Feeding the Lions

 In 1942, Frank Case wrote a cookbook entitled, Feeding The Lions. It is filled with recipes from the Algonquin Hotel kitchen alongside pithy favorites from famous Algonquin diners.
The hotel was made famous by the gatherings of a witty group of writers, editors, and actors who came each day for lunch. They became known as the Algonquin Round Table or as they might tell you, the Vicious Circle.

Case managed the Algonquin, buying it in 1927.  It is Case who is credited with the first "round" table.  In the beginning, the group dined in what would become known as the Oak Room and they were seated at conventional tables as if they were any diners. As the group grew, the rectangle table became increasingly cumbersome and the the group was moved to the Rose Room where Case installed a round table.

"A Vicious Circle" by Natalie Ascencios

Natalie Ascencios' "A Vicious Circle" features many of the key players in the what has been dubbed the Algonquin Round Table.  In this illustration you will find: Robert Benchley, Franklin Pierce Adams, Robert Sherwood, Harpo Marx, Alexander Woollcott, Marc Connelly, Edna Ferber, (seated) Dorothy Parker, Harold Ross, George S. Kaufman, Heywood Broun. This lively group, supplemented by the likes of Tallulah Bankhead, Alice Duer Miller, and Donald Ogden Stewart, held court from 1919 to 1929 at Algonquin Hotel.

They began meeting after John Peter Toohey, a theatrical agent, became angry at Alexander Woollcott for refusing to write about Eugene O'Neill, one of Toohey's clients. Toohey decided to invite Woollcott to lunch as a "thank you" while secretly planning on having Woollcott made fun of.  Of course, Woollcott loved it and began regular lunch meetings that became daily events.

Case oversaw the kitchen and collected the recipes in Feeding the Lions. He attributes the title to Edna Ferber.  Ferber writes in the cookbook:

"Highly spiced dishes happen to be my particular weakness and, at the same time, on my dietary taboo list. I manage to be stern with myself, except on those occasions when I lunch at the Algonquin. After looking at all the dishes that I might and should order,I take those curried shrimps with rice that the Algonquin chef does so tantalizingly."

Curry of Fresh Shrimp

2 lbs. raw shrimp (or 1lb. cooked, shelled shrimp)
2 tablespoons butter
1 1.2 tablespoons curry powder
1/2 cup white wine
3 cups rich cream sauce

Prepare 3 cups rich cream sauce, using half cream and half milk.

Boil the raw shrimp in salted water for 5 minutes and allow them to cool. Peel and remove the dark intestinal tract.

Saute them for 5 minutes in 2 tablespoons butter, add the curry powder and the wine and simmer for 5 minutes.  Add to the cream sauce, mix thoroughly and cook for 5 minutes.

Taste for seasoning.

Serve with rice pilaf and chutney.  Grated fresh coconut and chopped toasted almonds are traditional accompaniments.

In 1987, Aviva Slesin won the Academy Award for Best Documentary for The Ten-Year Lunch: The Wit and Legend of the Algonquin Round Table.  Unfortunately, it has been out of print for years, but recently turned up on YouTube. The Alan Ruldoph film, Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle is a pretty good fictional depiction of the era, and an excellent look at the evolving "round" table of Frank Case.

In 1998, The Algonquin received a much needed face-lift and the Rose Room was eliminated. In 2005 the Algonquin produced a new menu incorporating many of the favorites in Frank Case's cookbook.

In this day and age one might ponder if the round table seated a truly vicious circle.  Groucho Marx, brother of regular Harpo, was never comfortable with the luncheon regulars.  A quick wit who possessed his own biting repartee, Groucho Marx said of the Round Table, "The price of admission is a serpent's tongue and a half-concealed stiletto."

Honey & Jam

In our ongoing disdain for desserts that resemble compost, we have found another ally, Hannah Queen. He lovely new book, Honey & Jam is a tribute to dessert and to baking in particular.  Born and raised in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains, Queen picked up a cupcake cookbook when she was 16 and she never looked back. She began blogging as Honey & Jam and it quickly became a "go to" site for bakers.

