For something southern...

Seasonings, flavors, herbs and other aromatics are essential part of cooking in the way that you need good fertilizer with the right minerals and, frankly, shit. This does not give to the same methodology as plants. Shoveling enough shit on top and piss your pants if something beautiful actaully grows. I can not think of something more sinster than trying the same thing with food.

Every child sooner or later looks into the spice drawer and creates "something" using every bottle of spice they can lay their hands on or halfway pronounce. Most learn after a fateful spoonful that this awful creation should be trashed, never composted for fear of contaimination of the natural ecology of the land and never attempted again. Yet some professionals never figure this out and have the gaul to sell their defunct product to people as FOOD!

I take this a little closer to heart for several reason which I consider painstakingly obvious and others are very personal to me. Because of my burns, I can't tolerate being exposed to direct sunlight for very long. It literally makes my blood boil; large portions of my legs no longer sweat. Skin grafts don't sweat, exchange oxygen as well or even circulate blood like the rest of my skin does. The heat generated by my mucsles constantly increases the temperature of the blood flowing through my skin grafts. The lack of mature capillaries, veins and vessels prohibits the blood from quick circulation and proper disburtion of blood. I can't describe the exact sensation of walking under the sun with the dreading knowledge that your legs are slowly cooking and burning themselves much less how it feels when the hot blood pools in your feet. One could understand how insanely envious of anyone who can walk free under any circumstances. I reminded of the fact today returning home after walking 5 miles under the sun to discover small 1st and 2nd degree burns on my feet. So when I go out to eat and try the local food, I take risks.

I find myself extremly worried that cooks take clear advantage of their basics. Pay, use of their legs and components of food they have. I went with my brother to a local brewery that was recommended for their shrimp and grits dish. If I am going to be a southern chef, then I should be familiar with all forms of southern cuisine. So we toddled off and got a table.

I was not prepared for the quality of their food. We ordered a creole pizza and a shrimp with grits. A round of beers for the wait and I took in the scene, making notes about its layout, decor, spacing and other details. No sooner had I noted that the place was exceptionally clean for its local, that a roach trundles across my pad into the sugar caddies. I casually stuff the salt and pepper shakers into the caddy; pulverizing contaminated sugars and bug alike. Not yet ready to give up on a simple brewery until I have had my beer and food. It had been a while since I had a boc, a simply hoppy dark Germanic ale.

If you are like beer and like hoppier beers, then you can appreciate a hot summer days with a couple of bocs, enlightened black ales, or any ale of any color. This is the first alcoholic drink that I could order for my brother, a special occasion to be had. Yet, it was flat. How can you let your beer go flat? How could you let an ale go flat? An ale without carbonation is like over done scrambled eggs, those nearly grey ones that you get in your school mess, with out any condiments, even salt. It is the recognition that you are indeed drinking beer but all of the enjoyment and flavor seems to have been expended long ago.

So we downed the remainder of the beer and ordered another round, a porter this time. The porter was average, it wasn't going to win any beauty pagents but it tasted like a porter, a great comfort to me. We drank the beer as we chatted about the layout. The bar of the brewery is comforting to the eye despite the 1980's chairs and tables the that surrounded it. Yet the real eye candy was behind the bar, minds out of the gutter now. Beer vats and malters! If there was a god out there then the naive thought, that he/she/it/they('s') greatest gift would be creation of us in a similar likeness or image, is one of those hilliarious inside jokes at some oblivous dolt's expense. Yeast created products are the true gift. I hope the person who discovered that yeast transforms grain into precious culinary treasures, got laid, every night.

Our meals arrived with our third round of drinks, a pale ale. As I looked at out dishes my fears came true. My brother's shrimp and grits was a pile of sticky over cooked grits mixed with tiny nearly flavorless shrimp and topped with a grotesque pile of pork cubes with an eighth inch layer of seasoned salt with southwestern seasonings, cysco patented. Strangely my pizza featured the same pork cubes for some reason. The majority of my worries stemmed from my failing to comprehend why my pizza lacked a crust of a leavened dough and instead was a pita that had been cooked to a crispness equevilant of a softened communion cracker, I am guessing.

So I took my notes and finished my beer. We packaged our left overs and gave them to two homeless men on Franklin street. I began thinking about the beautifully arrange plate Linden referenced as the burning sensation of my legs filled my mind. Well, to the drawing board...

Shrimp and Grits

So there are a large number of ways this dish could be southern. Think of it. You could take it any number of ways.

1) Soak the shrimp in buttermilk and white wine before coating them in grated cheese and uncooked grits. Repeat the process twice and fry them in hot bacon fat. Serve with a simple beurre blanc sauce coating a frisee watercress salad and garnished with a sprinkling of chopped chives and cilantro.

2) Mix the grits with milk, butter and some sweet chipolini onions. Cook in a pot for 45 minutes then spread into a greased bread pan and cool until set. Cut the grit cake in triangles or whatever shape becomes pleasing to the eye. Put these in the oven with a thin coat of butter until golden brown. Saute freshly shelled and deveined (devein deepily for an added volume affect) with some garlic and oregano. Remove shrimp add a small helping of flour, stir until roux is blonde and mix in some white wine until smooth. Touch up with a little cayenne pepper. Arrange on plate with a biased slice of green onions as a garnish.

3) Make the grits the same as the last recipe except cut grits like you were layering a cake. A tall circle of cooled grit cake. Torte: cut horiziontally into the cake to produce three equal discs. Coat the tops of each disc with butter and bake until brown then remove. Chop shrimp roughly and saute lightly with chopped peppers and onions. On an oiled sizzle plate layer the grit cakes with the shrimp saute and some montery jack. You should have a three layers of cake with three layers of shrimp saute mixed with plenty of cheese. Put this under the broiler for about a minute to melt the cheese to a golden brown color. Serve immediately on a new plate with a drizzle of pure olive oil on top. I would serve with roasted cherry tomatoes but that is me.

Sorry Linden. I love the idea of shrimp and grites but I dislike the brewery's version. It makes my blood boil.