Black-eyed pea dip for a new year

It’s that time of year when we our thoughts are simultaneously in the past via reflection and the future via resolution. It’s also that time of year when we must eat black-eyed peas.

I’ve written plenty about black-eyed peas and why we Texans (and other Southerners) eat them on New Year’s Day. I’ve also given you some recipes.

This year, I had the honor of picking black-eyed peas at my grandma’s farm. And let me tell you, if you ever have the opportunity to eat fresh black-eye peas straight right out of ground, you’re in for a treat. When preparing the still-green black-eyed peas, she kept it simple by only seasoning them with a bit of salt, pepper and ham. And for the duration of my visit, it was all I wanted to eat. (Well, almost, as she had also made a chocolate pie.)

I can’t get fresh ones here in the city. I can’t even find dried ones. So my recipes always have a canned option. You can hardly go wrong with classics such as Texas caviar or a delicious soup I made last year called Good Fortune Soup. But those are for the converted, those who already love black-eyed peas. What about something for those who don’t love black-eyed peas?

I recently made a black-eyed pea dip. I seasoned it with garlic, bacon, cilantro and jalapenos, I made it creamy with a bit of cheese and I served it warm with tortilla chips. If you don’t like black-eyed peas, this might be the one for you—it already converted one nonbeliever and I’d be thrilled if it could convert more.
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Grasping at cheese straws

Cookie season is in full swing and will be for at least another week (there are, after all, 12 days of Christmas). I enjoy sampling from tins filled with raspberry bars, dolly bars, pecan sandies or ginger snaps, but after a while I’m ready for something savory. And that’s why I love cheese straws—a buttery, spicy shortbread cookie made with cheese.

Cheese straws are one of those classic Southern treats, something that no self-respecting hostess would be without in her culinary repertoire. They are usually served before a meal, though they are also delicious with soups, salads, wine, cheese and I have even been known to dip cheese straws into a bowl of queso.

The basic template for a cheese straw is butter, flour and grated cheese. But what makes them fun is that from there you can do just about anything you like. You can spice them up with cayenne and chili powder. You can make them sharp with a dash of Worcestershire or mustard powder. You can even deviate from the standard cheddar and make them with pepper Jack, Parmesan or Gruyere.



Cheese straws can come in all sorts of shapes and sizes. Some people pipe their straws out using a star tip and a pastry bag. Others stick the dough into a cookie press and form them that way. You’ll find cheese straws that are round and scored with a fork, you’ll find cheese straws that are as thick as logs and you’ll find cheese straws like mine—skinny rectangles dotted with holes.
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My oven-baked brisket

Brisket is one of those things that every Texan eats and every Texan has a definitive recipe on how to cook it.

We smoke it, we braise it, we roast it and we bake it. But no matter how we prepare it, the toughness of the cut insures that the procedure will be low and slow, which means that it will cook at a low temperature for a very, very long time.

For me, brisket was always a Sunday treat. When I still lived in Dallas, after church we’d go over to my grandparents’ house in Oak Cliff and we’d have a Sunday dinner of brisket that had been slow cooked with carrots, potatoes and onions. Or sometimes, to jazz it up, it would have been slow baked in a tangy barbecue sauce. It was always good.

As I grew older, I learned that the choice cut at a Texas barbecue is the brisket—silky and moist, seasoned with ample salt, pepper and smoke. I love both types of briskets, but have been successful in only recreating one type here in my tiny New York City apartment. And even though Mark Bittman wrote in last Sunday’s Times that when it comes to your kitchen, size doesn’t matter, I do think that my stovetop smoker is limited to smaller, quicker cuts of meat rather than a brisket.
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Christmas and a cup of champurrado

Recently, I stopped at one of my favorite Mexican carts to grab some tamales. As I waited in line, I noticed that most people were being served a steamy light-brown liquid out of a large cooler. As the temperature was biting and bitter, I wanted something warm, so when I ordered my tamales I pointed towards the cooler and asked for a cup of what the vendor was selling. I took a sip and it was like an extra-thick cocoa—somewhere between chocolate milk and porridge—spiced with cinnamon, vanilla and the burnt sweetness of piloncillo, a unrefined Mexican brown sugar. I asked what it was called and the man told me in Spanish, “Champurrado.”

