Molasses

I can’t claim to be the genius who developed the glorious spice combination that is a gingersnap, but I like to think I’ve put my chewy, health-minded signature on it. This recipe produces a fairly flat, crisp-edged cookie; if you like a cakier cookie, add an extra 1/4 cup flour.

Those of you who don’t have food sensitivities and are reading this cookbook simply to improve your general health should be applauded. I know how easy it is to be tricked into thinking that the low-fat glazed gingerbread in the display is healthy when you pick up your morning coffee at the local deli. I implore you, do not let your pre-caffeine fog steer you wrong! Make a loaf of this simple gingerbread over the weekend, slice it, and store it in your freezer for the week so you can grab yourself a piece on your way out the door. The pumpkin purée makes the bread so moist and fresh you can snack on it for days. As a reward for your foresight, consider slathering a thick layer of Vanilla Frosting (page 91) on top. I would!

I created this barbecue sauce to top the Dallas and Cheyenne burgers (pages 37 and 39), but it’s also an ideal dipping sauce for Perfect French Fries (page 86). After you’ve made this quick and easy sauce once, you’ll want to slather it on grilled chicken, steak, pork chops . . . you might never go back to the bottled stuff.

Gina: This is Pat’s “feel like a king” dish, and if you are married to a meat-and-potatoes man like I am, this dish will make him feel—you guessed it, girl—like a king. The secret to this sauce is two ingredients: bacon and beer. There isn’t a man anywhere in Memphis who would turn up his nose at a steak lacquered with both of those. We like to serve this steak sliced on the diagonal, with plenty of extra sauce on the side. When Pat takes a bite of this and gives me one of his sly winks, honey, I know it’s a slam dunk!

Pat: All it takes is a spoon and a wedge of warm buttered cornbread to turn these sweet Southern baked beans, made with chunks of chopped pork, into a meal. Tangy baked beans are a Memphis trademark—we serve them sweeter than other regions around the country do. At our restaurants and at home, we flavor the beans with molasses, brown sugar, and our famous Neely’s Barbecue Sauce—as well as plenty of chopped pork. The hickory flavor from chunks of smoked pork gives this dish some toothy tang.

Barbecue may be America’s greatest contribution to the global culinary repertoire. We figured out how to take rich, fatty, often tough cuts of meat and smoke them into submission until they’re melt-in-your-mouth tender. Then we slather them with sugar-laden, high-fat sauce. Here’s a sugar-free, zero-fat BBQ sauce that packs flavor without pulling punches.

Here is a fantastic coffee cake that tastes like gingerbread: perfect for cold days or nights.

In the convection oven, the baking temperature is reduced from 375°F to 350°F, and the baking time from 12 to 9 minutes. If that alone isn’t enough to convince you to turn on the convection bake mode, I bake three sheets of cookies at one time, which is what the recipe yields, reducing the total baking time from 36 to 9 minutes.

This bread is close-textured, grainy, and full of hearty flavor. It slices most easily the day after it is baked. Serve it very thinly sliced with a flavorful cheese such as gjetost, Jarlsberg, or Danish Havarti.

This is a favorite bread, especially in the Midwest, where many people have Scandinavian roots.

You can precook spareribs without covering them using this easy convection oven method. While the ribs are in their first stage of cooking, make the barbecue sauce for the final glazing and baking, or use your favorite store-bought brand.

My life is all about banging things out, getting things done, moving fast—but sometimes a detour from the fast lane can be a good thing, even for me. Years ago, Gwen and I were on our way home from a road trip to the Canadian Maritimes when we were forced off the highway by some epic construction. We ended up on a wandering road that took us through a charming series of dying industrial towns. There was not much to see... and definitely nothing to eat. But then, in Fall River, Massachusetts, right at the border of Rhode Island, we stumbled across culinary gold: an old gas station converted into a root beer stand. The owner, a retired A&W root beer guy, was behind the counter; all he served was root beer in frosted glasses. Our root beer came with a long lecture about chilling the glass, not the root beer itself (that kills the taste). We sat at a broken-down old picnic table and sipped. I'm all about root beer, and that roadside glassful was the best I ever tasted. This recipe is my stab at bringing that taste to cake—because the only thing better than root beer is root beer plus cake. There's a mad-scientist component to this recipe: when you whisk the baking soda into the molasses and root beer, there's going to be some crazy bubbling up going on, straight out of sci-fi. Don't worry: it's completely normal.