A Love Affair with Southern Cooking (2 page)

The city of the world where you can eat and drink the most and suffer the least.

—William Makepeace Thackeray, on New Orleans

F
irst, please read this section carefully. The information given here includes basics that will assist you as you cook.

• Before beginning any recipe in this book, read it—twice, if necessary—so that you know exactly what you are to do. Also check to see that you have all necessary ingredients and equipment.
  
• Before you begin cooking, measure all recipe ingredients and do as much advance prep as possible (peeling, slicing, chunking, and so forth) so that you don’t have to pause mid-recipe.
  
• Do not use one ingredient in place of another unless a recipe suggests substitutions.
  
• Pan sizes and shapes are essential to a recipe’s success, so never substitute one pan for another unless alternates are specified.
  

Note:
For baking, I recommend that you use light-colored pans (preferably aluminum). Dark pans as well as those lined with dark nonstick coatings tend to overbrown breads, cakes, cookies, and pie crusts.

• If a recipe tells you to “cool” something, let it come to room temperature.
  
• If a recipe directs you to “chill” something, refrigerate it or set it in an ice bath until uniformly cold.
  
• Always preheat an oven for 20 minutes, a broiler for 15 minutes.
  

Unless specified to the contrary

• Eggs are large.
  
• Butter is old-fashioned, unsalted stick butter.
  
• Use nothing else in the recipes in this book unless substitutes are given.
  
• Lard is rendered hog fat,
  not
  vegetable shortening. Many southern butchers, groceries, and supermarkets routinely carry it. Elsewhere, Hispanic groceries would be the place to look. When I lived in New York, my neighborhood Food Emporium (a high-end A & P) carried the Armour brand of lard.
  
• Cornmeal is usually stone-ground (see Sources, backmatter). If granular supermarket cornmeal is intended, recipes will specify that.
  
• Rice may be “converted” (Uncle Ben’s) or long-grain (Carolina). Recipes will specify which one to use for best results.
  
• Flour is all-purpose flour—a good balance of soft and hard wheats—
  unless
  a soft southern flour is called for.
  

Note:
Always sift flour before you measure it even if the label says “presifted,” because flour compacts in transit and storage. To measure: Spoon the sifted flour lightly into a dry cup measure (these are the nested cups in 1-cup,
½-
cup,
¹
/
₃
-
cup, and
¼-
cup sizes), then level off the surface with the edge of a small, thin-blade spatula. Breads (especially biscuits), cakes, and pastries made with unsifted flour will never be as flaky or feathery as those made with sifted flour.

• Sour cream is measured tightly packed in a dry measuring cup unless recipes direct otherwise. Here’s how to do it: Scoop up a tablespoon of sour cream, drop it into the dry measure (see Flour, above, for a description of these measuring cups), then, using the bowl of the spoon, pack it in; repeat until the cup is full, then level off the top with the broad side of a small thin-blade spatula.
  

Note:
Mayonnaise, lard, and vegetable shortening are measured the same way, and jam and peanut butter often are as well. Recipes are specific about how each should be measured.

• Light and dark brown sugars are measured tightly packed in a dry measuring cup unless a recipe directs otherwise.
  
• Molasses, honey, corn syrup, and other sticky liquids will slide out of measuring cups and spoons more easily if these have been well spritzed with nonstick cooking spray.
  
• All citrus juices (lemon, lime, orange, and grapefruit) are freshly squeezed. The one exception: Key lime juice. The bottled may be used if fresh Key limes are unavailable. (See Sources, backmatter.)
  
• Vanilla is pure vanilla extract, never imitation. Ditto almond, orange, lemon, and rum extracts. I find artificially flavored extracts unpleasantly perfume-y. They can ruin a good cake.
  
• Freshly grated Parmesan cheese is
  Parmigiano-Reggiano
  if you can afford it. Otherwise, use a Wisconsin or Argentine Parmesan and grate it yourself. Thirty seconds or so in the food processor and the job is done.
  
• Black pepper is freshly ground.
  
• Salt is uniodized table salt because it’s best for baked goods. You can of course substitute coarse or kosher salt in soups, salads, sides, and main dishes but increase amounts as needed to taste.
  

About Pork and Chicken

• Pork:
  Today’s lean pork has had so much flavor and succulence bred out of it that I now use only a “boutique” brand like Niman Ranch. I suggest that you do the same when preparing the pork recipes in this book. You’ll be happier with the results.
  
