Smoke and Pickles

by Edward Lee

  5Transfer the skillet to the oven and bake for 40 minutes, or until a knife inserted into the center comes out clean. Serve warm, cut into wedges, with a pat of butter on top.

  As the name suggests, you can use lardo for this recipe, but I actually use the fat trimmed off an aged country ham. It is smoky and renders beautifully. You have to use a cured fat, though. Don’t use bacon fat, because it will melt away completely.

  Curried Corn Griddle Cakes with Sorghum-Lime Drizzle

  Corn and curry are a natural pairing for me, and a perfect combination in these griddle cakes. It’s important to make this recipe with fresh summer corn, which fills these little pancake-like treats with bursts of sweetness. I kept this recipe vegetarian, but you can just as easily add pork sausage or country ham to the batter. Serve as a snack before dinner or as a side dish to a hearty main course. / Makes about 30 small griddle cakes

  Drizzle

  2 tablespoons unsalted butter

  ½ cup sorghum

  Grated zest and juice of 1 lime

  Corn Cakes

  2 tablespoons unsalted butter

  1½ cups fresh corn kernels (from 2 ears)

  1 cup cornmeal

  ½ cup all-purpose flour

  1 tablespoon sugar

  1½ teaspoons madras curry powder

  1 teaspoon salt

  ½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

  ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper

  ½ teaspoon baking powder

  ¼ teaspoon baking soda

  1¼ cups buttermilk

  2 large eggs

  6 scallions, chopped

  Corn oil for panfrying

  1To make the drizzle: Melt the butter in a small saucepan. Add the sorghum, lime zest, and juice and stir until combined. Keep warm until ready to use.

  2To make the corn cakes: Heat the butter in a large cast-iron skillet over medium heat until it foams. Add the corn and cook over medium-high heat until soft, about 4 minutes. Transfer to a bowl and let cool.

  3In a small bowl, whisk together the cornmeal, flour, sugar, curry, salt, black pepper, cayenne pepper, baking powder, and baking soda. Whisk the buttermilk and eggs in a medium bowl. Add the dry ingredients to the buttermilk mixture and whisk until well combined. Fold in the corn and scallions.

  4Heat 1 teaspoon corn oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add about a tablespoon of batter for each corn cake to the pan and cook, flipping once, until crisp and golden brown, about 2 minutes per side. Transfer the cakes to paper towels to drain, then keep warm on a baking sheet in a 200°F oven while you make the remaining corn cakes.

  5Transfer the corn cakes to a platter and serve with the warm sorghum-lime drizzle on top.

  WTF Potato Salad

  My neighbor and reliable taste tester Steven gave this dish its name. I’m not a fan of simple potato salads, which only hold my attention for a bite or two. So I came up with this version for those nights when I want to eat only vegetables but I don’t want it to feel too healthy or boring. I invited Steven over and he arrived, wineglass in hand, to try my new potato dish. I hadn’t decided what to call it, but after taking one bite, he shouted, “WTF, that’s good!” And so the potato salad got its name.

  Serve as a side with baked ham or steaks. / Feeds 6 as a side dish

  Dressing

  ¾ cup mayonnaise, preferably Duke’s

  2 tablespoons sour cream

  2 garlic cloves, minced

  2½ tablespoons fresh lemon juice

  2 teaspoons Dijon mustard

  5 dashes hot sauce (my favorite is Texas Pete)

  ½ teaspoon paprika

  ½ teaspoon ground cumin

  ½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

  ¼ teaspoon sea salt

  potato salad

  2 large eggs, preferably organic

  2 teaspoons olive oil

  4 ounces shiitake mushroom caps, thinly sliced

  1 teaspoon soy sauce

  ¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, plus more to taste

  1 tablespoon sea salt, plus more to taste

  2 pounds fingerling potatoes, scrubbed

  4 ounces sugar snap peas

  6 ounces country ham, finely diced

  1 red bell pepper, cored, seeded, and sliced into ribbons

  1 yellow bell pepper, cored, seeded, and sliced into ribbons

  2 celery stalks, thinly sliced

  4 pickled okra, thinly sliced (substitute 7 cornichons if you don’t have pickled okra)

  1To make the dressing: Combine all the ingredients in a bowl and whisk well. Cover and refrigerate until ready to use.