Has this ever happened to you—you learn about something new and suddenly it seems to be everywhere? I had never heard of champurrado before, but when I went into Queens last weekend almost every taco stand had large signs saying that they had champurrado. And everywhere I went, people were all ordering cups of champurrado.

How had I missed this? I’ve been a longtime fan of Mexican hot chocolate and my molinillo—the traditional tool used to mix Mexican hot chocolate—is one of my favorite kitchen gadgets as it’s both useful and beautiful. I also love atole, which is a thick, warm drink made with masa. Champurrado is the marriage of these two—an atole flavored with Mexican chocolate. Imagine a sweet chocolate tamale made liquid and you have yourself a cup of champurrado.

It’s traditional for Mexicans to make tamales at Christmastime and often these tamales are served with a cup of champurrado. It’s also popular in the morning with churros or as part of the early-evening refreshment known as a merienda. I also learned that cups are offered to carolers as they make their rounds.
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Cheese balls and Aunt Betty

Every family has its fair share of characters and mine is no different. It being the holiday season and all, I’ve wanted to make cheese logs and cheese balls for parties. I had a lovely memory of my grandma and I making these when I was little and so I asked her for her recipe. Along with the instructions came the story of Aunt Betty.

As you probably know by now, I come from a long line of farmers. Every once in a while, however, someone would leave the family business and move away to the big city. Such was the case with my great-great-great aunt Betty, my great-grandmother’s sister.

Twice divorced (quite a scandal, I’m sure, back in those days but at least she married well with one husband a lawyer, the other a doctor) she left rural Texas to be an Oklahoma City socialite. Whenever she’d come home to the tiny north Texas town of Melissa to visit, she’d both fascinate and annoy her family with her fancy cars, her fancy clothes, her fancy travels and her fancy food.



In her later years she had to leave the city and ended up back in Melissa. Even though she had returned to her roots, she arrived with the experience of her many years of so-called sophisticated city living. And one of the spoils of this experience was her contribution to the holiday table—her cheese ball. It was unlike anything my rural relatives had seen before, and some sniffed that it was definitely not proper country food. But no matter, it was still a hit and my grandmother, fortunately, got the recipe from her aunt Betty.
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For turkey leftovers, why not pipián?

I spend a lot of my spare time exploring the outer reaches of New York City in search of authentic and delicious Mexican food. Lately, I’ve been spending a lot of time in Elmhurst, a Queens neighborhood right off the 7 train. Like most of the Mexican immigrants in New York City, the dominant Mexican population hails from the state of Puebla. This means you find lots of tingas, cemitas and moles. And it seems that now pumpkins are in season, you’re also seeing lots of pipián—a salsa made out of pumpkin seeds.

The first time I had pipián, it was a beige, thick sauce dotted with brown specks. It didn’t have much heat and tasted like pureed pumpkin seeds more than anything else. I didn’t like it and was reluctant to try pipián again.

On a recent Saturday, however, I wandered into a lively joint on Roosevelt Avenue. Two men in cowboy garb were singing Mexican karaoke and the crowd was a mix of large families and young couples. And almost everyone seemed to be eating chicken covered in a green sauce. I asked the waitress what it was and she pointed to the menu: on special that day was pipián.

I have a few rules about deciding where I’ll eat Mexican food. One is that if it looks like I’m the only one who speaks English and there’s not an empty table in the joint, then the food will probably be good. Another rule is that I usually order the specials as these are often the cook’s specialty. So that Saturday afternoon, I squeezed into the last chair available and ordered the pipián.
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Uncle Richard's sweet potato pie

In times like these, I’m in need of some serious comfort. I work in magazines and it’s very grim seeing your industry on a downhill slide. Not a day goes by that I don’t hear about a spate of media-industry lay-offs or a publication closing. So to assuage my fears, I’ve been eating lots of pie. Sweet potato pie.

Sweet potato pie is always on our Thanksgiving table—my family prefers it to pumpkin pie, though the two are similar in texture and taste. But sweet potatoes give the custard a bit more heft and are, as the name implies, more naturally sweet than pumpkins.

I asked my grandma for the family recipe but she pointed me in the direction of my Uncle Richard. “Richard makes the best sweet potato pie,” she said. And after years of eating it, I have to agree that indeed he does.