• Chicken:
  Chicken breasts have grown so large that a friend of mine said they’d “feed a family of four.” I call them D cups. If you’re roasting a chicken, the size of the breast doesn’t matter. But it definitely does if you’re frying chicken. I find that frying-size chickens (about 3 pounds) are now a special order.
  

Here’s a tip:
If your supermarket or butcher has no fryers, go to the rotisserie department and sweet-talk the man in charge into selling you a raw rotisserie chicken weighing 2
½
to 3 pounds. If he won’t disjoint it for you, perhaps the butcher will. That’s what I was forced to do when testing the fried chicken recipes in this book.

About Pasteurized Eggs

Many old southern recipes call for raw eggs or ones that are not sufficiently cooked to destroy the salmonella bacteria that may (or may not) be present. It’s said that only one in 10,000 eggs may be infected; still, using raw eggs is rather like playing Russian roulette. I’d rather be safe than sorry. So whenever I think it advisable to use pasteurized eggs in a particular recipe, I say so. Fortunately, you can now buy pasteurized eggs at some supermarkets and specialty groceries (Davidson is the brand my markets carry). Pasteurized eggs can be used in place of raw eggs in any recipe; their whites are slightly cloudy and take longer to whip to stiff peaks than raw egg whites. Otherwise, I see no difference between the two. If pasteurized eggs are unavailable, I’d suggest buying eggs from a small local source, perhaps some trusted vendor at your farmer’s market.

As for Meringues

The time it takes to brown a meringue-topped pie may not render it safe, so use pasteurized egg whites or consider one of these other options: pasteurized egg whites sold in both powdered form (Just Whites) and in liquid (the Whole Foods grocery chain now stocks little cartons of liquid pasteurized whites). You might also consider using a meringue powder (stocked by some specialty food shops and most bakery supply houses); I personally find the flavor a bit artificial, but adding a few drops of pure vanilla extract will help erase it. If none of these options is available to you, use only eggs from a local source that you trust implicitly.

Note:
The American Egg Board recently worked out a recipe for a fully cooked meringue made with unpasteurized eggs. I haven’t the space to reprint it here, but you will find the recipe posted on their website://www.aeb.org/Recipes/EggClassics/SOFTPIEMERINGUE.htm.

About Pie Crusts

If you still make your own pastry, good for you. Many people are too busy to do so today and I occasionally plead guilty myself. Some frozen pie crusts are excellent; find a brand that you like and stick with it.

Note:
If you use a frozen pie shell, choose a deep-dish one and recrimp the crust to make a high, fluted edge. This will minimize spillovers, which so often happen with pies. Recrimping is easy: Simply move around the edge of the crust making a zigzag pattern by pinching the dough between the thumb of one hand and the index finger and thumb of the other. Takes less than a minute. Also, before you fill the pie shell, set it—still in its flimsy aluminum tin—inside a standard 9-inch pie pan; this is for added support.

To avoid spillovers, I slide the pie onto a heavy-duty rimmed baking sheet, preheated along with the oven to ensure that the bottom crust will be as crisp as possible.

Tip:
Also now available at many supermarkets: unroll-and-use pastry circles; look for them near the refrigerated biscuits. I find these especially good for pies larger or smaller than 9 inches—the diameter of most frozen pie shells. These pastry circles are also the ones to use when you’re making a two-crust pie.

Note:
If you are using a frozen or other prepared pie crust and a recipe calls for a
fully baked pie shell,
bake according to package directions.

I grew up eating well—cheese grits,
homemade biscuits smothered in butter,
home-cured ham, red-eye gravy—and that
was just breakfast.

—
OPRAH WINFREY

A glass of wine and a bit of mutton are always ready, and such as will be content to partake of them are always welcome.

—George Washington

I
grew up in a southern college town where teas and open houses were the preferred way to entertain, and, being a “faculty brat,” I was subjected to plenty of them. Whenever my mother was the hostess, my job was to keep the platters brimming with cheese daisies, tea sandwiches, and such.

My mother was big in clubs—the American Association of University Women (AAUW), the State College Woman’s Club, the Book Exchange, the Sewing Circle—and the meetings, it seemed to me, were mostly recipe swaps. The majority of members were southern, so the recipes Mother added to her card files over the years were also southern. I have that card file today, and to riffle through it is to remember not only the recipes but also those good southern cooks who gave them to my mother. Several of them are printed here for the first time.

The only time I remember anything alcoholic being served (except at the Carolina Country Club) was at Christmastime, when bourbon was slipped into eggnog. Most of the South was dry or semidry back then; only in New Orleans, Charleston, and parts of Florida could you buy a mixed drink.