The obsession, or lack there of, of "deconstructed" dessert is not born out of a desire to relegate dessert to the land of Betty Crocker, but rather from a place of craft and precision. Grind up enough cake, cookie, meringue and scatter it about with jam, coils, jelly, mousse, foam and a sprinkling of herbs and chances are one bite of it will be decent. But take a cake. It is a thing that every child knows. It is vanilla or chocolate. It is predictable...except when it isn't.

The recipes in Honey & Jam are anything but predictable.  Open the book to any page and you will be able to say: Cake! Pie! Cupcake!  But delve into the flavor profile and you find something completely modern. Butter is browned and bourboned. Vegetables take their place with seasonal fruits. Crumbles are enriched with herbs. The result is a collection of recipes that will elevate your baking to a new level.

One of our favorite types of cakes to bake are those that are baked in a single layer and require not frosting.  This is a great example.

Cherry-Almond Brown Butter Cake

1/2 cup (1 stick/115 g) unsalted butter
1 1/2 cups (170 g) all-purpose flour
1/2 cup (70 g) almond flour
1 cup (200 g) granulated sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup (120 ml) whole milk, room temperature
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1/2 cup (80 g) pitted whole fresh cherries
1/4 cup (30 g) slivered almonds
Powdered sugar, for dusting

Melt the butter in a small saucepan over medium heat and cook, stirring occasionally, until it turns golden brown and nutty scented. Set aside.

Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C). Butter a 9-inch (23-cm) round cake pan.

In a large bowl, whisk together the all-purpose flour, almond flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the milk, eggs, vanilla, almond extract, and the browned butter.

Pour the wet mixture into the dry mixture, stirring to combine. Stir in the cherries.

Pour the mixture into the prepared pan and sprinkle it with the almonds. Bake for 30 to 35 minutes, until the cake is golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Allow to cool for 10 minutes in the pan before turning it onto a wire rack to cool completely. Dust the cake with powdered sugar before serving.

 Honey & Jam is the perfect blend of old-fashioned baking and thoroughly modern flavor profiles. It is quite literally, the best of both worlds.  Betty Crocker is turning over in her grave.

The Broad Fork

We have posted a lot about Hugh Acheson’s The Broad Fork on our Facebook page, but it seems time to write about the book here. So here goes.  The Broad Fork grew out of a conversation with a fellow CSA member who asked a simple question: “What the hell do I do with kohlrabi?”

Indeed.  We learn to cook because someone taught us how, and we cook foods that we are familiar with, and if not, we learn to cook foods that we like and want to make at home.  So, what the hell does one do with kohlrabi?  

Our “what the hell” is artichokes. Don’t have them in the garden, don’t like to clean them, don’t like to eat them, don’t want them in my CSA!  Hey everyone has a veggie they hate!  Truth of the matter is, there are tons of vegetables out there that have very creative uses without boiling them in some salted water and slathering them with butter.

Hugh Acheson sets out to give the reader a look at many creative ways to showcase vegetables or a showcase for many creative vegetables.  The book is helpful, insightful, and never makes you feel like you are getting a lecture about not eating more vegetables.  He is funny, giving the impression that he would never come into your to kitchen and shout obscenities at you for minor kitchen infractions. In fact, he writes like he is exactly the kind of person you would want to let into your kitchen. 

Acheson would, as he does in this cookbook, make fun of you for having a refrigerator door with, “stuff in there from the 1990’s.”  For his Tatsoi Salad he will tell you, “No tatsoi? No problem. Use spinach or bok choy.”  But he will also tell you that tatsoi is “resplendent” so get some for your salads.  The first restaurant he worked in featured fried zucchini with, “the tenderness and attention to detail of a drunken sailor,” and from that experience he fries up green beans. Funny and helpful.

So how does Hugh Acheson answer the question: “What the hell do I do with kohlrabi?” 