  2To make the potato salad: Place the eggs in a medium saucepan, add 4 cups tepid water, and heat over medium-high heat. Bring to a gentle simmer and cook for 12 minutes. Drain the eggs and chill them under cold running water. Peel gently and reserve in a bowl of cold water in the refrigerator until ready to use.

  3Meanwhile, heat the olive oil in a small skillet over medium heat. Add the mushrooms, soy sauce, and pepper and panfry the mushrooms, stirring constantly, until wilted and nicely browned, 6 to 8 minutes. Transfer to a plate and set aside.

  4Combine 8 cups water and the salt in a large pot, add the potatoes, and bring to a boil over high heat. Cook for 16 minutes, or until the potatoes are tender but still have a little resistance when you insert a toothpick into one of them.

  5Turn off the heat and add the sugar snap peas to the pot. Wait 2 minutes, then drain the potatoes and sugar snap peas in a colander and chill under cold running water.

  6Cut the potatoes into bite-sized pieces and toss into a large bowl. Add the sugar snap peas, shiitake mushrooms, diced ham, bell peppers, celery, and pickled okra. Add just enough dressing to coat the vegetables, tossing gently. Taste and adjust the seasoning with salt and pepper.

  7Transfer the salad to a large platter and top with the hard-boiled eggs, cut in half.

  If you can, make the potato salad a day ahead and keep tightly covered in a glass container in the refrigerator overnight. Allow to come to room temperature before serving. The overnight rest allows the dressing to be absorbed into the vegetables and the flavors to become more harmonious.

  Butter Beans with Garlic-Chile and Celery Leaves

  This is my favorite way to eat beans. I can go all summer long eating this dish. Don’t bother making it with frozen or canned beans; they lose their subtle flavor quickly after they are picked. If you can’t find fresh butter beans, baby limas work fine. Just don’t make the mistake of calling them one and the same.

  A full-bodied Vermentino is a wonderful choice for this dish; I especially like the one from La Spinetta. / Feeds 4 as a side dish or first course

  ¼ cup chopped bacon

  1 cup chopped onions

  1 cup finely chopped tomatoes

  1 garlic clove, minced

  1 pound shelled butter beans

  1 cup chicken stock

  1 cup water

  2 teaspoons apple cider vinegar

  ¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes

  1 tablespoon unsalted butter

  Salt and freshly ground black pepper

  A few drops of fresh lemon juice

  A small handful of celery leaves (see note)

  1Cook the bacon in a large saucepan over medium heat until it begins to render out its fat, about 3 minutes. Add the onions, tomatoes, and garlic, stir, and cook for another 5 minutes.

  2Add the butter beans, chicken stock, water, vinegar, red pepper flakes, and butter and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer, stirring occasionally, until the beans are tender, about 30 minutes.

  3Season with salt and pepper, and add the lemon juice. Spoon into bowls and top each with a few celery leaves.

  When using celery lea
ves, pick the palest, softest leaves from the heart of the bunch. They are packed with flavor, so use them sparingly. And leave them fresh on the stalks until just before serving.

  Soft grits

  I get my grits from Anson Mills in Tennessee, and this recipe is adapted from their suggestions. All grits cook differently; depending on which brand you get, you will have to adjust your cooking time. The nice thing is, it’s almost impossible to ruin grits. Just keep adding liquid and cooking it down until the texture feels right to you. Don’t make them too pasty, though; that doesn’t taste good. I don’t add cheese to my grits, but you are welcome to grate a few teaspoons of your favorite cheddar right at the end before serving. Leftover grits hold well overnight; remember to add a little water when reheating and adjust the salt. / Feeds 4 as a side dish

  1 cup water

  ½ cup (3 ounces) Anson Mills coarse grits (see Resources, page 279)

  1½ cups chicken stock

  ½ cup milk

  Fine sea salt

  ¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

  2 tablespoons unsalted butter, cold and cut in small cubes

  2 teaspoons soy sauce

  1In a medium pot over medium heat, bring the water to a simmer, about 3 minutes. Add the grits and cook, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, for 6 minutes. Reduce the heat to low and cover the pot with a tight-fitting lid.

