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Screen Doors and Sweet Tea: Recipes and Tales from a Southern Cook
Gifted chef and storyteller Martha Hall Foose invites you into her kitchen to share recipes that bring alive the landscape, people, and traditions that make Southern cuisine an American favorite.
Born and raised in Mississippi, Foose cooks Southern food with a contemporary flair: Sweet Potato Soup is enhanced with coconut milk and curry powder; Blackberry Limeade gets a lift from a secret ingredient–cardamom; and her much-ballyhooed Sweet Tea Pie combines two great Southern staples–sweet tea and pie, of course–to make one phenomenal signature dessert. The more than 150 original recipes are not only full of flavor, but also rich with local color and characters.
As the executive chef of the Viking Cooking School, teaching thousands of home cooks each year, Foose crafts recipes that are the perfect combination of delicious, creative, and accessible. Filled with humorous and touching tales as well as useful information on ingredients, techniques, storage, shortcuts, variations, and substitutions, Screen Doors and Sweet Tea is a must-have for the American home cook–and a must-read for anyone who craves a return to what cooking is all about: comfort, company, and good eating.
Born and raised in Mississippi, Foose cooks Southern food with a contemporary flair: Sweet Potato Soup is enhanced with coconut milk and curry powder; Blackberry Limeade gets a lift from a secret ingredient–cardamom; and her much-ballyhooed Sweet Tea Pie combines two great Southern staples–sweet tea and pie, of course–to make one phenomenal signature dessert. The more than 150 original recipes are not only full of flavor, but also rich with local color and characters.
As the executive chef of the Viking Cooking School, teaching thousands of home cooks each year, Foose crafts recipes that are the perfect combination of delicious, creative, and accessible. Filled with humorous and touching tales as well as useful information on ingredients, techniques, storage, shortcuts, variations, and substitutions, Screen Doors and Sweet Tea is a must-have for the American home cook–and a must-read for anyone who craves a return to what cooking is all about: comfort, company, and good eating.
248 pages, Hardcover
First published April 29, 2008
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1863 people want to read
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August 6, 2021Ms. Foose writes some of the very best cook books that I have ever read. Her love for the south, specifically the Mississippi delta area, and it's cuisine comes across on every page and is contagious. The recipes are accessible, plentiful and varied, and the photography is exquisite.
I highly recommend this book for any chef. - Meagan
I highly recommend this book for any chef. - Meagan
August 8, 2013
This is a great read of southern traditions, stories, and recipes. Most of the food is rather traditional, as evidenced by my choice of recipe sampling including deviled eggs and three bean salad, a church potluck/pitch-in/covered-dish staple! In this cookbook, everything has a clever name. Deviled eggs are actually "Sold My Soul to the Devil-ed Eggs."
Like any good southern cookbook, there are also cocktails. Wow, are there cocktails. Pull down the mailbox door, sit on your porch, and drink in the humid afternoon cocktails. I gave in and made cantaloupe daiquiris since cantaloupe are in season.
The element I liked best in this cookbook is its emphasis on local ingredients that may not be available outside of the south - okra, black-eyed peas, lady peas, crawfish, etc. Right now, tomatoes are going crazy so I made the tomato soup recipe. Well kind of. I started with it, added extra canned tomatoes and some cream and left out the oregano. I figure it kind of still counts.
The dessert section was great, a bunch of simple traditional southern treats. I made the boiled vanilla custard, I just don't have a picture to show for it. I have marked others to try.
Recommended, for southerners and for people who wish they were!
Like any good southern cookbook, there are also cocktails. Wow, are there cocktails. Pull down the mailbox door, sit on your porch, and drink in the humid afternoon cocktails. I gave in and made cantaloupe daiquiris since cantaloupe are in season.
The element I liked best in this cookbook is its emphasis on local ingredients that may not be available outside of the south - okra, black-eyed peas, lady peas, crawfish, etc. Right now, tomatoes are going crazy so I made the tomato soup recipe. Well kind of. I started with it, added extra canned tomatoes and some cream and left out the oregano. I figure it kind of still counts.
