pretty by the bay

Most of my childhood was spent in the Midwest, but I moved to North Carolina when I was 15 and stayed until I was 28. Those formative years yielded a deep appreciation for Southern cuisine, and now that I live on the west coast I often lament the fact that authentic country delicacies are hard to find in my new environment. When California restaurants tackle Southern food, they turn simple fare into (unnecessarily) fancy and overpriced haute cuisine. I don’t like paying exorbitant prices for fried chicken, collard greens and mashed potatoes. I don’t care if it’s all organic and cooked with fancy spices and oils. I just want it to taste real, and I want it to taste good!

Foodbuzz 24×24 offered an opportunity to cook some Southern classics for my San Francisco friends. Some of these friends are just like me: Southern transplants in need of good home cooking. Others are native Californians who don’t know the important difference between grits and polenta. I couldn’t promise that my efforts would be as tasty as an established country grandma’s, but I could guarantee that we’d all have a good time and enjoy food not normally found in a California kitchen. My goal for this meal was to experiment with recipes, ingredients and techniques that were completely new to me. It would have been easier to fall back on my reliable recipes for NC pulled pork, cole slaw and baked beans, but I wanted to reach beyond my comfort zone and try a full repertoire of country classics.

First up: one of the dishes that scared me the most…collard greens. Done well, they’re tender and smoky with a subtle tang. Done poorly, they’re mushy and gritty and gross. I armed myself with a fabulous recipe (from this cookbook), a fabulous flavoring agent (ham hocks, where have you been all my life?!), and a fabulous friend, Leslie, who is ten times the Southern belle I could ever hope to be.

After an hour or two on the stove, that massive pile of collards cooked down in a salty broth filled with dark, tender greens and meat that fell right off the bones of the ham hock. No gritty, mushy collards here; these were nicely flavored with a bit of heat coming from a few teaspoons of crushed red pepper flakes.

My second challenge: buttermilk biscuits. I was instantly terrified when my mother (who I consider an expert baker) told me that even her biscuits turn out like hockey pucks. Biscuits, like pie crust, are temperamental, becoming tough and tasteless if you overmix or overhandle the dough. Since my own mother couldn’t weigh in with a great recipe, I consulted a real Southern mama named Valerie, who – according to her daughter – has been making wonderful biscuits for most of her life. The recipe was simple, with self-rising flour, buttermilk, baking powder, and the power combo of butter and Crisco. Mix, roll, cut and bake. Easy, right?

Turns out it’s not that simple. I think I rolled the dough a bit too thin, because these were laughably small. Maybe you can’t tell from this aerial view…

…but this side-by-side comparison with Pillsbury biscuits really shows how tiny mine were. (Yes, I had bake and serve biscuits as a backup. My mama didn’t raise no fool!)

Does size matter? Probably not. These tasted pretty good, and they weren’t hard or tough, so I guess that’s the most important thing. My friends pointed out that two mini biscuits were perfect stackers for a ham sandwich.

After tackling the biscuits and collards, I felt more comfortable with the remaining dishes, which were still outside my comfort zone but not nearly as stressful to make.

Hushpuppies - fried, buttered (or ketchuped) and happily consumed as a pre-dinner appetizer. Rather than making these from scratch, I used a mix imported from Oak Ridge, NC. They were oniony and sweet, just as a hushpuppy should be.

Chicken and dumplings, made the North Carolina way. These are not biscuity dumplings; rather, they’re noodle-like pastry thrown into simmering chicken broth and cooked until tender and puffy. You can add veggies if you wish, but most traditional recipes are a simple combination of broth, chicken and the dumplings themselves. It’s little more than a basic chicken soup, but it still feels special.

Creamed corn, made under the capable hand of my friend Melissa. The combination of sweet, fresh corn with butter and half and half made this dish part vegetable, part dessert. It was absolute heaven and a far cry from any canned version.

Hoppin’ John, a salty combination of field peas, bacon, crushed tomatoes and long grain rice. I made this dish in advance and reheated it before dinner. This dried it out a bit, which was somewhat disappointing, but the flavors were nice.

And to accompany the aforementioned biscuits, a true Southern classic – country ham. You can’t find country ham outside the south, but through the magic of mail order, I procured one for this special occasion. We couldn’t be prouder of our little bundle of pork.

Country ham is distinguished by a strong salty flavor. As my friend Leslie aptly pointed out, some are so salty that they make you hurt. This one was pleasantly mild, but still offered that traditional briney twang. We brought it to room temperature, sliced it and served it as-is, with the option to add it to a  buttered biscuit.

All of the above was washed down with two bonafide Southern beverages: sweet tea, expertly prepared by Leslie…

…and Cheerwine, a cherry soda bottled in Salisbury, NC. Corey recalls a moment in his childhood when he visited family in West Virginia and was shocked to learn that this sweet nectar isn’t widely available outside North Carolina. It’s a true regional beverage, delicious on its own or mixed with a bit of gin, lime and club soda.

No Southern meal is complete without dessert, and our menu included two classics. Banana pudding (made by Melissa using this recipe, but with half the sweetened condensed milk and only 2.5 cups regular milk):

And Red Velvet Cake, made by me using this recipe:

The cake looked impressive – gorgeous color, perfect cream cheese frosting – but the taste was a bit lackluster. Maybe it was still too cold from being in the fridge overnight. Maybe I overbaked it. Maybe red velvet cake just isn’t that awesome. I was bummed about the final product, but instantly felt better after a few bites of Melissa’s banana pudding. That woman may hail from  Vermont, but she does the South proud with her ‘nana puddin!

As we gathered around the table to fill our plates, I was reminded of the thing I love most about Southern meals: they’re all about friends and family coming together to celebrate traditions, new and old. I was  surrounded by friends I’ve known for a long time…

…friends I’ve made since moving to San Francisco…

…and friends who like to randomly recreate scenes from Top Gun.

I’m thankful these friends were willing to sample my Southern experiments and give me valuable feedback on each dish. I’ll continue to tweak them and share the fruits of my labors at future group dinners. I’m not a bonafide country chef, but I’m as close as a Midwestern-Southern-West Coast hybrid can ever hope to be.

*****

If you’re curious about Southern cooking, please look beyond the world of Paula Deen and consider a few of these resources, which helped me create the meal featured in today’s post:

This cookbook is my new Southern foods bible. It’s friendly enough for newbies and experts alike, with a nice collection of recipes from various Southern states. If you’re new to country cuisine, this book provides an excellent introduction (and tasty results).

The chefs behind that cookbook, Matt Lee and Ted Lee, have a wonderful online store filled with Southern staples. I purchased my Cheerwine, hushpuppy mix and field peas there; other goodies include Duke’s mayonnaise, fruit preserves, canned pickled vegetables and true country grits. I was impressed by their selection and their excellent customer service.

Other Southern goodies are available via mail order from A Southern Season in Chapel Hill, NC. Country ham and other NC treats are just a mouse click away.

Of course, you don’t need to mail order anything special to create a delicious Southern meal – many recipes rely on fresh, seasonal vegetables and pantry staples found in most major grocery stores. But it sure is fun to experiment with treats only available below the Mason-Dixon line.