The End of Southern Charm

Charleston, South Carolina is known for many things, but its' restaurants and dining out culture is the most famous. However something is happening to the culinary scene. Gone are the homey little eateries that celebrate Gullah and Low Country cooking. In their stead, it's more commercial and , homogenized . What happened to the charm of Southern cooking?

That's the question that Southerner herself, Kim  Severson posed in yesterday's New York Times Food section. Charleston has been a place to dine since George Washington's times, a city that is defined by such dishes as she-crab soup and shrimp and grits. It could all stem from the tourist trade that the city and state furiously courted after Charleston's naval base closed in 1996. The city now had to  focus on tourism to keep itself going. It worked. More than seven million (!) tourists a year crowd the charming streets, marveling over homes built in the early 1700's. Charleston becomes Manhattan on weekday nights with bacherlorettes coming out of Uber taxis, foodie tourists angling for the best tables and wide eyed cruise ship passengers dying to try the delicious food the city is known for. The crowds swell during The Charleston Food and Wine Festival which famed chef and restauranteur Nathalie Dupree helped start in 2006. Conde Nast Traveler Magazine added more fuel to the fire  by listing it as one of America's best small cities. other magazines such as Southern Living and Travel & Leisure has ranked it number one  place to be and to visit for several years in a row.

This has not helped local chefs  who want to preserve the down home feeling of  their smaller restaurants. Real estate prices go up. Small , privately owned eateries suffer because of this. Kenyatta McNeil, chef at Nana's has watched this change happen in his neighborhood. It has gone from mostly black to white along with seventy-five per cent of his business being the tourist trade. To bolster his business and other soul food institutions in downtown Charleston he started a tour called Geechee Eats Food Shuttle.It hasn't done well because  black owned restaurants aren't into the commercial branding that white owned eateries are known for. Tourism has changed life in central Charleston so much that people that Chef McNeil knows have moved to the northern part of the city near Charleston International Airport.Real estate prices and crowds have also driven growth in the downtown district. Unfortunately this  also means that waitstaff can't afford living there. They had to move to the cheaper suburbs and drive a distance to work. There is hope that tourism will change. The African American Museum will open in 2021 and will bring people who can trace their ancestry to the enslaved brought here. It will be a perfect canvas for restaurants that explore black food and bring back the original focus of Low Country food to the city.

Charleston is a foodie paradise, mainly thanks to its'' culinary heritage. It connects the city to its' roots and serves as a bridge to its' future. Hopefully bigger restauranteurs will realize this and try not to make its' cuisine so trendy.

A Can Of Wine And Thou

A loaf of b read, a can of wine and thou - wait - whaattt??? A can of wine? Yes, there's a trend now that has this fermented grape juice being popped into pop top cans. Before oenophiles turn their noses in the air, there is a lot of benefits to canned wine.

Eric Asimov pondered this in his weekly column, The Pour in today's New York Times Food section. It started with couple Gina Schober and Jake Stover talking about their wine loving friends who enjoyed an active life. Their fondness went hand in hand with hiking , biking and boating, activities that get laden down with heavy bottles.There had to be a lighter way to transport the drink - why not in cans. Husband and wife then started Sans Wine Company in 2016, dedicated to making good California wine and putting it into convenient lightweight cans. The couple does have experience. Mr. Stover was a vineyard manager who had made wine and had the necessary connections to find desirable vineyards with available grapes. His wife worked with a wine brokerage and knew how to market and sell wine. They used grapes from a single vineyard that had organically grown varietal breeds. These cans are not meant  to join wine cellar collections. They're meant to be imbibed the day they're bought so oenophiles can take advantage of their freshness  and deliciousness along with being thirst quenching. The next step is bringing back wine coolers with organic wine mixed with organic grape juice.

