Grilling

I use red peppers a lot, but they are grown so large these days that more often than not, I find myself with a quarter or a half that needs to be used up. The solution is to roast them and store them in olive oil. In fact, I’ve become so fond of my roasted peppers that I’ll sometimes make up a batch on the weekend to see me through the days ahead. If you have gas burners, use this top-of-the-stove method rather than doing them in the oven (if you don’t have gas burners, see page 143 for roasting). Because they become thoroughly charred all over, they develop a wonderful smoky flavor.

I love lamb chops, and I can’t resist when I find a pair of loin chops at least 1 inch thick sitting side by side in a shrink-wrapped package at the meat counter. Expensive? Yes, and I don’t really need two of them. But I give in and set aside the uneaten portion of the second one to tuck into a small casserole of French lentils. It makes an appealing second dinner.

I grew up hating pork chops. My mom used to make pork chops that were about as fat as a piece of paper (that’s all that was available back then), and she would cook them for a really long time—until they were dry and flavorless. Sadly, today so much commercially raised pork has so little fat in it that even if you cook it correctly, it can still be like eating your shoe. That’s why I love this brine—it infuses the pork with moisture and flavor, so you end up with a succulent and delicious chop. Then I crust it with one of my super-secret flavor weapons—fennel pollen. I discovered fennel pollen when I was working in Tuscany; it’s expensive but is so worth it. (If you can’t find it or don’t want to fork out the cash, toasted ground fennel seed is an acceptable substitute.) This is such a great combination of flavors that you will never think of pork chops the same way again!

In Italy they don’t eat spaghetti and meatballs. Instead they have what they call polpettini, or little meatballs (page 47). And when they want something bigger, they make polpettone—meatloaf. I figured, if they make little ones and a big one, why not make a medium-size one and throw it on a bun? This size is just right, and if I could have a burger this good every time I wanted one, I’d be a happy, happy girl.

Rib eye is my favorite cut of steak, especially when it’s on the bone. It’s big and fatty and luscious. And when you add a dry rub, it goes from delicious to delicious-PLUS. Enough said.

Grilled chicken is totally ubiquitous—it’s on every menu and it’s usually no big whoop. In fact, it’s often totally boring. But this grilled chicken is SOOOOO worth getting excited about! It’s slathered in mustard, lemon, rosemary, and spicy crushed red pepper so it just titillates your palate with flavor. Then it’s grilled until the outside is tangy, crusty, and crispy while the inside stays nice and moist. To make this as super-sexy as possible, it’s served with a perfectly charred and caramelized lemon half for an extra squeeze of flavor.

When soft-shell crabs are in season, it’s the one time of year I like being crabby! I adore these guys perched on a delicious veggie salad with garlic mayo. The beauty of the soft-shell crab is you can eat the whole shootin’ match—on a salad, in a sandwich, however. Who says being crabby isn’t fun?

I don’t think there’s anything terribly exciting about grilled scallops—but I do think you can put them together with interesting ingredients and make them exciting. That’s why I pair scallops with—wait for it—watermelon! I know, who would think of putting scallops with watermelon, let alone three kinds (watermelon, watermelon rind pickles, and watermelon radishes)? It may seem wacky, but the sweetness of the watermelon offset by the bitterness of the dandelion and the sharp red onion makes this a spectacular combo. And, if you’re thinking ahead (like we always try to do!), make the pickles a day (or a week) in advance and keep them in the fridge. These pickles make anything taste tangy and delicious; I keep a jar on hand for whenever a salad or sammie needs an extra little pickle-y punch!

There are so many things to love about chickpea fries—for starters you can make the base for this dish ahead of time and then fry up the fries just before you want to serve them. Also, I’ve added some crunched-up chickpeas into the mix for texture. And who ever thought of pairing these lovelies with a raw zucchini and onion salad? Look at me—always thinking up something new! Add a couple of grilled shrimp and some pine nuts, and you have something really special.

I am a huge fan of eggs—and I especially LOOOOOVE them when they’re served at a meal other than breakfast (though I love them for breakfast too!). There’s something elegant about putting an egg on a salad—and this particular salad combines the earthy meatiness of porcini mushrooms and the runny yolk of an egg, a combo that I think makes this a super-sexy appetizer or a lovely lunch.

I love the charred flavor of grilled pizza. You can top it with anything, of course, but this version is one of my favorites. It’s crispy and crunchy, kind of like a grilled cracker. Whenever I eat pizza I always give it a sprinkey-dink of crushed red pepper—it’s just better with a little kick! That’s why I make this infused oil for my pizzetta. It’s an amazing way to get a big flavor bump, and while I love this chili oil on pizza, it’s great on lots and lots of things.

I always say everything tastes better with bacon. And when fresh corn is at its peak and just screaming to be eaten, this recipe is unbeatable (it also reminds me of summer as a kid because it was always my job to shuck the corn). It’s the perfect combination of smoky, sweet, spicy, and bright—what more could you ask for, except maybe MORE!

