Viking Classic


Growing up in Hattiesburg, Miss. in the late 1960s and early 1970s I always looked forward to the Magnolia Classic.

The Magnolia Classic was a Professional Golf Association sanctioned event that was held in Hattiesburg every April opposite The Masters tournament in Augusta. Tom Watson and Nick Faldo played here but never won. Payne Stewart and Craig Stadler each won the tournament. Dwight Nevil won it twice.

Wednesday’s Magnolia Classic Pro-Am was an official school holiday in Hattiesburg. My friends and I worked as caddies to earn extra money. In its early days, the tournament attracted many celebrities. I watched Clint Eastwood try to hit a ball standing ankle deep in water on number 10. Robert Stack and Phil Harris played here. My friend Stan drove Jimmy Dean around with the task of keeping track of all of his jewelry.

Eastwood was only able to play a few holes. Female fans kept stealing his ball and eventually he called it quits.

I followed Glen Campbell around for a few holes and can remember being taken aback when he ducked into a Porta-Potty. At 10 years old I was amazed that celebrities actually used the restroom.

I remember in 1986— the last year I attended the Magnolia Classic— as the afternoon wound down and the day’s last groups were approaching the 18th green, someone busted out of the 19th Hole lounge yelling, “Jack Nicklaus just won the Masters! Jack Nicklaus just won the Masters!”

Eventually, the Magnolia Classic stopped booking high profile Pro-Am celebrities and the tournament moved to Jackson. It was sponsored by a bank and an insurance company. For me, it never held the appeal that those early days provided. These days I’m a cook, not a golfer.

In my absence the tournament has grown into a full-fledged, big-purse PGA event and is truly a feather in Mississippi’s cap. And to top it off, this year the Viking Range Corporation has stepped up to the plate as the title sponsor. And who said that food and golf were like chalk and cheese?

Mississippi Delta wunderkind Fred Carl, founder and CEO of the Viking Range Corporation has done it again. Viking is one of Mississippi’s premier industries and the one that I always brag about when dealing with people in New York and California. The marriage of these two great examples of what Mississippi has to offer makes perfect sense.

The tournament will feature plenty of golfing star power. John Daly, Steve Elkington, Jim Gallagher, Jr., and Davis Love III will be there. But leave it to Viking to bring out the culinary stars.

Viking has pitched a culinary tent on the Annandale grounds where chefs from all over the country will be performing demos for those who want to take a break from the action on the course (or for those who came to the event with a golf fanatic, but would rather eat).

Paula Deen’s sons, the Deen Brothers, will be performing a cooking demo, as will Mississippi’s own, Cat Cora, Food Network Iron Chef, and the Executive Chef at Bon Appetit’ magazine. A full list of the week’s chef demos can be found at http://www.vikingclassic.com/ .

Watercolor artist, Wyatt Waters and I will be hosting a dual demonstration at 1 p.m. on Sunday, the final day of the tournament. I’ll be preparing recipes from our soon-to-be-released cookbook, Southern Seasons, while Wyatt simultaneously paints a watercolor still life. I am not sure if we’ll have to whisper instructions to those in attendance, but I can’t wait to find out.


Caramel Brownies

Caramel

1 cup sugar
1/4 cup water

1 1/4 cup heavy whipping cream, heated

In a small, heavy duty saucepan, combine the sugar and water. Bring the mixture to a slow boil, stirring very often. Continue to cook until the mixture reaches a deep caramel color, about 10 minutes. As soon as this deep color is achieved, use a wire whisk and quickly stir in the warm cream. Return the caramel to a medium heat, and cook for 2-3 more minutes.

Remove keep warm while preparing the brownie batter.


Brownie Mix

6 ounces Unsweetened Chocolate
1 cup Unsalted Butter, cut into small cubes
1 cup All-Purpose Flour
1/4 cup Cocoa
1 tsp Double Acting Baking Powder
1/8 tsp Salt
4 large Eggs
2 1/2 cups Sugar
2 tsp Vanilla
1 1/2 cup Pecans, chopped (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees
Butter a 9x12 inch baking dish

In a small heavy saucepot, melt chocolate and butter over low heat. Stir constantly until the mixture is smooth. Remove from the heat and allow the mixture to cool completely.

Sift together flour, cocoa, baking powder and salt into a large bowl.

Using the whip attachment of an electric mixer beat the eggs on medium speed. While still beating, add the sugar, a little at a time, and continue to beat for 2-3 minutes until the mixture becomes thick and pale. Add in the chocolate mixture and vanilla and mix well. Add the flour mixture and blend well using a rubber spatula or wooden spoon. Stir in the chopped pecans.

Pour the batter into the prepared baking pan and smooth the top. Drizzle the caramel in rows lengthwise on top of the batter. Drag a pairing knife back and forth through the caramel lines. Bake the brownies for 25-30 minutes, or until the brownie pulls away slightly from the sides of the pan. Let brownies cool completely before cutting.

Yield:
16 brownies

Donald Duck Orange Juice


As I sat at the breakfast table this morning I stared at my glass of orange juice and contemplated the beverage’s evolution.

As a child, orange juice was kept in a small can in the freezer. One opened the can, dumped the syrupy, icy, orange clump into a pitcher, filled the empty can with tap water, added it to the pitcher, stirred, and orange juice was born.

I was born in an era just before major changes in food packaging were implemented. I am sandwiched between milk delivered in glass bottles on the back door steps and milk purchased in half-gallon paper cartons in a store. In those days all orange juice came in a can, just like chicken came on a bone.

For centuries— before freezers and concentrate cans— one had to squeeze his or her own orange juice, if there were fresh oranges available. That is still an option today, though I don’t imagine many people do it.

Upscale grocery stores have machines that mechanically squeeze fresh oranges while you wait. The quality, as always, depends on the quality of the oranges used. Occasionally the orange juice squeezed from one of those grocery store robot juicers tastes a little like orange rind. Bitter.

Today orange juice mostly comes in half-gallon cartons. There are many options available. As a kid I had two options in the morning— orange juice concentrate or no orange juice at all— today I can have orange juice with no pulp, orange juice with a small amount of pulp, orange juice with a lot of pulp, orange juice with calcium added, orange juice with less sugar, with fiber, low acid, heart healthy… you get the point.

Actually there were three orange juice options back in the day: orange juice, no orange juice, or Donald Duck orange juice. Option three— Donald Duck orange juice— was an option that was actually worse than not drinking orange juice at all. It was bad.

Donald Duck orange juice tasted like grapefruit juice. I hate grapefruit juice. For some reason, back in the 1940s, the Walt Disney Company gave a license to an orange juice manufacturer to use the likeness of one of their top cartoon characters, Donald Duck, for use in a new beverage. The company then proceeded to put bitter tasting grapefruit juice in a can and market it as orange juice. For a company that has licensed everything imaginable, it is their oldest surviving license still in existence

The cans of Donald Duck orange juice always looked rusted on the outside and the product inside always had a faint taste of the metallic can.

Question: If Donald Duck orange juice tastes like grapefruit juice. How awful does Donald Duck grapefruit juice taste?

My mom bought Donald Duck orange juice every once in a while. I am not sure why. The Sunflower grocery store always had plenty of frozen concentrate on hand.

