Chili, making a mess in my pink Le Creuset enameled cast-iron pot and on my stove

It turned cold by South Florida standards this week – after a long bout of 80+ degree weather and horrid humidity, we welcome temps in the low 70s, or 50s at night.

A perfect time to make a pot of chili.

This stuff doesn’t require long simmering, though you could. I fouled it up amazingly from the start – distracted by a batch of cookies I was making at the same time. I grabbed a can of tomatoes made with basil. I added things all at the wrong time. I had to adjust spices all over the place, but it worked. Remarkably, it turned out super.

Here’s a vague recipe for it. I probably added a bunch of stuff not mentioned. Sorry. Add basil if you so desire – I wouldn’t.

Note: My Texas friends are rolling their eyes and wondering how it is I can call this stuff chili, no doubt. I dunno either!

My cornbread recipe is here.

Jan’s slightly screwed-up chili

Rancho de Chimayo Hacienda sells their chile powder

• 1-1/2 pounds cubed chuck, or ground chuck
• 2 tablespoons chile powder, or to taste (I used what I bought at Rancho de Chamayo in Santa Fe, NM)
• 1 tablespoon cumin
• 1 tablespoon ground garlic
• 1 teaspoon oregano
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• 1/2 large white onion, chopped
• 1 (15 oz.) can red beans
• 1 (28 ounce) can crushed tomatoes, or whole tomatoes, crushed
• 1-1/2 cups beef or chicken broth – more as needed
• 1/4 cup masa harina
• Fritos and cornbread, for serving

Brown beef with spices, salt and pepper in bottom of large heavy pot over medium heat. Add onion and cook to sweat the onion. Pour in beans and tomatoes and stir. Cook for 5 minutes; taste and adjust spices. Add broth and stir. Add masa harina to thicken slightly. Continue to cook, taste and adjust seasonings and thin as needed with extra broth. Cook 25 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Serve hot and steaming in a bowl with cornbread and/or Original Fritos.

Freezes very well.

Makes 8 servings.

Pear butter, with chunks of pear - perfect on cinnamon toast /photo by Jan Norris

I worked a deal this year at Thanksgiving: I’d make two pie crusts in exchange for a jar of pear butter from my friend, Libby Volgyes.

I definitely got the best end of that stick.

Libby is known to her co-workers at The Palm Beach Post for her domestic goddess status when it comes to canning and preserving. However, she admits she’s not a baker – and rolling out a pie crust sends her into hiding.

So when I offered to provide the crusts, she offered to trade some pear butter.

Ding! ding! ding! My food memory box was calling.

Jars in the cabinets

For several summers in a row, my mom would spend some summertime with my Aunt Eleanor in Pace, Fla., helping her shell peas and beans and making jellies, figs when they could get them, and my favorite: pear butter.

They’d pick what I call “sand pears” – hard and gritty – from my other aunt across town in Pensacola, Aunt Sis. (Perloca, or Loki, Linton to most). The huge pear tree produced bushels of the fruit almost every year, it seemed. It had a few off years. My grandmother had planted the tree, I think behind her house which abutted the Linton residence.

Mom and Aunt Eleanor would spend mornings peeling the pears, and the afternoon cooking and canning.

She’d bring home jars of the stuff, to line up in the cabinets with the blueberry jelly, figs and pear preserves.

I’d grace a few very lucky friends with some if I were feeling generous.

Served on one of mom’s biscuits, hot from the oven and pooled with real butter and pear butter – lordy! I can hear my dad say, “This is fine eatin’, Mama.”

Different textures

Libby’s pears have a different texture than my mom’s – Libby’s are full of pear chunks, while mom pureed hers, coming up with a texture and flavor similar to apple butter. The syrup is clearer, too – mom used so much cinnamon, it darkened them somewhat.

I loved the flavor of Libby’s, however – with extra lemon, they have a brightness from the citrus which enhances the pear flavor as well.

No time these days to make biscuits, I just spooned them onto a piece of cinnamon toast. So good, I might have to make another to be certain. She should think about selling these at the green market – they’d be a huge hit. I’ve got a her company name, too: Fine Eatin’.