The Florida Sport Lobster Season is always the last consecutive Wednesday and Thursday in July. All one needs to join this sporting scene is a bully net—a regular net with the handle bent to form a ninety-degree angle. Just trap the lobster beneath the ring of the net, and when he kicks his tail up into the net, sweep him up and swoop him into the boat! If you keep some of this butter concoction on hand you can be ready to grill just about any seafood with a slather of citrus butter. (It’s handy to pack some in the cooler for grilling out because it does not leak like marinades and sauces might.)

Frog legs aren’t so much an acquired taste (the taste is great—I’ve never met anyone who did not like them once they tried them) as they just require some getting used to the idea of eating frogs. Cold beer is the thing to drink with frog legs, but it is also a great marinade to flavor and tenderize the meat.

I was a boy-crazy preteen when I went on a trip to visit my friend’s grandmother Beauxma in Saint Martinville, Louisiana, in the sugarcane-growing region of the state. I was so taken by the story of the Evangeline Oak. In 1907, St. Martinville author Felix Voorhies wrote Acadian Reminiscences: With the True Story of Evangeline, inspired by tales told to him by his grandmother. The account of Emmeline Labiche and Louis Arceneaux is said to be about the real people behind Longfellow’s tragically romantic poem “Evangeline,” about a woman looking for her lost love, Gabriel. In 1929, Hollywood came to town and filmed the movie Evangeline, starring Dolores Del Rio in the title role. After the filming, a statue of Evangeline (looking a lot like Dolores Del Rio) was erected on the spot marking the alleged burial place of Emmeline Labiche. As a whole, Southerners have never let the truth stand in the way of a good story; and now the stories of Emmeline and Louis and Evangeline and Gabriel have fused into one story told time and again beneath the spreading branches of the Evangeline Oak. In fact, Louisianans have taken the story so to heart that the Evangeline variety of sweet potato is fast becoming one of the state’s most popular sweet potatoes.

My cousin Daniel Foose fell in love with a girl he met in music school. Sueyoung Yoo and Daniel married out at our family farm, Pluto, on what might have been the hottest day that year, Saturday, June 30. Friends and family began to arrive the Wednesday before. As the bride and groom are both accomplished jazz musicians, she a pianist and he a bassist, most of the bridal party came with instruments in tow, and late-night jams filled the evenings. Sueyoung made kimchi, massaging each leaf of cabbage with rich chile paste and placing it in her groom’s great-grandmother’s soup tureen. Her soon-to-be in-laws, Uncle Jon and Aunt Caroline, had driven from Austin with a plug-in home-size chest freezer in the back of their Suburban rigged to a battery and filled with all sorts of slow-cooked Creole and Tex-Mex food for the reception. The reception came together in an eccentric perfection combining cooking from New Orleans, Korea, Mississippi, and Texas; and the band played well into the night. It is a joy to have Sueyoung in the family. Now out at Pluto we have kimchi buried in the yard and Korean barbecue is served on Christmas night.

Eleven casinos dot the Mississippi beachfront from Biloxi to Bay St. Louis. I’m not too much on gambling—I’m poor and my luck isn’t so great—but I have a friend, Dale, who works for a large casino concern and he invited me there recently for a big music event. With some time to kill I decided to try my luck in the casino. Cards are not my thing and I like gawking at people, so roulette seemed the best game for me. When the croupier, Twayla, set the ball to spinning it hopped off the wheel, missing the thirty-eight pockets, and went right down the front of my blouse. The guy next to me asked me my bra size and it came up on the next spin. People think I make this kind of thing up but Dale saw the casino security tape to prove it! Seventeen natural oyster reefs are managed by the Mississippi Department of Marine Resources along the Mississippi Sound, which runs ninety miles east to west from Waveland to the Dauphin Island Bridge. On the south side, the Gulf Islands National Seashore separates the sound from the true Gulf of Mexico. As I write this the fate of the Mississippi Gulf Coast, its oysters, and its tourism industry is under siege from that catastrophic oil spill. I am betting on the resilience of these folks; they have come back from the brink of disaster before.

Portobello mushrooms are so meaty and flavorful that many of my vegetarian friends prepare and eat them the way I do steak—throwing them on the grill and making a main course of them. For my part, I’ll take the steak and the portobellos, ideally prepared the way they are here: cooked simply so that their natural qualities can shine.

As its name suggests, flank steak comes from the flank of the beef, between the ribs and the hips. I’ve been eating and loving flank and skirt steak, which comes from the same area, my whole life, since they are used abundantly in Latin cooking. For some reason, these cuts have yet to reach a wider audience. This is curious to me, for what flank steak lacks in tenderness it more than makes up in fabulous beefy flavor. Cut it across, not with, the grain so it’s less chewy. This tangy marinade is great for any cut of beef. As with any marinade, the longer you can let the steak sit in it, the better it’ll be.

At Beso these tacos are served as an appetizer, but some people love them so much that they make a meal of them, ordering VeraCruz Corn (page 151) on the side. Guests often look at the dish’s name and exclaim, “I don’t like spicy!” but I always assure them that the chili powder adds only beautiful color and nice flavor. I promise it does not pica, as my Aunt Elsa would say, meaning that it’s not spicy.