  2In a small pot, heat the chicken stock and keep warm. Every 8 to 10 minutes, uncover the grits and stir them thoroughly while adding ½ cup of chicken stock until all the chicken stock is used. If the grits are getting too pasty, add a little water too. After 35 minutes, check the texture of the grits. They should be creamy and tender but not mushy. Add the milk and continue cooking for another 10 minutes. I like my grits just a touch runny, but that’s a personal preference. Cook until you get the texture that suits you.

  3Turn off the heat. Add the salt to taste and the pepper. Finish by stirring in the cold butter and the soy sauce with a wooden spoon and serve immediately.

  Bourbon-Ginger-Glazed Carrots

  I’m one of those people who think that if a recipe has ginger in its name, it should really taste like ginger. There is no substitute for fresh ginger, and this recipe uses lots of it. Warmed by the bourbon and the brown sugar, the ginger zips these carrots into a yummy accompaniment to a hearty rib-eye steak or slow-cooked brisket. This dish is another great example of how Asian spices can really marry harmoniously with the flavors of the South. / Feeds 4 to 6 as a side dish

  4 tablespoons unsalted butter

  1 pound baby carrots, sliced lengthwise in half, or large carrots (about 5) sliced into ¼-inch-thick rounds (see note)

  ¼ cup packed brown sugar

  3 tablespoons peeled, minced fresh ginger (see note)

  3 tablespoons bourbon

  Juice of 1 orange

  2 teaspoons salt

  Freshly ground black pepper

  Heat the butter in a large skillet over high heat. Add the carrots and sauté for about 6 minutes, until slightly softened. Add the brown sugar and ginger and cook, stirring, until the brown sugar dissolves, about 2 minutes. Deglaze the pan by stirring in the bourbon and orange juice. Cook until the carrots are fork-tender and the liquid is reduced and syrupy, 6 to 8 minutes. Season with the salt and pepper to taste and serve.

  If you can, buy organic baby carrots that are crisp and heavy for their size. Thumbelina carrots are an amazing choice for this recipe. They are packed with flavor, and they are the prettiest carrots you will find at the farmers’ market.

  You can use a Microplane to grate the ginger if mincing is too much work.

  Fried Green Tomato–Cilantro Relish

  Relish is endlessly versatile. In fact, I don’t even know what to specifically recommend eating with this relish, because the list goes on and on. Try it with brisket, cold cuts, or poached shrimp, or even on toast with a little butter. Frying the tomatoes first gives the relish that extra depth, making it almost a meal in itself. I’ve been known to eat it with salty potato chips and beer and not regret it at all. Make a double recipe, if you like—the relish keeps for a couple of weeks in the fridge. / Makes about 2 cups

  ¼ cup olive oil

  2½ pounds green tomatoes, sliced ¼ inch thick

  ½ cup chopped onion

  2 garlic cloves, minced

  3 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro

  1 tablespoon Dijon mustard

  ½ teaspoon sherry vinegar

  1 teaspoon sugar

  ½ teaspoon ground fennel

  ½ teaspoon ground cumin

  1¼ teaspoons salt

  ½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

  1Heat a teaspoon of olive oil in a large skillet over high heat. Working in batches, add the slices of green tomato in a single layer and fry for about 2 minutes on each side, adding more oil as necessary. Transfer to a plate.

  2When all the tomatoes are fried, add the remaining olive oil to the pan, then add the onions and garlic and cook over low heat until the onions are translucent and soft, about 4 minutes. Remove from the heat.

  3Finely chop the fried tomatoes and place in a medium bowl. Toss in the onions and garlic, add the cilantro, mustard, vinegar, sugar, fennel, cumin, salt, and pepper, and mix thoroughly. The relish can be stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks.

  When I chop cilantro, I use both the leaves and the stems. Store any extra cilantro standing in a glass of water in your refrigerator to keep it fresh for up to a week.

  The Editor

  I first met Ethne Clark when she asked me to write a column for Organic Gardening. She devotes an entire magazine to vegetables, with an undying love and devotion to the seasons. It was not one of those give-me-a-recipe-along-with-a-tagline-about-why-you-love-this-or-that kind of columns. As a chef, I am constantly asked to reduce my love for vegetables into twenty-five-word sound bites. Here was someone who was going to give me eight hundred words. Ethne asked me to tell the story of winter spinach. A week after I submitted the first column, Ethne called me to ask if I would write the entire series the following year. It is an honor to write for her and to write about the infinite crops that spring up in our backyards and farmlands.