She isn’t selling them yet, but I’ll let you know if she finds time to do so. Meanwhile, I’m off to make another slice of toast and enjoy the memories.

Any type of potato is good in a salad /photo courtesy National Potato Board.

A post by Food52.com (a website with terrific recipes) for a potato salad using arugula and Dijon vinaigrette got me to thinking. I’ll read every new potato salad recipe out there…yet I keep returning to the one of my childhood.

So I’ve decided potato salad may be one of those foods we like, but our family favorite may be the DNA one we return to time and again.

Regional differences

If you grew up in the South, and some Midwest states, that probably means you’re eating a potato salad with chunks of potato, mayonnaise (or Miracle Whip) as the “binder.” It also means it has hard-boiled eggs in it, along with chopped onion, celery, sometimes green pepper and pickle relish. A dab – not too much – of mustard, and there you have it. That’s the kind on our family reunion picnic table.

New Yorkers like a deli-style potato salad. (You can get it locally at Kevin’s Dockside Deli in Palm Beach Gardens.) It may (or may not) have mayo or a touch of sour cream in it, but vinegar and sugar plays in, and the result is a wet potato salad with the tang of vinegar and just a touch of sweetness. The potatoes are typically sliced, not chunked.

German potato salad, found in some west Texas locales, and all around Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, is made with sliced potatoes, bits of bacon and onions, and hot vinegar with only a touch of sugar (optional). Celery seed also is optional for this one. I like a hot potato salad with knockwurst, actually.

A “loaded baked potato salad” recipe came out of Texas (I think), sometime in the mid-70s; it made the rounds and has its followers. It’s heart-stopping just like a real loaded baked potato: Sour cream, bacon, cheddar cheese and butter, plus green onions, go into this recipe. (Not for dieters – but remember, everything in moderation!)

The Californians and West Coast types don’t have a set one, but do throw in avocados and artichoke hearts, and substitute the mayo for a vinaigrette made with olive oil and sometimes, balsamic or champagne vinegar. We’ve seen versions that contain pancetta instead of bacon, as well.

Recipes for potato salads

Here are common recipes for the most-fixed potato salads; tell us about your variations in the comments.

Southern potato salad

• 6 medium potatoes (peeled, if desired)
• 6 hard-boiled eggs, chopped
• 1 small sweet onion, chopped
• 3 ribs celery, chopped fine
  
• 1/2 green pepper, chopped fine (optional)
• 1/4 cup sweet pickle relish (or to taste)
• 1 teaspoon mustard
• 1/2 teaspoon celery seed
  
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 cup mayonnaise (or to taste)

Boil or steam potatoes until fork-done. Peel if desired; cool.

Combine potatoes with all ingredients except mayonnaise in large bowl and mix well. Add mayonnaise and stir to coat evenly. Chill well; keep leftovers chilled.

Makes 8 to 10 servings.

New York deli potato salad

• 3 pounds small red potatoes
• 1/4 cup sugar (or to taste)
  
• 1/4 cup vinegar
• 1/4 cup water
• 1/4 cup onion, pureed in food processor
• salt and white pepper to taste
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1/2 carrot, finely grated (optional)
• 1/3 cup mayonnaise (or to taste)

Cook potatoes to fork-tender by boiling or steaming; peel (if desired) and refrigerate. In a medium bowl, combine remaining ingredients in order given except carrots and mayonnaise.

Slice potatoes about 1/4 inch thick into a large bowl, and pour in oil mixture. Combine well. Refrigerate several hours or overnight. Before serving, stir in carrots and add mayonnaise to taste. Serve at once; keep leftovers chilled.

Makes 8-10 servings.

German hot potato salad – version 1

• 1/2 pound bacon (8 to 10 slices)
• 1/2 cup sugar, or to taste
  
• 1 cup white vinegar
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper, to taste
• 1/2 teaspoon mustard, or to taste (optional)
• 5 pounds potatoes, cooked, diced
• 1 medium onion, chopped (optional)

Chop the bacon to small dice; fry in a large skillet. Remove and drain on paper towels. Drain all but 2 tablespoons drippings from pan.

