My second road trip to Savannah started as a solo event, but quickly turned into a duo for four whole days: being fully vaccinated meant more hang time with my BFF. Stephanie’s place is about 15 minutes out of downtown Savannah, so we could pop in and out of town to do as little or as much as we chose. With her quarter at SCAD finished and my school year coming to a close, it was the perfect time to take advantage of our Memorial Day weekend by exploring the surrounding areas, cooking and relaxing.
‘The Cheese Board’ –with added summer sausage–from The Floridian , St. Augustine
What’s more fun than ordering from a menu? Creating your own menu. A charcuterie board is merely a combination—usually create your own—of cured meats, cheeses, pates, jams/jellies/compotes, nuts, honey, pickles, veggies, dried fruits, mustards, crackers, olives and the like, presented on, well, a board. The combinations are limitless and your board can be as big or as small as you can imagine it to be; they are great for a large party or a party of one. It is an experiment in flavor-pairing and an interactive way to dine with friends and family.
Every cook needs an arsenal: those essential items that you just can’t cook well without. For me, it’s my special knives, my Le Creuset pots that cook everything evenly, that nonstick skillet that never sticks, my favorite spatula and tongs, sheet pans, good olive oil, aged balsamic, and of course…spices. The right spice can turn boring into fabulous and introduce nuances and flavors to the most mediocre of ingredients. Enter my spice hoarding situation: you name it, I’ve probably got it—and so much more.
Types of honey from L to R: Gem Apiaries (Lutz, FL)-wildflower; Yankee Joe’s (Warner Robbins, GA)-wildflower; Winterthur (Winterthur, DE)-golden; Italian-cherry; Home Grown in the City (San Diego, CA)-citrus
Honey, we have a problem. Some—and when I say some, I mean my husband—might say I have issues. My real issue is that I don’t have enough pantry space to house my ‘collection’. What’s really wrong with having 24+ bottles and jars of honey, anyway? Each is unique in color and in flavor; would he be as critical if he amassed 24+ bottles of fine bourbon? I should think not…
I wasn’t always such as avid collector. In fact, this sugar girl was never a big fan of honey; it had an odd taste I couldn’t get past. A decade ago, a free sample of local nectar from a farmer’s market changed my opinion of this alternative sweetener—forever. Not only did I taste one sample, but I tasted four: one for each season here in Florida. Amazingly, they each looked and tasted shockingly different; I was dumbfounded. The variations resulted from what was pollinated during each season: Fall and Winter were dark amber to brown with a more complex flavor; Spring, practically clear yellow and mild tasting; and summer, still light in color, but cloudier and a bit more flavorful than spring. If this is what a year in Florida tastes like through the ‘eyes’ of local bees, my curiosity was piqued about the varietals of honey around the country, let alone the world. What might those taste like?
Using celery leaves as an ingredient never occurred to me before I read it on the ingredient list of my grandmother’s Thanksgiving stuffing/dressing recipe. Apparently, I was underestimating the leaves that I always discarded along with the cut white bottoms of the stalk. But, grandmas are usually right, and this was no exception: the stuffing got such a boost of freshness and celery-flavor that simply sautéeing the stalks just couldn’t provide. Think of these leaves as a substitute for parsley: hearty and slightly bitter; grassy, but not overwhelming. It’s everything I love about the flavor of celery without the crunch.
Celery leaves may be hard to track down: most grocery store-celery is sold as either the hearts—no tops— or if there are some leaves present, there are only a mere few; a farmer’s market or natural food store may be your best bet at finding them. When our COVID isolation started, I began getting weekly produce boxes from my favorite local farm and I received a surplus of celery with more leaves attached than I knew what to do with. In the interest of resourcefulness, my goal was to find other ways to use up the tops as well as the bottoms in my weekly cooking.
Grandma’s raisin sauce with a twist: mixed with apricots and pecans atop Brie
I remember so vividly being in my Grandmother’s kitchen, seeing raisins soaking in a saucepan on the back burner; she was making her usual accompaniment to ham: raisin sauce. This unique sweet sauce countered the saltiness of our annual Easter ham; I could never seem to get enough of it. Inasmuch as I love to cook—and for as much as I love this sauce—you would think I would make this stuff all the time, but for some reason I never did. I always left it up to my Grandma and later, my mom.
As I was preparing a batch for our COVID Easter meal for three, I questioned why this was only the second time ever that I had made it myself? One reason is that my mother typically hosts Easter: the sauce is always simmering away on the stove by the time we arrive. The other reason is that for many years I was a vegetarian and the only thing I/we ever paired this sauce with was ham: no ham = no raisin sauce. I was determined to find out what else goes well with the sauce that I could—and do—eat by the spoonful.
Pee-ca-DEE-yo! First of all, it’s just fun to say. Secondly, if I would’ve thought there was a way I could eat a version of the typically meat-centric Cuban cuisine back in my vegetarian days, I would have been beyond thrilled. So, years after I couldn’t eat another plate of black beans and yellow rice, I took to the kitchen…and my Omnivore’s Picadillo was born.
Three simple ingredients make for a powerful concoction that can take on cold and flu symptoms.
There is something about the power of three. Many cultures have their own trinity: a combination of three ingredients that serve as the backbone for building flavor in their dishes. In Creole/Cajun cooking, the Holy Trinity is a combination of onion, celery and bell peppers. The version in French cooking is called mirepoix and is made up of onion, carrot and celery. In Spain, their sofrito is typically comprised of garlic, onions and tomato.
I have discovered my own trinity of sorts which blends my cooking world and my medical world: ginger, lemon and honey. Instead of building flavors for a dish, I’m using them to build my immune system. As we are in the throes of cold and flu season, these three ingredients are the basis for a more natural way of managing the miserable-feeling symptoms that a virus can cause.
Tomatoes, feta, chickpeas and seasoning make for a tasty, simple salad
Eight staple ingredients. One bowl. Ten minutes. Lunch is served.
Well, technically, this salad is better after it sits for about an hour, but you get the picture. Chickpea, Grape Tomato & Feta Salad is our feature for the final week of salad month.
Ham, cheeses, tomatoes, olives and lettuce–and the tastiest dressing, ever.
For week three of salad month, I’m talking one of my favorite traditional—with lettuce—salads: Columbia Restaurant’s 1905 Salad.
Years ago, St. Petersburg had a Columbia on the third floor of our inverted Pier building: our city’s landmark. The 360-degree view of downtown and Tampa Bay made for the most picturesque place to lunch in the ‘Burg; enjoying traditional Cuban food while watching the dolphins and boats pass by was icing on the cake. And, although I tried many of the menu items at one point or another, my lunch there was always the same: the ‘half and half combo’ with the 1905 salad, gazpacho and some of the best iced tea around. The warm, individual loaf of Cuban bread that came out shortly after your drink arrived was the highlight of the meal–no sharing required.
Alright, so I have waxed poetic long enough. Sadly, the old Pier building was demolished and a new replacement is being built as we speak. I have not heard any talk of Columbia claiming a space at our new pier…sigh. For the record, I realize that there are five other Columbias in the state that I can visit, including the original location in Ybor City; but, not having one so close has been killing me.