In the North Carolina counties considered “wet,” there were state-run ABC (Alcoholic Beverage Control) stores where you could buy the hard stuff. Restaurants, however, were forbidden to serve cocktails until late in the twentieth century. Incredible as it may seem, the receptionist at East Tennessee’s posh Inn at Blackberry Farm told me to “bring my own” if I wanted a cocktail before dinner—in 1997! The county was still dry just ten years ago.

Throughout my childhood, the faithful preached the “evils of drink” except for “whiskey-palians” who—horrors!—drank
wine
at communion. Not so the more evangelistic denominations who preferred Welch’s grape juice (and whose congregations included many a fine bootlegger).

When I was old enough to drink, the BYO (Bring Your Own) party was fashionable, but the booze had to be hidden in a brown bag in both car and restaurant. We’d order setups, sneak our brown-bagged bottles from underneath the table, then add as much bourbon, Jack Daniel’s, or Southern Comfort as we wanted.

Does this explain why southern appetizers run to rib-sticking meats, cheeses, and eggs? I’ve always thought so; they helped “line the stomach” and sop up the booze. With no opened liquor allowed in cars, people would polish off their bottles before driving back home.

Today mixed drinks can be bought in nearly every southern town, but the Southerner’s fondness for substantial appetizers persists.

What follow are such perennial favorites as barbecued meatballs, pickled shrimp, candied bacon, and boiled peanuts plus some of the truly innovative new appetizers I’ve enjoyed on recent travels about the South.

Burn off your infested cotton! Plant Peanuts!

—
GEORGE WASHINGTON CARVER

BROILED OYSTERS WITH TOASTED PECAN PESTO

MAKES
4
SERVINGS

A few years ago
Gourmet
magazine sent me south to profile “Little-Known Louisiana.” I’d visited New Orleans several times, also parts of Cajun Country, but I’d never spent time in the central and northern parishes (counties). Driving over from Mississippi, I entered the Felicianas or “English Louisiana.” First stop: St. Francisville, high on a bluff above the great river with antebellum mansions scattered about. At The Myrtles, said to be America’s “most haunted house,” I encountered no ghosts. But I did discover a fine little restaurant called Kean’s Carriage House. Among chef Tyler Kean’s spins on southern cooking was this imaginative appetizer.

Coarse or kosher salt for anchoring the oyster shells

¼ cup lightly toasted pecans (10 to 12 minutes in a 350° F. oven)

2 small garlic cloves

3 cups firmly packed fresh basil leaves

2½ tablespoons coarse dry bread crumbs

2½ tablespoons freshly grated Parmesan

2½ tablespoons water

2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice 2

½ tablespoons butter, at room temperature

2½ tablespoons fruity olive oil

16 oysters on the half shell

2 tablespoons finely julienned fresh basil leaves (optional garnish)

• 1.
  Preheat the broiler. Spread enough coarse salt in a large shallow roasting pan for a layer about ½ inch thick; set aside.
  
• 2.
  Whiz the pecans, garlic, basil leaves, bread crumbs, Parmesan, water, and lemon juice in a food processor or an electric blender at high speed until reduced to paste. Add the butter and olive oil and churn until smooth. Set the pecan pesto aside.
  
• 3.
  Carefully remove the oysters from their shells and reserve. Wash and dry the shells, then bed in the pan of salt.
  
• 4.
  Return the oysters to their shells, set in the broiler 3 inches from the heat, and broil for 4 minutes. Remove the pan from the broiler and spoon the reserved pesto over the oysters, dividing the total amount evenly. Return to the broiler and broil for 4 to 5 minutes or until bubbling and lightly browned.
  
• 5.
  Arrange four oysters on each of four heated small plates; garnish, if you like, with a little of the julienned basil, and serve hot as a first course.
  

PICKLED OYSTERS

MAKES
6
TO
8
SERVINGS

Pickled oysters are a cocktail favorite wherever oysters are fresh, plump, and flavorful, meaning most of the South. The hostesses I know like to mound them in small crystal bowls, top them off with a little of the pickling liquid, and pass with toothpicks so that guests can “go spear-fishing.” Though the red serranos add color, I suggest sprigging the bowl with fresh dill umbels or sprigs of Italian parsley. Come to think of it, small fennel umbels would also be attractive and appropriate. Note:
Because cooking clouds the oyster liquid, I pour it through a coffee filter–lined sieve directly onto the oysters and spices. Makes for a prettier presentation at serving time.