The dessert section was great, a bunch of simple traditional southern treats. I made the boiled vanilla custard, I just don't have a picture to show for it. I have marked others to try.
Recommended, for southerners and for people who wish they were!
June 13, 2022
I really liked this southern style cookbook flavored with downhome wit and homegrown simplicity!
June 6, 2008
This book is fantastic! Martha Hall Foose's stories are marvelous, and the recipes are simply out of this world. If you have a chance to hear her speak or to attend one of her demos, do it! Plenty of yummy food and hilarious stories. I've had her Blue Cheese Pecan Bread, her Catfish in a Paper Bag, her Deep Shade Blueberry Cobbler with Homemade Buttermilk Peach Ice Cream (holy cow!), and her Hoppin' John. My personal favorite was the Sunflower Squash -- sorta like a squash flavored hushpuppy. If you grew up with good Southern cooking, these recipes will make you homesick. If you DIDN'T grow up with good Southern cooking, it'll let you know what you missed!
August 21, 2009
I love food. It's a borderline obsessive thing. I like to eat, I like to go out to new restaurants, I love to cook. At the reference desk, I always have various food blogs open in the background. I'm always making something new and bringing it in... and of course, I'm always on the hunt for good cookbooks.
Martha Hall Foose won a James Beard award in the American Cookery category for this book. And I completely understand why, and I've only just made one recipe! (Cornbread Crusted White Chili - and yes, it's as good as it sounds.)
I read this cookbook like a novel. Foose throws us into the slow Mississippi Delta world that she loves so much. Every recipe has a history; we meet characters like Aunt Mary Stigler Thompson - a woman who declares none of the entrants in the mayonnaise making competition are "as good as my own"; Mrs. Ethel Wright Mohamed, a woman stitched hundreds of tea towels to remember her beloved late husband; and M. Taylor Bowen Ricketts who cooked black-eyed peas just as well as she painted. Foose's notes section with cooking instructions are just as charming as the histories that grace every recipe.
Oh, and the food. Huge color photographs adorn nearly every page of complex, beautiful, mouth-watering Southern food. From curried sweet potato soup with pork rind croutons to banana puddings served in a mason jar to field peas with snaps... I was hungry every time I picked up this book. I took my time with Screen Doors and Sweet Tea - in fact, I took so long that it's now over-due. I had to quickly photocopy all of the recipes I want to try and return it to the library. I know I'm not the only one who's actually cooked from this book - at the front, I found a post-it note from another patron who had meticulously written out each recipe that she tried.
Southern cooking is not fast, nor is it easy. Many recipes require hours of prep work, and I know that I don't have a lot of time for this kind of cooking during my hectic work week. But for special occasions, I will definitely make a caramel cake. Or the greens with cornbread croutons. Or overnight dinner rolls.
Oh, it's time to start planning the next dinner with Foose. And I'm adding this book to my Christmas wish list.
Martha Hall Foose won a James Beard award in the American Cookery category for this book. And I completely understand why, and I've only just made one recipe! (Cornbread Crusted White Chili - and yes, it's as good as it sounds.)
I read this cookbook like a novel. Foose throws us into the slow Mississippi Delta world that she loves so much. Every recipe has a history; we meet characters like Aunt Mary Stigler Thompson - a woman who declares none of the entrants in the mayonnaise making competition are "as good as my own"; Mrs. Ethel Wright Mohamed, a woman stitched hundreds of tea towels to remember her beloved late husband; and M. Taylor Bowen Ricketts who cooked black-eyed peas just as well as she painted. Foose's notes section with cooking instructions are just as charming as the histories that grace every recipe.
Oh, and the food. Huge color photographs adorn nearly every page of complex, beautiful, mouth-watering Southern food. From curried sweet potato soup with pork rind croutons to banana puddings served in a mason jar to field peas with snaps... I was hungry every time I picked up this book. I took my time with Screen Doors and Sweet Tea - in fact, I took so long that it's now over-due. I had to quickly photocopy all of the recipes I want to try and return it to the library. I know I'm not the only one who's actually cooked from this book - at the front, I found a post-it note from another patron who had meticulously written out each recipe that she tried.
