Oakwood Inn Remodels Balcony

For those of you who have stayed with us, and in particular in the Pell room, you know we had a balcony off that room. It was not the prettiest. It was not the grandest. And it was fairly small. But it did offer you a decent view, but more importantly, it gave you access to the outside without having to walk downstairs and out the front door. Many of our guests who were smokers, liked it just for that reason, because you could go outside and smoke.

Well, the old one was a little old and rickety and was razed. We had a new larger one installed with a beautiful backyard porch area for us, the innkeepers. The new balcony can hold four people, not two like the old one, and we hope to put a nice table and chairs up their with a fold out canopy in case the sun is too hot. For now, we are still trying to get the darn thing painted. A little bad weather put us about 10 days behind and the painting still needs to be completed. But you can use it! Come see us and check it out.

Raleigh's Oakwood Inn B & B Economy Special

They are saying the Recession is over. Yeah, right. Unemployment is still high as Mt. Everst, people are holding onto their money because they do not have a lot to spend, and the banks still hold onto what was given to them so they can hand out executive bonuses. I thank all of those guests that have spent some of their hard earned savings with us. I thank them for stimulating the economy. The only way to stimulate the economy is to spend money. Lord only knows the banks are not doing their share.

We appreciate all of you who have done your share and spent a little. To help kick the economy in the buttocks, we at the Oakwood Inn B & B in Raleigh, NC are offering an Economic Special. We have lowered our prices to from November 1, 2009 until a date in 2010 when we see an increase in people traveling. On an aveage we have cut $20-30 per night off of the 2009 rack rate. Check out our prices on our website. The website reservations offer the best discount rate we have to offer. Some rooms are starting at $119. Now that may not seem like a deal, but add a breakfast for two, snacks like sodas, chips, cookies, internet service, and parking, and you got a darn good deal. The hotels downtown, where we are also located, charge a daily fee for internet and you may have to also pay for parking. Heck, you can stay with us, and walk to anywhere you need to go in downtown Raleigh. You can also take a free ride on the R-Line, a free daily bus service. Or if you'd like to pay a little, take a Raleigh Rickshaw ride right to the doorstep of where you are headed to.

Economic special for now is a great deal. If you are coming to Raleigh or the surrounding area, check out our website for some darn good pricing for rooms AND ALL THE AMENITIES included.

Daughter's Wedding in Michigan

My oldest daughter, Erin, got married on Saturday, October 17, 2009. In the photo is my 92 year old father, Lou, who made the drive with me from Raleigh all the way to St. Clair Shores, just east of Detroit. The standard French poodle of ours, Chimay, also drove up with my Dad and myself. The other two individuals in the photo are my cousin, Rick, and his wife Judy. I'm not much of a picture taker so there are none of the bride. Heck, she had a guy taking photos all night long, so I'll see if I can get her to send me some. I left Raleigh on the Sunday before which took us about 12.5 hours of driving. Doris flew up on the Thursday before the wedding. She had to tend to things at the Inn. What else is new, eh? It was a very nice wedding at St. Peter's Catholic Church in downtown Mt. Clemens. Later we had a grand celebration at Gino's Surf Lounge in Mt. Clemens, right on the Lake St. Clair. The weather was a little chilly to be outdoors on the patio/dock, but it was so, so nice to be off the water. Great atmosphere! The food was fantastic, roast beef, breaded chicken cutlets, and breaded pork loin, mashed potatoes, a wonderful bow-tie pasta with a non-meat alfredo sauce, and a huge dessert table! The DJ was really good, playing a variety of music for the young and old. The highlight, at least for me, was dancing to Shakira's "Hips Don't Lie".... I still have some moves in this 56 year old body. I also did a polka with my cousin Sandi, but I couldn't spin her around because she got too dizzy. You'd think I could lose some weight from the dancing... naw... ate too many apple fritters from the Italian bakery by my younger daughter's house.

On Sunday, after the wedding, Doris flew back with her daughter, Donna, and her boyfriend Jeff. My Dad, Chimay, and I left around 12 noon and arrived in Beckley, WV. Stayed over night, and then continued Monday morning at about 6am. Arrived in Raleigh at 10 am. It was a great trip with a lot of memorable moments. I have a few regrets of things I wish I did, but that is typical of me... always hoping for more or doing something different. Overall though, it was a grand time for all of us.

CookWise cookbook by Shirley O. Corriher

Remember when your mother or grandmother told you that you can change things in a recipe when cooking, but do NOT change a thing in a recipe for baking because disaster will be right around the corner! “Baking is a science; the recipe is a formula that can not be changed!” And of course, like most of us, you didn’t listen and you substituted magazine for butter, or used three eggs instead of one, or changed the melted chocolate to powdered chocolate and the results were a total flop. So how did the person who came up with the darn recipe in the first place figuring out the ingredients and correct quantities. Was it a dedicated trial and error process? But if it is science, well then like a scientist who understands the chemistry and physics of transforming a plant resin into rubber; if you understand the chemistry and physics of flour, water, yeast, and salt then it is reasonable to say that you can make bread from your own recipe.

