Gomming & Yowing

All about eating and talking and life in the South and anything else that strikes my fancy…

Archive for the category “locavore”

07 Sep 2008
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September Saturday

There are few things more enjoyable than a Saturday in September, especially if you live in (or visit) Western North Carolina. Today was all warm sun and wind; almost no humidity; and a sky the color of “the blue-tiled walls near the market stalls”* that we only get in the fall when the faded chambray sky of summer is flooded with a fresh infusion of bright blue.

No one needed anything from me today, so I caught up with an old friend and we gave ourselves over to the enjoyment of a September Saturday. We started with lunch at the Apple Crate Cafe** in Waynesville–a charming little restaurant just off the main road, and brimming over with apples and angels in its decor. My friend and I both opted for a tuna melt and a side of baked potato salad, and were delighted to find RC Cola among the fountain drink choices. When you visit–and I hope you’ll do it soon–be sure to check out the restrooms (“hens” or “roosters,” depending on your equipment); they’re just as nice as the restaurant itself!

 

We ran a couple of errands and one of our stops netted me, unexpectedly, the particular Webkinz one of my nephews has tried to find for months. (His birthday is next week, so now I’m all set!) We went downtown  next, and I remembered how much I always enjoy my visits to Waynesville. It’s just half an hour west of Asheville, but like Hendersonville (see my last post), it’s a world away.

Stopped in at Vin Wine Bar on Church Street; talked to the owner and picked up some info on next Saturday’s excursion to the Rockhouse Winery in Tryon, NC. Vin hosts a ladies’ wine club that meets monthly, I believe, and this is a club-related outing (there are a few spaces left; call 828-452-6000 for more info).

Then it was on to Barber Orchard (2855 Old Balsam Rd. in Waynesville; 828-456-3598), which feels a little like driving into the past. The older part of the building is all field stone rockwork, with a newer shed and packing area built onto the side. A long line of old apple trees screens the view of Highwa 19-23, and the trees were loaded with a bumper crop of purple-red fruit that makes you wonder which old heirloom variety they might be. There are plenty of apples for sale at the moment, including Cortland, Honeycrisp, Gingergold, McIntosh, and Golden Delicious. Other produce included locally grown tomatoes, cantaloupe, field corn, white and red potatoes, squash, muscadines, and plums. Barber Orchard is also known for its fresh-baked apple cakes, apple fritters, cookies, pies, cider, and cider slushies–plus pickled okra, dilly beans, and more kinds of pickles and jams and preserves than you can shake the proverbial stick at. (When a Waynesville-dweller brings a Barber Orchard apple cake to a staff meeting or office potluck, co-workers have been known to fight over even the crumbs left on the plate!)

Two apple turnovers, a bottle of cider, a half-peck of Honeycrisps, a jar of pickled okra, and a sample of fresh cider later, my friend and I parted company and I headed home with the top down, the radio up, and a downright satisfied smile on my face at the September-ness of it all.

* I’ve been on an Al Stewart kick lately, and I have his 1976 classic “Year of the Cat” to thank for that description of the color blue.  Thanks, Al (and happy “Time Passages” for your birthday yesterday)! watch?v=QM7LR46zrQU

** For more reviews on the Apple Crate Cafe: http://local.yahoo.com/info-13357050-apple-crate-cafe-waynesville

Posted in apples, cars, convertibles, Food, locavore, memories, weather and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
30 Aug 2008
2 Comments

Apple-icious Festival

Hendersonville Apple Festival

Hendersonville Apple Festival

Hendersonville holds its annual Apple Festival on Labor Day weekend each year. Booths line both sides of Main Street, which is closed to vehicle traffic, and it’s open season on all things apple-related: apple crafts, apple foods, apple gadgets, and lots and lots and lots of apples.

We went last night, and it was practically perfect, from the weather to the not-impossible-to-navigate crowds. The Buddy-K Big Band (http://www.buddykband.com/) was swinging in front of the gold-domed courthouse; a hit-or-miss engine was cycling and popping as it pulled the crank for homemade ice cream; the evening air was redolent with ubiquitous festival smell of fried peppers-and-onions. I opted for hand-cut french fries drizzled with salt and vinegar, then shared a fried apple pie a la mode (vanilla ice cream courtesy of the hit-or-miss engine, of course).

