She asked us to lunch and we debated on either barbecue, or New Southern cooking. I wasn’t up for barbecue, so we ended up at 18 Seaboard, a red brick two-level restaurant set in a former train station.

The chef-owner is Jason Smith – an amiable man who has quite the experiences under his rather young belt: cooking for big name chefs in North Carolina and New York, running a kitchen to feed 1300 daily in Antarctica, and now, being a new father with two restaurants. (He also owns Cantina 18 in Raleigh.)

18 Seaboard’s menu is modern Southern and American fare. Each dish that we ordered – we chose several  to get a great sampling – showed finesse and control. The plates were not only eye-pleasing, but every plate had a focused flavor.

Today’s feast

I’ll share an interview with the chef in an upcoming article here, but for now, I’ll share our menu and his simple, delicious recipe for corn soup.

• Corn Soup (made from corn delivered from the farmer that day)
• Snead’s Ferry She-Crab Soup with a sherry reduction
• Iceberg wedge with big bacon crunch
• Blackeyed pea cakes with zucchini, squash, and summer vegetable vinaigrette
• Crispy Pamlico shrimp salad with Asiago dressing and focaccia croutons

We had no room for dessert!

18 Seaboard’s Corn Soup recipe

• 2 tablespoons butter
  
• 2 tablespoons diced onion
• 3 ears fresh silver queen corn, shucked, kernels removed
• 1/2 cup chicken stock
• 1/2 cup heavy cream
• 1 sprig fresh thyme
• Salt and white pepper to taste

Heat large saute pan over medium heat; add butter when pan is hot. Swirl butter to melt; do not allow to brown. Add onion and saute 1 minute; add corn and cook 3 minutes more, stirring. Set aside. Combine cream, stock and thyme in small saucepan; cook for three minutes over medium heat with thyme. Remove thyme. Combine corn and stock mixture in blender; puree until smooth. Add salt and white pepper to taste.

Serve hot or chilled.

Makes 4 appetizer servings.

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An Ocracoke native, she had one of the biggest, fullest fig trees I’d ever seen last time I was here. She put up and sold jars of fig preserves, the old-fashioned syrupy kind, out of a shed in her back yard.

Oddly, my good foodie/Southern friend Ben Starling and I were just discussing fig preserves just before I left on this trip. We were lamenting the fact that we can’t find the dark kind of fig preserves – the ones that are packed in heavy, thick syrup, ones like my mom and Aunt Eleanor put up every year. We agreed we don’t cotton to that thin kind you find commercially.

Figs for breakfast and supper

They resemble the ones in the photo I found from McDonald’s Farm. (McDonald’s is a fruit farm in Baskin, La. — apparently with no web site — where they know a thing about figs, too. Chef Paul Prudhomme’s sister makes a cake from the preserves; her recipe is one I have dogeared from use. It’s in one of his cookbooks.)

Mostly, though, I believe fig preserves are made for one thing and one thing only: hot buttermilk biscuits. Poking a hole in the crispy top of the biscuit and filling its tender inside with a fig and its syrup is a ritual I have repeated countless times as a girl.

Licking the syrup that leaks out the sides from my fingers, swabbing up the last of the syrup on the plate with the last bite of biscuit…then wistfully looking at the empty biscuit plate and wishing I hadn’t been so polite to take only one. This is a direct brain-to-mouth memory.

You can see why it’s a mission to find these once more. I’ve been in fig withdrawal for over a decade, when I finished the last of mom’s fig and pear preserves. I’ll let you know how I fare, so check back.

Meanwhile, here’s the Ocracoke Island Fig Cake recipe, from the Ocracoke Cookbook.

Ocracoke Island Fig Cake

• 3 eggs
• 1 cup oil
• 1 1⁄2 cups sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking soda, dissolved in 1 teaspoon hot water
• 2 cups flour
• 1 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1 teaspoon allspice
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1⁄2 cup buttermilk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 cup fig preserves, chopped
• 1 cup chopped nuts (pecans, walnuts)

Beat eggs; add sugar and oil. After sifting dry ingredients, add to egg mixture alternately with buttermilk. Add vanilla and fold in figs and nuts.

