This easy baked ham gets a Southern‑style upgrade with a sweet‑tangy pineapple glaze, a touch of bourbon or whisky, and the bold kick of Creole mustard. Whole cloves perfume the smoked ham as it warms, while the quick stovetop sauce caramelizes it into a glossy finish that’s perfect for holiday tables or Sunday suppers.

Carver Ham with Tangy Heinz 57 Sauce

A boneless carver ham, is just a smaller, high-quality ham that's designed for easier slicing, making it a popular choice for gatherings, special occasions and perfect for holiday serving.

Online, Kansas City Steaks, Corky's and Rastelli's all sell carver hams, often with their own glazes which for this you'll reserve for another use.

You can usually find a carver ham right at your local grocery market or Walmart also and Frick's brand is a widely available carver ham. Bonus? Their pork is USA raised and typically sourced from Midwest states like Iowa, Missouri or Illinois.

Shrimp and Asparagus Casserole

This comforting baked casserole brings together tender Gulf shrimp and crisp asparagus in a creamy, savory base enriched with onion, pimentos, and a touch of sour cream. Finished with melted cheese and a golden, buttery panko topping, it’s a vibrant dish that balances freshness with indulgence—perfect for a family dinner or a special gathering.

Shrimp and Asparagus Casserole

This casserole is based on a vintage recipe from the 70s, that was apparently very popular as it appears in every single community cookbook I have!

It used canned asparagus and almost always cream of mushroom. From there ingredients can vary widely, as every single recipe I researched was pretty different and seems to be personal from cook to cook.

Sometimes made with the addition of cream, milk or evaporated milk, sliced or chopped boiled eggs, sliced stuffed olives, peas, pimentos, water chestnuts, sometimes sliced almonds and topped with fresh breadcrumbs, cracker crumbs or even potato chips.

Rotini pasta, tossed with pickle juice, cubed baked ham, cheese and pickles and dressed in a mayonnaise, pickle juice and sour cream-based dressing.

Dill Pickle Pasta Salad

I'm a pickle fanatic.

It would be a rare day that I didn't eat one with a sandwich or even just as a snack. Although I love bread and butter pickles, sweet gherkins and kosher dills the most, anything pickled is fair game - pickled okra, jalapenos, squash and beets - yep, love them all!

So, when I saw a dill pickle pasta salad going around social media I thought heck yeah, I gotta try that!

A sheet pan meal of fish, shrimp and smoked sausage with broccoli and potatoes.

Sheet Pan Seafood Dinner

A few years back, sheet pan dinners were all the rage.

I never quite got into them to be honest, mainly because with a mix of proteins and different varieties of vegetables, cooking stages are often involved in order to cook everything evenly and not overcook others.

A pasta salad made with farfalle bowtie pasta and cooked chicken, tossed with ranch dressing, bacon, grape tomatoes and baby spinach.

BLT Bowtie Chicken Pasta Salad

Good gracious the heat!

As I publish this here in July we've been under an extreme heat warning, not just the average heat warning, for days. I'm intensely thankful for air conditioning these days, and frankly the ability to pay for it cuz y'all... it ain't cheap for sure!

How's that heat going for the meal planning here lately?

A creamy egg salad made with grated boiled eggs, finely minced onion, mixed herbs and finely shredded Italian-style cheese, dressed with mayo and mustard and served on buttered and pan grilled bread.

Grilled Cheese Grated Egg Salad Sandwich

I have a classic egg salad that I make most of the time and I'm perfectly happy with that!

Still, I do enjoy trying new things. I mean after all, I do run a recipe website, right?

And... unlike a lot of you who manage to do everything from one of those smartphones, I do my work from a desktop computer. It opens to a Microsoft tab when I start up, where I ran across a version of this on one of the featured articles, and thought it was different and interesting enough to try!

Fresh asparagus, trimmed, tossed with extra virgin olive oil and seasonings and air fried.

