Georgia Vinegar Sauce for BBQ

The study of BBQ sauce comes with a map, and on that map, Georgia stands between two kingdoms: Carolina Gold - with a tart mustard base - on the east; and Memphis style - with a sweet tomato base - on the west. Their inescapable influence is felt everywhere in between. You could travel a lot through Georgia and never realize it had its own distinctive style of BBQ sauce. But a generation or two ago, and many more before, you would have been hard pressed to find anything else.

The sauce was only used with pork. It was thin and brown. A whiff would wake you up - shake you up. It was vinegar, dirtied with spice. It could separate on command. There was sugar in it, but not enough to detect. There was ketchup, but not enough to redden. It did not cover, it did not drip. It was not to be sopped. It just vanished in the close chopped meat and was not given a thought. I don’t remember anybody ever saying anything about sauce. You didn’t say that is good sauce. You said that is good BBQ. If you bought BBQ, you didn’t get meat in one container and sauce in another. There was no sauce on the side. It was in the meat. As far as I could tell, for most of my boyhood, the term BBQ sauce meant something made by Kraft or Johnny Harris, and it was sold in a bottle at Thriftway. If anybody ever used it, it was on chicken. It had nothing to do with BBQ pork.

In fact, I remember the first time I ever saw, as opposed to tasted, Georgia BBQ sauce. It was made by Mr. James Sanders, the venerated butcher at Thriftway, and it was in a big, clear plastic jar. I could see beneath the translucent brown liquid the strata of spice on the bottom, and I thought of the sandy floor of the swimming hole in the Little ‘Hoopie creek.

I am not trying to be poetic. I remember what I thought.

We have since grown cosmopolitan, and now generally avoid serving the sauce already mixed in the meat. I guess it’s just out of kindness to the purist who prefers not to smother and kill the taste of the meat itself. Though there’s nothing wrong with tossing the meat in a little something - a dollop of the sauce diluted in apple juice, perhaps - just a hint of the full-blown taste that also keeps things moist. But nowadays we are mindful of the sauce and the role it plays - and, just as with the meat, there is something to be said for being able to appreciate the sauce itself, by itself. Just as an important part of the experience.

So this is not the old-timey Georgia Vinegar Sauce that Ray Charles or Jimmy Carter grew up with. It is jazzed up a little. Sauced up, you might say. Our influential neighbors, after all, are close. And I couldn’t resist a touch of Georgia’s signature peach. But those qualities that set Georgia vinegar sauce apart from the other, thicker, sweeter sauces, are still there. Not only there, but amplified.

 

Combine in a sauce pan:

2 C apple cider vinegar.

1 C chili sauce

1/2 C hot sauce

1/2 C brown sugar

3 T peach preserves

2 T black pepper

2 T salt

1 T red pepper flakes

Bring to a high simmer, then bring it to low, and cook for 10 minutes.

And at last you have a use for one of those wonderful empty whisky bottles you couldn’t bring yourself to throw away.

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Chicken Maque Choux

This dish is the Cajun festival of corn. When corn is in season, it is a wonderful way to mark the event.

When my little girl was just that, still in footed pajamas, I would find her on a Saturday morning slouching gamely in her high chair, Seaboard Coastline Railroad cap cocked back against her curls: she would be waiting, fork in fist, patiently enough, but thoroughly evincing earnest demand - and what she was waiting for was corn maque choux.

Yes, even for breakfast.

I was still in school, working a part-time night job, living on that and what was left of my GI bill. Things were kind of tight. In a fit of extravagance I had purchased Chef Paul Prudhomme’s Louisiana Kitchen. I couldn’t help myself - it was just out, and the pictures were glorious. As Fate would have it, the first recipe I tried - and that was probably because I could actually afford the ingredients - was corn maque choux. The little one liked it, and she never ever tired of it.

Corn maque choux - pronounced “mock shoo” - is pure Cajun, perhaps going all the way back to the landing - when the dispossessed Acadians, having achieved their Aeneid, chose  Southern Louisiana to make their stand. Most sources say that “maque choux” is a French rendering of some long lost Indian name. For the Acadians had no word of their own for such an exotic dish.