Pour into greased 13-by-9-inch pan or bundt pan and bake at 325 degrees for 45 minutes to 1 hour, or in a well greased tube pan at 350 degrees just a little longer. If you use a cake tester, it may read sticky if you draw through a fig, so look instead for signs of wet batter.

*Chopped dates may be substituted for figs, but I wouldn’t.

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Clark’s Inn, Santee, SC

Clark's Inn dining room, Santee, SC

For the third time, we stopped at Clark’s Inn in Santee, S.C. to eat on the road. I think I’ll let the breakfast menu tell you about its style:

Start with our Homemade Country Breakfast: Sugar Cured Bacon, Smoked Sausage, Country Ham, Southern Style Grits, Home-Fried Potatoes with Onions, Homemade Buttermilk Biscuits with Sausage Gravy and Eggs cooked just like “you like”.

Our Ham and Cheese Omelets are famous and we have the Best Pancakes and French Toast you have tasted. Try our Old Fashioned Oatmeal or sample some Fried Green Tomatoes with Chutney.

We had baked chicken for dinner with a homestyle squash casserole (recipe for one like it follows) – though those fried green tomatoes were calling, I resisted for once, and reluctantly turned away from their so-claimed “Famous fried chicken.”

Hospitality here is four stars! This restaurant has been in operation every day except Christmas Day each year, since 1946. Pretty cool. And, it’s still in the original Clark family.

Squash Casserole with Stuffing

• 2 pounds squash thickly sliced (7 cups)
• 1/4 cup chopped onion
• 1 10 3/4 ounce can cream of chicken soup
• 1 cup sour cream
• 1 cup shredded carrot
• 1/4 cup butter
• 2 cups herb-seasoned cornbread stuffing mix (about 1/2 of 8-ounce package)

Preparation:

Cook squash with onion in boiling salted water for 5 to 10 minutes or until soft. Drain well.

Combine soup and sour cream. Stir in shredded carrot. Fold in drained squash and onion. Melt butter; toss with stuffing mix.

Spread half of the stuffing in a 12 x 8 x 2-inch glass baking dish. Spoon squash mixture on top. Sprinkle with remaining stuffing mixture. Bake at 350° until heated through, 25 to 30 minutes.

Makes 6 servings.

Jan’s notes: I’d add 1/4 cup chopped bacon to the squash; add it in with the drained squash and onion. Many recipes call for shredded cheese on top instead of stuffing.

Clark’s Inn and Restaurant

114 Bradford Blvd., Santee, SC 29142-8931
(803) 854-2141; clarksinnandrestaurant.com

Open daily for breakfast, lunch and dinner at 6 a.m. till close.

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ORLANDO – I’m up here taking a class that I desperately hope will improve my web site. It’s a week long and for bunches of reasons, have been unable to catch up with friends for dinner. Last night I took the easy way out and stopped by Uno’s on I-Drive to pick up a small pizza and a salad from Uno’s.

Very friendly servers helped me out in a town where everyone in the hospitality industry is nervous about being laid off at any minute — thanks to a weakened tourist season, though they’re encouraged by lowering gas prices.

Still, the majority of car tags around here are local – not what they want to see. Hope that changes for them as summer wears on.

Uno’s gets around

I’ve eaten at the original Uno’s in Chicago and did a big story on them when they first came to Fort Lauderdale in the ’80s. They’re even in New York now – pretty much a ubiquitous chain.

 That pizza last night was scrumptious — and not because I was hungry. The crust was crisp on the bottom, it was chock full of ingredients and wasn’t swimming in grease. I ate the crust rim – something I rarely do with other pizzas.