As I sat staring at my orange juice this morning— orange juice, by the way, that had been poured from a paper carton (medium pulp) — I reflected back on my first experience with Donald Duck orange juice. I was around eight years old. I was eating sweet rolls prepared by my across the street neighbor. I had asked for milk (the perfect sweet roll accompaniment). My mother poured orange juice, and not just any orange juice, Donald Duck orange juice.

It was the first case of taste-bud shock I had ever encountered. Taste-bud shock is when one thinks he is drinking a particular beverage, and there is an entirely different beverage in the glass. For example, your taste buds are ready to taste milk, your brain is sending signals all over your body— here comes some cold, delicious milk. Except it’s not milk, it is orange juice. Immediately your taste buds panic and your brain goes into sensory overload.

In my inaugural bout with taste-bud shock, my taste buds were bombarded with Donald Duck orange juice when they were expecting milk. That is a third degree taste-bud shock, skipping two steps altogether and going from milk expectancy to something that tastes like canned grapefruit juice.

We switched to Tang after that. I hate Tang, too, but next to Donald Duck orange juice, Tang is nectar of the gods.

Before long, we switched back to frozen canned orange juice concentrate and that is where we stayed until I moved away from home.

In my twenties I drifted away from orange juice, and by the time I returned to the fold, orange juice was being sold in cartons.

Sometimes we get caught up in romanticizing the “good old days.” Folks, there are no “good old days” when it comes to orange juice. It’s better than ever.

Today I drink orange juice that comes from a carton. And I don’t even have to open the carton and make a paper pour spout out of the corners of the top of the carton. The good folks at the orange juice manufacturing plant have seen fit to put a small plastic screw top on the top side of my orange juice carton. I shake and pour. No can, no grapefruits, no rust, and no taste-bud shock— just sweet, slightly pulpy, Florida orange juice.


Barbara Jane Foote’s Super Summer Tea

6 Tea Bags (regular size, or 3 family sized)
2 qts Boiling Water
1 1 /2 cups Sugar
6 oz. Can Frozen Orange Juice Concentrate
6 oz. Can Frozen Lemonade Concentrate
6 oz. Pineapple juice
Handful Fresh Mint
1 /4 tsp Cinnamon
1 /8 tsp Ground Cloves

Pour boiling water over tea, mint, cinnamon and cloves. Steep for 20 minutes. Strain into a one-gallon pitcher. Add sugar, stir until dissolved. Add juices and stir well. Fill pitcher with ice. Can be served hot or cold.

Southbound


The restaurant business is full of chef/owners with atypical success stories.

The restaurant business is full of culinary twists on tried-and-true recipes.

The restaurant business is notorious for its 90-hour work weeks for owners who are willing to open on a shoestring and do what it takes— whatever it takes— to build a business.

The restaurant business is often responsible for preserving storied and historic buildings.

However, the restaurant business is not full of concepts or personalities which bring all of those components together in one time and in one place.

The California Sandwich Shop on Front Street in my hometown of Hattiesburg, Miss is probably the most historic and storied restaurant property within a 60-mile radius. For decades it operated in a small space across from the railroad station downtown. In 1996 it closed.

Several years, and a few failed restaurant attempts later, an atypical bagel baker came to town.
From a Greek immigrant to a Midwestern male model

A native of Iowa, Chris Hackbarth worked as a model on runways in New York and Milan before traveling to Hattiesburg to visit his homesick sister. The 24-year old immediately fell in love with the revitalized downtown area and logged on to the internet to find a potential investment property. The first business that popped up was a struggling bagel shop located in the building that formally housed the California Sandwich Shop.

Hackbarth purchased the business, moved his belongings from San Francisco into a loft apartment in downtown Hattiesburg, changed the name of the business to Southbound Bagel and Coffee Shop, and began doing the countless tasks that are involved in owning a business.

He had never worked in a restaurant or owned a business, but those were not his biggest challenges. Hackbarth had never made a bagel.

After several harrowing days and 500 pounds of dough later, the Southbound bagel was born.

I have never been a fan of bagels, though I love Southbound bagels. While having breakfast at Southbound the other morning, a friend walked by my table and said, “You know the bagels are good because the Yankees eat here.”

Hackbarth’s bagels are not the typical New York bagel. They’re slightly sweeter and a little lighter. In my opinion they are world-class and Hackbarth makes all 12 varieties from scratch every morning.

The breakfast menu offers several omelets, bagel sandwiches, lox, and rich coffee. The lunch menu offers several sandwiches using bread made from scratch in the tiny 400-square foot Southbound kitchen.

Actually, the limited space in the kitchen might be the reason that the bagels taste so good. Typically, bagel dough is boiled before being baked. A large boiler wouldn’t fit into Southbound’s tiny prep kitchen, so Hackbarth “made do” with a steamer.
The steamer might be the difference; Hackbarth thinks it’s the calcium content in the downtown water. Steam or calcium, either way, the Southbound bagel is not dense, and not bread like— it’s just good.

I am new to Southbound Bagel and Coffee Shop. A friend told me of a little café downtown that made great cinnamon rolls from scratch every Saturday morning. I thought it might be a great place to take my children. After eating a few bagels and a killer omelet, I was ashamed that it took me three years to discover the place. The kids and I decided to make our Southbound visit a Saturday morning tradition.

For the neophyte restaurateur who hit a homerun his first time at bat, the days have started to get a little shorter. “I get up at 5:30 in the morning instead of 3:30, like I did the first year,” Hackbarth says. Though that might change as the restaurant has started opening on Friday and Saturday nights from 8 p.m. to 3 a.m. to service the late-night bar business in the downtown area.

The restaurant business is filled with hard-working success stories. The Greek immigrants who traveled to the South in the early part of the 20th Century set a lofty precedent with super-human determination and work ethic. They opened places like The California Sandwich Shop and thousands of others.

The baton has been passed to another generation. One, I am happy to say, that employs the 100-hour a week work ethic of our culinary forefathers.

As a fellow restaurateur, an avid customer, and the father of two cinnamon roll-loving kids (not to mention the husband of a woman who loves world-class bagels) I am rooting for the long-term success of Southbound Bagel and Coffee Shop.



Gingerbread

1 stick unsalted butter 1 cup brown sugar 3 large eggs 2 cups all-purpose flour 2 tsp ground ginger 1 1 /2 teaspoons baking soda 1 tsp cinnamon 1 /2 teaspoon salt 1 /2 teaspoon ground cloves 1 /4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg 1 cup molasses 1 cup hard ciderApple Icing for Topping

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Grease a 13 by 9-inch cake pan and line with parchment paper that has been greased.

In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar. Beat in eggs one at a time. In a second bowl, sift together the flour, ginger, baking soda, cinnamon, salt, cloves, and nutmeg. In a third bowl, combine the molasses and hard cider and stir to dissolve. Add the dry ingredients and cider mixture alternately to the egg mixture, beating after the addition of each.
Pour into the prepared pan and bake until puffed and set, approximately 35 minutes.

Remove from the oven and let cool in the pan on a wire rack.

Cut into squares and top with Apple Icing.

Yield: 24 squares


Apple Icing

2 Tbl butter
1 cup apple, peeled, cut into small dice
1 /4 tsp cinnamon
1 /2 cup hard cider
1 1 /2 cup confectioner’s sugar

Melt the butter over medium heat and cook apples for five minutes, stir in cinnamon and cider and cook five more minutes until most of the liquid is cooked out. Remove from heat and stir in sugar. Cool completely before topping gingerbread.