Well, Shirley O. Corriher has written the “chemistry/physics” text book for cooking… “CookWise”. As Ms. Corriher says in her book introduction, “CookWise focuses on how and why things happen in cooking so the roles that ingredients and techniques play are of paramount importance.” This gives you the “rules” of cooking and the reasoning behind them. Once you know the “rules”, then you can understand what can change in a recipe and how it will affect the outcome.

As I said in my other blog entry, Frank Dono, told me about this book. He let me peruse his copy, and it was only after 15 minutes, that I knew I needed this cookbook on my shelf. CookWise covers everything from the rise and fall of cakes, to understanding the mystery of eggs, to how the difference in the protein content of flour affects the final product. Shirley has talked to various scientists and chefs to understand the dynamics of the cooking process. She has not just developed her recipes and published them for us to use, but she has also shared all the knowledge she has gained in the process of putting them together.

Elliot Essman of Style Gourmet reviewed Cookwise and said, ”It will suffice that Shirley Corriher (who, by the way, is a benevolent, cherubic presence who frequently pops up as a guest on Alton Brown’s “Good Eats” television series) has pulled all the science together into a package I can use every day in my own kitchen.” Visit his website at http://www.stylegourmet.com/reviews/006.htm.

And yes, for all of you Alton Brown fans, Shirley not only appears on his Food Channel TV show “Good Eats”, but it is quite evident that Alton as learned quite a bit of what he knows about cooking from Ms. Corriher.

So, if you know someone who loves to cook, this would make a wonderful birthday or Christmas gift. I constantly recommend it to my guests at the Oakwood Inn during breakfast. I tell them how I used Alton Brown’s recipe for the puffy chocolate chip cookies I bake, with some modifications that I added. Alton’s recipe is in Corriher’s book…. Or is it Corriher’s recipe was on Alton’s show. Doesn’t matter, understanding some of the basics of the type of flour and oil to use, help me master the cookie that is wonderful, and the developed a recipe that I can call my own.

You can get CookWise at bookstore or order it online at Amazon.com.

Bon Appetit
Gary

Cooking At The Inn with the book CookWise, by Shirley O. Corriher

I’ve always enjoyed cooking. And eating. As a youngster I used to help my mother in the kitchen when she would be baking… more so at Christmas time. My job was to put the walnut on top of the cookie, or sprinkle the powder sugar on the chruscik (Polish dessert of fried dough covered with a blanket of powdered sugar). I also did the taste testing and also got to lick the beaters and bowel of uncooked cake mix, back when you didn’t worry about uncooked eggs. Back in the 1950’s and 1960’s you just worried about under-cooked pork…. Not like today… chicken, eggs, beef, spinach, peanut butter, hamburger, green onions… wait… is there ANY food that hasn’t been recalled or put on the FDA Alert?

The one thing I always wondered about was, how in the heck did the person who wrote the recipe know to use one cup of sugar and not two, or two eggs instead of three, or why do you use baking soda and not baking powder like the recipe we did last week? Must’ve been the scientist in me. As I got older I once in awhile gave cooking that Why question… why did the recipe call for this or that. Or maybe the How.. How did they know to use a teaspoonful of salt… and then why salt?

Alton Brown’s Good Eats TV show on the Food Channel sort of sparked my interest since he seemed to cover the Why’s and How’s of cooking and not just the “just do this, and mix it with that… and don’t ask questions”. When I started working at a local pharmaceutical company in the Research Triangle, I met Frank Dono, a real foodie!

Now this guy just immerses himself into cooking. I mean he enjoys the heck out of it! He's volunteered to work in a restaurant’s kitchen just to learn more about cooking and not even get paid. One year he grew in his own garden some eggplants…. in the numbers of 40… that’s right 40-some different varieties. He would cook different dishes with them. Now it also helps that he is Italian and learned some of his cooking technique from his grandmother, which explains the eggplant fetish. Over the past year, Frank has been cooking with peppers… all kinds and all varieties. Some of the dishes he comes up with are just fabulous! It also helps that his wife, Leanna, is a master gardener. She gives some brilliant direction on how to properly grow Frank’s fresh ingredients. Between the two of them, they could do a fantastic B & B utilizing fresh home grown garden veggies, fruits and herbs. Frank respects my baking capabilities, but I’ll tell ya, this guy can out cook me any day. I certainly respect his capabilities because he is a Master at the Stove…. and his wife a Master of the Soil!