2 dozen shucked oysters of uniform size (not too large) in their liquid (about 1 quart or 2 pounds)

Two 1¾-inch red serrano peppers, stemmed and cut crosswise into thin slices

4 whole allspice

4 blades mace

½ cup cider vinegar

1 tablespoon sugar

1 teaspoon salt, or to taste

1 to 3 small fresh dill or fennel umbels or sprigs of Italian parsley (garnish)

• 1.
  Place the oysters and their liquid in a large nonreactive pan and set over moderately high heat just until the liquid begins to bubble. The minute the oysters’ skirts ruffle, adjust the heat so the liquid bubbles gently, and simmer 1 minute longer.
  
• 2.
  Using a slotted spoon, scoop up the oysters, rinse, then place in a small, deep, heatproof, nonreactive bowl or crock along with the serranos, allspice, and mace. Set aside.
  
• 3.
  Add the vinegar, sugar, and salt to the oyster liquid, bring to a boil over moderately high
  heat, reduce the heat so the mixture bubbles gently, and simmer uncovered for 1 minute. Line a sieve with a coffee filter and set it directly over the bowl of oysters; pour in the hot pickling liquid. Once the liquid has drained through, cool the oysters for 30 minutes, then cover and refrigerate for at least 24 hours.
  
• 4.
  To serve, lift the oysters, serrano slices, and spices to a small glass or crystal bowl using a slotted spoon, and top with 1 cup of the pickling liquid. Garnish with dill umbels and pass with cocktails.
  

The banquet succeeded: the ribs and choicest fat pieces of the bullocks, excellently well barbecued, were brought into the apartment of the public square, constructed and appointed for feasting; bowls and kettles of stewed flesh and broth were brought in for the next course, and with it a very singular dish, the traders call it tripe soup…The dish is greatly esteemed by the Indians.

—
WILLIAM BARTRAM
,
TRAVELS OF WILLIAM BARTRAM
,
DESCRIBING A BARBECUE IN THE ALACHUA INDIAN TOWN OF CUSCOWILLA
,
FLORIDA
, 1773

SHRIMP-STUFFED CHERRY TOMATOES

MAKES ABOUT
6
DOZEN

These popular hors d’oeuvre are easy, attractive, and accommodating because they can be made several hours ahead of time and refrigerated until serving time. It’s best to use cherry tomatoes the size of a Ping-Pong ball; smaller ones are difficult to stuff, larger ones messy to eat. Note:
The best implement to use for hollowing out cherry tomatoes is a melon baller no more than three-fourths of an inch in diameter. The easiest way to fill them is to squirt the shrimp mixture through a pastry bag; no metal tip is needed because the opening at the bottom of the bag is just
right.
Tip:
If you have a food processor, chunk the cheese, shrimp, and scallions and whiz in a food processor along with all remaining ingredients for about a minute or until smooth, scraping the work bowl at half-time.

4 pints cherry tomatoes of uniform size, washed and patted dry

One 8-ounce package light cream cheese (Neufchâtel), at room temperature

6 ounces shelled and deveined cooked shrimp, finely chopped (see Tip above)

2 large scallions, trimmed and finely chopped (white part only)

2 tablespoons mayonnaise (use “light,” if you like)

1½ tablespoons finely snipped fresh dill

2 teaspoons prepared horseradish

2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice

¼ teaspoon salt, or to taste

¼ teaspoon black pepper, or to taste

• 1.
  Using a sharp knife, slice ¼ inch off the stem end of each tomato, then remove a sliver from the bottom so that the tomato will stand straight without wobbling. Using a small melon baller no more than ¾ inch across or the smallest spoon of a measuring spoon set, scoop out the cherry tomatoes, leaving walls about
   
  /
  ₈
  inch thick. Discard what you’ve scooped out; it’s mostly seeds and water. Stand the cherry tomatoes upside down on a baking sheet lined with several thicknesses of paper toweling.
  
• 2.
  While the tomatoes drain, combine all filling ingredients in a small bowl, beating until smooth. Taste for salt and pepper and adjust as needed.
  Note:
  If you have a food processor, mix the filling as directed in the Tip given above.
  
• 3.
  Fold the top of a medium-size plastic pastry bag down about halfway, then spoon the filling into the bag. Smooth the top of the pastry bag back into place, then twist to seal and force the filling to the bottom. Turn the cherry tomatoes right side up.
  
• 4.
  Squirt the shrimp filling directly into the hollowed-out cherry tomatoes, swirling it up on top. Transfer the tomatoes to a second large baking sheet freshly lined with paper toweling, and set uncovered in the refrigerator until ready to serve.
  
• 5.
  Pass the shrimp-stuffed cherry tomatoes with cocktails or set out on a party buffet.