Banana Fanna Fo Felvis

Elvis is alive… on candy wrappers.

I walked into a convenience store yesterday and ran into the King of Rock and Roll.

Immediately inside the front entrance of the store sat a huge display of a newly introduced candy: Collector’s Edition Reese’s Peanut Butter and Banana Crème cups—the Elvis edition.

The Elvis edition peanut butter cup has a photo of the King on the wrapper and a ribbon of banana-flavored filling inside the candy bar. The peanut butter-banana cup seemed to be something that Elvis might have liked. Impulsively, I grabbed one.

Elvis’ favorite food was a fried peanut butter and banana sandwich. Not the average meal fit for a king, but certainly fitting enough to be eaten in a jungle room outfitted with crush velvet furniture, shag carpeting, and the Memphis Mafia.

The photo on the candy wrapper was of the 1950s Elvis, not the late 1970s Elvis after he had eaten one-too-many peanut butter and banana sandwiches
I needed a drink to accompany the candy. I tried to think of what Elvis’ favorite beverage might have been but I had no clue. I narrowed my guesses down to a RC Cola or an Orange Crush. Ultimately, I thought that the orange flavoring might take away from the taste-testing of the banana and, since neither was in a small glass bottle, I opted for an RC.

Also, if I’m not mistaken, RC stands for Royal Crown, so it made perfect sense to purchase a royal beverage to accompany a candy featuring the King of Rock and Roll.

The chocolate-peanut-banana cup tasted mostly like a regular peanut butter cup except that there was a slight hint of banana flavor— similar to a banana popsicle.

A banana Popsicle doesn’t taste like a banana. It tastes like what the people at the Popsicle plant think a banana tastes like. The corporate chefs at Hershey, the parent company of Reese’s, must have been talking to the banana people at people at the Popsicle plant.

The Collector’s Edition Reese’s Peanut Butter and Banana Crème cup seemed like a candy that might have been initially conceived late at night on the Willie Nelson tour bus. It tasted like someone dipped a regular peanut butter cup into a glass filled with melted banana Popsicle juice. Realizing this, I came to the conclusion that Elvis would have loved the Collector’s Edition Reese’s cup.

Last year I filmed a television show at a place called Graceland Two in Holly Springs, Miss. Graceland Two is operated by a man who has dedicated his entire life to all things Elvis. For the purposes of the television program I had to do a cooking demo in the house. I prepared a fried peanut butter and banana sandwich.

The sandwich was surprisingly good. I cooked it as one would a grilled cheese sandwich. I was told that Elvis’ cook spread a lot of butter on the outside of his sandwiches. I opted for spray margarine which is what I use when I’m preparing grilled cheese sandwiches for my children.

I cooked the fried peanut butter and banana sandwich on a George Foreman Grill which wasn’t around when Elvis was alive. However, had the grill been around in the 1970s, I’ll bet Graceland would have had one in every room. George Foreman looks like he might have scarfed down a few fried peanut butter and banana sandwiches over the years.

The banana in the sandwich I prepared at Graceland Two tasted like banana, not like a Popsicle. The peanut butter I used was Reese’s. It is, in my opinion, the best-tasting peanut butter on the market.

I have heard that Elvis liked to add honey or bacon to his fried peanut butter and banana sandwiches. There is no word yet as to whether Hershey will be adding a Limited Edition bacon and banana-flavored peanut butter cup. Stay tuned.

S’more Squares

2 cups graham cracker crumbs
3 /4 cup melted butter
1 cup sugar

1 pound semisweet chocolate
1 /2 cup sugar1 1 /2 cups heavy whipping cream 1 1 /2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 jar Marshmallow Fluff (7 ounces)
3 cups marshmallows

For the crust:
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.

Spray the inside of a 9 x 13 inch baking sheet with non-stick cooking spray. In a bowl, combine graham cracker crumbs, sugar, and melted butter. Press mixture firmly into sprayed pie tin, covering bottom and sides.

Bake for 6 to 8 minutes. Set aside to cool.

For filling:
Combine chocolate, sugar and heavy whipping cream and melt in a double boiler. Stir until melted. Pour 2 /3 of the chocolate mixture onto the crust distributing it evenly. Set in refrigerator and allow this layer to harden while preparing the second layer.

For the second layer, add the Fluff to the remaining chocolate mixture and mix with an electric mixer until smooth. Pour this mixture on top of the firm chocolate layer and spread it out evenly.

Using a wet, sharp knife, cut the marshmallows into thin discs (three discs per marshmallow). Arrange the discs on top of the chocolate marshmallow layer. Place in the freezer for 24 hours.

After the squares have been frozen, brown the marshmallows underneath a hot broiler. Allow to cool once more.

Dip a sharp knife into hot water and carefully cut into squares.
Refrigerate at least 1 hour.
Yield: 24 squares

Diet Dilemma


I was walking from the restaurant to my office the other day and, out of the corner of my eye, caught a glimpse of C’est La Vie, the French bakery across the street.

The morning sun fell gently on the face of the bakery and a golden glow shone all about the building. Through the glimmering radiance I could have sworn I heard a heavenly choir of angels singing “Gloria” (not Van Morrison’s G-L-O-R-I-A Gloria, but the glory hallelujah-type ditty usually sung by a choir). The bakery was calling to me. My thoughts turned to pastry.

The custard-raisin croissant is a thing of simple beauty— butter, flour, milk, egg, and yeast. A touch of custard in the dough and the addition of raisins and cinnamon make it one of my favorite breakfast treats.

I continued to walk towards my office, ignoring the siren song of the heavenly choir. Approximately halfway across the parking lot, the diet angel and the diet devil instantly appeared— one on each shoulder— as they have many times before.

The diet devil spoke first, “Go over and get one of those custard-raisin croissants. You deserve it. Those scales in your bathroom are broken. There’s no way you weigh that much. Eat. Enjoy. Live.”

The diet angel chimed in saying, “Robert, you know those scales aren’t broken. If anything they are seven pounds off giving you a false sense of security. Croissants are loaded with butter and…”

“Don’t listen to him,” the diet devil interrupted. “He’d have you eating sunflower seeds and rice cakes all day. You’re a chef. Chefs aren’t supposed to be skinny. Eat one. Heck, eat two.”

“Skinny? Ha! You haven’t seen skinny since the Regan administration,” the diet angel replied. “Just go into your office and eat a protein bar.”

“A protein bar? You’ve got a world-class bakery across the street and you’re going to eat a protein bar?” said the diet devil. “I’ll bet they just pulled the custard-raisin croissants out of the oven. They’re probably warm enough to melt in your mouth.”

“Just think of how many extra miles you’ll have to walk to burn off those calories,” said the diet angel. “You’re gonna have to start shopping at the Big and Tall store again, and everyone knows you’re not tall.”

The diet angel won that battle, but the diet devil will live to fight another day (a potential rematch might be reconvened on my shoulders as early as this afternoon)

Lightheaded from a lack of substantive food, I sat at my desk and wondered how fate had dealt me such a terrible blow.

Why couldn’t a Frenchman have opened a bakery 97 steps (yes, I’ve counted them) away from my office when I was in my 20s? Back then, I could eat anything in site and not gain an ounce. When I opened my first restaurant, the people at the pizza delivery joint down the street from my house knew my name. I had a standing order when I got off work at midnight: a large pepperoni pizza and a two-liter Coke— all that and a 32-inch waist, too.