Kohlrabi Puree

2 tablespoons unsalted butter

1/2 yellow onion, diced

1 pound kohlrabi, peeled and chopped, greens and stems reserved for garnish

1 1/2 cups chicken stock

1 sprig fresh thyme

Kosher salt

1. In a medium saucepan over low heat, melt 1 tablespoon of the butter.  Add the onion and then the kohlrabi. Cook for 2 minutes, stirring the vegetables to coat them with the butter. Then add the chicken stock and the thyme sprig. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat then turn back down to simmer.  Place a round of parchment paper on top of the mixture, and simmer until the kohlrabi is tender, about 15 minutes. Remove from the heat and let cool slightly.

2. Transfer the mixture to a blender, add the remaining tablespoon of butter, and puree until smooth. Season with kosher salt to taste. Serve alongside finely sliced reserved kohlrabi stems and greens.

Pureed kohlrabi is the perfect side dish for a big ol’ steak, not to mention at least two folks at the table will ask you,  “What the hell did you do to the potatoes?”

The Charleston Academy of Domestic Pursuits

After watching The Lee Bros.' new show Southern Uncovered, set this week in Charleston, we were kind of in a Charleston mood, so we pulled out The Charleston Academy of Domestic Pursuits.  Though it may not seem exactly self-explanatory, the book is really a jam packed recipe book with etiquette tips interspersed.  Suzanne Pollak and Lee Manigault have put together a great collection of recipes and some tips on just how easy entertaining can be. They do not always agree with each other, which is a refreshing.  Many books that purport to be about entertaining give the impression that there is only one way to go...the authors often choose differing paths such as where one places one's dessert cutlery.

Now we just love "entertaining" books ; in fact, we would probably rather read entertaining books than actually entertain, but if need be, we are good to go for most any occasion.  No matter how much one entertain, however, there is that moment when you think, "What am I going to do?" This is the perfect book to pull off the shelf.  It is familiar enough to ease you into that party planning mode with recipes for spicy nuts, deviled eggs, angels on horseback, and a fine old-fashioned. 

On the other hand, there is the element of surprise, that item one would never think of as entertaining fare that will leave your guests blown away, like my fave, oxtail. There are also sautéed carrots and peaches, crunchy shallots, and ginger cheesecake for an unforgettable dinner party.

Here is a piece of advice we can get behind: "Two or three bacon appetizers are not overkill."
Indeed!

Candied Bacon

1/2 pound of your favorite sliced bacon
Turbinado sugar or light brown sugar
Freshly cracked black pepper
Cayenne

Preheat the oven to 350F.

Halve the bacon slices crosswise and arrange on parchment lined baking sheets so that the pieces don't touch. Sprinkle the sugar liberally on top to cover the bacon; season with black pepper and cayenne to taste. Bake, rotating once, until the sugar is caramelized, about 20 minutes.

There were a couple of reviews that implied this book was a bit old fashioned or that it was geared to wealthy housewives, like only rich people cared about such things as etiquette and entertaining.  Yes, for years we have been told, politely that one should chew with ones mouth closed and still, go to any fine dining establishment and you are likely to find a gentleman who wants you to remember him for his $10,000 Rolex, but all you will remember is seeing the food in his mouth!  Truth be told, one does not need a Victorian townhouse in Charleston, grandmama's collection of Francis 1 silverware, nor a Viking stove to host an elegant dinner party.  Even the girls down at the trailer park can tell you which side of the plate the fork goes on! 

Everyone can benefit from a little guidance on the domestic sciences.  The world is a better place with manners and a good candied bacon. The Charleston Academy of Domestic Pursuits is a fine place to get your party started.

Pure Pork Awesomeness

Kevin Gillespie is the brother, son, guy-next-door(who owns a really big grill) that I have always envisioned.  I loved him the first time I saw him on TV and have followed his career since then.  Let's just get it out of the way: most of the really talented, on-TV, own-my-own-restaurant(s), James Beard Blah-Blah-Blah appear to be a-holes! (Hey, you know it's true and you know which one you want to slap!) Lord knows, Kevin Gillespie's momma and grandma raised him right!  And who doesn't love a guy who puts a Ray Stevens epigraph in his cookbook?

Pure Pork Awesomeness is a love letter to the pig. It is also a love letter to the world.  Lest one think for a moment that Pure Pork Awesomeness is simply a barbecue book, it is not.  It is exactly what the title conveys, a look at the pure awesomeness of pork that is not relegated simply to the South, nor to America, but to the world, where pork is a staple in many languages. 

