Monte Cristo Skillet – and Your Cast Iron Memories
This delicious recipe is at the bottom of the post. Hope you get to try it soon!
Be sure and share your special Cast Iron memories in the comments below!
(more details at bottom of post)
Today I’m thrilled to bring you a guest post from the good folks at Martha White, along with a fun announcement! The National Cornbread Festival is coming up! The cornbread festival is held each year in the neat little town of South Pittsburg, Tennessee, and this year Martha White has asked me to be a judge. So I get to participate in the festival AND taste all of the yummy entries, to boot! The festival is a weekend long family event with all sorts of fun activities taking place, including tours of the Lodge Cast Iron Factory. Click the Cornbread Festival logo at the bottom of this post to visit the official homepage and learn more.
I’m really looking forward to meeting more of the Southern Plate Family! We have a page over on Facebook where folks can RSVP that they are coming so if you plan on coming out for the fun this year so click here to head on over there and let me know so I can look forward to seeing your face and keep you posted on times and location of the Southern Plate Family meet and greet.
I’m also hoping some of you will enter the competition. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if a member of the Southern Plate family won it? I happen to know that y’all are a group of extremely talented cooks – who cook for the love of family and friends – and I can’t imagine a dish tasting better than one made by one of you. For the official rules of the competition, click here. To go ahead and enter, click here.
This Monte Cristo Skillet was the Grand Prize Winner of the 2006 National Cornbread Festival. It caught my eye because I recently had my very first Monte Cristo Sandwich and absolutely loved it. Southern Living sent me to Charleston to do some presentations for the Taste of Charleston Festival. Have you ever been to Charleston? Oh my goodness gracious, is that a beautiful town! With every sight and sound I became more determined to bring my family back there someday so I could experience it with them (It is hard to enjoy a trip without the folks you want to share it with beside you).
As I’ve started traveling from time to time I’ve taken a queue from my adventurous counterparts at SL and started making it a point to try something new in each place if possible. In Charleston, I had my first Monte Cristo Sandwich and it was right up my alley. I ate it in the cafe of a beautiful hotel right downtown. The flavors were a unique combination for me: Ham, cheese, battered and toasted bread drizzled with a sweet fruit preserves and sprinkled with confectioner’s sugar. It was part lunch, part breakfast, part sandwich, part dessert, and all the way good!
So when Martha White offered to guest post I got to nosing around for what recipe I thought would appeal the most to everyone and as soon as this skillet came before my eyes, my heart just settled on it.
This recipe is quick to throw together and feeds six people. I like strawberry preserves with mine but feel free to use whichever you like best. I also omit the turkey and use additional ham in it’s place. Lunchmeat ham works just fine!
[amd-zlrecipe-recipe:362]
Love Your Cast Iron?
Be sure and pick up this month’s special Cast Iron issue of Taste Of The South. It is filled to the BRIM with delicious recipes for your cast iron skillet, gorgeous food photography,
and those sweet people even put my name on the cover!
I don’t know who is more tickled, me or my mother!
For those of you who want a cast iron skillet, but you don’t want to mess with seasoning it. You might check out the ones they sell at Cracker Barrel because some of them are already seasoned for you. I have one that was pre-seasoned, and I have enjoyed using it.
I have a small, a medium, and large cast iron skillet as well as a corn stick pan. When I decided a year ago to invest in an induction cooktop, I was thrilled that I could use my cast iron on it or I think that would have been a deal breaker! I have fond memories of my dear Aunt Macel cooking her famous peach cobbler in her cast iron skillet (as I do now) and of my Mother making peanut brittle in hers (also as I do now.) I absolutely will not make cornbread in any other pan!
My parents are from the north. We moved to Huntsville when I was in 5th grade. I’ve been in the south now for many, many years. I never really knew about cast iron until reading your blog and purchasing your cook book. I now have 6 cast iron skillets that I purchased from several antique malls and online. I followed the directions from a guest post on your website on how to season or re-season. This past weekend was my Birthday, which I spent with 2 girlfriends that came to visit from out of town (we stayed at a hotel) When I arrived home on Sat. afternoon, my husband made dinner which included corn bread made in one of the skillets…..it came out perfect. He is such a blessing to me and the cornbread was amazing!! 🙂 Christy, thank you so much for bringing “the south” to so many of us. You are a blessing to so many.
It seems we always have had a cast iron skillet. My mom and dad used one all the time. We still use cast iron skillets today. We have 3 of them. I love cooking in them. They are timeless and last forever! I just recently made glazed carrots in mine. I even cooked the carrots in the skillet. Mine were given to me by my mom and father-in-law. My children enjoy using them as well. It is our “pan of choice”.
Am another southern girl who grew up eating food cooked in cast iron cookware. Ihave spent most of my life in a small town across the state line from South Pittsburg , TN had family that worked in the Lodge factory there. When I turned 16 a uncle started giving me pieces of Lodge Cast Iron as presents. I started housekeeping with them 39 years ago and still use them. Uncle slao saw to it that my girls had Lodge Cast Iron to start their cookware collections. Our whole family loves it and doesn’t believinh in using any other Cast Iron; Lodge is the BEST. Look forward to seeing you at the Cornbread Festival.
Christy,
My mother straight from Germany used her big cast-iron frying pan for everything! In it she always made the best roast whole chickens I have ever eaten, turkeys, fabulous pot roasts, “farmer’s breakfasts” as she called them (chopped bacon, fried potatoes, chives and eggs, all scrambled together with a bit of garlic powder and Lawry’s seasoned salt) and almost everything else she cooked inside an oven or on the stove top. When my mom died a few years ago at age 80, I had to have that cast iron pan. For me it symbolizes a lifetime of wonderful food and wonderful times at my mom’s table. I am with everybody else in wanting a “assume nothing” guide to seasoning and cooking with cast iron!
My mouth is watering just reading about all thie good food which has been cooked in the cast iron skillets over the years. I have a large skillet and a small one. We will have been married 55 years in June and I’ve been using both skillets all these years. They are all I use when I bake cornbread. YUM! Thanks for sharing the recipe today. I’m anxious to try it.