Savannah, Georgia. September 3, 2015 It’s that funny time of year when the summer crops have run their course and the fall ones aren’t in yet. Some years you wonder if it’ll ever rain, and others, like this year, it has rained nearly every day all summer. They’ll predict sunshine and there’ll be a thunderous downpour the moment you take the rugs out to clean. The yard floods and the contractor says he’ll come to put in a sump pump but it’s the first day the sun has shone and has he come or called? Ha!

With all the brouhaha surrounding the food scene in Charleston and the Lowcountry these days, I have to chuckle at some of the new chefs and writers who act as though they’ve discovered some of the local dishes or the provenance of them, when I was writing about them 30 years ago. Tomorrow I will go pick chanterelles at one of my favorite spots, and everyone seems to know where a patch is these days, but I’m reasonably sure that I was the first person to write about eating wild chanterelles in the lowcountry back in the 80s. I was also writing about intense charcuterie — even included a recipe for blood pudding in my first book. Now, it seems, every other restaurant makes its own.

I am repeatedly told that I was ahead of my time. Perhaps.  It’s not as though I discovered any of the dishes or techniques. It just took awhile for them to catch on. As food has become television- and chef- and celebrity-driven, some food writers have taken a back seat, unless, of course, the writers are famous chefs and/or television “personalities.” I can hardly take any credit for pushing the envelope. I followed a long line of serious culinarians, many of them unknown to today’s foodies, who were writing about the fresh, the local, and the traditional, long before farmers markets were selling arugula and there was a virtual debate over benne vs. sesame (a prominent New York chef texted me today and asked me to explain).

When I look at the pioneering work of cooks such as Paula Wolfert, Diana Kennedy, Madeleine Kamman, Karen Hess, and Elizabeth Schneider, all of whom have dug deeply into the culture of the foods they write about, touching on linguistics, anthropology, horticulture, and history as well as cooking, I am in awe of the breadth of their work. They are some of the better known, but there are many others, much more unsung. The great stylist Lee Bailey, who died in 2003 at the age of 76, owned a home furnishings shop at Saks Fifth Avenue in New York. Louisiana born, he spent his adult life in New York — both in the city and on Long Island, but he never lost his southern gentlemanly ways.

He wrote some 20-odd books on cooking and entertaining and flower arranging, as well as several monographs, on berries, corn, and tomatoes. He came onto the scene about the same time as Martha Stewart, but, unlike the grand spectacles that Martha created, Lee’s “Country Weekends,” “Soup Meals,” and “City Food” were never overblown or “undoable” for ordinary blokes like me. His “Country Desserts” is page after page of cakes and cookies and pies and puddings and ice creams, with photos of each, that require no special ingredients or equipment, though he explains the best then available tools in an addendum. His instructions are precise. His descriptions are priceless. When he came to Charleston to shoot a chapter of his “Long Weekends” book, we became fast friends. I was awed by the spectacular and spectacularly simple meals he created at my friend Townie Krawcheck’s house. One of my favorites is his “Creamy” Corn Soup (the quotes are his), which is basically leeks and shallots sweated in a little butter then chicken stock is added and simmered, and finally freshly shucked corn. Pureed in a blender or food processor and strained, it is an elegant, refreshing starter that can be served warm or chilled, with or without a garnish of crème fraîche of yogurt. I’ve been eating the one I made earlier this week cold every day for lunch with a grilled cheese sandwich. I know Lee would approve. He was a driving force of the newly emerging “lifestyle” industry of the 80s and 90s, but I doubt that most young homemakers and chefs have a clue who he is today. After all, Sean Brock was a baby when Lee’s first books were released.

Another Southern food writer who was way ahead of her time and never properly appreciated was Sarah (“Sally”) Belk. Sally was a food writer and editor for many years in New York, though she’s a southerner through and through (born in Richmond to parents from each of the Carolinas). She served as the Senior Editor at Bon Appétit. Her Around the Southern Table, first released in 1991, never sold, though it is chock-full of historical tidbits and great recipes. A couple of weeks ago I bought some sweet potatoes. They were the first of the year, but they were properly aged. It’s been so damned hot that I couldn’t bring myself to bake them, even though I know that baking intensifies the sweetness the way boiling them never will. And I thought, hmmm, why don’t I make ice cream with them? A quick online search revealed several sweet potato ice cream recipes, but only one of them seemed right: one that was credited to Sally, with some tweaks. I immediately went to her book (which was republished by a discount house in 1997) and found the recipe, which is inspired by a Charleston sweet potato pudding, flavored with ginger, mace, or nutmeg. Sally includes cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg in hers, but I would leave out the nutmeg to better taste the sweet potatoes themselves. (I used freshly grated nutmeg and it’s very intense.) She suggests using any excess sweet potato puree for making her Sweet Potato Pasta (a flat noodle variation on gnocchi made with white potatoes) or for adding to soups and stews. I added some to Lee’s Creamy Corn Soup and it was divine.

Creamy Corn Soup after Lee Bailey

I didn’t follow Lee’s recipe for the soup. I simply put a half a stick of butter in a big enameled soup pot and added 3 big chopped leeks (mostly white parts) and sweated it for about 15 minutes. I then added 6 cups of homemade stock (mine was rabbit, but you can use whatever you please) and let it simmer for another 15 minutes. I then added the kernels and scraped “milk” from 3 very large ears of very fresh corn. I cooked it for another 5 minutes then pureed it in a blender and then strained it. I have eaten it hot, cold, and at room temperature. Today I added some sweet potato puree and it added an earthen touch.

 

 

 

Sweet Potato Ice Cream

adapted from Around the Southern Table by Sarah Belk

Other recipes I found called for canned sweet potato puree, but it never tastes right to me. Sally calls for cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and vanilla, which makes the ice cream taste like gingerbread or pumpkin pie. I don’t think they’re needed, but use them if you will. Perhaps a few grinds of nutmeg. I also think the nuts are better if roasted first. A tablespoon of Bourbon is a nice touch as well. In the end, I made Butter Pecan Sweet Potato Ice Cream. (See postscript.)

2 large sweet potatoes

2 cups milk

4 egg yolks from large eggs

2/3 cup firmly packed light brown sugar

pinch of salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon, optional

1/2 teaspoon ground ginger, optional

1 cup heavy cream

1/8 teaspoon vanilla extract, optional

1 tablespoon Bourbon, optional

1 cup coarsely chopped pecans or black walnuts, optional

Bake the sweet potatoes in an oven preheated to 400 degrees F until they are very soft, about an hour. When they are cool enough to handle, scrape the flesh into a food processor, puree, and pass through a sieve. Measure out one cup, cover, and refrigerate. Use any remaining as you will (see text above).

Scald the milk and set aside. In the top of a double boiler or in a pan that will fit over a pan of simmering water, beat the egg yolks, sugar, salt, and spices (if desired), then slowly add the milk, whisking constantly. Over barely simmering water, stir the custard constantly until it coats the back of a spoon, about 7 or 8 minutes. Remove from the heat, whisk in the sweet potato puree, and place in the refrigerator to cool.

Add the cream and, if desired, the vanilla and Bourbon. Freeze in an ice cream maker per the manufacturer’s instructions. Fold in the nuts, if desired.

Makes one quart, more if you add the nuts.

P.S. I ended up putting 2 tablespoons of butter, a cup of pecans, and 1/2 teaspoon salt in a sauté pan for a few minutes then transferring them to a 300-degree oven for about 15 minutes to roast until darkened. After the nuts cooled, I stirred in a tablespoon of Bourbon and folded it into the ice cream. (See photo at left.)