Air Fryer Roasted Asparagus

I love asparagus and I especially love it roasted and let me tell you, if you haven't tried it in your air fryer, you don't know what you're missing.

Roasting really brings out the sweetness in vegetables and intensifies the flavor and the air fryer is just another great option.

A fully cooked, bone-in, shank portion smoked ham, baked in an oven bag, then opened and finished with a root beer based glaze.

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Oven Bag Root Beer Glazed Ham

It's been quite a few years since I've used an oven cooking bag, though there was a time when they were pretty popular for home cooks. Considering they are still available today, apparently some folks continue to use them, most often I think for cooking holiday turkeys, since they are so easy to overcook otherwise and can be very dry. Better chances with an oven bag!

Initially I bought these to try one of Justin Wilson's recipes - he seemed to have used them quite a bit back in the day - but never got around to that recipe, so I thought why not try one with a ham since at the time of this writing, Easter is right around the corner! Ya gotta admit. That looks really good doesn't it?

A breakfast or brunch strata layered with sliced bread, fresh crabmeat and cheese, baked in a milk and egg custard.

Hot Crab Strata Brunch Casserole

I ran across this recipe in a 1977 The Southern Junior League Cookbook, which is a collection of recipes from different Junior Leagues across the south. Talk about an oldie but goodie! This recipe was submitted by the Huntsville, Alabama group and in the cookbook is called Hot Crab Sandwich.

I had never heard of anything like it before and I just so happened to have a half pound of crabmeat that I needed to use up, so thought I'd give a half recipe a try, although I did make a few changes, including to increase the egg.

Y'all. This turned out to be so absolutely delicious that I wished I would have made the full casserole! I do think while it would certainly make a great addition for any holiday breakfast or brunch, it'd be great for any other time too!

The classic dip combination of spinach and artichokes in an Alfredo base, with Italian and cream cheese and crabmeat.

Alfredo Spinach and Artichoke Dip with Crab

We're kind of in that awkward stage of food seasons down here along the Gulf Coast. Summer is gone from the calendar and mostly along with all the great summer vegetables, and though fall has arrived, the weather here can get a little wacky. Some days cooler, then others downright summerlike.

One thing is for certain this time of year though.

Tis the season for football and football means appetizers and snacks! Sandwiches, wings, meatballs, gumbo, chilis, soups, snacks, a wide variety of finger foods and dips, of course! You can grab up some ideas by tapping on those categories, or right here at this link.

A tomato and cucumber salad with red onion, olives and feta tossed in a Greek-style dressing.

(Almost Greek-Style) Tomato, Cucumber and Olive Salad

I'm always up for making different kinds of salads using tomatoes, cucumbers, or both!

I saw this Horiatiki Salata aka Hearty Greek Salad on the America's Test Kitchen channel on Roku one day recently and thought it looked so good I needed to make it right away!

Only thing is, I didn't have everything on hand that it called for though, so I had to make some adjustments, which is why I say this is an "almost" Greek-style salad.

Catfish fillets rubbed with a blackening seasoning and cooked in the air fryer!

Air Fryer Blackened Catfish

If you love well seasoned fish, you're gonna love this blackened catfish and it's made a little easier with the air fryer!

Usually when I blacken anything, it requires a screaming hot cast iron pan and that creates an intense amount of smoke, so for me, it's relegated to cooking outside on the grill. It works great, but the heat has really kept me from being able to do outdoor cooking in the summer.

This method provides a beautiful and flavorful blackening and it's done right in the air fryer on the kitchen counter and minus the smoke.

Shrimp and Pasta with Vegetables (Primavera)

Linguine pasta in a cream sauce with a mix of vegetables and shrimp.

Shrimp and Pasta with Vegetables

This dish came about when I found quite a few mixed bags of frozen vegetables up in my freezer that I had bought for something very specific that I had intended to make - but forgot about. That happens to me alot!