  “Historically, in the Old World, vegetables and fruit were thought to be ‘cold and wet,’ capable of unbalancing the body’s humors and causing ill health. That changed with the Age of Enlightenment and the seventeenth-century influx of New World produce that shook up tired European palates—and gardens. In homes where meat had been served in copious amounts, the vegetable course became a stand-alone entrée, and meat became the side dish. The diet of the rural poor was suddenly not only fashionable, but also good for you. Elizabethan philosopher Sir Francis Bacon wrote, ‘God Almighty first planted a garden, and indeed it is the purest of human pleasures.’ For centuries we’ve been finding our solace in the kitchen garden, tending neat rows of cabbages, gently thinning carrots, plucking herbs to revive our palates, and, at year’s end, gathering in our harvest. A metaphor for a life well lived.”

  —Ethne Clark, editor, Organic Gardening

  Bourbon & Bar Snacks

  Sin on a Saturday, repent on Sunday. Words to live by. The biggest Saturday in Louisville is the Kentucky Derby. It is what first drew me here. It is where fortunes are made and heartbreaks are plentiful. It is a weeklong marathon of gluttony and drinking and gambling and prideful lust and any other kind of trouble you want to find, culminating in what is for me, and for most Louisvillians, the best weekend of the year. Everyone you talk to has a line on a favorite horse. Everyone’s got a tip in exchange for a drink. The Derby is a sporting event second and a party first, with outlandish hats and seersucker suits everywhere you look, and afterward, a confetti tide of losing tickets strewn all over the city. By the time that familiar bugle announces the start o
f the Derby, most of us have consumed more alcohol and bacon than the average person will consume in a month.

  The Derby would not be the Derby if not for bourbon. Tradition says to drink mint juleps, but truth be told, most sensible drinkers will start with an obligatory mint julep in a pewter cup, then switch to the more civilized concoction of aged bourbon with ice and a splash of water. The history and lore of bourbon is so deeply ingrained in the identity of Kentucky it is hard to say which came first. Along with tobacco and horses (the first Derby was held in 1875), whiskey has been the backbone of the state’s livelihood and identity. Tobacco farming is on its way out, and the state’s dominance in the horse industry has been losing ground to states like Louisiana and Pennsylvania. But bourbon is here to stay. Kentucky still makes more than 95 percent of the world’s bourbon, and production has more than doubled since 1999. There is no distilled spirit more closely associated with a region than bourbon is with Kentucky. In my travels around the globe, I have been to some far-off places, and whenever I tell people I am from Kentucky, the first thing they mention is always fried chicken! The second is the Derby. And the third, invariably with a big fat grin, is bourbon.

  There are many debates about which is the best bourbon. The older the bourbon, the more liquid has been lost to evaporation (what is respectfully called “the angel’s share”), and the higher in price the bourbon gets. But that doesn’t necessarily mean it is the best. Debates turn into arguments about what proof it should be, how much sunlight the barrels should see, what kind of water to cut it with. Arguments turn into feuds. Every bourbon maker will give you ten reasons why drinking any other bourbon is a waste of time. It took me a long time to drink my way through the fifty or so major brands of bourbon. I have spent hazy afternoons at the old D. Marie at the top of the Galt House, sipping my way through a shelf of bourbons. I have paid fifty dollars for a taste of some rarefied Stitzel-Weller bourbon salvaged from the ashes. I have sipped and I have slugged. I have rollicked in the simple joys of a Rebel Yell and pontificated on the complexities of a Col. E. H. Taylor. I have graduated to the holy grail of bourbons, Pappy Van Winkle’s 23 Year, and, like an unworthy disciple, I have begged for more. Whiskey drinking is not a cheap endeavor. And it takes years to develop a strong opinion. Now, after eight solid years of drinking a whole lot of bourbon, I have come to this conclusion: I have never met a bourbon I didn’t like. There are plenty of wines I won’t drink and beers so awful I can’t repeat their names. There are scotches that taste like a donkey’s ass and gins so floral I feel like I’m drinking my wife’s perfume. Vodkas are pretty much tasteless except for the flavored ones, which taste more like chemical agents. I do love the flavor of tequilas, but I hate the flavor of the floor, which is where I always end up after drinking it. Cognac is delicious but too expensive, and rum reminds me of dessert. So bourbon it is.