Have you ever eaten Frogmore Stew? Pretty sick name as far as I am concerned...I picture a big pot of stew with 50 pair of little frog's eyes looking up at me! The recipe is a favorite of my family, but we choose to call it Low Country Boil. After all, frogs have nothing to do with it!

If you are looking for a big dish to feed a crowd on the 4th, this might be your answer. This recipe feeds 12, but can be doubled, even tripled if you have a pot large enough! It can be adjusted to serve any number. Allow 2 tablespoons of seasoning per quart of water. If you cannot find hot smoked sausage, use another smoked sausage such as kielbasa and add crushed hot red pepper to the pot."
Ingredients:
6 quarts water
3/4 cup Old Bay Seasoning TM
2 pounds new red potatoes
2 pounds hot smoked sausage links, cut into
2 inch pieces
12 ears corn - husked, cleaned and
quartered
4 pounds large fresh shrimp, unpeeled
Directions:
1.
Bring water and Old Bay Seasoning to boil in a large stockpot.
2.
Add potatoes and cook for 15 minutes. Add sausage and cook for 5 minutes more. Add corn and cook for another 5 minutes. Stir in the shrimp and cook until shrimp are pink, about 5 minutes. Drain immediately and serve.

Traditionally, this should be served outdoors, drained then dumped out on a big table covered in several layers of paper. All you need is cocktail sauce, crusty bread and butter, and a big green salad...oh and lots of rolls of paper towels!

31

Part of the joy of being together with my family at Smith Mountain Lake in Virginia were the games and challenges that popped up spontaneously , sometimes for hours! The whiffle baseball games were a hoot to watch….kids and adults joining in. The adults had to hold a full glass of liquid in one hand while playing to “make it fair for the children” In reality, the kids could and did do some serious butt-kickin’ out there. I believe the adults choice of liquid in their glass might have had something to do with it!

I personally was a spectator for the ball games and the fishing contests, but I did participate in the game called “31”. The back of the house overlooked the beautiful lake, and the veranda ran across the entire back. The table was often the scene of marathon 31 games. From the veranda we could watch the fishing, cheering and yelling for each little fish the children caught. My wonderful nephew, Neal, is an avid fisherman from Colorado, and spent most of his time on the dock, keeping the little ones safe and their hooks baited with worms!

The games of “31” were not without drama, suspense and loads of laughter! It was a new game to me, but my friend Winnie played it as a child during their family reunions! When I first sat down at the table, everyone else knew the game; maybe I’m just slow!

Now that I am home, I want to play, so I Googled the game rules, to make sure I remembered them correctly. They are:

How to play the card game thirty one :
Thirty-one is a card game played between two and seven people but is usually best played with at least four players. The object is to obtain a hand with a point value closer to 31 than the hands of one's opponents. Using one standard 52 card deck, cards rank as follows: aces are high, counting 11, face cards count 10, and all other cards count face value. Each player gets three cards and the rest of the pack is set in the middle of the table to act as the stock for the game, and the top card of the stock is turned over to begin the discard.
After the hands in the first round are dealt out, each player receives a previously chosen number of tokens, or, most commonly, coins. Play proceeds as in Gin Rummy, with each player, starting with the player to the immediate left of the dealer and going clockwise around the table, taking the top card of either the stock or the discard and afterward discarding a card. Play continues clockwise around the table until any player knocks or obtains a blitz.
When it is one player's turn, and that player believes his or her hand is high enough to beat those of his or her opponents individually, he or she knocks on the table instead of drawing and discarding. All other players, going clockwise from the player who knocked, have one more turn to draw from the stock and discard, or they have the option of keeping all three cards in their hands (i.e. standing, staying). A round ends when the player to the right of the player who knocked has had his or her final turn. If no one knocks by the time a player exhausts the stock, the At the end of the round, each player shows his or her hand and totals it up. The player whose hand scored the lowest has lost the round, and must place one of his tokens or coins in the center of the table.
If, at any time in the round, a player attains a hand made up of an Ace, King and Ten of the same suit (a blitz), he must immediately show it, the round ends and all other players must place one token on the center of the table.When a player has lost all of his or her tokens or coins, he or she continues to play until that player loses again; at that time, he or she must leave the game. The last player to stay in the game wins all of the tokens on the table.