June first – Summertime! Let me tell you about one of our favorite summertime lunches – Front Porch Salad. In a sort of tribute to Norman Rockwell, we sit back in our old metal porch chairs, look out at our quiet street and chat with neighbors. And we enjoy the antics of Humm-baby. (Giants fans will understand.) Our local hummingbird and his family fly fearlessly down and join us for lunch. They hover, or sometimes sit on at the railing of our feeder. Then they twitter away up out of sight, into the highest branches of our neighbor’s tall tree. I don’t know where I thought hummingbirds lived, but I was amazed to discover that they live in such tall trees.
Front porch salad is an idea more than a recipe. We start with a can of Kirkland canned chicken. Drain it and put it in a big bowl.
Chop up a small handful of toasted almonds, a jalapeño, a couple of stalks of celery, and a little bit of onion.
Add them to the chicken, along with just enough mayonnaise to make a moist mixture.
Chop up about four cups of romaine lettuce, and gently fold it into the mix. Make sure it’s mixed well.
Pile this on two plates and then add garnishing of whatever other salad-type goodies you like. Carrot sticks, raisins, apple slices, raw cauliflower, slices of bell pepper, or pickled peppers. 
Customize it with whatever you like best. I usually put sweet pickles and Kalamata olives on John’s; and dill pickles and artichoke hearts go on mine. 
And now that summer is almost here, we’ll both want piles of juicy fresh tomatoes. Ahhh! Off to the front porch! All I need now is a mint julep!
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Welcome! My name is Andrena Paladini and this is a blog about family and love and faith and fun. I call it Paladini Potpie because a potpie is like an adventure in a crust. You never know what might come up, but it’s always going to be good!
Think of the best potpie you’ve ever eaten…hot flaky crust holding a rich savory sauce and all kinds of pieces of meat and vegetables…and who knows what?
As a family, we’ve chosen to live within the parameters of God’s love and protection. This is the crust of our Paladini Potpie. The crust never changes. Within this crust, the savory sauce of family love binds it all together. That is also fairly constant. But beyond the crust and the sauce we can add just about anything!
Good ideas come our way and we’ve adopted and adapted them to add to what John calls our treasure box of memories. These stories and ideas from John’s treasure box of memories are the ingredients I’m putting into our Paladini Potpie.
(Okay, so this ridiculous mixing of metaphors about treasure boxes and potpies is exactly what I’m talking about. Silly and ungrammatically correct. But both illustrations work… so we’ll mix them together and it’ll be just fine!)
John and I have been married for 30 years. Our children have wonderfully doubled in number since David married Amanda, Monica married Dan, and Matthew married Sarah.
And the newest little treats that have been added to our potpie are six adorable grandchildren - Ethan, Angelina, Nathan, Audrey, Maleia and Caleb!
I hope you’ll subscribe to my Paladini Potpie blog, and keep up with all the fun new ingredients I add. Hopefully you’ll enjoy our stories and ideas, and find something you’ll want to put into your own potpie! Bon appétit!
June first – Summertime! Let me tell you about one of our favorite summertime lunches – Front Porch Salad. In a sort of tribute to Norman Rockwell, we sit back in our old metal porch chairs, look out at our quiet street and chat with neighbors. And we enjoy the antics of Humm-baby. (Giants fans will understand.) Our local hummingbird and his family fly fearlessly down and join us for lunch. They hover, or sometimes sit on at the railing of our feeder. Then they twitter away up out of sight, into the highest branches of our neighbor’s tall tree. I don’t know where I thought hummingbirds lived, but I was amazed to discover that they live in such tall trees.
Paladini Potpie 
June 2, 2012 at 8:41 am
Do you make this “to-go”? I’ll take two servings, please!