Teddy's Ice Box Pie Ice Cream

As a follow up to my Hummingbird Cake Ice Cream, I decided to try and duplicate another family favorite, Lemon Icebox Pie, in ice cream form. And I had a bit of a Eureka moment when I passed the lemon curd in the grocery store. (Eureka!) In my grocery story, lemon curd is found by the pie fillings.

Of all of the ice creams I have made so far, THIS is my favorite. The lemon curd makes the ice cream smooth and creamy and very lemony. The Teddy Grahams are perfect in the ice cream (and cute too!).

2 cups heavy whipping cream

1 can sweetened condensed milk
1 jar lemon curd

1/2 box of Teddy Grahams (or more or less, to taste)

Mix together the whipping cream, sweetened condensed milk and lemon curd in mixer on very low speed (just enough to blend). Add to ice cream maker. Add Teddy Grahams about 5 minutes before ice cream is through.

Pimento Cheese Biscuits

I will admit that Belinda Ellis is a culinary genius, but I think even she will give me that it's pretty hard to go wrong by combining biscuits and pimento cheese!

This recipe was in Garden and Gun magazine - and I knew I had to make it as soon as I saw it.

I think the biscuits taste just like cheese straws. My son said he thought they tasted like hushpuppies (and even dipped them in ketchup...I would complain but he gets that from his grandfather so it makes me smile). My husband said just make more.

Luckily, there are many more biscuits to try from Belinda's mad genius in her Biscuits: A Savor the South cookbook.

And Belinda KNOWS biscuits. She has worked 20-plus years as test kitchen and marketing manager for White Lily flour. (And, yes, Ms. Ellis, my Grandma Annie taught me how to make biscuits. The trick, she insisted, was touching the biscuits with your fingers as little as possible. She cut cold butter in with a knife and a fork. She insisted that you wanted the cold butter to melt in the oven, not on your fingers. Biscuits were one of the first things I learned to cook. I never knew they were considered "hard" to make by some until I got older!)

When I made the pimento cheese biscuits, I shaped some like more traditional biscuits lightly with my fingers. Some I just dropped with the spoon. (Those would be great on top of soup like a gigantic crouton. You could drop them by teaspoon if you wanted them to be closer to normal size.) But these would make great breakfast sandwiches too, and I would want the ones shaped more like a biscuit for those!

Here's a few more of Belinda's biscuits recipes. (Trust me. After tasting these, you'll want ALL of them!)

• Flaky Butter Biscuits
• I-Can't-Believe-Biscuits-Can-Be-This-Easy Cream Biscuits
• Gorgonzola, Walnut & Cranberry Biscuits
• Belinda's biscuit trick

Coast Seafood Trail ending in August

The Mississippi Gulf Seafood Trail is a campaign encouraging Coast restaurants to promote fresh seafood from the Gulf of Mexico. It started in June and ends on August 14.

 Established by the Mississippi Hospitality and Restaurant Association, the trail kicked off the "Summer of Seafood 2014" with over 40 restaurants.

After too many years away from the Gulf Coast, when I think of a seafood trail I think of all the miles I drive down there and back to Jackson to get my stash of oysters, Gulf shrimp, and, amazingly, cocktail crab claws. (I say amazingly only because I can't believe with a Fresh Market AND a Whole Foods in the Jackson metro area, I cannot get the cocktail crab claws that are sitting at Rouse's or Winn Dixie on the Coast. I also have to drive to get Barq's in a bottle, but that's another story.)

These cocktail crab claws are the best summer appetizer. They taste even better on the back of a boat. They are super simple and they will make everyone think you are a gourmet chef without even trying.

Get one Ziploc bag. Get one container of cocktail crab claws. (I've only seen them in one size.) Get one bottle of Kraft Zesty Italian Dressing. Pour the claws and the dressing into the Ziploc bag. Marinate overnight. Pour the claws into a colander the next day, allowing the excess dressing to drip off. Put back in bag.

Voila! Folks will be beating a seafood trail to your door for another bite! Promise!