Make the dressing: In a small bowl, combine sugar, vinegar, eggs, salt and pepper and mustard (if using); whisk to combine well. Pour into pan with drippings set over medium-low heat. Cook until thickened, stirring constantly.

Put potatoes and onion* in large bowl; pour cooked mixture over all and toss well to combine. Add bacon and toss again; serve warm. Refrigerate any leftovers. Warm leftovers in the microwave on medium power for about 90 seconds.

Makes 10 servings.

Variation: Cook the onion in the bacon drippings before adding egg mixture and toss in with dressing.

This is an entirely different German potato salad, courtesy of my friend, Lila Steinhoff.

Lila’s German Potato Salad

• 5 pounds potatoes, cooked to fork tender, peeled – see note
• 1/2 cup green olives with pimentos, chopped
• 6 slices bacon
• 1 onion, chopped
• 3/4 cup cider vinegar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup mayonnaise (or to taste)

Cook potatoes till fork tender. (Note: Lila uses the pressure cooker to cook in 10 minutes.) Run cool water over them; peel and cut into cubes.

While potatoes are cooking, make dressing: Slice olives and set aside. Cook bacon in skillet till crisp; remove and drain bacon. Crumble and set aside. Drain drippings from skillet, leaving about a tablespoon with all bacon pieces. Heat over medium heat, and add onion; cook till onion breaks apart, but do not overcook. Add vinegar and salt; bring to a boil. Turn off heat and add mayo, stirring to bring up all bacon from bottom of pan and incorporate. Add in bacon and olives; pour over warm potatoes and stir with wooden spoon to avoid breaking up potatoes. If creaminess from potatoes is desired, stir until a slight “mashed potato” effect is achieved.

Serves 12.

The lack of bread got me to thinking that this would never have happened in my mother’s kitchen. There was always and forever a loaf of white bread around. Even though she made some of the best biscuits and cornbread on the planet, never once did she make a yeast bread, at least to my knowledge. (I was the family baker, if you have read previous posts.)

Merita, no Wonder

My mother bought Merita bread. There were Merita bakeries in Miami we could see when we drove down to visit kin.

Merita’s loaf of white bread was soft, fluffy, with a nice brown crust on it. I have no idea whether it would mold – it never lasted long enough to find out, as bread does in my kitchen today.

Used for breakfast toast with mom’s homemade guava jelly, or as a “weenie” wrap for hot dogs when we had no hot dogs buns, or for sopping up the gravy from my mom’s cube steak and gravy, white bread was a staple. She’d buy two loaves at a time. I’d occasionally have to walk to the Publix behind our house and get more mid-week.

Grilled cheese, bologna, thin ham, banana, pimento cheese and egg and tunafish salad went on white bread – most often with mayo. Dad and I had been known to make mayonnaise and mustard sandwiches for a snack if no bananas were handy, though they were another staple my mom always had in the kitchen that I don’t.

Infrequent purchase today

I rarely buy a loaf of bread today. I don’t eat much bread, but more importantly, it takes too long to read the labels. I am a nut for labels, especially on bread – one of the most deceptive foods out there, nutritionally speaking. Bakeries can call their breads 50-grain bread, but most are made primarily with white flour (called “enriched wheat flour” on a label) – the first ingredient on the label – with grains and vitamins added BACK to the bread. What’s the point of taking out the bran and wheat germ to start with?

Only occasionally – and mostly when I’m making pimento cheese or bologna sandwiches – do I miss old-fashioned white bread. It’s probably more memory than flavor, though for both, I don’t want bread to get in the way of the pimento cheese or bologna taste.

For toast, I like whole wheat or even rye. The rest of the time, I make corn bread or biscuits and be done with it.

So what food isn’t in your kitchen that was a staple in your mom’s house?

Legendary Derby winner, Secretariat, covered in roses

Doing a Derby Party this weekend? Get out your widest hat, buy your fresh spearmint, shine your silver julep cups, and learn the words to My Old Kentucky Home, by Stephen Foster. (These are the modern lyrics sung at the Derby today.)

“The sun shines bright in My Old Kentucky home,
‘Tis summer, and people are gay;
The corn-top’s ripe and the meadow’s in the bloom
While the birds make music all the day.

