A great ham shank and some demolition going on

I had been doing some daydreaming lately about re-doing our New Year's Day dinner of ham, black-eyed peas, rice and cornbread and finally yesterday I made it so.  A 7.5# shank portion Smithfield ham went into the oven at 1:30 and by 6:00pm I was carving up all that luscious, succulent goodness and cackling about leftovers, ham stock and  ham-infused grits. Wowza, so much fun! (Yeah, I know - I'm easily amused, lol).

The fat cap is still on at this point. Took it off, scored the ham and back into the oven for another half hour - oh, I added some more water at this point too.

The next morning some ham, diced baked potato (with creole seasoning), fried egg and toast with homemade peach jam got our motors started.

Later, I will get my Instant Pot out and pressure cook the bone, and the scraps, along with water, some herbs and seasonings to make a delicious stock for soups, stews, and preparing grits, or barley for additional breakfast sides.  I'll use what stock I need for cooking, then I add some powdered bouillon to it to get a very concentrated stock. This, I usually freeze in an ice cube tray, then decant the cubes into a freezer baggie for later use, like stretching a stew or making gravy.

The Demolition

When we moved to our quiet neighborhood some years ago there was an old, unused concrete racquet ball court facing our roadway.  We loved the house and backyard views so much we just figured we'd live with the eyesore out front.  Well, guess what? The new owners just had it demolished and it gave us a much better view! In a matter of a few hours it was knocked down, cleaned up (all materials to be recycled), and the ground prepped for sod or whatever (I'm kind of hoping for tomatoes - haha).

The racquet ball court before, not too pretty

The after, although the new owners has landscaping plans too.
So much better!