Southern cooking is not fast, nor is it easy. Many recipes require hours of prep work, and I know that I don't have a lot of time for this kind of cooking during my hectic work week. But for special occasions, I will definitely make a caramel cake. Or the greens with cornbread croutons. Or overnight dinner rolls.
Oh, it's time to start planning the next dinner with Foose. And I'm adding this book to my Christmas wish list.
March 3, 2011
It is rare when a cookbook conveys not only recipe and technique but soul and humor as well. Many have recipes that we enjoy making but that we wished had more of the author's reflections on the subject at hand. Even more are long on 'personality' and short on interesting and functional recipes. Screen Doors and Sweet Tea by Martha Hall Foose (Clarkson Potter/Crown) smacks of great recipes you willwant to make more than once and stories you will want read aloud while making them.
The trail of a chef can seem like tracing the steps of a child set loose on a spring day; roving in no particular pattern as one thing or another is discovered, cherished, discarded or often eaten. Foose is no exception to the allegory; her dervish-path from Mississippi to France, Los Angeles, New Orleans and back again to the Delta is sprinkled here in there in her writing. It shows up in the flavors of her recipes that are recognizably southern and yet not solely of the South and in the techniques and stories that accompany each.
Of particular delight is her story of how grits saved upon upon first arriving in France for culinary training; it is told with an honesty proving that some of the most provoking parts of life cannot be made up. Recipes run from what would seem to be mundane southern fare suchas fried okra to more challenging bits of our culinary repetoire such as turtle soup (complete with tongue-in-cheek directions on how to shell a turtle).
Screen Doors and Sweet Tea speaks well of the cuisine and the character of the South. It will prove to be a trusty guide along your own culinary trail - with or without the grass stains.
(This review originally appeared in edible Memphis, Spring 2008)
The trail of a chef can seem like tracing the steps of a child set loose on a spring day; roving in no particular pattern as one thing or another is discovered, cherished, discarded or often eaten. Foose is no exception to the allegory; her dervish-path from Mississippi to France, Los Angeles, New Orleans and back again to the Delta is sprinkled here in there in her writing. It shows up in the flavors of her recipes that are recognizably southern and yet not solely of the South and in the techniques and stories that accompany each.
Of particular delight is her story of how grits saved upon upon first arriving in France for culinary training; it is told with an honesty proving that some of the most provoking parts of life cannot be made up. Recipes run from what would seem to be mundane southern fare suchas fried okra to more challenging bits of our culinary repetoire such as turtle soup (complete with tongue-in-cheek directions on how to shell a turtle).
Screen Doors and Sweet Tea speaks well of the cuisine and the character of the South. It will prove to be a trusty guide along your own culinary trail - with or without the grass stains.
(This review originally appeared in edible Memphis, Spring 2008)
January 3, 2022
I learned a few things about cooking that I did not know from this book. Don't use extra virgin olive oil when making homemade mayonnaise. "It is unrefined and contains monoglycerides that may cause the emulsion to separate."
When you have soaked your dried beans before cooking "and find the skins have completely slipped off the beans, that means that they were too old to begin with. Throw them out." They will be tough when cooked.
Many of the recipes are fried and most are fairly high calorie and delicious sounding. The best part of the book is the little sqibbits about the authors friends and family. Next to a recipe for (REAL) turtle soup:
"I asked my dear friend, Uncle Hank Burdine, about his turtle-cleaning methods. Hank allowed, 'It is the harest thing in the world to do. Best advice I can give is to put it in the trunk of your car and drive over to Louisiana and get one of them to do it.'"
The recipes are definitely not all traditional or old fashioned. Some include sophisticated ingredients like gouda cheese in the grits, carraway seeds in the carrots, and curry powder in the sweet potatoe soup. This is the new South and the inhabitants come from many cultures so she includes Chinese Pork Roast, Mexican Skirt Steak, and Lebanese Tabbouleh. Unlike the Southern traditions I was raised with she includes alcoholic beverages and lots of fish and seafood. Both of these things were either unknown or not mentioned in the more inland, more severe South where I grew up.