The young folks roll on the little cabin floor
All merry, all happy and bright;
By ‘n’ by hard times comes a knocking at the door
Then My Old Kentucky Home, good night!

Weep no more my lady
Oh! weep no more today!
We will sing one song
For My Old Kentucky Home
For My Old Kentucky Home, far away.”

Making a mint julep

Just like good food, a really delicious drink is only as good as its ingredients. For a mint julep, that includes the fresh mint – a must – clean shaved ice, and fine Kentucky bourbon, generously poured. Long ago it was served in silver mint julep cups, but a tall glass (collectors look for *Official mint julep glasses of the Kentucky Derby with lists of winners on them) will do.

Classic Mint Julep Recipe

6 to 8 sprigs of fresh mint, divided

1 teaspoon granulated sugar

3 ounces Kentucky bourbon

shaved ice

Put washed mint in bottom of glass or cup. Sprinkle sugar over mint. Pour a teaspoon of bourbon over the sugar and using a pestle, muddle the mixture, bruising the mint well to release its flavors. Let stand 2 minutes or longer. Fill glass with shaved ice and add remainder of bourbon. Garnish with fresh mint sprig.

For a party, make Mint Juleps for a Party. The recipe is from our own Palm Beacher, Lilly Pulitzer. It’s in *her party book, Essentially Lilly: A Guide to Colorful Entertaining.

Mint Juleps for a Party

(Begin at least 6 hours ahead.)

4 cups sugar

2 cups water

1 bunch mint leaves, plus extra for garnish

3 cups good Kentucky bourbon, or more to taste

Prepare simple syrup ahead of time: In a heavy saucepan, stir together sugar and water and cook, stirring, over medium heat until sugar is completely dissolved. Put mint in a bowl and bruise with muddler. Pour syrup over all. Allow to cool; cover and refrigerate 6 hours or overnight. Use a slotted spoon to remove mint leaves from syrup and discard. Pour syrup into a tall pitcher; cover and refrigerate.

When ready to serve, set out glasses, syrup, bourbon and shaved ice. Put remaining mint leaves in a glass of water to keep them fresh. Allow guests to make their own juleps (print out directions if desired). (If tending bar, make juleps by filling glasses with shaved ice, add 2 to 3 ounces bourbon, and 2 tablespoons mint-infused syrup. Add mint leaves and stir well. Garnish with a small mint sprig.

Makes 12 servings. Double the recipe for a bigger party or heftier drinkers.

* * *

(*Full disclosure – Anything you buy by clicking through to Amazon from my site nets me a few cents at no cost to you. I offer these links more as convenient suggestions than income – I don’t live off $118 a year I make from it.)

Belinda Hulin, cookbook author and food journalist

Belinda Hulin, food journalist from Louisiana, has a new book, Roux Memories: A Cajun-Creole Love Story with Recipes, that catalogues recipes and parts of lifestyles lost when hurricanes Katrina and Rita ripped through her childhood area around Lafayette, La.

Recipes from more than 40 years of life in Cajun country – crawfish gumbo, cracklin’ cornbread, dirty rice, king cake, pralines and jamabalaya are only a smattering of examples of the recipes she has tested.

Here’s a short piece about how the book came together and a special memory from her:

“Chicken and sausage gumbo is a south Louisiana classic, but truth to tell, my mother always preferred seafood gumbo. So I actually perfected the chicken and sausage gumbo recipe myself, back when I was first living on my own. I needed something distinctively Cajun that could still stretch to feed all my friends. It had to be relatively cheap to produce and equally at home when paired with iced tea, “drinkable” (read: cheap) wine or beer. And it had to feel substantial.

“Over the years, this has become one of my signature winter dishes because it isn’t ordinary, but it does qualify as comfort food. There’s also a bonus: During the long, slow process of preparing the gumbo, the house smells amazing and the kitchen gets warm and steamy.

My mother’s recipe box on the stairs

“I rescued my mother’s recipe box, which was casually stashed on a high step of the staircase before the family evacuated in advance of Katrina. While flipping through the box, I felt this overwhelming sense of relief. The box held my cousin Bertha’s famous (in Scott, Louisiana, LOL) peanut brittle recipe and her syrup cookies, which I adore. It also had recipes for Cousin Hazel’s fresh coconut filling, the birthday cakes my mother made for us and our friend Ms. Sarah’s pralines, among others.