One of the things that's most appealing (at least to this environmentalist) is that it leave almost zero waste.They are kinder to the environment than glass and easier to recycle. As for shipping, they are lighter and require fewer packing materials. There are other benefits to them as well.  Cans are lightweight and easily portable. They can be used where glass is not appropriate such as pools, beaches, rock concerts and sporting venues. They're perfect for backpacking trips  Restauranteurs like them because there is zero waste of the alcohol. Bobby Stuckey and Lachlan Mackinnon-Patterson of Frasca Food and Wine in Boulder Colorado serve single serve sparkling wine and a prosecco like sparkling wine without having to dump out leftover wine. The prices aren't so bad. Cans of reisling and carignan are both fifteen dollars while a 2017 can of  2017 Napa Cabernet goes for twenty-five dollars. Union Wine Company in Oregon sells 375 milliliter cans in a four pack for twenty-eight dollars. Not bad for a picnic at a concert or enjoying a sunset dinner on the dock. The only problem would come with underage drinking with teens and tweens guzzling the stuff like it's soda.

Wine in cans? It will be popular once it's out there. People will like the portability and ease of wine in lightweight cans. It's a sip in the right direction.

Good Nutrition Start Early

Baby Boy Sussex will be a child of two cultures - or more accurately culinary cultures.Yes, he'll be spoiled by a grandfather who has a fondness for sweets and will no doubt sneak him a toffee or two when he's older. He'll also grow up with a mother and grandmother guided by SoCal love of fruits and vegetables.That's the regimen that he and other kids should have for healthy lifestyle and a long life. It can work, if you start early enough.

When can babies eat solid foods? As any parent will tell you anywhere from four to seven months.This is when puree is introduced into the little one's diet. You can always buy jars of puree such as Stage One Beechnut's Naturals or you can make it yourself. The first is convenient if you don't have the time however homemade allows you control over what you feed your baby.There's also another reason - even though the jars may say natural or organic, they're not. The company  may load up the stuff with additives and preservatives - the last things any parent wants in his or her kid.Unhealthy fats may be added as fillers too along with thickening agents and starches. This means refined corn, wheat or rice is also part of the recipe.It's not only more less nutritious but also more expensive too. It's more cost efficient too. As they get older you can introduce them to different meals that can be not only packed full of nutrients but packed full of fun. Think broccoli tots or easy baked zucchini fritters. Homemade hummus with pita chips or crackers are also a good lunch  and let's the kids feed themselves.

Unfortunately there will be outside influences once the kids get into the play date and pre-K age. Meghan and Harry will discover that their little one may not want those bean sprout sandwiches and turn his nose up at avocado toast. School friends and even his cousins may influence him to gobble up Cadbury's treats and go wild with fairy cakes - cupcakes - at birthdays and holiday parties.Again it's time to make eating fun whether for a young royal or your prince or princess. A fun playdate and even birthday party treat is banana stacks. It's layering banana slices and low fat cream cheese on mini rice cakes. Dark chocolate or carob chips can be sprinkled on. Veggies such as squash are so vital to anyone's diet. However it can  be boring - and green to kids. Liven it up by turning  squash into pizza boats, chock full of homemade tomato sauce and vegan mozzarella cheese. Instead of cake  pops try corn  flowers. It's cutting cooked corn cobs into one inch thick slices and inserting sticks into them. As for birthday parties and holidays, homemade vegan cupcakes and cookies can do the trick instead of ice cream and candy.

As the Duke and Duchess will eventually find out raising a kid to eat healthy will be a daunting task. Yet they can rely on fun ways to serve fruits and veggies to appease a royal appetite. He'll have the  best of good foods .

Mix Versus Scratch

There is a huge controversy going on right now -and it's not what baby box Sussex will be named. It involves cakes mixes versus the all natural scratch cakes. Both have merits.Both have their detractions. What's a home baker to do?

Scratch cakes have been around since Roman times when special breads were baked with honey, butter and eggs. The18th, 19th and the first thirty years of the 20th Century saw housewives mixing ingredients such as eggs, flour, sugar  and butter into crude pans and baking them. They were eaten no matter how they turned out. The 1930's saw the birth of cake mix and it took twenty years for it to be a household staple.Now there's an internet controversy about which is better. Many home bakers- especially moms of young children - prefer using scratch recipes. The ingredients are natural plus they can change the recipe to suit gluten and allergy problems.One of the pluses of the internet age is that there are tons of scratch cake recipes from basic chocolate and vanilla to rum and strawberry flavors.Thanks to grocery stores , Amazon and King George's Flour ,all ingredients such as corn starch and vanilla pods can be found. Yet , despite  all this are scratch cakes better? Is the taste better? What about the crumb?