Richard loves his pies, and when my brother got married in September my uncle helped coordinate the marathon pie-baking party that side of the family held. See, my brother had decided that instead of a groom’s cake he wanted a table filled with pies. And so my family’s repertoire was on full display—chocolate, chess, apple, peanut butter and, of course, Uncle Richard’s sweet potato.
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Collard greens, Facebook and Twitter

My new friend Amy sent me collard greens last week. The gift was much appreciated and they were gorgeous, but there was only one problem—I couldn’t eat them because they were on Facebook.

Are you on Facebook? I just signed up about three weeks ago, and I’ve already reconnected with so many friends—both old and new. I’ve even discovered that worlds can collide as, say, I discover that a work friend is friends with a high school friend, unbeknownst to any of us that we all know each other.

Twitter is another application that has been occupying my time lately. It’s a microblogging site where you only have 140 characters to say your piece. There are many uses for Twitter, but I use it to chat with people and post the occasional query or inane thought. It’s kind of silly and sometimes feels a bit narcissistic—but it’s also a quick and easy way to connect with people, which for me is the great appeal of the Internet.

All this virtual living is fun, especially when you’re tethered to your computer for eight hours a day. But a girl still has to eat.

And that brings me back to collard greens.
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Pinto beans, three ways

It doesn't take much to please me. Give me a big, steaming bowl of charra beans, borracho beans or even plain, porky pinto beans and I will be delighted.

Beans were a big part of my diet growing up. At least once a week, we’d have beans for supper, either in the guise of bean salad or in big bowls served with a side of cornbread or tortillas. Sometimes it would be black beans and sometimes it would be navy beans but our core staple was pinto beans. As my mom says, “Pinto beans are close to a perfect food.”

Mom would soak them overnight and slow cook them all day with garlic, onions, spices and her secret ingredient—jalapeno juice. She’d add pork if it was available, but it was the jalapeno juice that gave her beans their fantastic flavor.

When I was little, I figured that we ate beans all the time because we were poor. But when our economic situation turned for the better we continued to eat beans. Why? Because we just enjoyed eating them so much.

I wasn’t alone in loving these beans; I had a friend who claimed them as her favorite food as well and she was known for being a picky eater, especially when it came to eating at our house. See, my mom was a health-food nut who had a reputation of being quite liberal with the wheat germ. And (it seemed) that not a dish was prepared without the addition of the cardboard-flavored sawdust stuff. (I have to admit, however, I actually enjoy wheat germ now that I'm more sophisticated, but that will just be our secret.)

I hated it—but since she was my mom, unless I wanted to starve I had to eat everything she gave me. My particular friend, however, had the luxury of not eating one of mom’s wheat-germ concoctions. Without fail, she refused to touch just about everything my mom offered.

Except for mom’s pinto beans.

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From hoecakes to hope

Have you ever had a hoecake? Last Saturday, I found myself in Oxford, Mississippi and that’s what I had for breakfast—hoecakes.

I was attending the 11th Annual Southern Foodways Symposium. This year, the theme was drinkways and true to form, that morning there were on offer cool jugs of thick, tart buttermilk dotted with flecks of butter. But it was the hoecakes that held my attention and left me craving more.

Hoecakes, at least where I’m from, aren’t that common. My great-grandma Blanche used to make them, but she was the last one in my family to prepare them on a regular basis. In Oxford, we were eating them for breakfast, smothered in sweet sorghum syrup, but my great-grandma used to serve them instead at lunch and dinner in place of cornbread.

It’s said they are named hoecakes because field workers cooked them on their hoes hovered over an open flame. They’re also known as Johnnycakes, ashcakes or hot-water cornbread, as my great-grandmother called them. But no matter what you say, cornmeal is the key to hoecakes. There are countless recipes for hoecakes, but at their most basic they are made with just cornmeal, hot water and salt.


Hoecakes are crisp on the outside and soft on the inside. Sometimes, they come stuffed with chewy cracklin’s, as were the ones I ate in Oxford. I’ve also heard stories of people adding green onions, corn or chiles to their hoecakes. I, however, prefer mine plain topped with a spread of sweet butter and a sprinkle of salt.
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Are you familiar with wacky cake?