Don't worry, Granny's Ham and Navy Bean Soup is in there along side Brunswick Stew, and Deep Fried Baby-Back Ribs.  You will also find Pork Pho, Sichuan-Style Twice-Cooked Pork Belly, Lemon-Ricotta Tortellini in Ham Broth, Zigeunerschnitzel, even tacos.

Tacos al Pastor

1 pineapple, peeled, cored, cut into 1-inch cubes, about 2 cups, or 1 (20-oz.) can unsweetened pineapple chunks, drained 

1 medium Vidalia onion, cut into rough chunks  

10 cloves garlic, peeled 

2 tablespoons ancho chili powder  

1 tablespoons cumin seeds 

1 tablespoons dried oregano  

1 tablespoons kosher salt 

1 teaspoon red pepper flakes  

1 pound lean pork shoulder, cut into 3/4-inch chunks (see Worth Knowing)

3 teaspoon grapeseed oil or canola oil  

8 fresh corn tortillas 

1/2 cup sour cream  

1 lime 

1 bunch cilantro  

Reserve 1/2 cup pineapple chunks and onion and refrigerate for later use. Combine the remaining pineapple, onion, garlic, chili powder, cumin, oregano, salt, and red pepper flakes in a blender and blend to a paste. Place the meat and marinade in a gallon-size zip-top bag, squeeze out excess air, and zip closed. Refrigerate overnight.

Strain the pork and discard the marinade.

Heat a sauté pan over high heat. Add just enough of the oil to the pan for a thin coating and heat until the oil just starts to smoke. Working in batches, add the tortillas in a single layer and heat just until starting to char, about 1 minute per side, then flip and cook for another minute. Wrap in aluminum foil to keep warm.

Add just enough of the oil to cover the pan, swirl to coat, and heat until smoking. Add the pork and reserved pineapple and cook for 1 minute, or until browned. Shake the pan to flip the meat and cook until the pork is cooked through and the pan juices have cooked dry, about 7 minutes, shaking the pan frequently.

In a small bowl, combine the sour cream with the juice of 1/2 lime and whisk until smooth. Cut the remaining 1/2 lime into 4 wedges.

 Coarsely chop 1/2 cup cilantro leaves. Reserve 4 sprigs.

Serve the tortillas topped with the meat and pineapple mixture, reserved onion, chopped cilantro, a drizzle of the lime sour cream, a lime wedge, and whole sprig of cilantro.

Worth Knowing
 
Look for a lean shoulder roast for this recipe. It will be a piece of a boneless Boston butt. Get the smallest and leanest roast you can find, which will probably be 2 to 3 pounds. If you get a piece with excess fat, just trim it away before cutting the meat into chunks. 

Not only do we love this cookbook, but we were huge fans of his first book, Fire In My Belly.  If Kevin Gillespie were our father, we would give him a copy of both books for Father's Day.  Of course, that would be really stupid as he wrote them, but we would give him a big, ol' pork butt and hope that he invited us over! Really, nothing says "I Love You" more than a pork butt and Father's Day is approaching.

Southern Made Fresh

We were so happy to find that Tasia Malakasis was not a one-hit cookbook wonder!  We loved her first book, Tasia's Table, and we were delighted to find that there was a companion book, Southern Made Fresh.

Since her last book she has been selected as one of the 50 people changing the South, she's built a new creamery, and put Elkmont, Alabama on the map, and she still had time to write another cookbook!  Just writing about it exhausts me. We were beyond bummed that our last (and first) trip to Elkmont was on a Sunday when Belle Cheve was closed. We simply must plan better on the next trip.

Southern Made Fresh is at the same time familiarly Southern and wonderfully contemporary. There are tea sandwiches, fried green tomatoes and deviled eggs but one will also find a chicken posole, vegetable soup with pecan pesto and a summer corn risotto.  Yes, there are peach fried pies, and there are also apple phyllo hand pies, and a sausage and sweet potato pie, too.