And the name Acadian would in time contract to “Cajun,” but you probably already knew that.

Prudhomme’s corn maque choux isn’t like anybody else’s. There’s no bell pepper, no celery, no tomato. It’s sweeter - but still savory. And it’s finished with an egg cream mixture which gives it the feel of a custard. It’s a great side dish, so good with pork. But that’s another story.

The Cajuns have a way of doing it with chicken. This recipe is tweaked a little in the Prudhomme direction.

One chicken cut up (or 8 thighs)

1/4 C bacon fat

1/4 C flour

2 C chopped onion

3/4 C chopped bell pepper - red and green

3/4 C chopped celery

2 cloves garlic, minced

1/2 C finely chopped andouille sausage

6 C kernel corn - cut off the cob from 8 ears; scrape as much milk from the cob as possible. Don’t hesitate to use a percentage of canned corn - it actually helps (somehow) with the overall texture. In fact, if you don’t have fresh corn, there is nothing wrong with using frozen or canned. It will still be delicious.

2 medium tomatoes, filleted, then chopped

1 T sugar

1 t salt

3/4 t white pepper

1/2 t red pepper

1/2 t black pepper

2 t tomato paste

3 C chicken broth + 1 C cream, combined, reduced by a third

1 C Sliced green onions - not just the whites, get some green - and much more for garnish;

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1) Preheat oven to 375;

2) Salt and pepper chicken pieces. In Dutch oven (5 quarts is exactly the right size) fry chicken in bacon fat, skin down first, in batches, until lightly browned and crisp, 4-5 minutes per side. Remove chicken from pan, and drain on paper towels. 

3) Sprinkle flour into the bacon grease. With a spatula, over medium heat, stir - constantly, smearing and mashing any clumps, scraping at the brown bits on the bottom - until the flour browns enough to make a blond roux.  

4) Combine onion, peppers, celery, garlic and finely chopped andouille; throw half of the mixture into the Dutch oven, and saute for about 5 minutes, or until lightly browning;

5) Add the rest of the mixture and saute a few minutes more;

6) Then add the corn, tomatoes, spices, and tomato paste, stirring well. Break out your wooden spoon and stir, thoroughly scraping the bottom of the pan. Cover the pot for a few minutes, rendering the juices, then stir and scrape some more. Repeat the process until there are puddles of bubbling liquid dotting the surface. Altogether this should take about 20 minutes.

7) Add the chicken broth/cream mixture, and blend well. Bring to a high simmer, and on medium high heat, still stirring periodically, reduce the liquid until the corn is barely submerged. Maybe about 30 - 40 minutes.

8) Blend in the green onion;

9) Arrange chicken pieces on top of corn mixture, skin side up, with as much skin as possible exposed;

10) Braise in oven, covered, for 40 minutes

11) Remove cover and braise 20 more minutes.

12) Braising can yield a lot more liquid. This next step is sort of like they do with Beef Bourguignon. Remove the chicken to some handy dish, and spoon as much of the liquid as you can into a saucepan. Bring it to a boil over high heat, continuously stirring, until it is nicely thickened. Then blend it back into the corn mixture. Now it’s less like a soup and more like a proper casserole. Replace the chicken, and there you are.

You can easily bring it back up to temp when you are ready to serve. And that can be, with tongs and spoon, straight from the pot.

Or from a platter.  

Garnish with more green onions. 

Goes beautifully with crusty bread or rice - especially dirty rice.

Chicken Marbella

Thirty some odd years ago, this dish took the country by a storm, and with good reason. It’s pretty to look at, easy to make, and absolutely delicious. The fruit and olive combination is not as novel as it used to be - but the brown sugar crunch on the chicken can still surprise - it sets the dish apart.

And this is a different take. The original uses two chickens, quartered. The brown sugar is rubbed all over the skin - caked on, actually - and after roasting, the skin is incredible. But my wife avoids eating chicken skin - the fact that it is the best part of a chicken notwithstanding. She always removes it and puts it on my plate. For her last birthday she asked me to make Chicken Marbella. And it occurred to me that without that baked-on burst of brown sugar on the skin, she has been missing, all along, what Chicken Marbella is all about.