It’s a friendly festival, and very family-oriented. None of the booths sell alcohol, and everything closes fairly early. Small-ish town America at its finest, and a very different experience than the festivals in Asheville. (More Mayberry, less Haight-Ashbury, you might say.)

We rounded out our evening with a stop at one of the many tents selling locally grown apples (Hendersonville is famous for its apples, by the way).  We stuffed a half-bushel bag with every available variety from Mutsu and Empire to Jonagold, Honeycrisp, Gingergold, Cortland, and Red Delicious. The bag weighed a ton; it was like carrying a sleeping three-year-old back to the car.

Are there more exciting festivals in the Southeast? Probably, but not many that are sweeter–in every sense of the word.

Posted in apples, Asheville, Festivals, Food, Hendersonville, Ice cream, locavore, weather and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
24 Aug 2008

Fleeting Figs…

A fig in the hand...
A fig in the hand…

Fresh figs are some of the most fragile and fleeting fruits I’ve ever seen. One website suggested you have approximately 12 hours from the time you actually dislodge the fig from the tree before you lose control of it (i.e. it turns to mush).

My fresh figs had a lifespan of about 48 hours all together, but many of them didn’t have that much staying power. I ate them, styled them for photographs, shared them with my family, then hit the fig-wall: time to do *something* with the fresh figs before they liquified and ran out of the basket.

I had dreams of caramelizing them and canning the results: tidy, pint-sized rows of golden-brown goodness lining the shelves of my kitchen, waiting to be opened up and spooned out over fluffy buttered biscuits while snowflakes whirl outside the window…but that involved finding canning jars, prepping figs, and dealing with my mother’s hippopotamus-sized pressure cooker, which I always assume will explode, showering anyone in the vicinity with glass shrapnel and geysers of liquid hot “figma” (like magma, only made of figs and sugar).

Freezing, then, was the best option. This still requires prepping the figs, but has no real opportunity to register on the Richter scale of my imagination. (“Asheville locavore blows a gasket–literally–in freakish home-canning accident!”) The fig-related websites (there are more than you might think) suggest boiling figs in a simple syrup before freezing. Hmm…sounds like I should just make fig sauce (like apple sauce, obviously, but with figs) and freeze that. I could still have the buttered-biscuit-snowfall-fantasy, even though freezer containers are 1) not as attractive as canning jars, and 2) even if they were pretty, they’re still hidden in the freezer.

I begin sorting figs, slicing off the stem end and “fig butt” of all those that haven’t either burst their skins or grown cobwebby white mold whiskers. (A fig is really just a fragile little bag of juicy fructose waiting to become a science experiment–eek!) There are still a lot of usable figs, and the ones that scare me go into a separate bag for the neighbor’s hog Brutus. (I’ve seen how and what he eats; I don’t honestly think he’ll mind a few fig whiskers.)

Once all the figs are in the pot, I add a cup or so of orange juice, the juice of one lime, a half-cup or more of brown sugar, a tablespoon of cinnamon, a teaspoon of dried orange rind, and a shake-shake-shake of an orange liquer for good measure (or “innacurate measure,” if we’re being technical about it). I turn the burner to medium and wait, stirring occasionally.

A couple of hours (and some adjustments to sugar and cinnamon) later, I have a pot full of beautiful fig sauce, boiled down to caramel-thick perfection, with a million golden seeds catching the light. So good, so worthy, as it were, of buttered biscuits on a winter’s day. As soon as it cools, I’ll put it in sturdy storage containers and bury it in the permafrost zone of the freezer. Pure fig heaven, waiting to be resurrected from from the depths of its artificially Arctic interment to live again at the breakfast table!

Posted in Asheville, Food, Fresh figs, locavore, weather and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment
19 Jul 2008
2 Comments

Seven-Mile-A-Minute

My last post ended with a thought about “sinister simian henchmen,” a.k.a. any creepy monkey that works in cahoots with an organ grinder, or a one-eyed spy for the Nazis in Cairo (Raiders of the Lost Ark), or most recently, Captain Barbosa’s chittering little undead sidekick in Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl (and the second and third films in the series, as well).

I don’t know why I find monkeys disturbing rather than charming; some people find them delightful and even keep them as pets. (Eek!) The last time I went to the circus, there was an act featuring baby baboons on bicycles, and it was all I could do to stay seated and not run out of the arena. Even the clowns were preferable to watching those sharp, wild, little faces (complete with funky bone ridges like the Klingons) furrowed in concentration on their task. 