In those days I had the metabolism of a hummingbird.

In my early 30s, I could eat a seven-course meal at a fine-dining restaurant, and three hours later, eat a late-night breakfast at an all-night diner— all that and a 34-inch waist, too.

In those days I had the metabolism of a mountain goat.

By the time I reached 40 years old, my waist had expanded to an all-time high of 42 inches and my metabolism was like that of a pot-bellied pig.

Today, at 45, I purchase jeans with a 38-inch waist and am currently on my way back to 36’s (as long as the diet angel can keep me away from French pastries). My metabolism is like that of an average 45-year old mammal and I am learning to live with it

National Geographic Adventure magazine just published a list of America’s top 10 cities http://www.nationalgeographic.com/adventure/relocating/best-places-to-live-2007/index.html#cities. Along with Nashville, Austin, and Chicago, my hometown of Hattiesburg made the top ten list. These lists have been around for years, but this is the first time that Hattiesburg has shown up on list that didn’t feature retirement communities.

I don’t think that it’s a coincidence that the same year a French bakery opens in town; we land on a top-ten list. The quality of life is going up. My waist size is going down, and through it all, the heavenly choir of angels is still singing.


Miniature Banana-Nut Muffins

2 cups flour
3 /4 cups sugar
1 Tbl baking powder
1 /4 tsp salt
1 /2 tsp nutmeg
1 /2 cup toasted walnuts, chopped fine
1 egg
1 /2 cup whipping cream
1 medium sized mashed banana (about 1 cup)
1 /3 cup melted butter

Preheat oven to 350.

In one mixing bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, nutmeg, walnuts and salt.

In another bowl, blend the remaining ingredients together well. Fold wet ingredients into the dry. Do not over mix.

Fill non-stick miniature muffin tins 3 /4 full of the mix.

Bake for 14-16 minutes.

Yield: 24 miniature muffins

A Singular Culinary Career


New Orleans has many culinary icons. In the beginning there were Jean Galatoire, Arnaud Cazenave, and Antoine Alciatore. By mid century the Brennan family began to set up shop in North America’s Creole Capital. In the 1970s Warren LeRuth was on top and passed the torch to Paul Prudhomme who began his reign in the early 1980s. Emeril Lagasse opened his first restaurant in 1990, and John Besh brought us into the new millennium. All have left their mark on the Crescent City’s culinary scene.

Countless chefs have passed through the city’s kitchens over the last century. Some became famous and moved on, others stayed. Still others finished their careers as local heroes, or toiled in obscurity in the lesser known kitchens— a career sous chef or line cook— spending decades feeding tourists and locals alike.

Nationally known icons aside, the most knowledgeable culinary personality in New Orleans— the man who has met every chef, eaten every dish, knows the food, has cooked the food, has written about the food, and eventually made a living out of talking about the food, while witnessing every restaurant opening for the last 35 years— is not a chef or a restaurateur.

Tom Fitzmorris knows New Orleans and he knows food. Born on Mardi Gras, he wrote his first restaurant review in 1972, and has written at least one per week ever since.

As one who is responsible for 750 words per week, I am in awe of Fitzmorris, whose daily internet newsletter, The New Orleans Menu — over 4,000 words daily by my count— contains the most informative and up-to-date chronicling in and of one of the nation’s top food cities.

Fitzmorris is the foremost expert on the New Orleans restaurant scene. He is certainly the senior statesman of New Orleans’ food writers. This Creolized version of Craig Claiborne has written for several national publications, served as editor of quite a few local publications, but the strongest witness to his prolific journalistic output is the daily newsletter, The New Orleans Menu.

I began subscribing to The New Orleans Menu, http://www.nomenu.com/, over eight years ago. Each free issue includes a recipe, a restaurant review, a top-ten list (top ten New Orleans steakhouses, top ten places to eat oysters, top ten formal dining rooms, etc), and various musings on New Orleans food and restaurants. Whether you dine in New Orleans once a week or once a year, The New Orleans Menu is a great reference guide for the food, restaurant scene, and culture of New Orleans.

In addition to the newsletter, Fitzmorris has hosted a daily radio show since 1975. The Food Show airs live on WSMB 1350 AM between 2 and 5 p.m. Monday through Friday.

As if all of the newsletter writing, restaurant reviewing, and radio-show hosting wasn’t enough to fill his day, Tom Fitzmorris’s New Orleans Food, a cookbook that encompasses his life in the kitchen and at the table, was released last year.

Many New Orleans cookbooks are written by restaurant chefs who have converted their recipes for home use. Often, the original intent gets lost in the translation. Fitzmorris, not a classically trained chef but certainly an exceptional cook in his own right, developed each of the book’s 225 recipes in his home kitchen for use in home kitchens. They are spot on.

One wonders when Mr. Fitzmorris sleeps.

During the Katrina evacuation, Fitzmorris spent the longest period he had ever spent away from his native city. Though during his temporary relocation he continued to write about the city and the losses incurred during the aftermath. Within a matter of weeks the daily newsletter returned, and once again Fitzmorris, certainly an icon in his own right, was keeping track of the city’s restaurant rebirth.

Today, Tom Fitzmorris is the writer of record for connecting New Orleans’ culinary past to its future. In a time when longstanding family heirloom recipes were lost to the levees, Fitzmorris’s writings, recipes, and recollections carry the torch.

Most of the population living outside of the immediate New Orleans trade area knows the names Lagasse and Prudhomme, yet history might show that one of the most important culinary icons in the Crescent City is not a chef but a chronicler.



Crescent City Grill Seafood Gumbo

5 cups Shrimp stock
5 cups Chicken Stock
5 Gumbo Crabs
3 1/2 cups Tomatoes, diced with juice
2/3 cup Tomato Sauce
2 Tbl. Worcestershire
1 tsp. Black Pepper
2 Bay Leaves
2 1/2 tsp. Basil
1 tsp. Oregano
1 1/4 cup Corn Oil
1 1/2 cups Flour
2 cups Okra
3 cups Onion, medium dice
1 1/2 cup Celery, medium dice
1 cup Green Onion, chopped
1 cup Bell Pepper, medium dice
1/2 cup Parsley, chopped
3 Tbl. Garlic, minced
2 Tbl. Creole Seasoning
3 Tbl. Hot Sauce
2 lbs. Medium Shrimp, peeled
1 lb. Claw Crabmeat, picked of all shell
1 lb. Lump Crabmeat, picked of all shell
1 lb. Oysters, with juice

Bring first 10 ingredients to a boil. Reduce heat to a brisk simmer and continue to cook skimming the tomato-like foam from the top of the stock— one hour.

While the stock is simmering, make a dark roux using the corn oil and flour. To the roux add the okra stirring constantly. Once the okra is incorporated into the roux add the onion, celery, green onion, bell pepper, parsley, garlic, Creole seasoning and hot sauce stirring well to incorporate. At this point you should have something that resembles a black gooey mass. Add the shrimp and continue stirring until shrimp turn pink. Add the crabmeat and oysters.

Turn up the heat on the simmering stock. Transfer the seafood-roux mixture to the hot stock and stir until the roux is completely dissolved. Bring the stock to a boil once more and then reduce to a simmer.

Remove the Gumbo crabs and serve over rice.