So, skinless, boneless Marbella it is. And the sugar can bubble and brown directly on the meat. If she thinks she likes it now (so ran my thoughts) just wait till she gets a load of this -

Boneless chicken cooks faster so the cooking time is reduced - and, happily, that’s a good thing: the prunes are little firmer, their texture more pleasing.

There are other departures; please forgive.  

The big thing is, she really liked it.

About 2-3 lbs. boneless, skinless thighs

1/2 C olive oil

1/2 C red wine vinegar

1/3 C capers, drained, with 1 t juice

1 C pitted prunes

1 C olives

1 C dried tomatoes in oil

1 head of roasted garlic, peeled and minced

2 T dried oregano

2 T dried basil

6 bay leaves

1 t salt

1 t black pepper

up to 1/2 C brown sugar

1/2 C dry white wine

Fresh oregano garnish

As for the olives, I typically get the most interesting mix available at the deli’s olive bar - often with a marinade of its own, which might include onion, more garlic, and hot peppers, you name it. I haven’t regretted it yet. It’s a good place to get the dried tomatoes, too, or for that matter the roasted garlic - but it’s easy to make your own.

1. In a large bowl, mix the oil, vinegar, capers, prunes, olives, dried tomatoes, roasted garlic, oregano, basil, bay leaves, salt, pepper and chicken - everything except the brown sugar and the white wine and garnish. Cover and refrigerate at least a few hours, preferably overnight.

2. Preheat the oven at 350 degrees.

Arrange the chicken pieces in a shallow roasting pan - a half sheet pan is ideal - and distribute the marinated vegetable and prune mixture with its liquid among the pieces. Then, cover each piece of chicken with about 2 t of brown sugar - probably a total of 1/2 C or so brown sugar.

Cook 35 minutes at 350 degrees.

3. Remove from oven, and carefully pour most of the liquid from the pan into a skillet - and over high heat reduce by at least a third - then taste it. If the flavor is thin, reduce it some more, up to by half. But don’t reduce it too much - you’ll be glad for any extra sauce.

4. Transfer chicken and vegetables to a platter, pour the reduced sauce evenly over it.

Or - you could put the sauce in a gravy boat and do it that way.

Serve with a likely starch - cheese grits, rice, pasta, etc.

Sweet Potato Eggplant Gravy

This is one of the greatest gravies of all time, terrific with roasted fowl, pork or veal. The recipe debuted in Paul Prudhomme’s groundbreaking first cookbook, The Louisiana Kitchen, where it was paired with roast duck. Later it was first choice to accompany his famous Tur-duck-en. It is the stuff of legend.

It is terrific with any roast fowl - and I am sure it would pair beautifully with roast pork or veal.

There is another Sweet Potato Eggplant gravy recipe featured on Chef Paul's website, but it is really different. This is the original. If you are actually going to go through the trouble of making Tur-duck-en, to make the experience thoroughly authentic, this gravy is a must. 

Of course, you might prefer (as I would) to consult the internet and order your Tur-duck-en from someone who can competently debone a whole turkey, a whole duck and a whole chicken, leaving each intact, then put them together so as to resemble one big bird -  and in that case, I recommend  The Best Stop Supermarket.

This is the Prudhomme recipe, pretty much, but I see that I have changed it a little over the years. Paul calls for duck fat and duck broth, but in our house (because of a pet duck issue) such a thing is frowned upon by management. So I use olive oil and chicken broth. Other changes are attributable to laziness or personal perversity.

Sweet Potato Eggplant Gravy

Ingredients:

1 medium eggplant
1 medium sweet potato
1 medium onion (finely chopped)
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1/4 C olive oil
3 bay leaves
1 1/2 t salt (in all)
1 1/2 t white pepper (in all)
1 1/2 t red pepper (in all)
1 1/2 t thyme leaves
1 t dry mustard
1/2 C brown sugar
7 C chicken broth
3 T Grand Marnier or Triple Sec
1/2 C sliced green onion

Peel and chop eggplant, which should yield around 4 cups. Peel the sweet potato and cut it in two: cut one half into half-inch dice, and set aside; finely chop the other half.