So…scary monkeys and late summer have combined to put me in mind of one of the scariest short stories I ever read: “Where The Summer Ends” by Karl Edward Wagner. I found it years ago in a compilation of scary short stories, and read it mostly because, as a friend once said, “if something has text on it, I’ll run my eyes over it.” After a moment or two, of course, I was completely hooked and couldn’t put it down.

The story is set in Knoxville, Tennessee, which is about two hours west of Asheville on Interstate 40. Wagner catches the tone and the texture of the town with ease as he begins to spin a tale of late summer days swollen with humid heat and dank, overgrown kudzu on a dead-end street. You can practically smell something dark and sinister beginning to bulge out of the pages. I don’t want to spoil the ending for you, but I will say there’s *something* in the kudzu, so beware!

After reading that story, I pay more attention to kudzu than I used to. The road from my house to anywhere else passes between banks of the stuff for some distance. This time of year, it’s thick and lush and green…and it grows so fast you can almost see it lengthening into new stems and leaves (the better to clutch you with!) as you pass. My great-grandmother called it “that old seven-mile-a-minute” because it grows so fast and claims its territory in such a hurry.

Believe it or not, kudzu produces flowers in the summer–very pretty purple blooms that tend to shy away from sight under a layer of vines. They smell sort of purple, too, but you only know this if you drive around in smellovision (see the post from June 4) and sniff it out. Some locavores harvest kudzu; it turns up as jelly and pickles and a very fine “flour” that beats cornstarch for its thickening properties.* It’s a popular ingredient in handmade paper (whirl it up in a blender and smooth the fiberous pulp over a flat surface to dry in sheets) and it’s used as livestock fodder in Japan (from whence I believe it originated). Did the Boy Scouts really introduce kudzu into this country, using it as roadside ground cover to stabilize banks and hills along the new interstate system, which was one of their national projects in the 1950s? Could be true; could be an urban myth. Regardless, it’s here–especially in the south–and probably here to stay. And if you read Karl Edward Wagner’s take on kudzu, you’ll stay out of it!

*If you are planning to harvest kudzu for any sort of gustatory project, look for a patch  well away from the road. Public right-of-way kudzu tends to have been heavily sprayed with herbicides for years upon years, and that’s not an ideal situation for ingestion.

Posted in Asheville, locavore, memories, weather and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
23 Jun 2008
1 Comment

Chicken, Fried (Part II)

Chicken in various stages, pre-fryingMy mother, \" width=

Pan full of frying chickenNicely browned pieces, ready to go into the oven.

So you’ve got your chicken (fresh or frozen) cut up in pieces, with the skin removed. Standard pieces are breast, thigh, leg, wing (some people include the back and neck, I’ve been told, and others leave the leg attached to the thigh).

Pour some milk (maybe 1 1/2 – 2 cups; can be regular, skim, goat, buttermilk–whatever) into a shallow dish, add an egg, and whip it in slightly (nothing fancy–just a few turns with a fork). This makes what my grandfather called an egg wash (sometimes made with water, etc.). Dip each piece of chicken into the egg wash, then into flour. My mother always puts flour in an old bread wrapper, then drops the chicken into the flour and “floofs” it around to coat the chicken. She uses self-rising flour, which has a little bit of salt added, for extra flavor. (This flour-coating is akin to dredging, but the confines of the bag make it go a little faster.)

Once you’ve got several pieces of chicken to this stage, put them in a hot skillet (about 1/2″ of cooking oil or shortening, heated until it almost smokes) and let them begin to brown. (Yes, fried chicken is, indeed, fried–in hot fat.) While these pieces brown, get more chicken pieces milk-washed and floured. (You can do them all ahead of time, but the flour sinks in and some pieces might need to be re-dipped.) If you’re worried about handling raw chicken, all I can tell you is be careful and wash your hands and table afterward.*

Turn the chicken in the pan, allowing it to brown on both sides. You’re not trying to cook it all the way through–just get the flour browned and the flavor sealed in. After each piece comes out of the skillet, put it in a regular baking pan–it will finish cooking in the oven. Pour the used cooking oil into a sturdy dish (not plastic!) and allow the “brownings” to settle to the bottom. Wipe out the skillet, add more oil, bring it up to temperature (hot-but-not-smoking) and start the process over. By the time you’ve cooked most of your chicken, you can use the leftover oil for the last pan and save the “brownings” (would be drippings if it were from a roast) for gravy (if you’re a cream-gravy-with-fried-chicken afficianado).