Lawsuits Aplenty



A man in Morgantown, West Virginia is suing fast-food giant McDonald’s for $10 million because they put cheese on his hamburger.

According to a recent story in the Charleston Daily Mail, “The man says he bit into a hamburger and had a severe allergic reaction to the cheese melted on it. Jeromy Jackson, who is in his early 20s, says he clearly ordered two Quarter Pounders without cheese at the McDonald's restaurant in Star City before heading to Clarksburg.”

“His mother Trela Jackson and friend Andrew Ellifritz are parties to the lawsuit because they say they risked their lives rushing Jeromy to United Hospital Center in Clarksburg.”

According to the report, “the three drove to Clarksburg and started to eat the food in a darkened room where they were going to watch a movie, Houston said.”

Anyone who has ordered fast food at a drive-through window in the last 10 years knows to check their order at the window before pulling out of the line. There is a humorous scene in one of the Lethal Weapon films in which Joe Pesci delivers a profanity-filled rant about the high probability of having one’s order messed up when using the drive-through window. I am not sure what movie the threesome was planning to watch, but if they would have rented Lethal Weapon, they could have save a little pain and suffering.

Mr. Jackson must be the most lactose intolerant man on the planet. Actually, I didn’t even know that McDonald’s used real cheese on their hamburgers. I thought that they used one of those cheese-food type products.

In 1992, a lady received $2.9 million after spilling McDonald’s coffee in her lap. In 2002, two overweight girls sued the largest burger chain in the world claiming that McDonald’s food made them fat. Before long, McDonald’s will have to change their corporate symbol from golden aches to a huge bullseye.

Everyone is suing everyone else nowadays. Maybe I’ll find an open-minded judge, a few sympathetic jurors, a billboard lawyer, and sue some people, too.

In today’s legal climate I could have a field day. There are tons of people who have caused me irreparable harm over the course of my life. I’ll sue them all.

I will sue the Mattel toy company for using those evil twist-ties when packaging Barbie dolls requiring a mechanical engineering degree just to free Barbie from her box.

I will sue Led Zeppelin for the hearing loss I sustained while listening to their music with headphones on during high school. Add the Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd, and Van Halen to that list.

I will sue Sony because the clock on my DVD player is still blinking.

I will sue movie director, Martin Scorsese, for making movies so well that I have spent approximately 1,235 non-productive hours in a sedentary state— time which could have been spent in community service or in the pursuit of world peace— watching his films.

I will sue all of the major disco groups of the 1970s because I never learned to do the Hustle.

I will sue Bobby Brown for messing up the life and career of Whitney Houston, and then I’ll sue Whitney Houston for marrying Bobby Brown in the first place.

I’ll sue the makers of mousse hair gel, because I applied so much of it to my mullet-style haircut in 1986 that my hair began to fall out— a serious condition that continues to this day.

I will sue my wife for making my son and me sit through the movie version of the musical Hairspray. I will then sue John Travolta and the movie’s producers to have those 177 minutes of my life given back to me.

I will sue the producers of the TV show So You Think You Can Dance because, at one time in my life, I actually thought that I could dance. It turns out that I was terribly terribly wrong.

I will sue the makers of Milk Duds— $1 million for each silver amalgam filling in my mouth.

I will sue the makers of amalgam fillings because they allegedly lead to a loss of memory.

I had other lawsuits in mind, but I have forgotten them.

If a lady can get almost $3 million for coffee burns and a guy can get $10 million because they gave him cheese on his burger, I should certainly be entitled to a cash award for all of the horrible atrocities that I have been forced to endure over the course of my life.



Black and Blue Burger

3 pounds Ground Beef
1/3 cup Blackening Seasoning
1 Tbl Kosher Salt

1/2 pound Blue Cheese Crumbles

6 Hamburger Buns
1/4 cup Unsalted Butter, melted

6 Slices Red Onion
8-12 slices Ripe Tomato
2 cups Iceburg Lettuce, shredded

1 recipe Blue Cheese Dressing

Divide the ground beef into 6 equal parts and form 1-1/2-inch thick patties.

Sprinkle patties with the blackening seasoning and salt. Cook over direct high heat for 8-10 minutes for medium- medium well burgers (155-160 degrees). While the burgers are still on the grill, top with blue cheese crumbles dividing equally between burgers. Close the grill lid to melt blue cheese.

Brush the inside surfaces of the hamburger buns with the melted butter. Place on grill and cook over medium-direct heat for 2-3 minutes. Place burgers on the grilled buns and top with onion, tomato and lettuce. Serve the blue cheese dressing on the side

Yield: 6 burgers


Blue Cheese Dressing

1 cup mayonnaise
1/2 cup crumbled blue cheese
1/3 cup sour cream
3/4 cup half and half
1/2 tsp paprika
1 Tbl garlic powder
1 tsp Worcestershire Sauce
1/2 tsp white pepper

Use a wire whip to combine the mayonnaise, blue cheese, sour cream and half and half in a stainless steel bowl. Mix these ingredients together thoroughly and then add the remaining ingredients and blend together. Refrigerate until needed. Best if made a day in advance.

Yield:
2 1/2 cups

From Sausage Gravy to Snails



In Georgia, on the border of North Carolina, sits a restaurant and inn that has been serving great home-cooked meals since 1917.

I discovered The Dillard House several years ago on the recommendation of a former classmate. I have returned every year since, when my friends and I gather for our annual whitewater rafting trip.

The Dillard House is located in Dillard, Georgia, a town settled in 1794, when an officer who served in the American Revolution, Captain John Dillard, was awarded a land grant of 1,000 acres. The Dillard House offers cottages, chalets, and very nice hotel rooms. It has horseback riding, swimming, tennis, trout fishing, and even a small petting zoo for children. But where the Dillard House shines is in the kitchen. The Dillard House is all about food.

Throw me in the briar patch.

People travel great distances to eat at The Dillard House. In a town of 198 people, the Dillard House serves over 1,200 hungry diners for Sunday lunch, alone.

The dining room at The Dillard House is expansive, with huge windows overlooking a beautiful valley nestled among the Blue Ridge Mountains. The restaurant is large and comfortable and as casual as the food that is served.

Posted at the entrance is a large menu which changes with each meal period. A dinner menu might read: Fried chicken, baked chicken, country-fried steak, country ham, bbq chicken, fried corn, tomatoes, potatoes au gratin, peas, cole slaw, butter beans, fried okra, fruit, rolls, cornbread, and peach cobbler with ice cream.

Once your party is seated, a server approaches the table and says, “Welcome to the Dillard House. Have you dined with us before?” I have, several times, but I always say no just so I can hear the next line in the servers pitch.

“Did you see the menu out front?” he says.“Yes,” I say.

“We’re about to bring it to you.”

I love that. My guests are always stunned. They bring the entire menu to your table within minutes of being seated.

The restaurant is a family style restaurant. Trust me. If you’re going to pick a family with whom to eat family-style food, the Dillards should be at the top of the list.

On a recent breakfast visit, the menu consisted of eggs, grits, pancakes, cottage fries, sausage (link and patty), sausage gravy, bacon, country ham, red eye gravy, pork tenderloin, baked apples, blueberry muffins, buttermilk biscuits, cinnamon rolls, and sliced fruit, all for $14.95.