I like it. It’s that simple. I don’t miss it because I don’t miss any pizza enough to pine for it, except maybe the Pizza Oven’s pizza from my childhood (Rod Campbell, are you still out there?) and only because my parents liked it and bought it for us to take to the drive-in. Even more fun.

Fight with me if you like — I’ve had this argument before many times with readers who are as passionate about pizza as I am about good fried chicken and no sugar in cornbread.

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So my food friends in Jacksonville are taking the water taxi to dinner these days.

There’s a unique restaurant up there in a burg named Mandarin on the Julington Creek  called Clark’s Fish Camp. Unique in so many ways — including an owner, Joan Peoples, who’s still there after nearly 30 years at it. It was a bait shop and expanded to its current property that includes a room-long bar, outdoor boat docks, deck seating and several rooms indoors.

Are we there yet?

We had been on a vacation that landed us in Ponte Vedre Beach. Never one to settle for a lousy chain restaurant when I can eat like a local, I asked the very smart desk folks at the Hilton Garden Inn where the popular local spot was for seafood. They sent us to Clark’s with a warning that it was out of the way, and even if we thought we were lost, we probably weren’t there yet. “Just keep going,” they said.

I’m glad they warned us. They were SO right. This place is one of the toughest spots to find anywhere. It’s down and around and through several residential neighborhoods that you’re sure has to be the wrong way. At last, you hit “the street.” Suddenly, you can’t miss it — every car and boat trailer in the northeast is lined up along this narrow road trying to park or put in or pull out a boat. It’s the nuttiest traffic mess I’ve ever seen — at least before the shuttle launch snafu.

It’s all in the decor

After about 45 minutes of figuring out where and how to park along the road and avoid the tow truck, we made it to the outside deck next to the water hyacinth-filled creek. There would be a wait — 45 minutes or so, we were told. We got a drink and waited out on the dock where signs warned, “Do not feed the alligators!”

Now I imagine it’s novel for tourists to see those signs and they probably think it’s a joke for them – and probably ignore them. We natives know they’re deadly serious. You don’t feed an alligator because they really love to eat. They have big, very powerful jaws and impressive numbers of teeth. But they don’t really know when you’re through feeding them – and will keep snapping at whatever’s close whether it’s food or not. (If you are intent on cleaning the gene pool, go ahead and feed ‘em: They love marshmallows.)

It’s a jungle in there

We were called for our table, and led through the narrow passage from the bar to the back deck.  I wasn’t quite prepared for the wild -literally - decor. Years ago, the owner was given a stuffed raccoon or squirrel – I forget which — and decided it would be a nice complement to the rustic bar decor. Things snowballed after that, and it wasn’t long before there was an entire jungle’s worth of animals — stuffed, mounted and otherwise taxidermed in their finest form — all on display in every nook and cranny of this restaurant.

Fake plants and tree branches were added to create a diorama of sorts. Many of these creatures are downright scary — huge snakes, gators, pumas, lions growling and so on. They are grouped overhead in the dining room, ready to pounce if they could just come back to life. I could see little kids having serious nightmares after eating here.

So a gator in the bathroom is no big deal

I’m sure at first, it was no big deal to hear a report that there was a gator in the bathroom. Up here that could mean all sorts of things: A stuffed one, or a  two-legged variety that bleeds UF orange and blue, or even a kiddy toy left by a visitor from the Alligator Farm in St. Augustine. 

But it turns out, there was a gator in the bathroom — a live one. He (or she) had likely been driven in by the torrential rains and flooding they’ve had, and made a cozy home for himself behind the toilet. I can only imagine the poor sap who came up on the rascaly reptile. The news reports indicated it was only a 3-footer, but there’s enough power in a 36-inch alligator’s tail and jaw to get my attention. He was dragged out by the tail, rather ignominiously, and returned to the creek.