I baked both scratch and mix cakes during my lamb experiment.What produced a better bite? The box mixes, of course. As with scratch ones I could alter the recipe, getting rid of the vegetable oil, adding double the amount of eggs along with including a cup of cold water. The crumb was dense and moist, perfect for the lamb cake and a good foil for the super sweet icing that would frost the lamb.The baked vegan lamb was not that great tastewise. The recipe was from Vegan Cooking In Colorado which was taken from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World and modified. (I bought the cupcake book and will be experimenting with its recipes soon). To me there was too much almond extract - four teaspoons - that gave the cake a sickly sweet taste. The crumb was so delicate that the lamb's head fell off. Maybe the recipe would have worked  for cupcakes or layer cakes. The color was very pale too. There was no richness there. The mix cakes - all Duncan Hines blended with Dream Whip had this , possibly because of the addition of Dream Whip. I won't rule out homemade cakes yet when I want to impress  - then it's a Duncan Hines cake mix all the way.

What's the best recipe to use when making a cake? That's really up to the home baker. What works for one baker may not work for the other.As with cooking the answers lies with experimenting.

Cooking With Alliums

Want to zing up your Saturday suppers? Or turn your blah weekday meal into something sophisticated and elevated? Then try the allium family. What or who are they? The best friends a home chef could have.

The allium family have long been beloved to chefs and cooks all over the world.The family consists of garlic, onions, scallions and leeks along with shallots and chives. People have been cooking with them since ancient times. The early Egyptians even worshipped one - garlic -place whole bulbs of them in front of King Tutankhamun, the Boy King. Onions too, have been in the kitchen for five thousand years, mainly being used in China and India. The family is a must have for eating healthy.
They can detox the body thanks to being mostly organosulfur compounds - namely sulfur which acts as an anti-inflammatory agent. This lowers the risk of cancer and protects normal cells from becoming mutant ones.Alliums are also high in glutathiones, an important nutrient that protects the body from cellular damage.it also boosts immunity and lowers the risk of heart attack. Again this also detoxifies the body, helping to lower diabetes and cancer. A weekly dose of scallions or shallots also helps in protecting the heart as well.Green onions alone can regulate blood sugar and protect from peptic ulcers thanks to inhibiting bacterial growth in the stomach's lining.


One thing about any of the alliums. They are extremely versatile in the kitchen. Onions can go into everything from tarts to salads. A fun Sunday brunch recipe is zweibelkuchen or onion pie. This Swabian recipe, usually made in the autumn but can be baked year round consists of a yeast dough topped with buttery, caramelized onions, Black Forest bacon and an eggy quiche like filling.It's usually served with grape must. For a lighter dish try a tomato , cucumber and onion salad. It's not only has flavor but also bright colors , perfect for a barbecue side dish. The flavoring is unusual, a mix of salt and sugar blended with tarragon. Another tasty side is Neopolitan bread salad, that has sliced onions sharing a bowl with tomatoes and cubes of stale Italian bread.Scallions are a healthy and refreshing way to liven up any dish. An easy one with a definite Chinese flavor is chopped scallions fried with ground beef and garlic served over a bed of rice or cellophane noodles. You can sub in soy beef crumbles for the meat for healthier fare. Add a good two cups of chopped scallions to a  pound of meat. Shallots, similar to scallions, are perfect in chicken dishes.Its' delicate flavor is perfect for poultry and even good in chicken soup.As for chives, they are any potato's mate. Try Hassleback potatoes or a liberal sprinkling on a bowl of mashed potatoes.

Alliums are a kitchen must have. They are not only good for you but good for any savory recipe. Try them in a variety of different ones this Spring season.

A Fancy Barbecue

Could a barbecue be  elegant? Can  lobster and London broil replace dogs and burgers?The answer is yes. It's just a matter of elevating the menu and adding a fancy spin on backyard dining.