I recommend this book to anyone interested in food. You will gain weight just reading it.
When you have soaked your dried beans before cooking "and find the skins have completely slipped off the beans, that means that they were too old to begin with. Throw them out." They will be tough when cooked.
Many of the recipes are fried and most are fairly high calorie and delicious sounding. The best part of the book is the little sqibbits about the authors friends and family. Next to a recipe for (REAL) turtle soup:
"I asked my dear friend, Uncle Hank Burdine, about his turtle-cleaning methods. Hank allowed, 'It is the harest thing in the world to do. Best advice I can give is to put it in the trunk of your car and drive over to Louisiana and get one of them to do it.'"
The recipes are definitely not all traditional or old fashioned. Some include sophisticated ingredients like gouda cheese in the grits, carraway seeds in the carrots, and curry powder in the sweet potatoe soup. This is the new South and the inhabitants come from many cultures so she includes Chinese Pork Roast, Mexican Skirt Steak, and Lebanese Tabbouleh. Unlike the Southern traditions I was raised with she includes alcoholic beverages and lots of fish and seafood. Both of these things were either unknown or not mentioned in the more inland, more severe South where I grew up.
I recommend this book to anyone interested in food. You will gain weight just reading it.
July 23, 2008
this was a cute book, with great little stories before each recipe. as far as a recipe book goes, i wouldn't really use it. being a southern girl myself, the few southern recipes i would ever want to cook are recipes that i would get from my southern friends and family. know what i mean?
for instance, at Thanksgiving, my Mom makes an amazing turkey dressing. it's not too dry or crumbly, so delicious. my aunt Diane makes (to her family) an amazing turkey dressing. her family likes that it's not too runny (like my Mom's), although my family would consider it nearly burnt. both dressings must be at our holiday dinners for everybody to be happy, because those are "our" dishes.
so i certainly wouldn't use this book for a turkey dressing recipe, because it wouldn't taste like my Mom's. same with sweet tea, fried catfish, cornbread, or barbecued ANYTHING. I happen to have a barbecue king for a father, so if i want any barbecue recipe, i'm going to get it from him, because i want it to taste like his does.
the recipes are probably terrific, but I just wouldn't use them. maybe you would. either way, the book is worth the read for the great stories, side notes, and pictures. the recipes are just a bonus feature. :)
for instance, at Thanksgiving, my Mom makes an amazing turkey dressing. it's not too dry or crumbly, so delicious. my aunt Diane makes (to her family) an amazing turkey dressing. her family likes that it's not too runny (like my Mom's), although my family would consider it nearly burnt. both dressings must be at our holiday dinners for everybody to be happy, because those are "our" dishes.
so i certainly wouldn't use this book for a turkey dressing recipe, because it wouldn't taste like my Mom's. same with sweet tea, fried catfish, cornbread, or barbecued ANYTHING. I happen to have a barbecue king for a father, so if i want any barbecue recipe, i'm going to get it from him, because i want it to taste like his does.
the recipes are probably terrific, but I just wouldn't use them. maybe you would. either way, the book is worth the read for the great stories, side notes, and pictures. the recipes are just a bonus feature. :)
July 15, 2012
I'm extremely picky about my cookbooks, especially Southern ones. But this one is excellent! Most of the recipes are classic Southern dishes with a modern flair. I cannot wait to make the sweet tea pie. I like that she changes some recipes to make them easier for today's cook (e.g., the caramel cake recipe) while still remaining true to the history and nature of the dish. Usually I read a cookbook and mark two or three recipes to try. I want to make 2/3 of the recipes in this book! I also just moved near the author's Viking cooking school... hopefully I will be able to take a class one day!
PS-I had NO IDEA that the author is who opened Bottletree Bakery in Oxford, MS... I have traveled all over the world and have never had a brioche anywhere close to those at Bottletree. Oxford would not be the same without Bottletree!