Her lemonade has a jalapeño bite, the iced tea features bourbon, and her moonshine is peachy.  Vegetables seem to stand out and the recipes appear to be plucked straight form the garden.  It's no wonder people want to party with Malakasis! 

Here is a recipe we love. And while it is true that we would eat gigantic bowls of rice every single day, this is the kind of recipe that would have us eating out of two bowls!
 

Cajun Dirty Rice

1 Tbsp. vegetable oil
4 oz. chicken livers
4 oz. ground pork
1 tsp. kosher salt
½ tsp. freshly ground black pepper
½ tsp. chili powder
1½ cups chicken broth, divided
1 small onion, chopped
2 celery ribs, chopped
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 small jalapeño pepper, seeded and chopped
2 tsp. dried oregano
3 cups cooked long-grain rice
⅔ cup chopped green onions
2 Tbsp. chopped fresh parsley
Garnish: celery leaves

1. Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add chicken livers; cook 3 minutes or until browned. Remove chicken livers from skillet. Let stand until cool enough to handle; chop.

2. Add pork to skillet; cook, stirring to crumble, 4 minutes or just until beginning to brown. Stir in chopped chicken livers, salt, pepper, and chili powder; cook, stirring occasionally, 2 minutes.

3. Add ¼ cup chicken broth, and cook 3 minutes or until broth evaporates and meat mixture is browned, crusty, and slightly sticks to skillet. Add onion and next 4 ingredients. Cook, stirring occasionally, 7 minutes or until vegetables are browned, crusty, and slightly stick to skillet.

4. Add rice, green onions, parsley, and remaining 1¼ cups broth. Cook, stirring occasionally, 5 minutes or until liquid is absorbed and rice is thoroughly heated.

 Is it too early to be on the look out for book number three?

Culinary Echoes From Dixie

In 1914 according to Kate Brew Vaughn:

"It has been a great pleasure and gratification to me to see the growth of interest in cookery and household efficiency. Fifty years ago, women of refinement were prone to declare almost boastingly that they had never cooked a meal in their lives, and today we note with interest their granddaughters cooking wholesome meals without becoming degraded in the work."

Ah, those poor degraded women of the late 1800's who were forced to cook for the family. In a attempt to instruct these "granddaughters" who are now making their way into the kitchen, Mrs. Vaughn wrote Culinary Echoes from Dixie.  However, before one can set about to cook for the family, Mrs. Vaughn has very strict rules for the budget.

" Twenty-five percent for food, twenty percent for rent, fifteen percent for operating expenses, fifteen percent for clothes, and twenty-five percent for  higher life --education, benevolence, entertainments, and savings."

And one might imagine, cookbooks.

Now one of the reasons folks just love old cookbooks is because they find recipes that have been adapted into the most ravishing dishes, when in fact, the origins are quite simple.  For instance, several years ago in the New York Times, Julia Reed raved about the frozen tomato at the Belle Meade Country Club in Nashville. Well truth be told, frozen tomatoes, a kind of  tomato ice cream served on a bed of lettuce were quite popular.  Mrs. Vaughn's recipe is a bit less complicate than Belle Meade's; more if a tomato sorbet than an ice cream, but the effect is the same.

Frozen Tomato Salad

Peel and chop fine 8 ripe, firm tomatoes. Season with a little salt , pepper, and sugar and three drops of onion juice; turn into a freezer and freeze.  Fill a melon mold with this frozen mixture, pack in ice and salt, and let stand for several hours to ripen.  Serve on a bed of white celery leaves garnished with olives, with mounds of thick dressing over it.

Now while both of these recipes are fine, here is Miss Lucinda's trick for accomplishing the same thing in no time.  Grab a bottle of you favorite Bloody Mary mix.  Pour in in the ice cream maker following the factory instructions.  In 40 minutes you will have a tasty tomato sorbet that will make you the Belle (Meade) of the ball, or tasteful summer luncheon, which ever comes first.

Franklin Barbecue

You might just ask yourself, are so many people getting into the race for President just so they can go to the head of the line at Franklin Barbecue?  Since they are always being asked, "Why do you want to be President?"  I think skipping the line at Franklin might be an electable response.

