Southern

In most bait shops throughout the South and beyond, big gallon jars of pink-tinted pickled eggs sit on counters next to smoked summer sausages. Here these two favorite fisherman’s snacks are brined up together and make a perfect take-along lunch for a day out on the lake for the angler gourmand.

This may barely qualify as a recipe. It’s not a time-saver, that’s for sure, because these take forever to assemble. That doesn’t stop my friend Neck-bone Red from dropping me a note to inquire if I am going to be bringing bacon crackers whenever she knows I’ll be at a party. I have found in my hours devoted to crafting these irresistible bowtie-shaped snacks that the way to make a bunch of them at a time is to place them on a wire rack set over a rimmed baking sheet. The rack keeps the crackers from getting soggy while they bake and are corseted by the bacon.

Many a child home sick from school has been fed Rum Tum Tiddy—a soothing, warm concoction of tomato soup and melted cheese over toast. Where the dish got its funny name I don’t know. I do know that it can hardly be said without a smile or guffaw. Here those comforting flavors are set up as a pick-up snack great for parties of all ages.

In the South, we mean it when we offer you a tall glass of sweet tea—it is sweet! This is the real thing, infused with help from the hot sun and sweet enough to put a smile on anyone’s face. Make sure to add the sugar right after you bring the warm tea in from the sun so it’ll dissolve completely. Once the sweet tea is mixed, keep it refrigerated and discard it if it appears at all cloudy.

This combo was born out of the remake of a classic cocktail, the Hurricane. Passion fruit adds a tropical flavor and I just love the crunch of the seeds. The result is a tantalizing and refreshing mix using one of South Florida’s most delicious fruits.

Grits get a bad rap, man. Most of the time grits are watery and served with greasy eggs in a diner. Grits can be so much more! By using good-quality coarsely ground grits and cooking them right, you can easily elevate this Southern staple. Serve with Slow-Roasted Pork Shoulder with Pickled Onions (page 162).

Collard greens with bacon or ham are a classic—spicy, smoky, and tender in an addictive savory broth. Most recipes splash in some vinegar to add a little tang and balance the bitterness of the greens. Soy sauce adds a different spin to this Southern staple. Try this alongside Thyme-Smoked Four-Inch Porterhouse Steak (page 168) or Whole Roasted Chicken with Plumped Raisins, Toasted Pine Nuts, and Arugula (page 142).

Sorghum is a rich, earthy syrup produced mostly in the South and Midwest from a naturally sweet and juicy grass of the same name. So nutritious that doctors used to recommend a daily dose, it is similar to molasses but a little less sweet and with a deeper flavor.

In restaurants, raw oysters tend to be disappointing and expensive. At home they are a slightly messy but relatively cheap treat. Skip the sweet cocktail sauce and serve them with a bottle of good hot sauce—classic and delicious.

The amount of crab and shrimp you need will depend on appetites and on how well your guests know each other. When you serve crabs in mixed company, even dear friends will shock you with their daintiness, but if it’s a family dinner, as ours is tonight, you might expect people to put away eight or ten crabs apiece. If crabs aren’t available, a seafood boil is equally delicious with just shrimp, especially if they are wild ones, still fresh enough to have their heads on.

If you can’t grill the radicchio, just sear it on the stovetop in a cast-iron pan over medium-high heat until it is caramelized and tender.

A laying hen is a different animal from the six- to ten-week-old supermarket fryers, roasters, and broilers we usually see. Laying hens are typically sold between one and three years old and create a different sort of stew, deeper in overall flavor but with less succulent meat. If you are using a laying hen, increase the cooking time to about an hour and a half, or until the meat is very tender. It will not be necessary to remove the breast meat during cooking as directed below.

Silvia and I have made this often over the years, the first time in my (illegal) home kitchen for an Easter catering gig when we made the entire meal twice, timing it so that the second roast was perfectly blistered and crispy when we arrived back home with a car full of dirty pots and pans to have dinner with our own families. It goes well with wilted spring scallions, roast potatoes (basted in the drippings), lightly dressed spicy arugula, and beans in all forms. One favorite bean dish for this ham is from Amanda Hesser’s The Cook and the Gardener: flavorful white beans simmered with hearty herbs and crème fraîche until slightly thickened.

In the South, you usually find pepper sauce in the middle of the dinner table beside the salt and black pepper. Don’t confuse this pepper sauce with a Tabasco-type sauce; this simple seasoning is made from vinegar and whole peppers. Over time the peppers will flavor the vinegar, and the longer it sits, the better it gets! Pepper sauce is used as a seasoning and an ornamental decoration. A few dashes will heighten the flavor of black-eyed peas, all types of greens, barbecue, and many other traditional Southern dishes. Pack your pepper sauce in glass containers of any size and shape. The aesthetic value of the glass combined with the color and variety of peppers creates a beautiful conversation piece.