Anyway, Frank is the one who told me about Shirley O. Corriher’s cookbook entitled CookWise The Hows & Whys of Successful Cooking with over 230 Great-Tasting Recipes. It also has on the cover, “The Secrets of Cooking Revealed”. It also won the James Beard Foundation Award for Excellence. This is a very prestigious cooking award… you can Google it to learn more about it.

This had to be one of the best recommendations I have ever had from Frank. Better than, “Here try this pepper it is only a 3 on the pepper hot scale, 10 being the hottest.” And then I bite into it, and my mouth turns into Hades just as he says, “Wait… oops.. I’m sorry that was a 7!” No kiddin’ my mouth knows it very well by now, Frank. No, really he is a very knowledge cook, chef, and all around foodie. I was just having some fun. He recommended Shirley’s book, and I really have learned a lot about the scientific basis of cooking. This is a fabulous book for anyone who really wants to learn about what happens on the molecular level when cooking. It would make a great Christmas present, or birthday gift for someone you love who just loves to cook.

I promote CookWise by Shirley O. Corriher at the Inn all the time with our guests. It is a cooking reference all good cooks and chefs should have on the book shelf…. and should read it as well.

On my next blog post, I will discuss CookWise in more detail. Until then.. which only should be in a couple of days…. Bon Appetit à l'Auberge!

Oh! One more thing. Frank the "The Little Italian Foodie" (really, I think he is only about 5ft 6 inches) also told me about Penzey Spices... another fantastic recommendation for herbs and spices... another blog post in the near future! Another great Christmas gift.

SHIRRED EGGS

Oakwood Inn B & B Shirred Eggs

Over the years, we have had many guest stay with us that have had our Shirred Eggs for breakfast and thoroughly enjoy them to the point that they would like the recipe. Now there are various ways to prepare this delightful dish. I learned about this breakfast entrée while taking a culinary class at the Macomb Culinary School in Michigan. This is a fairly simple dish to prepare and one that is filling enough so you shouldn’t want to snack before lunch.

Basically, shirred eggs mean baked eggs. The recipe that I have perfected is one with some cream, cheese, a dash of herbs, and a meat. It can be made without meat for vegetarians.

Many of our guests have asked on numerous occasions, on how to prepare Shirred eggs. The recipe although fairly simple, requires you to use a shirred egg ramekin, which seems difficult for people to find at a regular store. The ramekin is a special baking dish. I have decided to assist many of you wanting to make this breakfast dish, by purchasing the ramekins from our restaurant supply store and offering two of them for sale along with the recipe, all for a $10.00 price.

If you truly love this breakfast dish as much as we do, and would like to prepare yourself at home, please let us know and we will be happy to sell you the Oakwood Inn B & B Shirred Eggs recipe package complete with recipe and two ramekins all for $20.00 which includes sales tax.

I you stay with us and we happen not to prepare this breakfast dish, since we are a chef's choice B & B, we will still sell you the Shirred Egg Recipe Package if you ask for it prior to you departing.

Bon Appetit

Doris

Linden Room Remodel

Well its been over two months and we are finally coming down to the final wire with the Linden Room remodel. For those of you who have stayed with us and in particuliar, rented the Linden room, may remember that it was the room across from the office. It is the second largest room in the Inn. It had a light tan and white design wall paper... old and sort of worn. The bathroom, which was the first bathroom in the house, had a yellow semi-modern bathtub from about the 1960's. Yellow 4 inch hexagon floor tiles, a forest green painted vanity, and a green print wallpaper. It also had a queen size bed.

The new look will sport the walls with chocolate colored walls, white trim and a new white crown ceiling molding. A new hand made king size bed that can be split into twins if needed will be the focal point of the room. If you remember the little carpeted foyer area that granted access to the bathroom, well it is not a part of the bathroom with new 12 inch tiles of multi-shades of tan, brown and cream colors. The foyer has had a shelf built in with a mirror and lights to provide a make-up area.

The tile scheme continues in the bathroom, on the floor is 12 inch tiles, in the new two person shower with dual shower heads and bench are 4 inch tiles and some smaller two inchers creating a border about 5 feet off the floor. A new 17 inch high toliet, so you do not feel like you are sitting on the floor to take care of business. The vanity is a brown colored wood cabinet with a white marble top. New lighting fixtures throughout the bathroom/makeup area.

I'm not sure what Doris has in store for curtains or drapes if anything. The TV is a new 17 inch, I believe, screen with DVD player. A new radio/clock with an iPod docking station will also be in the room, so for all of you who have those iPod machines... here you can play your customized song lists.

Overall, I must say the room looks darn good and very upbeat. As soon as I can get some pictures, I will post them which hopefully will entice some of you to rent it out.
Well, back to work. Talk with ya'all soon.
Gary