Recently, I was perusing my photocopies of old family recipes in search of inspiration. I was hoping to find a casserole since it’s officially turn-on-the-oven weather, but instead I came across something even better: a delightful dessert called wacky cake.

I remember when my grandmother had given me that recipe. We had spent the afternoon in her dining room at the farm with boxes and books of her recipe cards strewn about the table. With each recipe she saw, a story followed—both long and short. And when she found this one, she was thrilled as she had forgotten about it. “Oh, wacky cake!” she said. “I used to make this with your mom and uncles. This is the best cake. It's a keeper!”

Wacky cake is so named because if you look at the recipe you’ll scratch your head when confronted by the absence of eggs, butter and milk. (At least that is my theory, if you have a better explanation, please, by all means share!)

Likewise, the method of mixing is surprisingly simple: you just throw all the dry ingredients together in the baking pan and then make three holes to add the remaining liquid ingredients. The reaction of the vinegar with the baking soda makes the batter bubble and froth and provides all the leavening this cake needs.
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Making corny dogs at home

Football, cooler weather, and chili cook offs all signify that it’s autumn in Texas. But no October is complete without a trip to the State Fair of Texas.

Held in Big D, our fair boasts a 52-foot talking statue named Big Tex (whose signature phrase is “Howdy folks, I’m Big Tex!”), racing pigs, the Texas Star Ferris wheel, and the most impressive array of fried foods ever seen.

It’s become an unofficial annual competition to see what crazy concoctions the vendors will create: fried Coca-Cola, fried jelly beans, fried strawberry waffle balls, fried moon pies and fried guacamole are just a few of the fried foods on offer this year. And while I love fried foods as much as anyone, I have to admit that despite the fair’s bounty, I still prefer the original State Fair fried food—Fletcher’s Corny Dogs—most of all.


Carl and Neil Fletcher started selling their corny dogs—deep-fried hot dogs dipped in corn-bread batter—at the Fair in 1942. It has not been proven if they are the inventor of this treat, but I do believe they were the first to call it a corny dog as opposed to a corn dog, as it’s more commonly known. What makes a Fletcher dog so special is its crunch; theirs are the best corny dogs you’ll ever eat.
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In search of West Texas asado

Have you ever had asado? Nope, not carne asada. Asado. You haven’t? Don’t worry; I hadn’t either until a couple of months ago. But I don’t think it’s too farfetched for me to say it’s now one of my favorite dishes. Here’s how I learned about it.

Last year, I was dashing through the Times Square subway station during the morning rush hour and I saw a man wearing an Austin College T-shirt. Austin College, my alma mater, is such a small school that you seldom see people sporting kangaroo pride. So even though I was late, I had to stop and chat with him.

It turned out he was my year and yet I couldn’t place him until he said where he was from. “Of course!” I said. “You’re the guy from Gun Barrel City!” And then my memories of him all fell into place. I mean, when someone comes from a place with a name like Gun Barrel City, how could you ever forget him?

He was only in town for a few days, but when he returned to his home in Odessa, Texas we started an occasional correspondence. When I decided this summer to fly into Midland—the sister city to Odessa—I contacted him and he graciously offered to take me to dinner.

I arrived on a Sunday and since the area has a large Catholic population, most places were closed. After much research on his part, he finally settled on Ajuua’s. I was delighted to see that the restaurant was packed with Mexican families and most of the men were wearing cowboy hats and boots. This was going to be good.

“You should get the asado,” he said.

“Carne asada?” I said.

“No, asado,” he said. “It’s a local specialty.”

He then explained that asado is pork slow cooked in a red-chile sauce. It’s similar to New Mexico’s carne adovada, except adovada is made with New Mexican red chiles and asado is made with anchos.
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Grandma's chocolate pie

There are pies and then there is my grandma’s chocolate pie.

It’s a luscious chocolate custard resting on a flaky, almost salty crust, topped with a springy meringue. For me, it’s la pièce de résistance and whether times are good or times are bad, it’s always welcome and appropriate.