Hope the flood did no damage

The restaurant was closed at the time — they’d been closed for a week due to flooding. I hope the water didn’t do much damage, though Peoples said she’s used to floods during hurricanes. Not just from thunderstorms, though, so this may have caught her up short. She also collects fish plates and has the most impressive collection I’ve come across. To a dish nut like me, seeing this display was the best part of my visit. The plates are from the Victorian era, typically from Germany, Austria and France, and are delicately hand-painted. I hope none were damaged from the floodwaters.

A local hang-out

The popularity of the place with the locals, plus the chance to eat oddities such as ostrich, rattlesnake, kangaroo and more has made this the go-to place in the area. I can vouch for their fried green tomatoes, shrimp, fish and judging by the smiles on the diners next to us, the prime rib. Sure hope to get a chance to go back soon. I recommend it — just get good directions, and then drive till you think you might be in Georgia.

• Clark’s Fish Camp
• 12903 Hood Landing Road
• Mandarin (Jacksonville), FL 32258
• (904) 268-3474

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Nshima and bream dinner

A friend in Africa writes about the national dish — nshima, a dish made from maize meal. The closest common food to it, she says, is a very firm, congealed polenta.

(Somewhere in Zambia)

Hi, Jan!

The photo above is of my favorite meal -nshima and bream dinner, with vegetables. The nshima is the side starch that looks like mashed potatoes, but is much firmer. It is, apparently, the national dish. It goes with everything and shows up everywhere; it’s even listed on local fast-food joints’ menu boards: Nshima dishes.

The interesting thing about nshima is what a difference eating it with the hands makes.
Originally I poured on a little of the bright orange gravy servers put in front of me, and picked at it with a fork. I enjoyed it, although could only pick away so much before I got bored. My dining companions, on the other hand, ate with gusto, and made it disappear with help from utensils.

But doing so the right way isn’t easy to do right, even if you’re a finger food aficionado, as I am. This isn’t just a pick-it-up-and-pop-it-into-your-mouth endeavor.

No – to do this right you have to dig in to the pile of nshima on your plate, and start a sentence about the current state of politics in Zambia. This will tend to be a run-on sentence, so as it goes on, you will have plenty of time to knead the nshima in your hand with your thumb, against your other four fingers. When you are about ready to stop talking, you bring the kneaded nshima down to the main dish and use it to mop up the vegetables, meat or fish. In this way, the entire serving will disappear rapidly.

I do want to note that the dining room where I was staying had a little sink with running water in the corner, where guests washed their hands before and after eating.

Still, that much hand contact with one’s food can be difficult for a germ-phobic American to get comfortable mastering. I figure I will practice in the privacy of my home, once I get my kitchen equipped and figure out how to make it.

 - T.

 

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She just launched her own travel blog, called InnSide Florida, and because travel dovetails with food, she’s guest blogging here once in a while.

Today, she’s got great ideas for housing winter visitors — in someone else’s house!

Here’s Mary…

The INNside Scoop on Local B&Bs

By Mary Thurwachter

Looking for a nice place to put out-of-own visitors while they’re in town visiting you?

You’re in luck! South Florida has some fine B&Bs. Here are eight to check out:

Sabal Palm House Lake Worth Photo courtesy Sabal Palm House

Sabal Palm House, Lake Worth

Like Ritz-Carlton treatment but can’t handle the price tag? Sabal Palm is the place for you! It the only Florida bed-and-breakfast from Orlando to Miami to earn AAA’s Four Diamond Award for nine consecutive years. With seven guest rooms/suites, the B&B has views of the Lake Worth Municipal Golf Course and the Intracoastal. The beach, galleries and stores, including lots of antique and collectible shops, are within walking distance. Rooms are named after artists. For details, call 561-582-1090 or see www.sabalpalmhouse.com.

Casa de Rosa, West Palm Beach

Elaine Calendrillo’s Dutch apple pancakes are legendary. But the yummy breakfasts are just one reason to stay at this four-bedroom, 1926, Tuscan-style B&B in Old Northwood. The tropical gardens are lush, the pool is inviting and hospitality is tops. For details, call 888-665-8666 or see www.casaderosa.com.