The meals arrive in large serving bowls, and when they are emptied, they are refilled until you throw in the towel (or the napkin, in this case).

The food is good. The menu claims that many of the vegetables are locally grown. They must be doing something right; Southern Living magazine has listed The Dillard House as the South’s “Favorite Family Restaurant for Country Style Cooking” in its Reader’s Choice Awards for the last 10 years.

While in the area, I traveled 14 miles north to Highlands, NC, where I ate one of the finer Italian meals I have eaten in a long time. Ristorate Paoletti has been in business for 54 years on Main Street in Highlands. The wine list is extensive, the room is dark and crowded, and the food is excellent.

It’s been at least a decade since I have eaten escargot— the fine-dining staple of the 1950s— but as I was dipping my bread in to the last remaining pool of the herb-scented butter remaining in the bottom of the Escargot alla Bourguignonne dish, I wondered why.

The wine-laden, garlic-spiked herbed butter that remained in the snail dish was so good that I abandoned the marinara served with the calamari and resorted to dipping my fried squid into the escargot butter.

Fresh figs wrapped in prosciutto and finished with a balsamic reduction is another staple that has been done and overdone throughout the years. Though left in the hands of the kitchen crew at Ristorate Paoletti, it was taken to another level.

Our group ordered several pasta dishes, all of which were well above average. But the hit of the evening was a risotto feature with grilled lobster, scallops, and shrimp. It was rich and creamy, and the grilled lobster added the perfect texture contrast to the rice.

Highlands is a quaint resort town with mid-century charm, no crowds, and great restaurants and shops. It sits in stark contrast to Dillard, just 14 miles south at the base of the mountain.

Two distinct towns, two distinct restaurants, two distinct attitudes, all in one geographic area, Dillard and Highlands are a great escape— all this and rafting, too.

Lasagna with Spinach

1 Tbl Olive oil
2 Tbl Garlic, minced
1 10-oz package Spinach, frozen, then thawed and excess moisture squeezed out
1 10-oz package Spinach, fresh, cleaned and roughly chopped
1 /2 tsp Salt

2 Eggs
15 oz Ricotta cheese
1 cup Romano cheese, shredded
1 1 /2 tsp Black pepper
1 1 /2 tsp Salt

12 Lasagna sheets, cooked until al dente in boiling salted water
2 cups Mozzarella, shredded
1 recipe Tomato Sauce (recipe below)

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

In a large skillet, heat olive oil over medium heat. Sauté garlic for 30 seconds, add fresh spinach and cook until wilted. Season with salt. Add drained spinach and set aside. In a mixing bowl, combine the ricotta cheese, Romano cheese, eggs, salt and pepper. Stir well.

Ladle two cups of tomato sauce into a three-quart baking dish. Place a layer of three pasta sheets on the sauce and top with half of the ricotta mixture. Spread half of the sautéed spinach on the ricotta mixture. Lay down another layer of pasta sheets and top with two cups of sauce. Spread out evenly. Sprinkle the sauce with half of the mozzarella cheese. Repeat these two steps again. Cover the baking dish tightly first with plastic wrap and then foil. (The plastic will not melt. It will prevent the cheese from sticking to the bottom of the foil). Bake covered for 1 hour. Remove foil and plastic and bake for an additional 10 minutes. Allow lasagna to set 20 minutes before serving. Spoon the remaining sauce on top of lasagna just before serving. Yield: 8-12 servings


Tomato Sauce

1 /4 cup Olive oil
2 cups Onion, small dice
2 cups Carrots, shredded
1 /3 cup Garlic, minced
2 tsp Basil, dry
1 tsp Oregano, dry
2 Bay leaves
2 tsp Salt
2 tsp Black pepper, fresh ground
6 oz can Tomato paste
2-28 oz cans Tomatoes, diced
28 oz can Tomatoes, crushed
1 1 /2 cups Water
1 tsp Balsamic vinegar

In a large heavy duty saucepot, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add onions, carrots and garlic. Cook vegetables 10 minutes stirring often. Add herbs and tomato paste and cook for five to six minutes (This helps to caramelize the tomato paste resulting in a sweeter tomato sauce). Add remaining tomato products and the water. Turn heat to low (very low). Allow sauce to cook for 3 1 /2 hours, stirring often. Add vinegar. Yield: approximately three quarts.

Sauce is best after two or three days in the refrigerator. Sauce freezes well.

Fireworks and Food Foibles



One of the benefits of being a writer is that I am always on the receiving end of humorous and informative stories reported to me by the people I meet.

Last week I heard one of the best yet. A friend of a friend was recounting a recent Fourth of July meal with his family. His grandmother, a spry 93-year old, picked up a small box of bang snaps— the small firecrackers that are wrapped in paper and explode when thrown on the ground— and popped a few of the firecrackers into her mouth thinking that they were candy.

I am not sure if they exploded when she bit down on them or not, but the young man recalling the story told of a puzzled look on her face as smoke drifted out of her mouth while sitting at the dinner table. Luckily, she wasn’t harmed and apparently laughed it off. Others in attendance were witness to a story that will certainly be told, retold, and added to the file of ancestral remembrances that are recounted every time the family gets together, and certainly every Fourth of July.

The story reminded me of my brother’s wedding, 28 years ago this month. At the time, the practice of throwing rice at weddings was beginning to go out of style. Apparently the wedding rice was being eaten by birds creating intestinal problems. This was the first wedding I attended that offered bird seed to throw at the bride and groom as they made their escape.

The wedding reception was held at the bride’s home. Small bowls of bird seed were placed around the front door so guests could grab a handful when the newlyweds made their exit. At one point during the reception, I rounded a corner to find my grandmother, a very prim and proper Southern lady, popping handfuls of bird seed into her mouth. Well into her eighties at the time, and possessing all of her teeth, she smiled politely as she crunched and chomped the bird seed. When I told her that bowls were not filled with nut-like hors d’oeuvres for eating, but a rice substitute to hurl at the newlyweds, she looked confused and relieved all at once.

I could tell that she had been wondering why the people in that town ate such strange food. Minutes later, I found my uncle doing the same thing.

Families are full of these stories. They happen all of the time, most of the time when a group is gathered together and sharing food and/or drink. Through the years, we relive them often.

One Christmas Eve, my inebriated septuagenarian aunt did the jitterbug on my mother’s coffee table. It embarrassed all of the grown-ups in the family, but we kids have been repeating the story ever since.

As a child, my wife tried to reheat pizza in a pop-up toaster, which, as a story, is not quite as popular as the time she put her entire hand in the toaster. Her father reminds us of these childhood blunders often, and we remind him of the tamale surprise he once cooked for a Thanksgiving meal.

Fortunately, these types of family-food legends are being told less and less through the years. Not because people have tired0 of telling them, but as my children grow older, they create stories with each passing day. Stories that we will certainly tell and retell embarrassing them often, especially in front of company as our parents did before us, and their parents did before them.

What have we learned today?
1.) Be careful what you do at family gatherings unless you want your foibles to be relived and retold ad infinitum.
2.) Throwing rice at weddings is for the birds.
3.) Old people will put almost anything into their mouths
4.) Fireworks and grandparents don’t mix.



