The kitchen, oh the lovely kitchen. Let’s go there.

Beth’s kitchen is in the opposite direction of the ‘model home’ layout.  Whereas one is coldly designed as a staging technique, when you step into Beth’s world your heartbeat slows down and a wave of peace and calm washes over you.  This is a real home. A real kitchen. Yes, hers is a kitchen restored to reflect an updated usability that an one hundred year old home needs yet it still manages to keep its charm.  I just love that one wall is a Stephens family community chalkboard.  Daily quotes, the upcoming weather report, and displays random bits of notes that only a family would understand.  A family connected.

Did I mention a chalkboard? Try about a hundred on for size.  Beth may have a chalkboard addiction, and may need professional help.  Chalkboards are scattered throughout her home, particularly abundant in her kitchen. Yet somehow, somehow, it really just works.

 Here, she uses a smaller chalkboard near her sink to give me an impromptu cooking lesson that explained the difference between croque monsieur and croque madam.  She treated me to croque monsier, er, that is, croque smoked-salmon because I do not eat ham. Is there a French name for that?

I do know there is an English phrase for it = savory deliciousness. I wish you could taste this over the internet. Picture crisped edges of rich French bread, homemade pesto mayonnaise, Dijon, and a sprinkling of herbs de provence.  Add the savory smoothness of goat cheese and top it with a smoked salmon that brings just the right earthiness of depth by itself. Once combined with the cheese and condiments it is engages just about every taste bud within your mouth.  A salad perfectly complimented our sandwich and was beautifully arranged on her built-in and century-old sideboard.

Gotta’ love a gal with a built-in sideboard.

 Let’s keep touring the kitchen, shall we?

The kitchen has an adorable corner sink.  Have you ever come across one?  It made me want to instantly go home and remodel my own kitchen.  (If only it had an available corner, sigh.)

 Yes, the sink is adorable and truly is cozy, however it is more than a chalkboard here or there or an adorable sink that makes Beth’s kitchen so approachable.  Take a look around at all of these photos and really see all the little personal touches?  Do you see the fleur de lis painted on the window? The tin pot with flours? Glasses stacked within arms reach, each with their own personality?

My eyes landed on an old weather-worn recipe equivalent notation, clipped on a wired hutch door with an antiquated clothes pin.  Beth has a story for that one, too. A story about how she found that raggedy piece of paper in her grandmother’s hutch. I love that she displays it. Still part of her grandmother’s hutch. I love her stories.

Beth isn’t your ordinary food blogger.

She starts conversations.

You’ll want to be a part of them when you follow her blog.

Her pantry stopped my heart. Her husband took out the shelves and created a wrap-around and to-the-ceiling blank canvas for her.  Spices lined all the way up on one side. I admit that I shameless stole this idea from her for my own pantry.  I love how functional it is.  I love that she can see all of her pantry essentials and cookbooks.  I love it so much that I made it my own personal “favorite space” in my newly remodeled kitchen.  The Arkansas Democrat Gazette even interviewed me for it.  Thanks Beth for the inspiration.  Feel free to gather inspiration yourself.  I promise she won’t mind.

The kitchen tour winded down and Beth plated the final finishing touch, a homemade tart.  She is a girl after my own foodie heart, providing us both with a savory tart and a little after dinner blackberry bubbly apertif.

 Can you see why I love to call her my friend?  Everyone should be so lucky to have a little big of sunshine and inspiration in their lives.  I call mine… Beth.

May our friendship live happily ever after.

Lyndi

Eat well, my friends. Eat well.