Let me say right off the bat, I am one of those girls that barbecues.  One guy who was working for me, said he knew I was from the South because I had a dozen rigs to cook out. I found another guy who was helping me with yard work looking a bit puzzled.  He said, "You have like nine grills."  Well, I said, "Ones of whole hog, one for shoulders, one for steaks, a smoker, a clay oven..."  He just went back to work.  Yes, I am a bit inclined to love a good barbecue book.

Franklin Barbecue is the kind of meritocracy story that America was built on.  Of course, for every one Franklin there are thousands of failures, but we do love to extol success.   Here's the story:  Kid from Texas is kinda lost in the world.  Buys a cheap smoker and even cheaper brisket.  His first try, not great, so he becomes determined.  Keeps working at it.  Works odd jobs, saves $1000.  Tried to buy large smoker.  Fails.  Keeps at it. Gets smoker in disrepair.  Cleans and fixes smoker.  Buys $300 trailer.  Fixes it up.  Gets food truck license.  Moves smoker and trailer to lot.  Makes brisket.  People come.  End of second mother BBQ blogger comes, says best bite of brisket ever.  Lines form.  Lease former barbecue restaurant complete with old, disgusting food(someone else's failure), fix up. Longer line. Texas Monthly -- Best Barbecue in Texas. Lines, longer lines. Bon Appetite -- Best Barbecue in USA.  Television.  More television.  Only time ever but POTUS goes to front of the line.  (In all fairness he did pay the bills of some of the people he cut in front of.) Cookbook!

Actually, Franklin Barbecue is a meat-smoking manifesto.  I knew going into this that the book contained only a few recipes.  The best early review of the book came from Helen Rosner in EATER.  When I got my copy I read the blurbs.  I read about Aaron Franklin, but then I had read about him before, seen him on television, and on television, and on television.  Read about his coauthor and his photographer.  I read the introduction where Franklin says if you want to find the recipes just go to the last chapter.  But I started with chapter one.  I looked up and realized several hours had passed.  I was still reading.  I was reading Aaron Franklin's meat-smoking manifesto like it was a novel -- or a manifesto.  I am ready to go all Anonymous on my smoker.

You know how "they" say, " I could listen to so-and-so read the phone book."  Well, I believe I could listen to Aaron Franklin read the phone book.  Who knew smoke could be so fascinating?  Who could compare brisket to Mary Lou Retton?  Who could make the Maillard reaction sound like so much fun?  I now worry about sausage casings, and wonder if my flue is long enough, and think that maybe, just maybe, I should learn to weld.

The term "hot and bothered" usually has a sexual connotation.  Unless you have spent your last $100 on a piece of meat, tossed it on a smoker, and tended it for 12 hours through smoke, sun, rain, heat, and mosquitoes, you haven't been truly hot and bothered.  You want to understand what that feels like, read Franklin Barbecue.   Me, I'm off to buy a welding mask.

Zora Neale Hurston on Florida Food

Today's Famous Food Friday features Zora Neale Hurston.  Hurston was so much more than a novelist; she was a writer, folklorist, activist, and anthropologist. Most people might remember Hurston from reading Their Eyes Were Watching God in school, but know little else. If one were ask Hurston, she would have said she was born and raised in Eatonville, Florida, but in truth, she is an Alabama girl, born in Notasulga.  Since she was just a child when the family moved to Eatonville, she probably had little memory of Alabama. Her favorite spot may have been Eau Gallie, Florida where she wrote to friend,  "Somehow this one spot on earth feels like home for me. I have always intended to come back here. That is why I'm doing so much to make a go of it."

Hurston in Eau Gallie

For Hurston, home was Florida.  In his book, Zora Neale Hurston on Florida Food, Professor Fred Opie delves into Hurston's early twentieth-century ethnographic research to examine the food of Florida that appears in her writing.  A graduate in anthropology, Hurston conducted ethnographic research with Franz Boas and worked with both Ruth Benedict and Margaret Mead.  After her death, Hurston's papers were ordered to be burned, but a friend happened to pass by the house and stopped, put out the fire and saved the collection.