And I know, you're gonna say "now Mary. That's pasta primavera!" Well, yes, to a certain degree, it is!

Pasta primavera is an American dish of pasta in a cream sauce with fresh vegetables, typically fresh spring vegetables, and the primary difference here is that instead of those typical fresh vegetables, I used those frozen ones.

Waste not, want not, and plus, it shaves off a little time!

A Southwestern style pasta salad featuring rotini pasta with taco seasonings, salsa, veggies and beans. Drizzle with your favorite salad dressing and garnish as desired.

Taco Pasta Salad   

Pasta salads are such a welcome addition to the summertime menu, aren't they?

Some days it's just so hot that the thought of putting a lot of effort into a full out meal can be daunting and overwhelming, nevermind the fact that I may not even have an appetite for that!

What happens with me during those times is that I end up snacking on a whole bunch of junk, instead of having a "meal."

Not great.

Another classic egg salad made with hard boiled eggs, red and green onion, lemon, seasonings, parsley, mayonnaise and Creole mustard.

Another Egg Salad

It's sure been another hot summer hasn't it y'all? And it seems to be all over the country so I guess we're all in good company.

Well, it is summer! But... I'm SO ready for fall.

I'm still plugging away over here cooking up a storm anyway. I mean, no matter the weather, we still gotta eat, right?

Still, there are days where the heat is just too exhausting to me and egg salad is a welcome addition, whether stuffed into a fresh garden tomato, spooned onto sandwich bread, or scooped on a plate with some crackers.

Pasta salad, made with tiny shell pasta, tossed with a dressing made with mayonnaise, sour cream and Creole mustard with grilled salmon folded in.

Grilled Salmon Pasta Salad

I love fish! Some of my favorites include Mississippi farm raised catfish, of course, as well as the bounty from our beloved Mississippi Sound and the Gulf.

White trout, speckled trout, redfish, mackerel, snapper, red drum, grouper, even good ole ground mullet and Biloxi Bacon aka striped popeye mullet or jumping mullet, are just some of the fish that are found here, and frankly most of us from here were just about weaned on it all from birth!

A classic tomato salad with sweet onion and cucumber and a nicely balanced vinegar based dressing.

Cucumber Tomato and Onion Salad

I love cucumber, tomato and onion salad combinations and I eat them constantly over these hot summers, so I am always playing around with them.

It's pretty amazing how subtle changes in the same basic ingredients can completely alter the texture and taste in them and the dressing on this one is a great balance between tart and sweet to me.

A simple spiral sliced ham, brushed with a brown sugar, mustard and pineapple juice glaze enhanced with optional holiday spices and baked.

Baked Spiral Sliced Ham

I have a pretty good collection of baked ham recipes here on the website, but you may have noticed that I haven't ever featured a spiral sliced ham here. Ever.

Until today.

There's a reason for that, and it's simply that I have never had a great amount of success in warming them through without it ending up dry. Until today.

I am happy to say that, as simple as this ham is, it turned out excellent!

A quick, delicious, sweet egg custard made easy using the microwave! Suitable to serve with fruit, in trifles, layered desserts, or in a banana pudding!

Microwave Custard

I have a confession.

I have been using the microwave to make custard for my banana pudding instead of a stovetop double boiler for awhile now.

I know. I know. Just like a microwave roux, it seems controversial, but it really isn't.

Cucumbers and sweet onions, marinated in a slightly sweetened white wine and rice vinegar dressing with mustard seeds and tossed with fresh tomatoes.

Marinated Cucumber and Tomato Salad

Seeing as it's summer as I write this, that it's hotter than hot right now, and I'm certainly getting my fill of all the cooling foods I can right now, here's yet another cucumber and tomato salad to add to the collection!

This version was inspired by one that I ran across in Paula Deen's At the Southern Table cookbook. It was a little bit different from the typical cucumber and tomato salad and interesting enough that it had me curious, so I thought I'd give it a try... with my own adaptations, of course!