PS-I had NO IDEA that the author is who opened Bottletree Bakery in Oxford, MS... I have traveled all over the world and have never had a brioche anywhere close to those at Bottletree. Oxford would not be the same without Bottletree!
July 27, 2009
With family living in the Deep South I have actually had several of these recipes, and certainly heard of many others. I purchased two copies of this book, one for me, one for my sister who is moving south this summer.
July 27, 2009
Good recipes though the pithy little southern comments got annoying pretty early. However, Great recipes and tips from how to fry perfect okra to the elusive lady bean salad pictured on the cover. This summer I'd just like to see a tomato that looks that good here in TX.
January 15, 2015
Oh man oh man! She had me at Yazoo Cheese Straws! As someone from Yazoo City and the Delta I connected with not only the recipes but the stories in this cookbook. Great collection and highly recommended.
October 9, 2020
Martha can truly cook. Some familiar but never predictable recipes–pimiento cheese, gumbo, cornbread–besides being too good to leave out, are joined in this sterling cookbook with many others less commonly seen but no less superlative, all unmistakably Southern, like Delta hot tamales, for example, or West Indies salad (from Mobile, circa 1940s), salmon croquettes, biscuits with tomato gravy, and black bottom pie. Her book is one to be cherished, shared, and consumed.
John Egerton [Southern Food: At Home, on the Road, in History]
If you’ve got a rocker on the front porch, get into it; if not, settle into your favorite chair. In either case, fix yourself a long drink and give yourself the pleasure of spending a little time with Martha Foose on her Mississippi farm before you head into the kitchen. Martha is that delightful combination of charming storyteller and darn good cook and in this book you get generous servings of each–both are delicious.
Dorie Greenspan
Martha Foose's Screen Doors and Sweet Tea is a treasure-chest of superb recipes like Green Chile Rice, Lady Pea Salad, and Sweet Tea Pie. And her stories of growing up in Mississippi have the unmistakably Southern cadence of tales swapped across the dinner table. The book has given us a new appreciation for the genius of Delta cuisine, and even better, it has us yearning to cook, gather friends, and tell stories.
Matt Lee and Ted Lee [The Lee Bros. Southern Cookbook]
This book takes me back to the things I loved about my childhood in the rural south. I can’t wait to get copies for my mother and aunts. I love it.
John Besh
This is it. The real thing. Honest eats. And diverting tales. From Martha Foose's Mississippi Delta, that queer and otherworldly land of catfish and cotton.
John T. Edge [Fried Chicken: An American Story]
John Egerton [Southern Food: At Home, on the Road, in History]
If you’ve got a rocker on the front porch, get into it; if not, settle into your favorite chair. In either case, fix yourself a long drink and give yourself the pleasure of spending a little time with Martha Foose on her Mississippi farm before you head into the kitchen. Martha is that delightful combination of charming storyteller and darn good cook and in this book you get generous servings of each–both are delicious.
Dorie Greenspan
Martha Foose's Screen Doors and Sweet Tea is a treasure-chest of superb recipes like Green Chile Rice, Lady Pea Salad, and Sweet Tea Pie. And her stories of growing up in Mississippi have the unmistakably Southern cadence of tales swapped across the dinner table. The book has given us a new appreciation for the genius of Delta cuisine, and even better, it has us yearning to cook, gather friends, and tell stories.
Matt Lee and Ted Lee [The Lee Bros. Southern Cookbook]
This book takes me back to the things I loved about my childhood in the rural south. I can’t wait to get copies for my mother and aunts. I love it.
John Besh
This is it. The real thing. Honest eats. And diverting tales. From Martha Foose's Mississippi Delta, that queer and otherworldly land of catfish and cotton.
John T. Edge [Fried Chicken: An American Story]
October 19, 2021
I go through a lot of cookbooks. Although I love the idea of this one, southern hospitality and all, I didn’t find the recipes to be truly outstanding. They’re good, and so is the organization of the book. I wish the time to make each recipe had been included at the top like many books do. I find that very helpful to determine how I should manage the day.
