Bravo Gelato - Nashville, TN

People seem to be going nuts about the maple bacon gelato here, but this cup of blueberry was the best thing I ate all week...

Bocado

Have we mentioned the burger at Bocado in Atlanta? Not too shabby:

Peg Leg Porker

Two of our favorite things...our man Billy Reid is making shirts featuring one of our favorite BBQ sauces - the Peg Leg Porker. Check Billy's site to get yours.

Liquor Store Web Design

We've launched the website for Holiday Fine Wine & Spirits in Atlanta:

'Sloppy Jose'

Taqueria del Sol is featuring the 'Sloppy Jose' taco this week - house-made Sloppy Joe filling, cheddar, jalapenos, and the kicker - Fritos!

What I Learned In Colorado

I learned that they take their jerky seriously...so seriously that there's a 'Jerky Wagon' near Dillon. Here are a few of our favorites - the Kippered Elk Steak was an especially big hit.

Local Coffee

Thanks to the good people at 1000 Faces Coffee in Athens, GA for sending over a bag of El Bambito...this may be the new house coffee for the Green Olive Atlanta office.

Beer Friday

Seeing as how we have a bunch of friends playing the South By Southwest festival in Austin this week, today's featured libation for Beer Friday is the one and only Shiner from Texas.

Southern Foodways Alliance Potlikker Film Festival: Nashville

POTLIKKER FILM FESTIVAL
Sunday, April 25, 2010
4-7 p.m. @ City House
1222 4th Ave N, Nashville, Tn 37208
www.southernfoodways.org

Tandy Wilson of City House
Tyler Brown of The Capitol Grille at The Hermitage
Pat Martin of Martin’s Bar-B-Que Joint
Silver Sands

Music from Ketch Secor and Morgan Jahnig (from Old Crow Medicine Show) and Friends


Beverages from Nashville’s own Yazoo Brewing Company, Corsair Distillery, and Mountain Valley Spring Water

$45

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER NOW

Oxford American 2010 Southern Food Issue

The Oxford American has outdone themselves with this year's southern food issue...set aside several hours to read this one, as I had trouble not reading the whole thing at one sitting. They also outdid themselves at the launch party in Charleston this weekend, serving plenty of Pappy Van Winkle 15-year bourbon at Billy Reid's store...

Thanks Dad!

You have to love a dad who pays a visit to the one and only Moonlite BBQ in Owensboro, KY, and knowing that he can't bring me back an order of their famous mutton, he at least sends some BBQ packets as consolation. I'm off to find some tips on cooking mutton.

Scott's Variety Store & BBQ - Hemingway, SC

I was lucky enough to experience the best whole hog BBQ I've ever had this weekend - courtesy of my new hero, Rodney Scott, of Scott's Variety Store in Hemingway, SC. Our man John T. Edge has already done a better job writing it up than I can - take a few minutes to read this great piece.

Web Design - Vern Yip

We're excited to have launched the website for Vern Yip, star of countless shows on TLC, NBC and HGTV among others...

How It's Done

This sign stopped me in my tracks while driving through South Carolina yesterday...I wanted to stick around until it got dark so I could see what it looked like when lit.

Mobile Post - Jim 'N Nick's, Charleston, SC

Second breakfast of the day - hot link and pimento cheese; the first was an oyster and liver po boy at Hominy Grill...

Shaun Doty At The James Beard House - New York, NY

Some shots from the kitchen at the James Beard House for Shaun Doty's recent dinner...

Chess Pie

Chess pie has been served to me so many ways by members of my family that I decided to have a little taste off...confession: I am not the chef in my family. My husband is amazing...I can't boil water. I called my 91 year-old grandmother yesterday 6 times to go over the recipes... My "tasters" are unaware of my lack of skill -- tonight is the inaugural Slow Food Nashville Board Meeting - and in true Slow Food fashion, it is a potluck. Members include a James Beard nominated chef, a revolutionary farmer, the founder of the convivium who just so happens to have one of the most sophisticated palates of any Southerner I know, the regional Whole Foods culinary director...and more -- I am in hot water. My contribution to the meeting is dessert. (I thought about cheating and calling in a favor from a pastry chef pal here in Atlanta and bringing Phatty Cakes but guilt got the best of me.)

Chess pie: According to James Beard's American Cookery (1972) "chess pie was brought from England originally, and was found in New England as well as Virginia. Recipes vary, but are generally similar in that they call for the preparation of a single crust and a filling composed of eggs, butter, granulated sugar, brown sugar and vanilla. What sets chess pie apart from many other custard pies is the addition of corn meal. Some recipes also call for corn syrup, which tends to create a more gelatinous consistency. The pie is then baked. The result is very sweet and is often consumed with coffee to offset this."

The other weekend, my husband thought he was making chess pie and really made a preparation of pecan pie -- using the core ingredient corn syrup. Chess pie does not contain corn syrup. I think David Chang's Momofuku / Milk Bar Pastry Chef Christina Tosi's crack pie might, however, but...that is another conversation entirely.

Photo of Crack Pie (thanks to Ed Levine of Serious Eats)

Many attribute the name's origin to a colloquialism really... "just pie" shortened to "jus' pie" or "jess' pie," and then corrupted to "chess pie". Some say that the name came from the way it would hold up well over time in the pie chest...

Version #1: This photo is of the first version I made...(ever). This one contains eggs, corn syrup, sugar, vanilla, butter..and I burnt the hell out of it (as expected). This is really the pecan pie -- this is the version that Jeff made a couple of weeks ago and I ate while it was supposed to be cooling (when he went out to run errands). It tastes exactly like Tosi's version...and yes, I feel like a crack whore with only $2 in my pocket eating it. My grandmother does not approve of this version (nor does she approve of crack).

Version #2 At first glance, it looks like I burned the hell out of this one too. I didn't. This is the brown sugar version. My paternal great great aunt used to make this one:

Ruth Smith's Brown Sugar Chess Pie

This contains the pastry holy trinity as well...butter, sugar, eggs...with the addition of brown sugar, vanilla...baked slow and easy at 325 for an hour... This one is going to Nashville to be judged this afternoon.

Version #3 I have high hopes for this one. It is a lemon chess pie. I think I should have pulled this one out of the over 10 minutes earlier -- it was in there 70 minutes (I was on the phone).

I have some meyer lemons left over from the cocktail sessions last week...so this one has 2 sticks of butter, 2 cups of sugar, 1 tbsp corn meal, 2 tbsp flour, 5 eggs, tsp vanilla, and somewhere around 1/2 cup of lemon juice. I made 2 of these...betting the farm.

Headed to Nashville now...stay tuned...

Album Design

I won't claim that the cover of this record is the only reason I bought it (take a look at that track list!), but this may be the best album cover art since Emerson Lake and Palmer's Tarkus.

Jim 'N Nick's

Spotted this on the Jim 'N Nick's trailer in Smyrna today:

Le Vigne - Dahlonega, GA

Here's a few more of Chef Steven Hartman's dishes at Le Vigne, the restaurant on the grounds of Montaluce in Dahlonega, GA.