Apricot Casserole

3 16-ounce cans apricot halves, lightly drained
1 cup light brown sugar
1 stick unsalted butter, cut into pats
1 1/2 sleeves Ritz crackers, crushed into small pieces almost to crumb state

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Grease a 2 1/2-quart casserole dish. Using a bowl, crush the apricot halves between your fingers. Add the brown sugar and Ritz crackers and mix well. Pour mixture into the casserole dish and dot with the butter pats. Serve as a side item to accompany an entrée, just as you would a vegetable like asparagus or broccoli.

Yield: 8–10 servings

Food For Thought



“If I was a doughnut, I‘d eat myself.”

Those words were spoken by my six-year old son as I sat watching him eat doughnuts yesterday. Our family talks about food a lot. My daughter talks about what we should have for supper while we are eating lunch. It’s genetic.

“Daddy, Jesus is like a doughnut hole.”

“How is that, son?”

“Well, a heart is like a doughnut. It can have a hole in it. But Jesus is like a doughnut hole. He can fill the hole in your heart.”

No seminary necessary, just one year of kindergarten. How could I argue with that? It’s doughnut logic. I am not sure if they are teaching food-related Sunday school lessons at our church, but the sugar-fueled religious philosophy is getting through in the First United Church of Krispy Kreme.

Many of the world’s problems are being solved over newsprint, coffee, and a few dozen glazed, every morning in doughnut shops all across the country. It’s the same with my family.

I guess it’s mostly my fault that a lot of my family’s thoughts and plans are centered around food, though it is food that often brings families together.

A few years ago I wrote a column about the five tenets I have tried to incorporate into my daily life— faith, family, friends, food, and fun, in that order. My wife and I have structured our parenting philosophy around those principles.

When I speak to large groups or associations, I always cover the Five Fs, one-by-one, in great detail. When I reach the food part, people tend to chuckle. But food is serious stuff. I am not talking about treating food seriously as so many of the stuffy food scholars and historians do, but the simple process of sharing a meal with family and friends. That, my friends, is a dwindling ritual that is seriously needed.

As a society we have gotten too used to pulling up to a drive-through window, picking up a paper sack of food, taking it home, and eating it on a TV tray in front of the TV. That’s not supper.

When I was growing up, moms came to back doors and yelled, “Supper,” and everyone ran to the dinner table. Today a mom yells “Supper” from the back door and everyone hops into the mini van.

We have lost something through the years. For my family, the simple process of sitting down— television off— and sharing a meal is one of the most important parts of our day. In addition to being able to share our outlook and experiences with our children, we get to listen.

Listening within families is underrated. There is so much to hear, from serious cases of schoolyard drama and hiccups in the social interaction process to statements such as, “Daddy, do you want to feel my booty muscles?”

“No, son, I do not.”

Three years ago I began writing down a lot of the things my children were saying with the intent of publishing a book. The most recent entry: “What time is eight-seven-central?”

Of the seven books I have written so far, this would be the only one that wrote itself. Many of the quotes are about food, some are just food related.

My wife was walking through the grocery store the other day and turned down an aisle just in time to see our son approach a perfect stranger, “Hey, do you want to smell my nose air?” he asked, as he tilted his head back and quietly blew air out of his nostrils. Seconds earlier, he had sprayed Febreze air freshener directly into his nose. Funny enough, his dry, exhaled “nose air” did smell like lavender and vanilla.

Now if I could just come up with some food-related advice that would make him wear underwear.



Shrimp Harrison

2 lbs. 21-25 Shrimp, peeled and deveined
1 tsp Kosher Salt
1 tsp Old Bay Seasoning
1/2 tsp Black Pepper, freshly ground
3 TBSP Olive Oil
2 cups Mushrooms, sliced
1 1/2 tsp Garlic, minced
1/2 cup White Wine
1 Tbl White Vinegar
1/4 cup Chicken Broth
1 cup Caramelized Onions
3/4 cup Unsalted Butter, cut into small cubes
2 Tbl Parsley. Freshly chopped

1 Recipe Really Rich Grits

Season the shrimp with the salt, Old Bay Seasoning and black pepper.

Place the olive oil in a large, heavy duty sauté pan over high heat. Heat the oil until it just begins to smoke. Carefully place the shrimp in the smoking hot pan. Allow the shrimp to cook without moving them for 2-3 minutes. Add the mushrooms and garlic and cook for 5 minutes. Using a slotted spoon, remove the shrimp and hold them in a warm place.

To the shrimp skillet, add the white wine and vinegar and reduce until there is almost no liquid remaining. Add in the chicken broth and cook until only one tablespoon remains. Add the butter cubes and stir constantly until butter has dissolved, being careful not to cook too long (if you cook it too long at this stage, the butter will separate).

Add the caramelized onions and warm shrimp back into the pan and stir so that the sauce coats the shrimp. Remove from heat and stir in parsley.

Place 3/4 cup of cooked grits into each serving dish, top the grits with the shrimp and serve immediately.

Yield: 8-10 servings


Caramelized Onions*

2 Tbl Unsalted Butter
3 cups Yellow Onion, thinly slice
1 tsp Kosher Salt

Melt butter over medium-low heat in a large sauté pan. Add onions and salt to the melted butter. Cook onions for 15-20 minutes, stirring them often to prevent burning. The onions should continue cooking until a rich brown color is obtained.



Really Rich Grits

1 quart heavy whipping cream
1 cup grits
2 tsp salt
1 tsp black pepper
1 bay leaf
1/2 cup unsalted butter cut into cubes
1 cup parmesan cheese, grated

Preheat oven to 275 degrees

Stir together the cream, grits, salt pepper and bay leaf.
Place the mixture in an oven proof baking dish and cover. Bake for2 1/3-3 hours, stirring every 30 minutes.

Once the grits are soft and creamy, stir in the butter cubes and parmesan cheese. Serve immediately.

Icees, Bikes, and Brain Freezes



Over the past few weeks my family has been catching up on movies, sometimes seeing two films in one day.

I love movies. As a matter of fact, the two things I love most about owning my own business are— getting to wear whatever I want to work (no neckties, ever), and being able to see a matinee in the middle of the day.

During the summer we bring our children to matinees, and lately, I have devised an effective method that turns the average movie visit into a well-oiled and precise system of which puts us in our seats just as the previews start.

After parking, I go to the ticket counter to purchase tickets. My wife flanks me and— with the kids in tow— heads immediately for the concession stand line. Once I arrive with the tickets, I replace her in line and she and the children find our seats (first row above the walkway in front of the rail). Fast, efficient, effective.

Our concession order is the same every time— a large Diet Coke for me, water for my wife, a small popcorn for the family to share, Milk Duds for me, an orange drink for the girl and a cola-flavored Icee for the boy.

Yesterday, as I was making my way to our seats carrying all of the concession-stand booty, I took a sip of my son’s Icee. I hadn’t had an Icee in years. It was good. I took another sip and another. I was instantly transformed to the hot summers of my youth, riding my Schwinn bicycle around the Hillendale neighborhood of my hometown, Hattiesburg, Miss. I took another sip, this time a bigger and longer one. By the time I reached our seats the Icee was half gone and I had a brain freeze.

My son took one look at his Icee (or what was left of it) and sent me back to the concession stand.

I purchased most of the Icees of my youth at a convenience store called The Minit Mart. It was the junk-food capital of our neighborhood and the central meeting place for both bicycling kids and teenagers with drivers licenses. The Minit Mart was made famous in a Jimmy Buffet song that told a story of the composer and his friends— during their college days at the University of Southern Mississippi— utilizing a five-finger discount with peanut butter and sardines. In the song, the name was changed to “Mini Mart” I assume to protect the not-so innocent.