Having banana trees I’ve made dozens of banana bread recipes, and this one didn’t stand out. The Crumb Cauliflower is a unique recipe allowing the vegetable to keep its crunch which I enjoyed, but I would have to cook it a little bit more for company I believe. Baked beans are baked beans. The chicken thighs and dumplings came out heavy but tasty. Lots of traditional recipes are here if you’re looking to have a resource for such things. I think I’ll stick to the cocktails!
Having banana trees I’ve made dozens of banana bread recipes, and this one didn’t stand out. The Crumb Cauliflower is a unique recipe allowing the vegetable to keep its crunch which I enjoyed, but I would have to cook it a little bit more for company I believe. Baked beans are baked beans. The chicken thighs and dumplings came out heavy but tasty. Lots of traditional recipes are here if you’re looking to have a resource for such things. I think I’ll stick to the cocktails!
January 15, 2018
When I read a cookbook, I find myself using two criteria. First, how many of the recipes am I interested in making? And second, how are the stories (either interspersed between recipes, or included as lead-ins for the recipes)?
For this particular book, I found it lacking in both. Admittedly, Deep South cooking is not food I lean toward naturally; but the lists of ingredients and described effort for many of the recipes made them even less appealing. Additionally, I found the stories to feel repetitive after a while. Others might find this intriguing and useful, but it was unfortunately not to my taste, in the kitchen or in the reading.
For this particular book, I found it lacking in both. Admittedly, Deep South cooking is not food I lean toward naturally; but the lists of ingredients and described effort for many of the recipes made them even less appealing. Additionally, I found the stories to feel repetitive after a while. Others might find this intriguing and useful, but it was unfortunately not to my taste, in the kitchen or in the reading.
May 10, 2018
HOW do you write a cookbook that both makes me famished and also want to start packing to move?! We're gonna have to ask Martha Hall Foose because she has done just that.
I adore the stories and remembrances she shares with us about a time and place both familiar and foreign to someone who grew up on the great plains. And that's before we even get to the food! I want to eat it all right here. right now.
I don't know that I've had another book, let alone cookbook, come together so well to make me feel so comfy and soothed. So thank you Miss Martha, for that!
I adore the stories and remembrances she shares with us about a time and place both familiar and foreign to someone who grew up on the great plains. And that's before we even get to the food! I want to eat it all right here. right now.
I don't know that I've had another book, let alone cookbook, come together so well to make me feel so comfy and soothed. So thank you Miss Martha, for that!
May 16, 2017
Nice book with a lovely little story to go along with each recipe. Not as many pictures of the food as you might like. Most of the recipes are more labor-intensive than anything I would make. A lot of them do remind me of my childhood and my mother's down-home Tennessee cooking. I would gladly eat nearly any of these if someone else made them for me. A great read.
June 1, 2017
We often forget that US Southern food is a cuisine in itself.
The recipe notes give an entertaining insiders look into life in the deep South - think setting a bourbon based drink on your mailbox door while you and your neighbors sit on a tree stump and go through your mail.
The recipe notes give an entertaining insiders look into life in the deep South - think setting a bourbon based drink on your mailbox door while you and your neighbors sit on a tree stump and go through your mail.
April 2, 2019
I do have a pronounced weakness for true southern cookbooks, probably because I was not exposed to this cooking in my youth. These are some real gems and they ring true to both culture and ingredients. recommended.
August 1, 2019
Okay...still don’t like stories in my cookbooks, but at least with this one the recipes were worth it.
October 8, 2019
Great cookbook!
March 19, 2020
Delicious recipes and great storytelling! LOVE this cookbook!
June 28, 2020
Interesting stories about the recipes.
December 2, 2020
A great, easy-to-follow intro to Southern cooking. Liked this a lot!
March 15, 2021
A lot sassy southern stories are in this book ! Noted some recipes to do in forthcoming summer.
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May 14, 2023Chatty like porch sittin'. Looking forward to the sweet potato biscuits, and loving how the recipes have a title and a descriptor.
August 12, 2015
What a delightful book and discussion! The What's Cooking group enjoyed reading about the characters that populate Foose's hometown and family as well as the recipes that she shares with us.
