BASQUE CHICKEN HAS LONG had its Nashville hot chicken moment. To get it, you no longer have to go to its place of origin, the Pays Basque in the southwest corner of France. It is a beloved national dish, so commonplace that it’s easy to find as a convenient, grab-and-go food in grocery stores all over France.

Last winter, my husband and I ate a lot of the stuff. We were living in France, in the Loire Valley, some 560 kilometers northeast of the Basque region. We spent much of our time redoing the kitchen in a sixteenth-century house my husband bought more than twenty years ago. To eat, we set up a makeshift kitchen in a small, unused room on the top floor, equal in (more…)

One Friday morning, in early December, Mike and I drove out of Richmond, Virginia, heading west and south toward Knoxville, Tennessee.

As we rode, we listened to Cormac McCarthy’s Suttree, a novel set in Knoxville in the early 1950s. Its epic length requires more than a drive to Knoxville and back to hear the whole thing, even when taking a slightly longer return route, through North Carolina, to eat a barbecue lunch.

All of the writing in Suttree is vivid, overflowing its pages. Crossing over from Virginia into Tennessee, we heard a particularly visceral passage about (more…)

Yesterday, I arrived in Inverness, Florida. I’m here to visit my mother and Gary. One of the first things we’ll do, as soon as I’ve published this posting, is to head over to a nondescript strip mall on Highway 44 West where one of the most unique ice cream establishments in America is found: Lynn’s Ice Cream & Belgian Waffles.

During a previous trip to Inverness, I spent several hours with the owners, Lynn and Rudi Weber, they answering my many questions so that I could write something about them for this blog. It’s amazing what (more…)

Not an ounce of good taste is wasted in this house. Sesame seeds collected at the bottom of the paper bag that once held a loaf of sesame rye bread are saved and sprinkled on buttered and honeyed toast the next morning. The residue of mushroom liquor and butter clinging to the insides of a container that held sautéed mushrooms is freed with a splash of hot water and put into the service of a mushroom omelet.

I have to admit, I sometimes slip up and forget to be mindful; I forget to give that over-looked throw-away item a second life in my kitchen. When I do, I berate myself. But one type of missed taste opportunity that is never lost on me or my husband, Mike, are the remnants of dressing, sauce, or appetizing drippings in plates or bowls or pots or pans. A swipe of bread through these flavorful dregs becomes dessert (and if we’re out of bread, a spatula or index finger works).

At these savor-the-flavor moments, Mike often does the honors. He’ll rip off a piece of bread and run it through the serving bowl. Then, like a rooster (more…)

I was searching my book shelves for a copy of The Sun Also Rises or For Whom the Bell Tolls. Instead, I found Lives of the Saints, a relic from when I was an art history student, before I’d struck a path to editing cookbooks and writing about food. Its pagan orange edging and ecclesiastical purple binding with faux leather texture and faux gold stamping beckoned. I picked it up and discovered it is the perfect size, fitting easily in my hands.

I don’t believe I ever spent much time with Lives of the Saints when I was an art history student. But now, looking through it, I found a code I’d overlooked, a signpost for the turn off from art to food.

When you open Lives of the Saints, you come to a full title page featuring a group portrait of several saints. After that each saint is given his or her own short write-up, some with their likeness included. The book is organized chronologically: It starts on January 1 and proceeds to the end of the year, with a saint for each day.

Some of the saints are patrons or patronesses of specific professions or health conditions or categories of people, like orphans. Take St. Apollonia. She is the Patroness of Dentists. In the year 248 or 249, this Virgin and Martyr “fell prey to a howling mob venting its fury on any Christians it could find.” The mob knocked out all of her (more…)

Last Saturday morning, in anticipation of a forecasted sunny day ahead, I made a batch of A’ja (bread fritters) from Jerusalem: A Cookbook. These fritters, along with several other recipes from the book, can be served either warm or room temperature, making them an excellent choice for picnicking.

Once the fritters were fried, the requisite tahini sauce made, the sliced tomatoes and cucumbers prepped, and the rosé wine chilled, we (more…)

It’s time for Pink-eyed Peas! Pink-eyed Peas! Pink-eyed peas?

Who ever heard of pink-eyed peas? I hadn’t, before taking a trip to Alabama last month, and none of my Northern friends or family members has either. But down south locals are eating them with some smoky, salty pork goodness and, depending on who you talk to, some pepper relish on top and a slice of cornbread on the side.
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Heading down and out of the narrow, winding streets of the medieval hill-top town of Sancerre, we realized we forgot to pick up some of the ham of Sancerre, a local specialty which is smoked over vine roots (sarments de vigne). We continued our descent, assuming we’d be able to find it in the surrounding area. Stopping not more than 10 miles away at a neighboring village, we asked a baker if she knew where else we might purchase it. It is available in Sancerre, she said, only Sancerre.

Monsieur Fortin’s Charcuterie Artisanale and Traiteur is strategically located on the Place Henri IV, in the heart of Henrichment, a town noted for its symmetrically planned central square. We stopped at the shop to buy some Pâté de Campagne, but soon spied saucisson sec, a dry-cured sausage with a signature dusting of edible white mold, hanging from the ceiling. When we requested one, Monsieur Fortin proudly explained that they are his spécialité de la maison (house made specialty). (more…)