Icees were a great portable drink. In those days most soft drinks came in glass bottles, not the safest vessels to be drinking while riding a bicycle. An Icee— cold and sweet— was served in a paper cup with a long stroon.

A stroon is a half straw/half spoon that could be used for slurping and spooning in alternate steps. I always felt the stroon was included to prevent brain freeze. If one slowly spoons their Icee into their mouth the chances of a full-scale brain freeze decreases dramatically, though most kids still sucked Icees through a straw, quickly delivering the cool sugary liquid to the stomach, and consequently a burning freeze to the brain.

The brain freeze, sometimes known as an ice cream headache, is a medical phenomenon that, according to my research (read: 10 minutes on Google) has no medical explanation. I never knew anyone who could get through a hot Mississippi summer without contracting at least one severe, but quickly dissipating, case of brain freeze. A fan of Icees would deal with the brain freeze almost every time he or she drank one.

Sno-cones were summer treats, but they always seemed more like ice cream than a beverage. Cokes in the little bottles were good, but only when stationary, and in those days not many days or nights were spent in a stationary position.

As adults we stop doing things that we did daily as kids— rolling in the grass for no reason, running so long and so hard that it took several minutes to regain your breath, and not on a treadmill or stair climber but in the schoolyard and through the woods. We rode bikes and played board games, and tackle football in friend’s front yards, and we drank Icees.

Today a gynecology clinic stands where the Minit Mart did, we don’t roll in the grass for fear of staining our clothes, and bicycles mostly stay parked. We have turned into calorie counters and self-appointed food police. We have traded in our Icees for fruit smoothies and we might just be the lesser for it.











Chocolate Pie

1 cup plus 2 Tbl. Sugar
3 /4 cups Heavy cream
3 /4 cups Buttermilk
3 1 /2 Tbl Cornstarch
Pinch Salt
4 Egg yolks, reserve whites for meringue
3 ounces Semisweet chocolate, high quality
1 Tbl Butter
3 /4 tsp Vanilla
1 (9-inch) Pie Crust, baked

In a small saucepan combine the sugar, heavy cream, buttermilk, cornstarch and salt and whisk until smooth. Place over medium-high heat, and bring to a boil, whisking from time to time, allowing the sugar and cornstarch to dissolve and the mixture to thicken (about five minutes). Continue cooking at a low boil for an additional five minutes, whisking constantly.

In a mixing bowl, beat egg yolks lightly. Pour 1 /2 cup of the hot mixture into the egg yolks and whisk thoroughly. Pour the egg yolk mixture into the saucepan and whisk over the heat until thoroughly combined (about 30 seconds).

Pour mixture into a mixing bowl, and whisk in the chocolate, butter and vanilla. Continue whisking until thoroughly combined (mixture will be very thick). Pour the chocolate batter into the prepared pie crust. Prepare the meringue and spread over the pie and bake at 350 until golden, about 8-10 minutes. Allow pie to cool completely before serving (refrigerate at least four hours). Yield: eight slices



Meringue:

4 Egg whites
6 TBSP Sugar
1 /2 tsp Cream of tartar

Beat the egg whites with an electric mixer. When they start to increase in volume, add in the sugar and cream of tartar. Continue to beat until stiff peaks form.

Ratatouille


This weekend I took my children to see the new Disney/Pixar film, Ratatouille. It’s about France’s greatest chef—a rat.

The food in the animated feature looks good enough to eat. A majority of the movie takes place in a French restaurant kitchen and most of the main characters, sans the rat and his family, are chefs.

In a few weeks, Catherine Zeta Jones will be starring in a new movie in which she plays a chef. From the previews, it appears that she’s in love with another chef.

Restaurants, chefs, and food have never been more popular than they are today.

When I was a kid Walt Disney movies were about parentless baby deer, dogs, and Volkswagens that had minds of their own. The closest Disney came to a culinary theme was an Italian restaurant scene in Lady and the Tramp in which two dogs eat a plate of spaghetti.

I have two friends who don’t let their children watch any mainstream television. Their children are 10, eight, and three-years old. They watch The Food Network. And when I say they watch The Food Network, I mean they watch the Food Network exclusively. It’s the only thing that’s program on in their home.

Today’s kids know the chefs, they know their restaurants, and they know their personal histories. Consequently, they know a lot about food, much more than I did in my late teens and early 20s.

The Food Network is miles ahead of the television of my youth with three channels and eventually PBS in the late 1960s. PBS is the only place I remember seeing cooking on television. Julia Child and Justin Wilson were the early pioneers.

American food has come a long way in a short time, due in part to Julia Child and James Beard on television and Alice Waters at Chez Panisse in Berkley. Up until the late 1970s, the only “serious” food was French food, and “serious” chefs were French chefs. All of the serious American restaurants were French themed.

Today, some of the world’s greatest chefs are Americans who cook fresh, regional, and seasonal cuisine. As it has been for years in Italy and France, culinary regionalism is the order of the day. Today’s American cuisine is fresh, local, broad, and complex, from California cuisine, Southwestern, Tex-Mex, Southern, Cajun, and Creole, to the Northeastern region, Midwest, Florida, Carolina barbeque, Texas barbeque, and the list goes on.

In our restaurants and in our homes, we have become more aware of what we put in our bodies. Due to busy schedules and two-income families, eating out is more popular than ever— good news for restaurateurs, not-so-good news for the family dinner table.
Several times each month I speak to junior high or high school students about careers in the restaurant business or culinary arts. They see chefs on television and they want to open restaurants.

Food is “in.” When I opened my first restaurant in 1987, goat cheese and fresh herbs were special-order items from my food supplier. I fielded questions from customers such as, “What are shiitake mushrooms?” These days I can purchase micro greens grown in California and have them flown in the next day.

In the fine dining kitchens of the 21st century Americans, eat mostly fresh and local food instead of complicated and overwrought French classical dishes. We have countless web sites and blogs that discuss food to the nth degree. We have come from a rudimentarily animated bowl of spaghetti in Lady and the Tramp to truffles and foie gras that appear as authentic as the real thing on Ratatouille.

For those of us who love food, things are looking up, and the future is looking tastier everyday.



Robert’s Ratatouille

1/2 cup good quality extra virgin olive oil
3/4 cup yellow onion, medium dice
2 tablespoons garlic, minced
1 1/2 cups yellow squash, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
1 1/2 cups zucchini, cut into 1/2-inc cubes
1 1/2 cups eggplant, salted, rinsed, and cut into 1/2-inch cubes
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup red peppers, medium dice
2 teaspoons Crescent City Grill Creole Seasoning
1 1/2 cups Tomato Concasse
1/4 cup white wine
3/4 cup fresh basil, chopped fine (do not substitute dried)

In a sauté pan over medium high heat, sweat onion in olive oil. Add garlic. Add squash, zucchini, eggplant, salt, and pepper and cook until vegetables become al dente. Add tomato concasse and cook for two-three minutes. Add Creole Seasoning and deglaze with wine. Cook for two minutes. Add basil just before serving.
Yield: 6–8 servings

© Robert St.John 2002 from the cookbook A Southern Palate by Robert St.John illustrated by Wyatt Waters, Different Drummer Press