“I especially loved finding my late father’s chili recipe–which calls for 25 pounds of beef! Seeing all those recipes, and remembering the people and places, made me smile at a difficult time.

“But after going through the box, I started to think about all the recipes that weren’t in there. For example, my grandmother’s unusual beef boulettes and the corn maque choux and smothered okra dishes I loved as a child, and my Mom’s baked stuffed redfish. And I realized that I needed to finally get those things written down, for the day when I couldn’t just ask my mother to make them.

“It took me about a year to put the recipes together. Most of the dishes are things I’ve been cooking or eating all my life, so it was mostly a matter of getting a recipe on paper that matched the taste I love. In some cases, I sent emails to cousins and friends asking for instructions. For some recipes I started with what I knew of the oral tradition – asking my mother and others what they most remembered about a dish and how their mother or grandmother prepared it – and then I’d develop, test and retest to get a workable recipe.

Fifth cookbook

“This is my fifth cookbook, but truly, this one is a labor of love. Like many ethnic cuisines, Cajun and Creole cooking is largely an oral tradition. Unfortunately, when something like a major hurricane happens, you realize that your extended family may not always be there to share the story.”

Check out Roux Memories: A Cajun-Creole Love Story with Recipes, and another favorite from the area, Cooking Up a Storm: Recipes Lost and Found from The Times-Picayune of New Orleans – other recipes rescued from cooks after Katrina.

Recipe

Here’s the Chicken and sausage gumbo recipe from her new book – make it and freeze the extra in one-night portions; eat it over rice.

Chicken and sausage gumbo

• 1 whole chicken and 4 chicken breast halves
• 10 to 12 cups water
• 4 bay leaves, divided
• 6 cups strong chicken broth
• 1 cup vegetable oil
• 1-1/2 cups granulated flour
• 2 medium onions, chopped
• 1-1/2 teaspoons salt or to taste
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon white pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme leaves
• 1/2 teaspoon rubbed sage
• 1 pound andouille or smoked sausage, sliced
• 2 stalks celery, sliced
• 1 green bell pepper, cored and diced
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 cup chopped parsley
• 2 tablespoons file powder
• 1/2 cup sliced green onions
• Tabasco sauce to taste

In a large pot, combine chicken, chicken breasts, water and 2 bay leaves. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to medium. Simmer until chicken is done, about 35 minutes. Remove the chicken and chicken breasts and set aside to cool. Strain cooking liquid into a large soup pot or Dutch oven and add 4 cups chicken broth. Bring liquid to a boil.

In a heavy saucepan over medium heat, combine oil and flour. Cook, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, until mixture turns a dark reddish brown. Remove from heat and add 1/2 the onions. Stir until onions begin to brown around the edges, about 1 to 2 minutes. Carefully add the roux to the boiling broth. Stir to blend and reduce heat to medium. Add remaining bay leaves. Simmer 11/2 hours.

Add salt, black pepper, cayenne, white pepper, thyme and sage. Add sliced sausage and continue to simmer 15 minutes. Turn off heat and let the pot stand 10 minutes, untouched. Skim off the sausage fat that rises to the top of the gumbo.

Turn the heat back to medium and stir in remaining onions, celery, green pepper, garlic and half the parsley. Simmer until vegetables are tender, about 15 to 20 minutes. Remove chicken from bones. Cut chicken meat into bite-size pieces and stir into the gumbo. Simmer 10 minutes. Stir in file powder, remaining parsley and green onions. Serve in bowls with steamed rice and pass the Tabasco.

Makes 10 to 12 servings.

Rack's Deviled Eggs

My colleague John Linn at Broward New Times wrote online about the $5 for 5 deviled eggs served at Gary Rack’s new Downtown Eatery + Tavern in Boca Raton. That’s a comfort food-with-a-twist spot. (Very fun, whimsical and vivid decor, solid drinks and some good dishes in Mizner Park.)