I can’t remember a period in my life when it wasn’t my favorite dessert. My family has always been pie eaters, but we fall into several camps: there are the peach enthusiasts, the pecan lovers and then there are those of us who prefer the chocolate. My mom loves the chocolate best so that’s probably why it’s my (and my brother’s) favorite as well. But that doesn’t explain why Mom doesn’t make it. Nope, only one person can make my grandma’s chocolate pie and that’s my grandma.

When I went to visit her in August, I told her I wanted a chocolate pie. That was no surprise—I always insist that she bake me a chocolate pie when I visit. But this time I was determined to document her making it so I could try and recreate it back here in NY.

She had all the ingredients spread out on the counter and then I saw it: her recipe card. I hadn’t noticed before that she uses a recipe—I always assumed she baked chocolate pie from memory. The old card was yellowing and splattered with spots. And it called for Oleo as one of the ingredients. What a treasure! Before we started baking, I decided to take a photo of the card and as the light was waning in the kitchen, I took the card out to the front porch to shoot it before she started cooking.
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In the kitchen with Everyday Food

Last Wednesday, I had an excellent day. As I’m sure you know by now, two of my blog buddies, Matt from Matt Bites and Deb from Smitten Kitchen were on the Martha Stewart show and I was fortunate to have a ticket to see them live from the studio audience.

Now, what you don’t know is that the last time I saw Martha Stewart’s show live was with my mother three years ago. If you glance over at the archives, you’ll notice that I started this blog in September 2005 but I didn’t post much until the summer of 2006. This is because I spent that period dealing with some awful stuff in my life, which, strangely enough, began the day I last saw Martha Stewart (though it wasn’t her show’s fault I went through a rough period—I swear!).

When I started blogging again in August 2006, I was still a little sad but this blog helped me heal. Not to mention I made a ton of great friends along the way. So while the blog has archives from that period of eleven months, I’ve always felt that my blog’s official birthday was August 2006. I guess you could say it was born prematurely.

But what does this have to do with Martha Stewart? Well, that day three years ago when I was sitting in the studio audience, I had no idea that someday I’d be sitting in the audience again cheering on my friends as they baked alfajores or chatted about blogging with Martha. Nor did I know that I would have the opportunity to spend the afternoon in the Everyday Food test kitchen. Of course, you never know what the future may hold for you, but the next time I feel a little down I’ll just remember this happy turn of events—there’s always something wonderful on the horizon and everything usually comes full circle.

Enough about me, however—you want to know what it’s like in the Everyday Food kitchen. At the taping, I met one of my Twitter pals—Everday Food editor in chief Deb Puchalla a.k.a. @everydayfooddeb—and she invited me to join some of my fellow bloggers at the test kitchen after the show. We were sworn to secrecy about what they were cooking (did you know that they work almost a year in advance of publication?) but what I can say is that it is one of the most inspiring places I’ve been to in New York City.
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Hurricane Ike and some peanut butter

My brother Jacob was married in Portland, Oregon last weekend. A joyous occasion, definitely, but there was a hint of anxiousness as Hurricane Ike barged into our hometown of Houston, Texas. We were relieved that Mom and Jacob’s best man had flown out to Portland before they closed the airports on Friday, but it didn’t mitigate the sadness we felt as we watched the destruction on TV.

I’ve only been in one hurricane in my life—Hurricane Alicia back in 1983. That was the last big one to hit Houston and much of the news coverage referenced the parallels in the two storms’ aftermaths. Beyond flooded streets, there were also piles of glass, stacks of tree limbs and wrecked buildings. But even if you’re spared all of that destruction, no one is spared the loss of electricity.

Besides riding my bike around the neighborhood during the eye of Alicia, having no power for a few days (in the hot, humid summer no less) is my biggest recollection of that storm, and that meant lots of card games and nap times. But what did we eat? I couldn’t remember, so I asked my dad. He said peanut butter.

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Recipe for a trip to Texas

I recently went to Texas to look at real estate and visit family, as many of you may know. What you don’t know is that I made up most of my ambitious itinerary as I went along, which had me zigzagging across the state with little time to breathe, let alone properly relax.

My aunt has a saying, “When you fail to plan, you plan to fail.” My travel plans were cobbled together at the last minute, and while my spontaneity prevented me from seeing and doing everything I wanted to, I would not say that my trip was a complete failure. 

