WFAEats

I never heard of fish camps – roadside eateries with a gravel lot, home-grown signage and knotty pine interiors – until I moved to North Carolina. In my native Illinois, the only time people ate fish in mass quantities was at the Catholic Church on Fridays during Lent or at a fish-fry event that involved a feeding of the flock.

Dear Etta Kate: I work in a small office of 10 employees. Once or twice a week, a few people will grab lunch together. I join in about half the time when they ask me. I rarely initiate. For one thing, lunch gets expensive. But the actual reason is that I like keeping some distance from my co-workers.  

  Here's a pre-season dining tip: Cam Newton is getting into the food business.

The Panthers' quarterback said on an interview with WCCB-TV Friday he's starting a food truck called "Smokn' Aces."

George McAllister has the best-smelling basement in all of Charlotte. That’s where he extracts honey from his backyard hives – and invites other beekeepers to join him – on his annual honey harvest day each summer. It’s an awfully sticky business with a pretty sweet result, which we’ll describe in a moment. Until then, just imagine breathing in soft air that’s scented with candles made of sugar and the fragrance of a million flowers.

Around 8,000 years ago, when Stone Age humans hunted woolly mammoths, they also dug into rock crevices and climbed trees in search of wild honey.

How can we possibly know this, without the written language that wouldn’t be developed for at least 2,000 years?

A cave painting near Valencia, Spain, shows a prehistoric hunter bravely pulling honey from a tree hive while angry bees swarm all around.

That buzz you hear isn’t just the honeybees – it’s the interest in keeping and gathering honey from “apis mellifera” that’s growing in the U.S.

Right now, we’re suiting up in protective gear so you don’t have to, and we’re smoking out the stories and lore to share with you next week.

But why wait? Here are some thoughts to whet your appetite until then.

Silly gardeners. While we've been sweating and struggling in the summer heat, the smart folks at the NC Cooperative Extension Service have been coolly building a giant online resource for us. Sponsored by N.C. State University, the Extension Gardener Handbook can solve just about any problem -- and enhance the experience of gardening for everyone. So pour yourself a cold beverage, find a shady spot, and check it out. 

The popularity of hummus is exploding in America, drawing comparisons to the rise of Greek yogurt.

Local hummus-makers can try to impress a hummus expert of sorts during the upcoming Charlotte Jewish Film Festival. Filmmaker Alex Matros will judge a hummus contest in conjunction with the showing of “Life and Hummus.”

Dear Etta Kate: Is it just me, or have weddings gotten out of control? With everything from canine wedding attendants to GoPro filmings of the ceremony, it's hard to get a handle on how to behave. 

Summer calls for potato salad, macaroni salad, tuna salad, egg salad, ham salad, chicken salad, deviled eggs. My magic ingredient for all of these is homemade zucchini relish. Forget the sugar-onion-vinegar combinations. This relish does the trick in one easy step.

With zucchini-drop season upon us, I must share this crucial recipe. You know what a zucchini drop is: those well-meant gifts of squash that arrive at your door from neighbors, friends, co-workers.