Bake chicken at about 350 degrees for about 30 minutes, but start checking it before the time is up. Dark meat takes a little longer than white to cook, so be sure to poke around for done-ness.

Fried chicken is traditionally cooked on top of the stove, but if you’re cooking for more than a couple of people, it takes forever to cook skillet after skillet of chicken. The stovetop method also uses more grease and allows the chicken and its breading to absorb more.

It sounds like a lot of steps, but this recipe is pretty simple (egg wash, chicken, flour, oil) and amazingly good. It doesn’t have a lot of seasoning, but it doesn’t need it–you can salt and pepper to taste at the table. It’s not greasy, either; the baking dries the breading and makes it tender-crispy rather than hard-fried or soggy.

There are lots of good fried chicken joints in the world, and I’ll gladly chow down on Bojangle’s or KFC or any of the other million places you can go…but there’s just no fried chicken like my mama’s, made with her own hands and her daddy looking over her shoulder from that big old diner in the sky. (Can’t wait to try THAT menu someday!)

*For those worried about safe handling (i.e. inviting “Sam & Ella” to your chicken fry!**), plan on washing your hands and utensils thoroughly after you finish frying the last batch and before you put it in the oven. My mother keeps a little jug of water-and-bleach by the kitchen counter–just like her father did–and uses it for cleaning up after working with fresh meat (especially chicken). Don’t forget to wash the faucet handles of the kitchen sink–chances are, you touched ‘em with your chicken hands at some point!

** Sam & Ella = salmonella

Posted in Asheville, diners, Food, Fried chicken, locavore, memories, Southern food, Southern traditions and tagged , ,
07 Jun 2008

Asheville City Market

Went to Asheville’s City Market last Saturday. It’s located in the parking area of the city’s Public Works Parking Lot on South Charlotte Street (yes, that’s the parking area for the “Taj MaGarage” if you remember the debate over its fairly grand exterior ) and has been operating for a couple of months. Lots of local vendors, including Spinning Spider Creamery (www.spinningspidercreamery.com), Imladris* Farm (www.imladrisfarm.com), Hickory Nut Gap Farm (www.hickorynutgapfarm.com ), and many other locavores.

I arrived around 11:30 am (it’s open 8 am - 1 pm every Saturday from now through December-somethingth) and it was busy, but there were still parking spaces available. Lots of attractive baked goods, soaps, and herbs for sale, but not quite as much produce as I’m sure will be there in just another week or so when local gardens reach production levels.

Talked to Chris Owen of Spinning Spider; she’s offering Cheese-Making 101 over the course of the next few months. You can take a stand-alone class or the entire series, and the number of students is kept relatively small (eight or so) so all can see/hear and get some hands-on experience. I sampled some of the wares while I was at their booth, and if novice (or even professional) cheesemakers can get results like that, I say “take the classes!”

 Here’s the schedule:

  • June 15: The Fresh Cheeses
  • July 6: Feta and Ricotta
  • August 10: Bloomy Rind Cheeses
  • September 14: Raw Milk Aged Cheese

You can visit their website to register or for more information.

Sampling artisan cheeses at Asheville City Market

I’ve included some photos here and on my flickr page to set the mood:

 Nice graphic poster from the City Market

Cute sign advertising market specials

 

 *Yes, Imladris is an Elvish name for Rivendell, which I’m sure you’ll know if you happen to be a Lord of the Rings fan (a fan of the books, that is–the movies left something to be desired, if you’re a purist), and I’m sure the farm is a beautiful, peaceful place worthy of the association.

 

Posted in artisan cheese, Asheville, Asheville City Market, Asheville shopping, cheese-making, Food, Fresh cheese, locavore and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment
26 May 2008

Tres Leche, Continued.

Fast forward 20 years to my recent trip to Miami. Versailles is still in business, but the concierge at the conference hotel where I was staying did NOT think it was a good idea for me to go there by myself.

(Note: I travel alone to lots of different places and have never been one to skulk in my room rather than explore my surroundings, but I also ask for recommendations and pay attention to advice. It’s a strategy that’s worked well for me over the years.)

The concierge advised me to try Larios* on South Beach for authentic Cuban food and the safety of a crowded tourist district. Not knowing what the past 20 years had done to or for Versaille’s neighborhood, I took his advice and hailed a cab for 820 Ocean Drive. The driver (Balthazar Lucien–I hope you or the Miami Taxi Board read this!) argued with me about the street address, but finally agreed to take me there. He apparently still thought I was wrong since he dropped me at 120 Ocean Drive (the address he had insisted on in the first place).