Pour the olive oil into a large skillet and get it hot. Throw in about three fourths (should be about 3 cups) of the eggplant. Saute it till it browns, adding more oil if you need to. Then add the chopped onion and what's left of the eggplant, and cook this until the onion begins to brown.

Next add the finely chopped sweet potato and the garlic. Stirring occasionally, cook for maybe 10 minutes. Add 1 t of the salt, 1 t of the white pepper, 1 t of the red pepper, and all of the thyme, and dry mustard. Cook for a few minutes more.

Now, over the next 10-15 minutes, in small doses, add 6 cups of the broth (which will leave you 1 cup in reserve), and the brown sugar, stirring as you go.

As stated, 10 or 15 minutes should be enough.

Remove from heat, and strain, mashing with a spatula as much liquid - and as much softened vegetable, which will be the body of the sauce - as you can into a large saucepan.

Throw away the vegetables in the strainer.

Over fairly high heat, pour the remaining cup of broth into the saucepan with the strained liquid, and add the diced sweet potato. Cook for about 10 minutes, skimming any froth. Then add the Grand Marnier and the remaining 1/2 t each of salt, red pepper and white pepper (a typical Prudhomme touch: I suppose a second stage of spicing lends a certain boost), bring it to a boil and simmer until it has reduced to about 3 cups.

Stir in the green onions, cook it a minute or so more, and that's it.

Artichokes Mandeville

Creamy crabmeat and artichoke salad served in an artichoke pirogue beached upon a light tossed salad, as cool and refreshing as the champagne on ice beside it.

When you feel like getting carried away, a pirogue is the perfect means of transportation.

Here’s what you’ll need:

3 artichokes, of the pointy variety

3 lemons

1/2 lb lump crabmeat

1 stalk of celery, minced

1 scallion, finely sliced, with a lot of green

1/2 C mayonnaise

1/4 C sour cream

1 t minced tarragon

hot sauce

black pepper

peppercorns

bay leaves

olive oil

The Pirogues

Put a stock pot filled with enough water to cover the artichokes over high heat. Stir into the water about a 1/4 cup of good olive oil; a handful of peppercorns; a couple of garlic cloves sliced in half; the juice and carcasses of two lemons; and a bay leaf.

Of the three artichokes, take the two most boat like, and trim them: with a pair of scissors, starting at the bottom, clip the thorny tip of each leaf until you work you way up to the point. Do not touch the leaves that comprise the point of the artichoke. It is the bow of your boat, and should be left intact. These two artichokes will be cooked, then sliced in half - forming four pirogues. But that’s later.

The third artichoke has a different purpose, so don’t worry about trimming it.

When the water is boiling, throw in all three artichokes, cover, and, on low-medium heat, cook 30 minutes. When they are done, remove, drain and allow to cool.

With a sharp knife, remove the stems, and set aside.

Take the untrimmed artichoke, and slice off the point - about 2-3 inches down from the tip. Now remove all the leaves. Since it is cooked, you can do much of this with your fingers. Nestled in the center of things, you will see the choke, prickly and disagreeable. With a paring knife, or a grapefruit spoon, or both, carefully scoop out the choke, leaving something like a basin. Whittle away the rough hide around it, and you will have something resembling a hockey puck with a dip in the top. Something you would put under a table leg to protect the floor.

In the canned goods world, this is what is called an “artichoke bottom.” But it is really the artichoke heart - that is, the heart of the honest-to-God-artichoke. I have to be careful here, because in the canned goods world, what is called an “artichoke heart” is not that at all. It is basically a “baby artichoke,” but do not suppose that to be an infant artichoke. Oh, no, it is a  fully matured artichoke whose growth was stunted because denied the sun by the h-t-G artichoke above it on the stalk. Having no choke, it is wholly edible, and should therefore be forgiven for all the confusion it causes. Whew.