Fred Opie has studied Hurston's ethnographic research and her literary works to look specifically through the lens of food. The book is loaded with historical photos that bring the period to life. There are fields of collards, enormous barbecue pits, chicken frying, church picnic, and advertising encouraging the consumption of lots of corn.

He augments Hurston's writings on food with a collection of recipes belonging to Hurston and to the African-American community from traditionally black newspapers and other period cookbooks. Opie spends special attention to the descriptions of how foods were cooked whether braised or barbecued, smoked or fried. There is also an emphasis on traditional ingredients such as cornmeal, fish, and rice and peas along with folk remedies Hurston collected. Many of the farm laborers and sawmill workers had little or no access to doctors or medical attention so plant based cures were common among workers.

In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Tea Cake is bitten by a rabid dog and his mind deteriorates from the infection. He needs a doctor but the closest one is in Palm Beach and there is no way for Tea Cake to be saved.  In her research, Hurston came across a remedy for "Loss of Mind."

Loss of Mind Remedy

Sheep weed leaves
Bay leaf
Fig leaf
Poison oak
Sarsaparilla root
2 cups water

Take the bark and cut it all up fine. Make a tea. Take one tablespoon and put in two cups of water and strain and sweeten.  You drink some and give some to the patient. Put a fig leaf and poison oak in show.  (Get fig leaves off a tree that hasn't borne fruit.  Stem them so that nobody will know.)

 We may make a big jug of this and keep it handy!

We collect cookbooks not just for a collection of recipes, but because they root us in a specific time and place. What we eat is embedded in our lives and history.  It reveals who we are.  Zora Neale Hurston's life can be found in the food of her beloved Florida.  We might never have known that if not for Fred Opie.

Simply Vegetarian Thai Cooking

When I saw Nancie McDermott recently, she said she would hook me up with a copy of her book Simply Vegetarian Thai Cooking.  She was true to her word.  It was sitting on my desk when I was working on my last post for Sorghum's Savor.  I mentioned that Ronni Lundy used a lot of sorghum in Asian cooking and one of her dishes is adapted from a recipe by McDermott, so I must be on the right track with this week's cookbooks.

I don't cook a lot of Asian, so this seems like a great place to start. Simply Vegetarian Thai Cooking is an update of an earlier book, Real Vegetarian Thai. I suppose my resistance to cooking Thai food is the daunting list of ingredients. I have a huge pantry, but I rarely run across a Thai recipe that doesn't require at least 3 items I don't possess, so "throwing" something together is always a bit hard. McDermott is masterful at giving options for lemongrass, galanga, and other items that might not be handy.  That being said, imagine how cool these recipes are in all their exotic glory.

The best part of the book comes late in her section entitled Basic Recipes. This section contains many of the stocks, sauces, condiments, and curries that make the recipes come to life. I do love to cook curry, but lately, they have been lacking, so this part of the book is a definite sweet spot.  While a curry does require a rather long list of ingredients, they are easy to come by.  Her simple curry paste is going to be a staple in the fridge.

Quick-and-Simple Curry Paste

5 fresh serrano chiles, three fresh green jalapenos or 7 long slender dried chiles
1 cup coarsely chopped cilantro leaves and stems
1/2 cup chopped onion
1/3 cup coarsely chopped peeled fresh ginger root
1/4 cup chopped garlic (15-20 cloves)
1 tbsp grated lime zest
1 tbsp ground coriander
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp fresh ground black pepper
1 tsp salt

1. Stem chiles and discard some of the seeds. Chop fresh chiles coarsely. Soak dried chiles in hot water to cover, about 10 minutes.

2.  Drain dried chiles, if using. In a blender or mini processor, combine chiles, cilantro, onion, ginger, garlic, lime zest, coriander, cumin, black pepper and salt and grind to a fine, fairly smooth puree, stopping often to scrape down sides and adding a few tbsp (30ml) of water as needed to move the blades.  Transfer to a jar, seal airtight and keep in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks.

I am sorry I didn't have this cookbook earlier, I would probably now be a whiz at Thai!  Well, it is never too late to start and I am headed to the kitchen now!