Grandview Gardens: West Palm Beach

This restored 1924 home with five guest suites in a separate building has private entrances to guest rooms, terraces, large bathrooms and a swimming pool. There’s also a two-bedroom, two-bathroom, 1925 Bermuda-style home surrounded by lush, tropical landscape and has a private garden pathway to the tropical garden,  sun deck and heated pool. Close to CityPlace, the Norton Museum and Armory Art Center, the Kravis Center and the Convention Center,  Grandview Gardens B&B is a good choice for culture-seekers. For details, call 561-833-9023 or see www.grandview-gardens.com.

Mango Inn, Lake Worth

Within walking distance of downtown shops and restaurants, the Mango Inn has seven guest rooms and a pool. Breakfast is served on the veranda overlooking the pool. The new owners are medical professionals – two nurses and a doctor – so guests are in good hands. For details, call 561-533-6900 or see www.mangoinn.com.

Sundy House, Delray Beach

Most people know of the Sundy House because of its restaurant, but there is also a B&B and natural swimming pond set in lush tropical gardens. Guest rooms have hand-painted details, original artwork, fine bed linens and natural themes reflecting the lush landscape. A separate cottage has a fireplace and Jacuzzi. For details, call 561-272-5678 or see www.sundyhouse.com.

Crane’s Beach House, Delray Beach

The tiki bar at this inn, just a block from the beach,  has become a popular weekend hangout, but the B&B itself is a hit, too. Each room is unique and guests love the cool pool. For details, call 866-372-7263 or see  www.cranesbeachhouse.com.

Hibiscus House, Old Northwood, West Palm Beach

This B&B was built in 1922 by Mayor David Dunkle during the Florida land boom. It’s West Palm Beach’s first B&B and it has a nice little pool and a fabulous gourmet breakfast. For details, call 561-863-5633 or see www.hibiscushouse.com.

Hibiscus House Downtown, West Palm Beach

A block from CityPlace and within walking distance of The Convention Center and The Kravis Center,  this cozy two-home inn has a reputation for good breakfasts and the trolley stops right in front of the place. For details, call 561-833-8171 or see www.hibiscushousedowntown.com.

Mary Thurwachter writes about Florida inns at INNsideFlorida.com.

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Spring Lake Inn - summertime

Owners of the Spring Lake Inn, a bed and breakfast in Spring Lake, N.J., have come up with hands-on vegetarian cooking classes for their guests, free if you stay two weeknights during January through March. The classes are small — six allowed, including children -and you get to keep your apron, eat your food, and take home the recipes.

Classes are taught by innkeeper Donna Ferris and include dishes such as the Sun-dried tomatoes strata with cheddar cheese, or the Cheese blintzes with berry jam. For kids, there’s the Baked cheesy pizza omelet or PB&J French toast sticks.

The inn is from 1888 and was a horse stable back in the day, now repurposed as a 16-room inn; it’s only a block away from the ocean and a stroll down to the lake. (I like the idea of the Turret room with ocean views.

Go on — be different. Do a winter getaway in the northeast when the crowds are gone! More info: Spring Lake Inn, www.springlakeinn.com; or phone 732-449-2010.

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Heard from Stuart food-friend and savvy businesswoman Pat Williams that I simply must check out Orsay in Jacksonville. It’s the former Crush Bistro, with some of the staff and sous chef-now exec chef from that popular spot. California-French and fresh, it has “simply the greatest cassoulet,” duck breast and steak frites anywhere, Williams vows. She also loves the decor – rough textures juxtaposed with elegant fixtures at the same time. Works for me — I’ll let you know when I go. Sounds like a find.

Orsay

• 3630 Park St., Jacksonville
• (904) 381-0909
• www.crushbistro.com

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longer having to answer to One Who Must Be Obeyed.