I ate heartily, took hundreds of mouth-watering photos, had the pleasure of watching the Democratic convention with two of my favorite Democrats—my grandma and my mom—and managed to both make and see good friends. That said, I’ve made a list of guidelines to follow next time I travel, just to make the trip a little less stressful.

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South Beach and beef jerky

I’m on a diet. One day I woke up and suddenly all my clothes felt snug. I bought two pairs of jeans to tide me over until I lost the weight, but one day I woke up and those felt snug. I was at a crossroads—I could go buy even larger jeans or lose the weight. I opted for the latter.

I’m not much of a follow-the-rules kind of person so the thought of adhering to a strict diet automatically raises my internal rebel. Tell me that I can’t have something and I’ll want it even more—that’s human nature. But after much research I learned that there was one diet I could follow—the South Beach diet.

I decided to go with South Beach because it seemed easier than the other diets—no counting calories, just eating as much as I want of the right kinds of food. And thankfully, the right kinds of food are things I love—fresh vegetables, lean protein, low-fat dairy, eggs and nuts; forbidden during the first two weeks are sugar, fruits, breads, alcohol and fatty protein. I admit that it’s been difficult seeing the tail-end of the summer fruit at the market and not being able to indulge, but thankfully there are plenty of fresh vegetables to keep me and my stomach satisfied. And I’ve had some great support during these past few days with my blog buddies Kalyn, the guru of all things South Beach and Karina, the guru of all things gluten-free, both of whom are also doing South Beach right now.

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Pico de gallo recipe

Pico de gallo, you oughta give it a try-o
Even if you're from Ohio, it’ll get you by-o.
Don’t get it in your eye-o unless you want to cry-o
So come on, don't be shy-o, eat some pico de gallo!
From “Pico de Gallo” by Trout Fishing in America.

You know how it is when you get a song stuck in your head and it just won’t quit? The past few days I’ve been singing “Pico de Gallo” by Trout Fishing in America and no matter what I do, the silly song won’t leave me alone.

It’s not a complete mystery, however, why I’ve been humming this tune. It’s August, which should be officially deemed national salsa month. Everything you need to make salsa is fresh and in abundance. Cilantro, tomatillos, tomatoes, garlic, onions, jalapenos, habaneros, serranos, corn, peaches or whatever else your stomach desires. (And perhaps this is why the Austin Chronicle has its annual hot sauce festival in what is also the hottest month of the year.) If you go to the farmer's market, you will be struck by the bounty. It’s beautiful. And you will also feel the urge to take advantage of it because this is the peak—soon we’ll only have apples, pears and squashes.

I think I’ve probably made a different type of salsa every night this week, but the one I always like to always keep on hand during late summer is pico de gallo. Most of my other salsa recipes can still taste OK with canned tomatoes or tomatillos but it’s impossible to make pico de gallo (pronounced pee-ko duh guy-yo) unless the ingredients are fresh, ripe and in season. It just won’t taste the same—it’s a salsa fresca.

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Cool off with hot jalapeno pickles

If you’re of a certain age, you may remember a time when along with chips and salsa, you also got free corn tortillas, pats of butter and hot pickle relish served to you at your local Tex-Mex restaurant.

You’d see this in classic Dallas places such as El Fenix or El Chico, and in Houston establishments such as Molina’s. The hot pickle relish, also known as escabeche, was made up of jalapenos, carrots and cauliflower and it was tart, fiery, crunchy and yes, very refreshing.

There’s been a lot of bad news about jalapenos lately, namely those from Mexico. And while I’m glad they pinpointed the source of the salmonella, it didn’t give me much confidence in buying jalapenos at the grocery store, especially when their origin was unknown.

Earlier in the summer I bought a jalapeno plant and it produced two tiny peppers, until it started shedding all of its leaves working its way toward a slow death. I have since nursed it back to health and it now has a few blossoms, which if all goes well could mean more jalapenos. Very local and very fresh! But my one plant isn't enough to keep me satisfied.

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Marfa and a plate of stacked enchiladas

“Oh Texas, rise and sing along, forever a part of you is gone. Oh Texas, say a word today in praise of the Old Borunda Cafe” From the song "Old Borunda Café" by Bob Campbell

Last week, I hungered for a big bowl of sky. Stuck in New York City, I decided to satisfy my appetite by looking at West Texas real estate web sites.