There is a parable in all that, somewhere. One day we will find it in a country song.

Now the two remaining artichokes are ready to become pirogues. With a large, sharp knife carefully slice them in half lengthwise. With a smaller sharp knife, trace a line - giving yourself an outside margin of at least 1/8 inch - around the choke, then cut along that line more and more deeply until you can remove the choke with your fingers. Remove the inner leaves, which are inedible - if you are unsure, take a bite and decide for yourself. But you want enough room for about a half cup of crab salad. More detail about all this, along with some photographs, can be found at Artichoke Pirogues With Crawfish Cardinale 

Now peel the stems, cutting away all but the tender (comparatively, anyway) flesh. Throw them in with the heart and dice it all up, quarter inch. This will assist in turning what would otherwise be  Crabmeat Mandeville into Artichoke Mandeville.

The Crabmeat Salad

In a mixing bowl, blend the celery, green onion, mayonnaise, sour cream, tarragon, a few dashes of your favorite hot sauce, and black pepper to taste. Cut the remaining lemon in half lengthwise. Set one half aside and zest the other. Squeeze the juice of the zested lemon into the crab mixture, and stir in the zest. Fold in the crabmeat, not in any heavy handed way, along with the diced artichoke meat.

Thinly slice the remaining half lemon into so many half moons. Pick the nicest four for garnish.

Now you have four pirogues. Fill them with the crabmeat salad, dividing it evenly. Lend a becoming blush with a sprinkle of cayenne or paprika. Garnish with the lemon slices.

Chill.

Serve atop a green salad, tossed with a light dressing, the simpler perhaps the better, the remaining lemon slices thrown in.

Alabama Hot Slaw

The day I first experienced the St. Florean Memorial Day Barbeque in Florence, Alabama, was the day I discovered Alabama Hot Slaw. It was heaped upon a worthy sandwich of pulled pork, and was just hot enough to get away with the name - though not by much. But it was delicious - and really brought an already terrific sandwich up a couple of notches. Like a perfectly matched wine can take an already perfect dish to a new height. 

Slaw is great on a BBQ sandwich. That is established. It’s been going on in the piedmont of North Carolina for a long time - the red slaw on the coarse-chopped shoulder, and a sandwich that will steal your heart. But as wonderful as that is, this can be even better - because this slaw is better.

1/2 head cabbage, shredded (or a 1 lb bag from your grocer)

2 stalks celery, finely chopped

1 bell pepper, finely chopped

1 onion, finely chopped

1/2 C white vinegar

1/2 C sugar

10 oz. catsup - 10 oz wt is about 1 C

1/2 T tabasco

1/2 t cayenne

1/2 t black pepper

1/2 t salt

1/4 C finely chopped sweet pickle

(Ok, when I have them, I use candied jalapenos instead)

Chill.

Then Chill.

Braciole

In my younger days I lived in Boston - on Hancock Street, just a a few steps off 'Dot' Ave - and played the role of the impoverished student. But it wasn't bad enough to rate the term, really. I had my GI Bill, and a part time job, and rent in a condemned building is awfully cheap. With a little prioritizing, one could live pretty well. Volume could be the key consideration. As my similarly situated friends (there were several habitable apartments in Hancock House, as we called it) quickly learned, on a diet  predominantly of Jell-O and popcorn, we need never stoop to drinking domestic. I hear even now the stately toast - 'Gentlemen, I give you - starvation!' Those were the days.

And when splurging was an option, there was spaghetti. At Purity Supreme, the grocery around the corner, a pound of it went for just 55 cents. The ingredients for a respectable sauce - even with meat - could be had for a few bucks more. There were other delicacies within our means. Like these super thin cuts of round steak - not so cheap by the pound, but sliced so thin that a little went a very long way. They were labled braciole - which I assumed was pronounced like broccoli with an Italian accent - and were terrific done up in a skillet for a breakfast of steak and eggs. 