By the time I figured out the mistake (no visible street numbers until I was out of the cab and in the wrong hotel) and hiked eight blocks in heeled sandals, I was hungry enough to eat anything. Found Larios at last and put my name on the waiting list guarded by a visibly bored hostess who looked like the love child of Victoria’s Secret and Darth Vader.

Went inside to anesthitize the stumps of pain that were once my feet (thanks again, Mr. Balthazar, for taking me eight blocks out of my way!) with a mojito. Twenty minutes later (the wait time offered by Victoria Vader), I asked a different member of the staff if the inside wait was shorter than the outside wait. Turns out there was no inside wait–the outside wait was due to limited seating (and probably the discretion of Ms. Vader).

Long post short: I started with a corn tamale appetizer, then an entree of shrimp creole with rice and plantains (tamal de maiz, entonces el camarones criollos con arroz y platanos). Good food, fast service, loud atmosphere. Wait staff was attentive, which is not always the case when dining alone. Do servers fear they won’t get a big enough tip when it’s a lone diner? I tend to leave more, because I know they’ve gone to as much trouble for my single table as they would for several diners–so don’t judge this book by its lone cover! 

Certainly didn’t need dessert…but ordered tres leche cake anyway. It arrived in short order and I jumped right in. Perfect cake texture and richness, perfect “soakiness” in each bite (cake was completely saturated, but completely firm), pure heaven, just like I remembered.

I had to leave a little on the plate (even a locavore has her limits), and I regretted not being able to finish it. The plate was whisked away, I paid my tab, and prepared to stand back up on my heeled sandals and take another cab back to my hotel. Had to walk a couple of blocks (ouch, ouch, ouch!) until the crowd thinned out enough that I could see/hail a cab. Luckily, this guy believed me when I gave him the hotel address, and even pointed out some sites along the way (like Al Capone’s last house). I arrived back at the hotel in good shape (aside from the soles of my blistered feet) and thanked the concierge for his advice (mostly to let him know I was still alive).

As I said, I have no idea what the neighborhood around Versailles is like these days. It’s probably fine and I would probably not have had any trouble…and maybe the cab driver would have taken me directly to Versailles without argument. But, whatever. We live, we learn, we indulge in tres leche cake. Can’t wait for the next opportunity!

*Larios is owned by Gloria Estafan and/or her family, and like Versailles, it gets mixed reviews in most of the sites. My dinner was good, if not incredibly authentic, and less expensive than I expected–although the mojito was pricey. Definitely better than staying in and wishing I’d gone out!

Posted in Cuban food, Food, locavore, Miami, South Beach and tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment
22 May 2008

Too Far Afield?

I have been straying, lately, from the locavorism of my own town, but I figure that wherever you are at any given moment, that’s where you should be locavorating. Kind of like “bloom where you’re planted,” but more like eat/drink/observe/chronicle what’s happening around you, regardless of where it’s happening.

Could be construed as an excuse, of course, but I have had the local customs and foods and whatnot of other places on my mind recently. Elotes, huitlacoche, and now I’m feeling the pull to discuss the tres leche cake I enjoyed in Miami a couple of weeks ago.

Food is just so good, and such an easy way to keep memories fresh and connected, that I like to start writing about it and see where my locavoraciousness takes me.

Speaking of food: tried to order the fried-green-tomato-with-pimiento-cheese-and-bacon sandwich today at Magnolia’s (corner of Market and Walnut in downtown Asheville). They’ve enlarged their menu, and this sandwich is a really nice addition. Looking forward to it…but they had no green tomatoes to fry, so I had to revise my lunch game plan. Rats.

Put me in mind of an experience, years ago, at the Arby’s on Four Seasons Blvd. in Hendersonville. Went in to order a sandwich, but they were out of roast beef. Now that I think about it, that happened nearly 20 years ago, but it clearly made a lasting impression.

Puts me in mind of the following unconnected-to-food silliness: One night in class, we were covering different forms of mediation in the court system.

  • Me (whispering to study partner): “What’s an arbitrator?
  • Study partner: “Well, it’s when two disputing parties go to a third party for–”
  • Me: “Nope! It’s someone who refuses to sell roast beef!”