Enter an amazing piece of property in Marfa, Texas. The real estate agent (yes, I’d gone so far as to place a call) told me that it wasn’t officially on the market but with the right offer the owner would sell. I asked for a ballpark and she quoted me a figure a bit out of my price range, but very reasonable for what you get: an old adobe compound comprised of five buildings that could be filled with several living and work spaces. There’s also a gorgeous private yard with stone patios and pathways, a fire pit and a garden with one of the most impressive patches of lavender I’ve ever seen.

But here’s my favorite part: one of the buildings used to house a café. But not just any café. This building used to house the Old Borunda Café.

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Peach ice cream on a summer morning

I was talking to my grandmother the other day, and she mentioned that she had just eaten a peach from her tree. “It was a perfect peach,” she said. The season is almost over in Texas, but it’s just begun here in New York so last Saturday I scooped up a few at the farmers’ market.

While our peaches aren’t as famous as Georgia’s, it’s difficult to find a more sweet, juicy and tangy peach than a Texas peach. And while, yes, we Texans like to brag about many things, peaches are near the top of my list.

My grandmother freezes bag upon bag of her peaches every year, and there are also plenty of peach pies and cobblers made with the harvest. But it’s reached that point in the summer when I no longer want to heat up my apartment by baking—I need my food to be quick and cool. So when it comes to peaches—what I’ve been craving is the soft floral flavor of peach ice cream.

Back home, we had Blue Bell’s Peaches & Homemade Vanilla available by the gallon during the summer months when you needed a taste. But here in New York City, I’ve seen peach sorbet but no peach ice cream. That’s not a problem, however, since homemade ice cream is always better than store bought.
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Carnitas, Houston style

The last time I visited Houston, I arrived at midnight. I was exhausted, but my mom was waiting for me with a to-go container filled with my favorite restaurant dish: enchiladas verdes—corn tortillas wrapped around crisp, juicy cubes of carnitas, dressed with a green salsa thick with avocados, tomatillos, cilantro and onions. And while it’s not the most traditional of Tex-Mex dishes, it’s what I often crave as there is no finer combination of flavors than salty sweet pork paired with tart tomatillos.

Carnitas, which means little meats in Spanish, come in several guises. Some people serve it stringy, like pulled pork. Some people serve it in huge chunks, with bits of bone still attached. And some serve it in smaller cubes, perfect for popping in your mouth. Though no matter how it’s presented, it’s always succulent slow-cooked pork that’s tender on the inside and crunchy on the out.

The state of Michoaca, Mexico is renowned for its carnitas. And for good reason—they cook huge hunks of pork shoulder in oversized copper pots filled with lard. It’s a decadent eating experience as the pork is slick and smooth with just enough texture to keep things interesting. Of course, after eating Michoacan carnitas you immediately fall into a pork-fat coma and can’t get up for days. I adore the Michoacan carnitas and have even made them a couple of times when I have had pounds of lard on hand. This past weekend, however, I was a bit short on pig fat and decided to try another recipe to see if I could approximate their porcine excellence without going whole hog.

After experimenting with a host of recipes (and suffering a spectacular failure with milk-braised carnitas that ended as an insipid pile of mush), I decided to try Diana Kennedy’s method. She recommends cooking the pork shoulder in water until the liquid has evaporated. Because you haven't trimmed the fat off the pork, after the water is gone the pot is filled with rendered pork fat (aka lard!) that browns the outside to a caramelized crisp. It’s such a simple method that I had my doubts but figured it was at least worth a try.
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Easy as fried pie

Cake or pie? That’s a question often posed, with much weight attached to the answer. For me, the choice is simple: I’ll take the pie.

I don’t know what this says about me exactly, but I do come from a pie-eating family, which might hold some sway over my decision. Likewise, I have more of a salt tooth than a sweet tooth, and the flaky, tender, slightly salty crust has always been my favorite part of a pie, so much that you could bake me pie-crust scraps and sprinkle a little sugar and cinnamon on them and I’d think that was the best treat ever.

