My great aunt Marion Peagler, late of Savannah, won the title of best cook in our family

Hands down

Champ

A life long weight watcher, fat phobic, and stylish dresser, it’s amazing that Aunt Marion didn’t weigh a ton considering her freezer always had containers of okra stew, raw beaten biscuit ready for baking, what she called ham steaks, McKenzie gold foil butter beans, and these perfect little cream cheese tarts

Bacon drippings remained in a dedicated container ready to season those butter beans and all manner of vegetables

Real butter only

Full fat everything

She taught me to make her cheese straws, which were the stuff of legend

A great old school Southern cook who embraced the microwave, the food processor, and any new gadget to come from the mind of engineers

She gave me “Aunt” Blanche Grundy’s shrimp creole receipt

She gave me my great grandmother’s tea punch written in her curling cursive

Her crab dip notes say “bake in petit pans” whatever those may be

One of my all time favorites of hers was indeed those cream cheese tarts

I call them Aunt Marion’s Cream Cheese Tarts

Easy as can be

People eat them and about die off

A perfect base for fresh fruit in season

My favorite is to serve them with peaches, macerated in a little sugar with the smallest hint of almond extract

So good in late July and August when it’s hot and peaches are in season

Also great with any form of berry macerated in a little sugar

Aunt Marion shared this receipt with everyone, so, here ‘tis

Take them out of the freezer and onto the plate

Easily doubled, too, by the way

And, because we all could use something sweet these days, I’m proud to share this with all 27 of my followers

Enjoy

Aunt Marion’s Cream Cheese Tarts

8 oz. cream cheese, softened and at room temperature

1 cup powdered sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 container Cool Whip – seriously – COOL WHIP -thawed

Line twelve muffin cups with cupcake liners.

In a mixing bowl, with a fork or hand mixer, mix the cream cheese with sugar and vanilla until well blended. Fold in the Cool Whip until thoroughly mixed. Drop by tablespoons into the cupcake papers. It’s about two full tablespoons per cupcake/muffin. Freeze in the muffin pan. After frozen, you can store in plastic bags.

If you serve with peaches make a simple syrup and add 1/4 teaspoon of almond extract. Trust me. Do it.

Aunt Marion would be tickled to know I’m letting everyone in on this secret. Absolutely tickled

Her words not mine

I had a charge account there

Back in the early 1990’s

Sutton’s Drug Store

159 East Franklin Street, Chapel Hill, NC 27514

Since 1923

Back when I was in school at UNC, Sutton’s was still a full on old school small town drug store

Dr. Woodard, the pharmacist, dispensed prescriptions in the back and Don and crew ran what was a lunch counter serving burgers, fries, and various ades. My favorite was and still is the cherry limeade

Diabetes in styrofoam

A friend and I had weekly lunches there on Wednesdays

Jesse, our lovely waitress and doyenne of the greasy spoon, knew to look out for our table

One Wednesday, she actually made a couple get up from our regular table chastising them for intruding on our space

She literally asked the couple if they knew they were sitting in our booth

I can hear her now, “GET UP!” she admonished them

On another Wednesday, we watched wide-eyed as Jesse screamed across the store, “I’m gonna kill you!” as she picked up a pair of scissors and chased a shoplifter out of the store and down Franklin Street

“I’m gonna kill you!” remains one of my favorite moments in four years of lunches

My wife and children love the place

LOVE the place

Any time we are in Chapel Hill, we go to Sutton’s

It’s now a full fledged diner owed by the same Don who worked there when I was in school

It was with full fledged horror that we read this week they are really struggling to keep the lights on and the griddle greasy because of Covid, because of the University’s decision to send everyone packing, because of North Carolina’s phased re-openings

A couple of weeks ago, Don told us they never closed during the quarantine

Now things are catching up with them

So, what’s a Tar Heel with a former charge account to do?

Well, he gives to a Go Fund me or two

Link provided

https://www.gofundme.com/f/sutton039s-drug-store?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=m_pd%20share-sheet&fbclid=IwAR2LV8LkfrCTNGXFSIFeHeQCtHh_tbyBZTFnIGQezm2O3XosaIq_6-WIcDY

In less than two days, fellow Tar Heels have given almost $30,000.00

Even this newly minted Tar Heel seen eating at Suttons a month ago

One day her pic might be on the wall

If Covid and draconian shut downs take out Sutton’s, well, let’s just say I’m going to grab a pair of scissors and run down some fools and scream, “I’m gonna kill you” due to my own frustration

I know that my thirty or so followers may want to contribute even though they’ve never sat in the yellow booths, never seen the myriad students’ pictures on the walls, never read The Daily Tar Heel, never charged anything to their parents

If you’re so inclined, please give

If you’re not, well, I’ll still raise my styrofoam of cherrylimeade to you