Kay Tyler

Kay Tyler has always been a “breakfast person” and that’s a good thing, because that’s the meal she cooks the most of now as owner of the Cart Barn Inn in Bruce, where she provides a daily breakfast meal for her guests.
Gravy and biscuits were the first meal she served when she and her late husband, Paul, opened the Cart Barn Inn in the fall of 2007, and “that went over well,” she said.
“Hashbrown Casserole is a real staple here,” she said, as is the Breakfast Bundt Pan. “It is really neat, so pretty, and it is very tasty,” she said.

“You can use any meat or any veggie you want. The key is not to add too much bread. The tater tots add just the right amount of potatoes. They shred up and you would think they were hash browns without making it dense. I have made this so many times and varied the ingredients almost every single time. So get creative.”
She makes her mom’s (Ora Mae Ferguson) banana bread for the Inn, too. Her mother always kept banana bread made at home because Kay’s daddy, Grady, liked it.

“Breakfast is pretty special here. The guests sit around and enjoy meeting each other. And I enjoy the interaction with them. It is a fun time,” she said.
Kay and her guests also exchange a lot of recipes. One of them, Mindy Bodenhamer of AL, shared her “fabulous” French Toast Bake recipe with Kay.
The recipe uses blueberries, but besides that, Kay has used strawberries, and her favorite, blackberries. “I need to try peaches.” She makes this dish pretty often. “It is a treat and people are surprised when they get it.”

A lot of times on Sunday, she will make a sausage, cream cheese and crescent roll bake along with the hashbrown casserole.
“I am a cheese person. All my grits and eggs have cheese.” She makes scrambled eggs with cheese, onion and colored peppers, and she makes different kinds of quiche. Occasionally she will fry potatoes with onions, and people like that, she said.

If the breakfast she has prepared one morning is more traditional and not sweet, she might bake Aunt Cleo’s strawberry cake or serve a peach cobbler.
It is rare that a guest has a special food need, but she has been able to get goat milk for one before.
Although she and Paul did a lot of traveling and always enjoyed the food, breakfast has remained her favorite meal. Her mother was also a breakfast person, and her parents, who were good cooks, both made breakfast.
“Neither of my children are really breakfast people, but Alison’s favorite dessert is Aunt Cleo’s strawberry cake and Robert is a ‘chocolate nut’,” she said.

Breakfast Bundt Pan
1 cup diced ham
2 cups frozen tater tots
1 dozen whisked eggs
1 can (8) Pillsbury Grands biscuits, diced up, raw
2 cups cheese of your choice (I use cheddar)
1/4 cup milk
(Option: Use any meat or veggie)
Mix all together. Put in greased bundt pan. Bake on 400° for 45 minutes. When done, flip onto platter. Cut and serve.

Hash Brown Casserole

2 lbs. frozen hash browns, thawed or not, but broken up
1/2 cup butter, melted
1 can (10.75 oz.) cream of chicken soup
1 pint sour cream
1/2 cup onion, chopped
2 cups grated cheese
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. pepper
Preheat oven to 350°. Spray 11×14 casserole or baking dish with cooking spray. In large bowl, combine all ingredients and stir together. Spread evenly in prepared pan. Crush Corn Flakes on top and pour butter over top. Bake 45 minutes to an hour until top is golden brown.

French Toast Bake
(Mindy Bodenhamer, Alabama)
12 slices day old French bread (1” thick)
5 eggs
2 1/2 cups milk
1 cup packed brown sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
1/4 cup butter
Arrange bread in greased 13×9 baking dish. Mix other ingredients and pour over bread. May refrigerate the night before.
1 cup pecans
1/4 cup butter
2 cups fresh or frozen blueberries, blackberries or strawberries
Remove from refrigerator 30 minutes before baking. Sprinkle pecans and 1/4 cup butter over top and bake uncovered at 400° for 25 minutes. Sprinkle with berries. Bake 10 more minutes. (After I add nuts and fruit, I drizzle syrup over it all and put back in oven.)

Banana Bread
(Ora Mae Ferguson)
2-3 very ripe bananas, peeled
1/3 cup melted butter
Pinch of salt
3/4 cup sugar (1/2 cup if you would like it less sweet; 1 cup if more sweet)
1 large egg, beaten
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
Preheat oven to 350°. Butter a 4×8” loaf pan. In mixing bowl, mash bananas with fork until completely smooth. Stir melted butter into mashed bananas. Mix in baking soda and stir. Stir in sugar, beaten egg and vanilla extract. Mix in flour. Pour batter into loaf pan. Bake 50 minutes to an hour at 350° or until tester inserted into center comes out clean. Remove from oven and cool completely on rack. Remove bread from pan. Slice and serve.

Aunt Cleo’s Wonderful Strawberry Cake
(Cleo Box)
1 box white cake mix
1 Tbsp. plain flour
1 small pkg. strawberry Jello
3/4 cup salad oil
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup frozen strawberries
4 eggs
Preheat oven to 350°. Mix salad oil, water and eggs together. Add cake mix and 1 Tbsp. plain flour until blended. Add frozen strawberries and Jello and blend. Pour into two oiled round cake pans and bake until a toothpick inserted into center of cake comes out clean.
Frosting: 1 box powdered sugar
1/2 cup strawberries
1/4 lb. oleo and 2 Tbsp. Crisco
2 Tbsp. vanilla
Milk to give smooth frosting consistency
Have oleo and Crisco to room temperature. Cream together. Add powdered sugar gradually to mixture and blend with mixer. Add strawberries and blend. Add vanilla and blend. I then add a little milk to frosting mixture to make it smooth and easy to spread. More powdered sugar may be added if the consistency isn’t what you want it to be. To add color to your frosting, a little strawberry Jello may be added.