This isn’t to say that I don’t love cake because I do. But if someone was offering a portable dessert, such as the choice between cupcakes or fried pies, it would be no contest. Much to my chagrin, however, fried pies are nowhere near as ubiquitous as cupcakes. Matter of fact, I have a hard time finding them anywhere except at fast-food places, and what they offer is not even close to the glory of a fried pie made with two hands, a fresh filling and love.

Fried pies are a longstanding tradition in Texas, found at fairs, cook-outs, restaurants, bakeries, and, of course, in home kitchens. They are a terrific dessert for big picnics and other outdoor feasts because they’re portable, don’t melt and taste just as good either hot or cold. And they are very warm-weather friendly. If it’s oppressively hot outside, wouldn’t you rather stand over a skillet for a few quick minutes than be subjected to an oven's overheated wrath for one very long hour? That’s what I thought.
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With beans comes rice

Beans and rice. Do any two foods go better together? OK, maybe, peanut butter and jelly, but if you give me a serving of beans, I will definitely want a serving of rice right beside it.

When my parents were young and poor, we’d eat out once a month at Pancho’s. They liked it for two reasons: one, it was all you can eat and two, kids got a free plate of beans and rice. Of course, there wasn’t anything special about beans and rice—we ate that at home all the time as well. But I didn’t mind because I love it so much; the two are not only a perfect protein, but in my view, they also make up a marvelous meal.

Many cultures have a version of beans and rice, but naturally, my favorite version comes from Mexico: pork-laced refried beans served with a pile of rice rich with garlic, cumin and tomato. When I first started cooking for myself, figuring out how to make refried beans taste as they should wasn’t all that tricky—as long as you’re adding bacon grease or lard, refried beans will be smooth and satisfying. But Mexican rice? That was a far more difficult challenge.

For some reason, I had been taught that Mexican rice was made by cooking it in Pace Picante Sauce. It was good, but it wasn’t right. I wanted Mexican rice that was more golden than red, more dry than wet and more heavy with spice than bright with acidity. I tried a few recipes I came across, but none of them satisfied me.
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Does food need a story?

Does food need a story to be delicious? I don’t know, but it sure does help.

Take the Big Apple Barbecue Block Party that occurred in Madison Square Park two weeks ago. This event, which attracts some of the nation’s most laurelled pitmasters from across the nation, is an incredible way for New Yorkers to go on a barbecue tour of America without ever leaving Manhattan.

I hate to say it’s a popularity contest, but some of the pitmasters do garner longer lines than others. Why? Because these pitmasters have a legend, a face, a story behind what they’re serving. And because of that, people are curious about their food.

We had our first heat wave of the season that weekend, and even though there are trees and lawns in Madison Square Park, it’s a fight between concrete and chlorophyll for comfort, and the concrete always wins. Fortunately there was plenty of water, lemonade and cokes on hand, but I still chose to spend most of my time in the comfort of the (slightly) cooler seminar tents.
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Dr Pepper and peanuts

A friend brought up an interesting point the other day. She said, “Why do Texans refer to all soft drinks as Coke?” And while it’s true, I don’t have an answer for that. (Do you?) But what’s even more puzzling is that Coke isn’t even a Texan product—it’s from Georgia. Our local soda is Dr Pepper, born in Waco in 1885 one year before Coca-Cola was conceived.

Dr Pepper turns 117 years old this week, and the town of Dublin, Texas is having a weeklong celebration. If you’re not familiar with Dublin, here’s a bit of background. The bottling plant in Dublin is the oldest Dr Pepper bottler in the world. But what makes it even more special is that it’s one of the few plants that still bottle Dr Pepper with cane sugar rather than high fructose corn syrup. And yes, it tastes much, much better. In certain circles, drinking a Dublin Dr Pepper is akin to sipping a magical elixir.

Like all precious things, Dublin Dr Pepper is not widely available. In New York City, you’ll have more luck finding Big Red than Dublin Dr Pepper (though you can order it online). For many years, there were legal restrictions that prevented the Dublin plant from distributing beyond a 44-mile radius of the small town. Those have been lifted now, but it’s still difficult to find the drink. This stuff is sensational, so demand far outstrips supply. Enter bootleggers and a black market. Robb Walsh recently wrote a brilliant article about Dublin Dr Pepper and the people who go to extreme lengths to satisfy their thirst.

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