Traditional Banana Pudding
Banana pudding casts a golden glow upon our lives. Never have I met anyone who doesn’t like ‘nanner puddin’, but I know in the cockles of my heart that should I ever, my dislike for them will be immediate, profound, and on the spot. I’ll probably stomp on their toe or something.
But banana pudding, like so many treasures on our sideboard, has been corrupted by convenience. What’s most often served as banana pudding is made with cheap cookies, packaged Jell-O, green bananas, and topped with Cool Whip. Quality banana pudding is made with Nabisco/Nilla Vanilla Wafers (kinda/sorta the same thing), ripe, fragrant bananas, vanilla custard, topped with meringue and browned.
First, the custard. Separate 4 eggs; blend the yolks well with 2 cups whole milk (or, better, half-and-half), and a teaspoon vanilla extract. Put this mix in a double boiler. Combine ½ cup sugar with 1/3 cup all-purpose flour, and slowly stir into the warm liquid. Cooking until thick, then cool.
You’ll need about 5 bananas. I implore you to select bananas well beforehand, because if you can only find bananas that have a tinge of green on them, you can set them on a shelf in the kitchen until they soften and ripen. And, yes, a banana will develop sugars in the pulp after being picked. Wait until the bananas are still firm, but lightly flecked with brown. Trust me, this is an essential step. An 11 oz. box of wafers has about 40 cookies. Use all of them.
Begin with a layer of custard in the bottom of an 8×8 baking dish, then a layer of wafers, then a layer of sliced bananas, repeat these layers. Whip egg whites with ¼ cup sugar until stiff. Top pudding with meringue and place in a very hot oven (400) until lightly browned. Cool thoroughly before serving, but this is best made the morning of and not refrigerated.
The Pink Drummer
Jesseburgers
To each pound 90/10 ground beef, add a quarter cup finely diced onion, two minced cloves garlic, a tablespoon of salt, two of coarsely-ground black pepper and three of Worcestershire sauce. Form into patties, brush with light vegetable oil and refrigerate for at least an hour. Grill until just done; they should be pink in the middle. Top with smoked cheddar before serving.
Sweet Potatoes with Buttermilk Lime Crema
Mix sour cream and buttermilk 2:1 with the juice of a lime and a teaspoon salt. Refrigerate. Coat sweet potatoes with vegetable oil and generous amounts of salt, and bake until cooked through. Cool thoroughly before slicing and topping with the crema and a dusting of black pepper. These are excellent with grilled meats and vegetables.
Glazed Figs with Roquefort and Pecans
Glaze ripe fresh figs by covering in a hot simple syrup with a squeeze of lemon and refrigerating overnight. Drain, slit and stuff with Roquefort. Top with crushed pecans. These are good with cold coffee.
Dungeon Dip
The first time I had this recipe was at D&D sessions in the late Seventies, which were of course quite avant-garde in those days. Now what’s usually called seven-layer dip is cliché, but it’s still a good, cheap, and easy go-to nosh for a big group. Most versions include refried beans, guacamole, sour cream, salsa, grated cheddar cheese, and black olives, but consider it a chaotic good concoction.
In a glass or ceramic baking dish, layer 1 (16-ounce) can refried beans (Blue Runner cream-style red beans are also great to use), 2 cups guacamole with the juice of two limes, 2 cups shredded sharp cheddar or a taco cheese blend, 1 finely-chopped raw red onion, 2 cups of sour cream seasoned with a packet of taco seasoning, 2 cups pico de gallo (recommended) or a very chunky salsa drained, 2 small ripe tomatoes diced, and 1 small can of sliced or diced black olives (optional, at least in my game).
Refrigerate—covered with foil or plastic wrap—for at least an hour. Top with finely-shredded lettuce, and serve with corn tortilla chips. This is the most basic recipe; feel free to improvise and revise. I like to add a little garlic to the beans, and if I add ground beef—which I rarely do, since the dish is quite substantial as is—it’s layered between the beans and guac. If you use a store-bought salsa, it’s important to drain it in a sieve beforehand, else it will make the mixture quite soupy. I also add diced jalapenos to the beans rather than sliced japs in the tomato/onion layer. Chopped green onions mixed with the lettuce adds more texture and zing.
Cornbread and Buttermilk
On summer afternoons when the air was smoky with dust and the sun bore down like a burden, my Grandaddy Jess would walk from his store up to his house, sit on his front porch, take off his hat, and holler at Granny Ethel in the house to bring him milk and bread.
So she would crumble that cornbread she always kept on the back of the stove into a tall glass, pour in enough cold buttermilk to cover not all the way but almost, stick a long teaspoon in it, bring it out to Jess, then go back to the kitchen where she had her radio.
Jess would sit on the porch overlooking his store, his field of corn across the road, his son’s house with its tumbling children on the corner, and he’d think about this year, think about last year, think about next year, and then go back to the store, leaving behind a tall glass streaked with thick milk and bits of bread.
He was content.
A Southern Summer Salad
Within living memory, this simple dish was a staple on meat-and-three menus throughout the rural South. Juice from the vegetables stirred with oil and vinegar make a mild, flavorful vinaigrette best with beans or cold meats. I love to use it in the old three-bean-salad, and it’s great with fish or shellfish.
Use fresh vegetables; supermarket tomatoes don’t have enough of that wonderful gelatin surrounding the seeds, and those cucumbers are too watery. Sweet yellow onions spoil the bite, and red onions discolor the mix; white boilers are best. Cut vegetables into bite-sized pieces, place in a glass or ceramic bowl and toss with a generous salting and a good bit of fresh ground black pepper. Resist the temptation to use garlic and/or herbs. Add enough white vinegar to cover the vegetables by half and half that amount of corn oil. Do not use olive oil, which will coagulate when refrigerated. Refresh the mix with vegetables, seasonings, and liquids as needed.
A History of Jackson, 1865-1950
“When were Jackson’s historic neighborhoods developed?” “How did the city grow during different historic periods?” “What did Jackson look like as it evolved from the nineteenth to the twentieth century?” The answers to these (and thousands of other) questions are found here, in From Frontier Capital to Modern City: A History of Jackson, Mississippi’s 1 Built Environment, 1865-1950. While the document is not dated, it was likely published sometime in 2000. This project must have taken several years, drawing upon the resources of the Mississippi State Archives, Mississippi Department of Archives and History (MDAH); the Records Management Division of the City of Jackson; and private collections of photographs from local citizens. A key player in this effort was Helene Ascher Rotwein—whose job in Jackson’s Department of Planning and Development was no doubt instrumental—and other members of the LeFleur’s Bluff Historic Foundation. While there is no index, the table of contents is incredibly detailed, as are the references cited, and the voluminous footnotes are incredibly precise. Click on the annexation map below to access the work.