Enough, already. Restaurants do run out of things. Even Arby’s. Even roast beef.

Posted in Arby's, Asheville, Food, Fried green tomatoes, locavore, Magnolia's, memories and tagged , , | Leave a Comment
18 May 2008
1 Comment

Farmer's Market

Haven’t blogged lately; have been traveling to other locales and checking out their locavore action. More on that topic later.

As a family (parents, siblings, in-laws and offspring), we generally get together every Saturday night and have dinner. Last night was no exception, except that dinner came almost entirely from the WNC Farmer’s Market. The menu included new white potatoes boiled in their thin little jackets, fresh sweet corn (could be sweet, fresh corn, but it actually was sweet corn as opposed to field corn), fresh cabbage, and (of course) my mother’s corn bread.

A perfect spring meal. The potatoes were fork-tender and moist, almost the consistency of firm custard. A sprinkle of salt is all they needed to achieve potato nirvana, at least in my book.

We’re mostly a corn-OFF-the-cob family, so we sliced into slabs of fresh corn, watching them topple away from the cob in perfect yellow sheets. Once you’ve cut off the kernels, then you scrape the cob with the edge of the knife, releasing the milky corn-hearts to pile up on top of the corn already on your plate. A little salt, a little fresh lime juice squeezed over it–fresh corn heaven!

(Sidebar: Years ago, I was on the Copper Canyon train near Creel, Mexico, and encountered elotes vendors for the first time. They were carrying 5-gallon buckets out of which they dipped and sold paper cups full of freshly-cooked corn mixed with salt, lime juice, butter, and some variety of red pepper sprinkled on top.  It was SO good, even though I’m not a fan of butter on corn, believe it or not, that I could have probably eaten a whole 5-gallon bucket full of of the stuff. Ever since that day, I’ve been cutting my corn off the cob and adding salt and lime. S&L is also really good on baked sweet potatoes, especially since I don’t like butter on them, either.)

After dinner, we had a fresh cantaloupe for dessert. Does it get any better than that? The only flaw was that we’re still experiencing a few dregs of blackberry winter, so it was damp and chilly rather than feeling like spring. Oh, well. At least it TASTED like spring!

Posted in Asheville, Cornbread, Food, locavore, memories, weather and tagged , , , , , , ,
19 Apr 2008

Best Dish in North Carolina

Hendersonville chef and restauranteur Scott Adams owns and operates Blackwater Grille (http://www.blackwatergrille.net/), which specializes in local Southern Highland cuisine. Scott and I go to school together on Tuesday nights (we’re both earning our Masters degree in Management & Leadership), and here’s the scoop on his “real life” when not in class:

Blackwater Grille is a contender in the North Carolina Department of Agriculture’s 2008 “Best Dish in North Carolina” contest (http://www.ncagr.com/markets/gginc/bestdish/index.asp),  which requires chefs to develop a  dish using local products. Western North Carolina has several finalists this time, so for those who don’t know NC extends further west than Winston-Salem, it’s an opportunity to come taste the region for yourself.

Blackwater Grille took second place last year in the Casual Dining category, and is the only independent restaurant to be named a finalist two years in a row. Way to go, Scott and crew!

Here’s the lowdown on Blackwater Grille’s entry for Best Dish (and yes, I asked for permission to describe it–didn’t want to spill the beans or upset the apple cart, or any other potentially damaging food-related cliches):

Scott’s presentation begins with a Blackberry Salad featuring a mix of local greens and herbs, applewood smoked bacon, goat cheese from Spinning Spider Creamery (http://www.southerncheese.com/Pages/spinningspider.html), warm blackberry butter (have mercy!) and a balsamic vinaigrette.

The main dish is a confit of rabbit with heirloom tomatoes, mushrooms and ramps (more details on each of these later), served with a side of spinach dumplings and roasted garden vegetables.

Dessert = a Napoleon made from nut breads (apple butter-walnut and pecan) layered with blackberries and strawberries grown at a local farm and berry ice cream (also made at the farm), and topped with a traditional Southern delicacy known as chocolate gravy. Don’t know about chocolate gravy? Where have you been all your life? 

I think I put on a few pounds just describing Scott’s culinary version of heaven-on-a-plate…can you imagine what the real thing tastes/smells/looks like? Let’s get on over to Blackwater Grille and see what’s cooking!

 

Posted in Asheville, Food, locavore and tagged , , , , , , | Leave a Comment

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