This GRIT (Girls Raised in the South) couldn’t let deviled egg nugget go without comment – or a recipe. It’s just too easy to make your own, and throw in whatever you like – for about $2 for 24 deviled egg (halvesies).

So run over to Clean Plate Charlie and read the recipes. Want even more? Get Debbie Moose’s cookbook, Deviled Eggs: 50 Recipes from Simple to Sassy.

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.

Nellie and B.R. Harrelson, cuttin’ a rug

Lemon meringue pie = Father’s Day

My dad had a sweet tooth – a miserable thing for my mom, who didn’t really like to bake. That is, it required a recipe, and extensive time in the kitchen – two things she had no use for, really. (But could she dance! – as did my dad – that’s them above, at a wedding. The cap he’s wearing is an inside joke.)

So once I was “of age”  – around 8, I began to bake. Pleasing my dad with goodies was a high point of my cooking. I was, after all, the quintessential “daddy’s girl,” even if he tried his best to raise me as a tomboy. (I can still throw a mean cast net and in a pinch, clean an old-fashioned carburetor. And thank heaven for his teaching – no man in my life has ever been able to fix my small appliances — so I do it. It vexed him that I spent so much time with my nose in books; he wanted me to have hands-on learning, and so I did.)

Of all the sweets Dad loved, pie was his favorite. And of all the pies I baked for him through the years,  chocolate cream and lemon were his two favorites. I’m quite sure coconut cream was in that top three, but it wouldn’t be until after his death 18 years ago that I learned to make that sinfully rich variety.

Mom’s version – from a box

Of course, my mom did bake for him occasionally, but took the easy way out. She’d get a box of My-T-Fine pudding and pie filling. It had a capsule in it as I remember (My-T-Fine has been off our shelves for decades) that dissolved as you cooked it.

This was the only “boxed” filling she and my dad liked, so mom kept a shelf full at the ready, though mostly, she used it as a pudding. Pie took too long.

Lemon meringue /photo by Daniel Greene

A cookbook discovery

Then here I came, with  my bookwormy ways, exploring cookbooks (!) – the very few my mom had in the house, that is. They were Thermadore cookbooks – they came with the 1956 appliances put into the famous tract houses of these SoFla neighborhoods when they were built. She had the books stuffed in a kitchen drawer that held all the “junk” – that tells you how seldom it was referenced.

There was a pie recipe in the oven one – for lemon meringue. It called for egg yolks, and real sugar and lemons – oh, the thrill! I got it out one day and decided to make it, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Meringues – trouble in an eggshell

It was from the first pie I baked from that book that I learned the tricks to a pie crust, and a meringue, though not from the book. A neighbor taught me - after a dozen egg whites had gone down the sink, and my tomcat Jinx was getting woozy from eating the surplus yolks – that you must gradually add sugar, or the whites won’t whip. (It’s a story for another day.)

Needless to say, the cookbook was sparse in its directions.

Just to be sure – second helpings

Once I mastered it, I would bake this pie for him for every Father’s Day, and every birthday thereafter.  And once, when he help me buy my first car (a Datsun 1200 – with a 1.2-litre engine and manual tranny all so I could drive like a maniac).

If Dad were here, I’d be making that pie today. It would be served on the round oak pedestal dining table in my dining room that he refinished numerous times (after burning it with his Lucky Strike cigarettes). He’d probably say, as I brought it out of the fridge, “Looks like a good ‘un, don’t it mama?”

After a bite, then, “That’s purty good pie, doll. I think I need me another piece — just to be sure.”

To those who never met him who are reading this – I’m so sorry. You missed knowing a “good ‘un.”

Old-fashioned Lemon Meringue Pie

• 1 cup sugar
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 3 tablespoons cornstarch
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1-1/2 cups water
• 2 lemons, zested, seeded and juiced
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 4 egg yolks, separated
• 1 (9 inch) pastry pie crust, baked
• For meringue:
• 4 egg whites (from above)
• 6 tablespoons white sugar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a medium double boiler, whisk together 1 cup sugar, flour, cornstarch, and salt. Stir in the water, lemon juice and lemon zest. Cook over medium-high heat, stirring frequently, until mixture comes to a boil.

