Little Rock, AR - Soggy Bread & le Petit Rocher

We arrived in Little Rock today. We’ve never been to Arkansas. Here’s our campground from the Clinton Bridge overlooking it.

And, our view out of our living room window of the Arkansas River, which divides Little Rock and North Little Rock where we are.

We arrived at our campground about 3:00 and, after we spent a bit of time setting up, we took advantage of the marvelous bike trail that is right next to the campground.

Hey, why is this called Little Rock? Who knows? Raise your hands high. Gary and I have our hands held high since we walked the path and read the signage. Not only is there some explanatory signage BUT there is also a piece of the actual ‘le Petit Rocher’, the Little Rock. Sure enough, there is really a little rock as opposed to the big rock which obviously isn’t important for this story. Here’s the story: this French guy, Jean-Baptiste Bernard de La Harpe, the first European explorer, found the rocky bluff on the north side of the river and called it le Rocher Francais, the French Rock in 1722. The smaller outcropping on the south side of the river they called le Petit Rocher, the Little Rock, and it appeared on maps of the area in 1799. And there you have it: Little Rock. Ta Da. Here’s a piece of the ‘Little Rock.’

Hey, if anyone says they are serving a strata for a meal - count me in. I like a good strata. But then, what’s not to like: chicken or ham, cheese, eggs, spices, cheese, maybe some nuts, and, did I mention that there is usually cheese? Yep, I do like a nice strata. Easy to cook. good to eat and easy to clean up after.

On the other hand, Gary says he’s not always fond of ‘soggy bread.’ It seems that we have a fundamental difference of opinion here. But - I’m the cook and every now and then, we’ll have strata. Although I’ll have to admit. we have it probably once a year. And, this is the once a year that we will have strata. I have some bread that I should use soon, some peanuts that have been around since I served a peanut chocolate whipped mousse a month or two ago, some fresh spinach that will not last for ever, some left over rotisserie chicken and some cheeses that I should use. What else is a perfect match for these besides a good strata? I whipped it up, put it into the refrigerator for the flavors to ‘marry’ pulled it out after our daily walk and baked it up.

Look at this.

And, Gary took a second serving. Oh, look, he finished his second serving and took another spoonful. Must have been a hit. I’ll make that again - oops, when will I have the exact amount of those exact ingredients to whip together again? But, hey, that’s the beauty of a strata - you can put just about anything into them and they will taste great. No two stratas are the same.

We arrived in Little Rock yesterday, late as I mentioned in yesterdays blog. Obviously, we didn’t get much accomplished except out daily walk but are taking tomorrow off to try to get some things caught up. Things like this blog which is about 5 days behind.