Staying in San Jose at the really swell boutique hotel, the Wild Palms. Highly recommended — cute rooms, lovely landscaping and full breakfasts. It’s a Joie de Vivre Club hotel, and if this represents their properties, I’m joining!

Our 12 hours of room-to-room travel time from Ft. Lauderdale left us weary (4 a.m. is when I get to bed, not get up and rush to an airport!) but we wanted to cram in a day of sightseeing anyway, so headed to Santa Cruz. The oldest old-fashioned amusement park (wooden rollercoaster, and hand-carved carousel horses) on the coast is here; really a cool looking place but deserted this time of year. The municipal pier next to it provided the amusement in the form of elephant seals that congregate by the hundreds under the pier. Bush’s brazillions come to mind.

Agressive creatures. And — surprise! They can heave themselves out of the water at least 4 feet. I went downstairs to a platform next to the pier to investigate, along with a biker couple who were having a rolicking time, thanks to what looked like a gallon-sized can of Foster’s beer.

On the ocean side of the platform there was a gated door that led to a little platform, as for a performer to stand. We all had our backs to the platform, standing about 3 feet away, peering under the pier at all the seals. In an instant, a huge seal heaved itself up on that platform and barked like a maniac. I jumped back and nearly crashed into the fence. The other couple yelled. They tried to shoot photos, but the seal wasn’t cooperating and kept turning away. I raised my phone to get a close snapshot, when the seal lunged up and over the 3-foot gate. We all ran for the stairs. Once on deck, the big guy (or gal – didn’t ask for its name) went to the fence in the far corner. I eased back down the steps to get that photo, but this thing was territorial and barked and moved at me as though to challenge me to a flipper duel. No thanks: He/she outweighed me by a good 300 pounds and his/her breath was enough to knock me over without a fight.

A Japanese tourist with a videocam followed me down, and got the same reaction, so it wasn’t personal.

Gave up that pursuit, and went to get oysters at Sagnaro Bros. – they’ve been there since the ’30s and are still family owned.  Deep fried artichoke hearts with a pesto aioli – terrif! and fresh, icy cold bluepoints, with a Sierra Nevada pale ale (brewed around here, and shipped cold to us down in Fla.).

On to capture the Pigeon Point lighthouse just north of us at sunset. It’s the tallest lighthouse on that coast and lighthouses are a photo fetish of my partner, the tunesman. We passed a surfing competition just north of the pier; neither of us was impressed with the surf there, but it was a mild day at sea for these parts.

We got great shots of a bike path for Ken Steinhoff’s blog; it runs along the cliff next to the highway. Scary and neat! Too hilly for me, though. Also good shots of the natural bridges rock formation at a beach there; and then onto the lighthouse.

On the way, we marveled at all the farming that’s done directly on the cliff tops – especially the pumpkin patches. Seaside Pumpkins was our favorite — it was literally on the oceanfront. That would be muy expensive farmland in our region.

Hit the lighthouse directly at sunset – nice, for a change, to see the sun set over water. took the Pescadero road back to the interstate, stopping at Alice’s Restaurant for a cup of soup; we were beyond tired at that point. It was good tortilla soup; and pretty good pumpkin pie. Great acoustic group, too. (Restaurant named after Arlo’s song – not the namesake.)

The Tail of the Dragon route in the NC mountains have nothing on this Pescadero road. It’s one hairpin after another – Chuck Keefer, and other bikers, take note. We saw a six-point deer on one of the turns, giving me flashbacks to hitting the deer out in Lake O after a bike ride, and totalling my truck, so I became deer-shy and slowed even more. My arms were tired from all the turning.

Alice’s waitress steered us north on the interstate rather than south, insisting it was right so we went at least 20 miles out of our way before we realized her apparent confusion. I went back to my own map and got us back straight away.

A bed never felt so good.

Keep those food suggestions coming! I’m off to Cheryl’s today, and headed south of Santa Cruz, but might try Duarte’s later.

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