Place pan over bottom of double boiler, and stir in butter. Place egg yolks in a small bowl and gradually whisk in 1/3 cup of hot sugar mixture to temper the egg yolks. Whisk egg yolk mixture back into sugar mixture.

Bring double boiler to a boil and continue to cook yolk-lemon mixture on top, while stirring constantly until thickened, from 10 to 15 minutes. Remove from heat.

Make meringue: In a large glass or metal bowl, whip egg whites until foamy, but not dry. (Tilt pan to get all of egg whites. Keeping mixer running, add sugar gradually, and continue to whip until stiff peaks form. Spread meringue over pie, making sure meringue touches all edges of crust to seal the pie, to prevent shrinking.

Bake in center of preheated oven for 10 minutes, or until meringue is golden brown. Remove carefully and cool on counter for 15 to 20 minutes before refrigerating until completely cold.

Makes 8 servings.

Chicken fried steak

My Yankee food buddy, The Meatist, has just written up his First Encounter of the Southernmost Kind: a story on Chicken Fried Steak.

I love it when somebody discovers a food I’ve been eating all my life – and “gets” it. Or sorta.

He gives a recipe for this staple of Southern kitchens that’s almost right. It will work, but…

The Southern additions

I shall correct him: Ignore his plan to use panko breadcrumbs – they’re heresy, and bad for the gravy. Stick to the flour, which creates part of the thickening.

Also, “make a roux” is the phrase he’s looking for when describing the base moves for gravymaking, but he’s learning, so I take no points off. Add 20 minutes to this for properly browning the flour to a pale tan, slowly over the medium-low fire, then add the milk or cream – and a dash of salt, please. Cook it any faster and you’ll burn it, because now it’s got flour and not breadcrumbs.

Nellie Harrelson’s second-best dish

This was my mother’s near-best dish (her chicken and dumplings were king) - this was, after all, something she could fry in no time. Frying is what she and my beloved Aunt Eleanor did best – to any food that came through their kitchens. 

Steak, chicken, pork chops, fish, bacon – we didn’t eat lamb, or I bet it would have been fried, too. Any vegetable can be fried – all the better in or with bacon fat: Fried squash, fried onions, fried tomatoes and potatoes, fried corn. Why not bread too? Let’s go: fried cornbread and hushpuppies, fried biscuits out of cans that turned into doughnuts, fried pies – oh, lordy mercy! Is your mouth watering just yet? (See why I pity Yankees?)

So fried steak just had to be – was there another kind?

We did cook steak like normal people – broiling it or cooking it on a charcoal grill. But for most nights, it came to the table thin, crispy and covered in steaming gravy.

‘Mike’s coming – I’m fryin steak’

My cousin Mike knows this dish only too well. He traveled around Florida quite a bit with his job as an air traffic controller at one point, and hit Mom and Dad up for dinner and a room whenever he went through Hawthorne (a fork in the road just east of Gainesville).

He’d call ahead to let them know he was coming, and put in the request for this favorite meal: fried steak and gravy with Fordhook limas cooked in bacon fat, biscuits and more often than not, rice. My mom wasn’t a mashed potato fan, except on those rare occasions she made roast beef. Southerners eat more rice than potatoes, unless you count sweet potatoes.  (Think rice plantations of the South that preceded cotton…)

She was thrilled that he loved this, and complied, of course, every time. 

Too rich for us all now

This steak-cooking method is definitely not on the American Heart Association’s meal plan. Having married a Southern ’Bama boy (Roll Tide!), and now sharing a kitchen with a Georgia Cracker, I have made my share of chicken fried steak over the years, but I honestly can’t recall the last time I pulled out the iron skillet for this job. Our health matters more these days, though my disposition would definitely benefit from a taste like this now and again. I’d cook it for Mike, now, but he, too, painfully gave up fried foods due to diabetes.

Cracker Barrel for a fix

If you don’t want to mess with it, I’ll concede that the Cracker Barrel on 45th Street in West Palm Beach does a fair job at it. Not all Cracker Barrels are alike, I’ve heard. I can’t vouch for many of them, but this one gets this dish right.