First of all establish some sort of dress code for the guests. The best bet is looking to beach weddings for inspiration. A semi formal look would be fine. It's not overly formal, and comfortable enough to relax in. Think slacks and a button down shirts for men while any summer dress and sandals will do for women. As for the host's end, if you're doing the grilling , grill in old clothes, then change.If it's too much serve food that can be made in advance.What do you serve at this sort of gathering?Good food , but not the usual messy fare. The best way to decide on a menu is think of what you would have at an indoor party. One of the easiest paths to take is having a buffet.It's a no brainer to set up tables at your yard's parameters , leaving the space in between for tables and chairs. Have chilled bruschetta topping just warmed Italian and French bread slices.You can do a different spin on it , by putting swirls of basil or kale pesto on the slices.Polenta rounds  topped with sauteed cremini and shiitake mushrooms are another lovely opener.  Try cherry tomatoes stuffed with minced mozzarella - a perfect warm weather treat, especially when paired with champagne.

What about the main fare? Serve spiral ham and London broil along with roast turkey.  All can be grilled, the turkey  does need to be tented with aluminum foil when cooking outside. Another idea is barbecued shrimp which can be put on mini skewers for easy  no mess handling . Want to add another level of elegance? Then think of serving barbecued lobster tails. Surprisingly , they're easy to cook on the grill. Start with a lemony marinade of lemon juice, zest and olive oil - or canola oil for a lighter touch. Best of all the tails are a fast cook - only taking ten to twelve minutes . They can be cut into nuggets for easier, no fuss eating. Scallops are another elegant choice. Soak them in a lime marinade for something different. As far as sides, think classic yet simple.An avocado mousse, made with cream and spiked with chili peppers is a good choice,perfect with chicken or seafood. A Spring greens salad is also an ideal foil for any red meat main dish. As for ending the meal, place plates of petit fours and fancy homemade shortbreads on the table.Confectioner's sugar dusted cupcakes are another lovely way to end. Serve coffee and tea in fancy plastic cups that you can buy from Amazon. These come in silver or gold and provide a classy touch.

Yes, a barbecue can be classy and elegant. It starts with smartly dressed guests dining on fancy food on fancy plates. What a great way to start the summer grilling season.

Is Kelp The New Kale

There's a new green in town that may dethrone kale as the top veggie. It's seaweed and it's not only versatile and nutrient dense but also good for the planet. Eating it is good for us and good for Earth.

Melissa Clark explored this in yesterday's New York Times Food section. As seen here , the entire section was dedicated to sustainability and eating to help the planet. Kelp is one of those plants that is low impact on the climate but high impact on diets. Ms. Clark traveled to Portland, Maine where the plant is surrounded by clean seawater. (Don't try this at home, especially if your shoreline is near a big city) Eating seaweed is nothing new.Different kinds such as sweet red dulse,inky alaria and ruffled sea lettuce have fed coastal communities for thousands of years. Traditional Welsh recipes calls for frying fresh seaweed in bacon fat while the Irish cook it with potatoes The Scots even bake it into breads and biscuits. Indigenous Americans were not immune to its'' possibilities and cooked all manners of seaweed, from brown to green to red. Of course most Americans have had their first taste with Japanese sushi, yet it's not the same as fresh. It hasn't caught on, probably because of  seaweed salad most sushi restaurants serve. It's cloying and damp, a far cry from what is originally cooked in Japanese households and restaurants.

Will kelp fly in American home kitchens?One of its' big pluses is that the cell structure won't break done during freezing , thawing and then refreezing. This is due to it developing in constantly changing tides and temperatures. Keep in mind that its' different from nori, kombu and  dulse. These have to be prepared differently. Ms. Clark puts it smoothies, soups and saute pans with a hit of chile and garlic.  She gives three different recipes. One is roast chicken with crunchy seaweed and potatoes. This is a sheet pan meal so the seaweed is baked til it's crisp and crunchy  not unlike kale - which you can sub in for it. Then there is creamy white bean and seaweed stew with Parmesan. It's a typical Italian bean soup spiked with dried kombu which is often used in Japanese soups. If you want something a bit more briny the last recipe is a lemony pasta with anchovies and kelp. Chiles give it bite. In this, kelp is pureed but you can also use kelp smoothie cubes. Think of it as a pesto thickened with an anchovy paste flavored with lemon zest,  garlic and chile peppers.It's an interesting concept that can work with any kind of pasta, preferably a chunky kind like rigatoni.

Will it help the planet to eat kelp and its cousins? Yes. Will it help your diet? Yes. Cooking and eating seaweed is a win-win situation. Try it not just for your sake but also for the planet's.