We sampled the following...
- Blue Cheese Pecan Bread
- Baked Beans
- Dark Secrets
- Proper Fried Chicken
- Orange Sherbet
- Bread Pudding with Whiskey Sauce
- Monday Red Beans and Rice
- Apricot Salad
- Blackberry Limeade
- Chile Lime Skirt Steak
- Salmon Croquettes
- Pralines with Bacon
- Strawberry Missionary Society Salad
While we were divided on some of the recipes as to how much we liked it, no one disliked anything that they tasted. Foose is a chatty author. Each recipe comes with a description of a situation or a person that has a connection to it. She is also generous with photos and side notes to help you with substitutions/techniques and menu ideas.
Overall her instructions are clear and well written. One member who cooked the Baked Beans found that the temperature was way too low to cook the beans and increased it from 250 degrees to 400. Everyone who prepared the Proper Fried Chicken found that it was labor intensive and probably not a recipe that they would make again. They enjoyed it, but anticipated purchasing future fried chicken meals locally.
Foose's James Beard Award is well deserved as her cookbook is a nice introduction to Southern cooking and culture.
We sampled the following...
- Blue Cheese Pecan Bread
- Baked Beans
- Dark Secrets
- Proper Fried Chicken
- Orange Sherbet
- Bread Pudding with Whiskey Sauce
- Monday Red Beans and Rice
- Apricot Salad
- Blackberry Limeade
- Chile Lime Skirt Steak
- Salmon Croquettes
- Pralines with Bacon
- Strawberry Missionary Society Salad
While we were divided on some of the recipes as to how much we liked it, no one disliked anything that they tasted. Foose is a chatty author. Each recipe comes with a description of a situation or a person that has a connection to it. She is also generous with photos and side notes to help you with substitutions/techniques and menu ideas.
Overall her instructions are clear and well written. One member who cooked the Baked Beans found that the temperature was way too low to cook the beans and increased it from 250 degrees to 400. Everyone who prepared the Proper Fried Chicken found that it was labor intensive and probably not a recipe that they would make again. They enjoyed it, but anticipated purchasing future fried chicken meals locally.
Foose's James Beard Award is well deserved as her cookbook is a nice introduction to Southern cooking and culture.
January 10, 2012
Fantastic cookbook with recipes from a Mississippi chef, writer, and bon vivant. Reading through this cookbook today actually made me weep; food can trigger such strong memories, and recipes have the same power. I wanted to be 8 years old again in the Mississippi Delta, at a family reunion, sneaking deviled eggs off the big platter while the aunts set everything out. It's a book of memories if you grew up in the South and are a certain age. The recipes are a mixture of old-fashioned standards (egg and olive salad, root beer glazed ham, fried okra) and more modern or reinvented ideas (curried sweet potato soup, chile lime skirt steak, sweet tea pie). Her writing is interspersed throughout the recipes--denoting each one and then there are some essays, too. This cookbook is a wonderful one for me, and I know that not only will I turn to it in times of need (for a covered dish supper, dinner party, or standby lunch) but also will flip through it in times of acutest homesickness.
June 30, 2011
The sweetpotato curry soup was probably the best soup I've ever made. I've used a half a bottle of brandy on the milk punch recipe (and felt really southern drinking it). I've made the delicious and adorable polka-dot shortbread for a birthday gift, and the rich and creamy buttermilk peach ice cream for a treat! All winners,(though the ice cream needed more peaches and less buttermilk) the cobbler will likely be next, then I might need to focus on less fattening fare for awhile. I would love to have this perfet summer cookbook in my collection.
June 22, 2012
It was the title that reached out and grabbed me first as I wound my way through the library shelves on a sunny Saturday afternoon. It wasn't quite warm enough to brew up a batch of sweet tea but that wouldln't stop me from reading about it! While these southern recipes sound delicious, especially the Blackberry Limeade (otherwise known as Amethyst Elixir), what really captured my attention were the descriptions and little stories that accompanied each recipe. Choose it for the recipes and savor it for the stories.
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