for dinner.  That is so funny because I am not a sandwich girl.

25:33
I'm not a bread girl. Like I made sourdough bread for the first time this weekend  and it was slightly undercooked. So it's got like this bagel texture to it. Yeah. And I literally had a slice of that bread this morning with a little bit of cream cheese on it. It was like eating a bagel.  I'm so in love with my mistake.

25:54
I love that. I love sourdough. really do.  I love bread. I wish I did not, but I love bread. I said, if I had to choose between bread and pasta, I could live without pasta for the rest of my life,  but bread do not take that away from me. couldn't live without watermelon. I could not live without sweet peppers  and I could not live without granola. I actually love granola.  It's one of my favorite things to eat. I'm really weird,  but  I am a super

26:23
girls. So  when we roll into summertime, I'm like, oh,  oh,  but we hit August, September, I'm like, soup seasons come in. Yay.  I know I love soup to soup and gumbo and all of that. It's like, it's like a warm hug. Like, we're the same way. We love winter food, but we don't get a whole lot of winter here. But  yeah, I just love those comfort meals. It's, could eat soup all the time.  Uh huh.  Yep.  I

26:53
Because I am a Northern Tier State girl, I have lived on soups in the wintertime my entire life. My mom would make some really, really nice venison stew. And my son's girlfriend's family just gifted us a bunch of venison. Oh, nice. And like this weekend is not supposed to be cold. But as soon as I saw the venison, I was like, who's up for venison stew? And my husband and son were like, we are.

27:21
So we're gonna have some venison stew Saturday  in June. Perfect. Just turn up the AC and you're gonna turn down the AC and you're good.  Well, I'm gonna have my husband cook up the venison pieces because I'm not good at  it. It's not my forte, but he is really good at it. It's already cut into like soup and stew beef sizes. Yeah. So I'm gonna have him cook it up really quick Saturday morning before it gets hot out.  And then

27:49
The soup part doesn't take long because I'm really good at flavor profiles in a short amount of time because I've learned to be.  So I have  celery, have carrots, I have onion, and I have thyme, and I have garlic,  and I have beef stock. So I think I'm good. I think I'm good on making venison stew, I think.  Now I'm hungry.  Yeah, me too.  We haven't had...

28:17
We haven't had venison in like three or four years now.  when my son got back from his girlfriend's house, was like, by the way,  look what the girlfriend's family gifted us. And I was like, oh my God, are you kidding? He's like, nope.  Oh nice.  We've almost, it's like I've forgotten almost what beef tastes like because we eat so much venison. Like we just have  a freezer full and it's,  you know, but some people  don't like it.

28:47
I don't know. Some people just don't like it at all, but I guess we've gotten accustomed to it. I love it and it's lean. It's healthy. So  yeah, I don't love venison steaks, but I do like venison in stew. think it's because of the way that it cooks. Yeah. And that's what we usually do. well,  I mean, we'll, cook the backstrap. We, cook it, uh, we grill it and then we slice it and I'll usually make like a  chimichurri to go on it.

29:12
Um, we love that. That's our favorite way to cook that. But as far as the other pieces, we'll usually cook it in like a rice and gravy or stew or whatever, because it's just a little tougher, you know? Yeah, exactly. And I grew up with parents that hunted for deer and they were in Maine. So Maine deer where we lived, they like acorns and pine needles and  the occasional apple if they can get into the orchards.  so venison in Maine is very, very

29:41
gamey. Venison in Minnesota, they're like corn fields and they like alfalfa and they like soybeans. So it's not as gamey. So it's not as hard for me to eat it. Apple fed venison. Oh my God. It's probably the Never thought about that. Yeah. I would think that you have a different taste. Yeah. The acorns and the pine needles that the deer in Maine like to eat, they have a bitter

30:11
flavor to them and that comes through in the meat. Yeah. So lucky you are to have grown up in Maine.  I know. Don't make me cry.  Oh,  I always tell my husband I want to go vacation there.  I just I want a lobster roll.  You should go. You should go do it. It's on my bucket list. It's a we plan to it's just I need to get there.  Yeah, it's

30:39
You're in Louisiana, so it's probably a good 36 hour drive Yeah, I assume you would fly so  I'm sure we would fly but yeah But yeah, I would love to just just drive up there drive, you know,  how beautiful so yeah We always drive because I don't fly. I do not like being in planes. I've done it three times in my life I don't want to do it again

31:06
The road trip from Minnesota to Maine is so gorgeous because  we go through Wisconsin  and Illinois and Indiana and Ohio and Pennsylvania. And I think we go through a little bit of New York, upstate New York,  then Vermont, New Hampshire, and then into Maine. And it's gorgeous. We try to go between May and October because  we went in October in 2014.

31:35
And I spent the entire time we were there worrying that the weather was going to shift and we were going to be driving back in snow because you never know. You literally never know. I hadn't been to Maine in the fall in forever and trees were turning and it was just amazingly gorgeous. And I don't regret it at all. What I regret is that I wasted time worrying about if we were going to be driving home in a snowstorm or not. Right. Yeah. Well, when I plan my vacation, I'm going to have to call you so I can get all the

32:04
the scoop on where to go. Just don't go to the main mall. know, you know how Minnesota has the Mall of America? Right. Yeah. The main mall is like the big mall in Maine. And I think it's still there. Like I haven't been near it in 20 something years, but don't bother. It's not worth it. What you want to do. We've totally veered off topic here, but I'm going to tell you anyway. What you want to do is you want to go.

32:34
to  the lobster shack, I think it's the name of it. I think it's in South Portland, it's on the beach. Well, it's actually on the cliffs overlooking the ocean.  And you walk in and they have a tank full of live lobsters that are fresh caught. You get to pick the lobster that you want. They pull it out of the tank, they  do the thing. They either give it to you whole or you can get a lobster roll made out of it, however you wanna do it.

33:01
and you go sit outside at a picnic table with the red and white tablecloths  and you eat french fries, lobster roll, and a Coke.  What a dream. In the breeze, off the ocean. If you want the real experience, that's the thing to do. I'm making notes because this is what I'm, this is like, it's like a foodie's dream.  Oh my God. Yes, it is. And I haven't done it in...

33:30
I would bet 15, 20 years was the last time I was there. So if you do it, you'll have to do it. So, and tell me about it so I can live through your vicarious life. Right. Yes. right. So try to keep these to half an hour. Christi, thank you for helping me try to help people with staying cool with food in the summertime because it is a trick. It is a trick. This was a pleasure. I had so much fun. I always enjoy our conversations. Me too. I adore you. I think you're fantastic.

33:59
Where can people find you?  Well, I am on  Facebook, Instagram and TikTok.  It's all under T's Kitchen.  And yeah, go look me up  and follow. I mostly do Cajun food.  But you know, I like to sprinkle a little bit of mom life in there too and just random stuff here and there.  Yeah. And if anybody wants to listen to  our original episode, it's  T's Kitchen on my podcast episode. So that's what it's called.

34:29
And it'll give people some background on why I wanted to talk to you specifically about food because you're really good at food.  So thank you so much for your time, Christi. And as always, people can find me at atinyhomesteadpodcast.com.  Have a great day, Christy. Thanks. You too.  All right. Bye.