Then along comes a friend who not only knew how to pronounce braciole (brah-'zhol), but actually had a recipe, and showed us what it was all about. Stuffed with Italian sausage and braised with tomatoes, it was absolutely fantastic with spaghetti. 

I have since learned that braciole is typically made with a stuffing of breadcrumbs, parsley, cheese and pine-nuts - but at best, that's only so-so with spaghetti.  

Down South, odds are you won’t find the already thin sliced braciole cuts on the butcher’s shelf; so you have to butterfly it yourself.

Which brings us to flank steak. It’s not only a great cut of beef - its dimensions are made to order. It's also fairly easy to butterfly.

FOR THE BRAISING SAUCE:

1 medium onion chopped;

5 carrots, julienned;

1 small fennel bulb, thin sliced in 2 inch lengths (save the fronds);

6 garlic cloves, minced;

1 24 oz can tomato puree;

1/2 C chicken broth;

1/2 C dry vermouth;

1/4 C olive oil;

Salt and pepper

  

FOR THE BRACIOLE:

1 flank steak, 1 1/2 pounds or so, butterflied - pounded to about 1/4 inch thickness;

1 pound hot Italian sausage (removed from casing if using actual sausages);

2 C freshly made, and not too fine bread crumbs (if using store-bought, make it 1 1/2 C Panko);

1/2 C parsley, finely chopped;

1/2 C selected fronds from fennel bulb, finely chopped;

Parmesan cheese for sprinkling

TO MAKE IT:

1. PREHEAT OVEN TO 350 DEGREES

2. Butterfly the steak. You’ll need a long, sharp knife. A boning or carving knife is ideal. Lay the steak on the cutting board before you, with the grain (which is easily seen on a flank steak) running up and down. Imagine the steak is a book, and you wish to open it at the middle-most page - but the pages are glued together, so you will have operate. The steak will probably be about an inch thick. You want to cut that thickness in half.  Hold the knife as flatly as possible and cut along the middle of the right edge (or if you are left handed, the left edge) and saw a little, working your way up and down the length of that edge. 

Continue, deepening and smoothing, until you can  peel back the top half of the book, and keep peeling and cutting until it is in fact like an open book - but do not go so far as to cut it in two. Then flatten it with the heel of your hand, cover it with plastic wrap, and pound it with a meat mallet - front and back - as uniformly as possible, until you have a general thickness of about a quarter inch.

Now that you’ve read all this, it may have occurred to you to JUST FIND A VIDEO DEMONSTRATION on line.

If by chance the steak comes apart on you, no worries. It does not have to be all in one piece. You can make more than one braciole. It will all be sliced into so many roundels anyway.

3. Blend sausage with bread crumbs until spreadable, and mold sausage over the steak, covering each piece, maintaining a margin of about an inch; cover it evenly with parsley and fennel fronds; sprinkle with Parmesan cheese.

4. Starting with a wide end - with the grain, as you face it, running left and right, east and west - carefully, tightly roll the steak, just as you would a jelly-roll. The grain should be running with the length of the cylinder you are forming - that way, when the roll is sliced into roundels, you will be cutting against the grain - which makes for better eating.

Then, with 10 inch pieces of string, at 2 1/2 - 3 inch intervals, tie the roll securely. Generously salt and pepper. Cut the roll in half, for better maneuverability. Now you are ready to sear it.

5. In a Dutch oven, over medium high heat, bring the oil to shimmering. Add meat rolls, and, turning with tongs, brown thoroughly. Remove and drain.

6. Reduce heat to medium, add carrots, onions and garlic;  sauté, stirring occasionally. When vegetables have wilted, add broth and wine, scraping the bottom to loosen any tasty residue from the saute. Blend in the tomato puree, and bring to bubbling.

7. Place steak rolls back in Dutch oven, turning them in the sauce. Transfer the Dutch oven to the preheated oven and cook COVERED 1 hour, giving the meat another turn about half way through. Then, turn the rolls again, and cook UNCOVERED 30 minutes.

8. Remove the rolls, allow to cool, and slice into 3/8 - 1/2 inch roundels.

9. Serve atop pasta, covered in sauce and grated cheese.