A Love Affair With Southern Cooking_ Recipes and Recollections - Jean Anderson [20]
Next step: distillation. The sour mash goes into 100-foot copper stills, then into charred oak barrels to age and acquire its amber color. What makes Jack Daniel’s such a mellow whiskey is the ten-day process that follows: filtering through ten feet of sugar maple charcoal.
No one knows why Daniel named his whiskey Old No. 7. Take the distillery tour and you’ll get a different theory from every guide.
Today, you can order a Jack Daniel’s in more than 130 countries. But you can’t buy a round in Lynchburg, Tennessee. The town that “jack black” built has been dry since Prohibition.
* * *
* * *
TIME LINE: the people and events that shaped Southern Cuisine
1585–87
With Elizabeth I’s blessing, Raleigh organized an English settlement on Roanoke Island. Within a few years, it vanishes, and the fate of the “Lost Colony” still puzzles historians and archaeologists.
1607
The English found a colony at Jamestown, Virginia, under the leadership of Captain John Smith. Awed by the local bounty, he writes, “neither better fish, more plentie, nor more varitie had any of us ever seen in any place.”
1609
The English colonists at Jamestown produce wine from native grapes but are disappointed with the results.
1611
Viticulturists arrive from England to help the colonists produce wines good enough to export. They fail.
1612
Realizing that Virginia’s true gold is tobacco, John Rolfe begins growing bright leaf.
1614
John Rolfe marries Pocahontas and secures peace for the young Virginia colony—at least for a few years.
1616
George Yeardley, deputy governor of the Virginia colony, erects America’s first windmill, imports a herd of cattle, learns to fertilize the soil, and urges the colonists to grow tobacco.
* * *
WATERCRESS-STUFFED EGGS
MAKES 4 TO 6 SERVINGS
These colorful hors d’oeuvre often show up on southern tea tables and buffets. They’re also passed with cocktails.
6 hard-cooked extra-large eggs
2/3 cup finely minced tender young watercress leaves
3 medium scallions, trimmed and finely chopped (include some green tops)
3 tablespoons mayonnaise (use “light,” if you like)
1 tablespoon minced parsley
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
¼ teaspoon salt, or to taste
¼ teaspoon black pepper, or to taste
1/8 teaspoon hot red pepper sauce, or to taste
1. Peel the eggs, halve lengthwise, then “pop” the yolks into a small bowl and mash well with a fork. Add all remaining ingredients and beat with a fork until blended. Taste for salt, black pepper, and hot pepper sauce and adjust as needed.
2. Stuff the egg whites with the watercress mixture, mounding it up nicely. Cover the eggs loosely with plastic food wrap and chill for several hours.
3. When ready to serve, arrange the stuffed eggs on a colorful round platter.
CHEESE DAISIES
MAKES 4 TO 4½ DOZEN
During my growing-up years, cheese daisies appeared front and center on nearly every Raleigh buffet table, and my mother made them to perfection. Back then, faculty wives were constantly swapping recipes and this one came from a Southerner whose name, I’m sorry to say, I’ve forgotten. I still have Mother’s smudged file card on which the recipe is recorded in the straight-up-and-down script I know so well. On the flip side, Mother noted that if the dough is too cold, “it will be too crumbly to put through a cookie press.” To which I’d add, it needs to be malleable—about the consistency of Play-Doh. Note: For best results, grate the cheese yourself. I use a food processor fitted with the fine shredding disk and the job is done in seconds.
1½ cups unsifted all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon paprika
¼ to ½ teaspoon ground hot red pepper (cayenne), depending on how “hot” you like things
¾ cup (1½ sticks) cold butter
2 cups loosely packed, finely grated sharp Cheddar cheese (about 5 ounces)
1. Preheat the oven to 350° F. Sift