Preservationists and Historians Rally to Save 19th Century Bar Tujague's

Tujague's is one of the most authentic, unspoiled examples 
of a nineteenth-century bar left in America. 
To lose it would be to not only lose an important link 
with the history of New Orleans 
(a city whose reputation as a place to visit was largely built
 on the character of its old bars and restaurants) 
but with America's history as well. 
I know that with a little patience this historic place 
can be saved, and I pray that that patience is found.

~ David Wondrich
cocktail historian

It's hard to spend much time in New Orleans without, at some point, ending up at Tujague's. The restaurant, built on the site of an old Spanish armory in 1827, is just around the corner from Jackson Square and, although I've never ended a night there, I have begun quite a few days in the cool embrace of its bar. Nursed along several afternoons as well with a Sazerac or a Angostura phosphate in hand. I don't know how old the long cypress bar itself is, but the mirror behind it came from Paris in the decade before Lincoln was elected president. The bar is far older than I and — or so I thought until this week — was destined to survive me.

That prospect is now in doubt.

Errol Laborde, editor of New Orleans magazine, writes about troubling rumors concerning the historic restaurant after its long-time owner, Steven Latter, recently died:

According to the rumors, the building on Decatur Street that houses the last of the original Creole Restaurants and the second oldest (after Antoine’s) restaurant in the city will be sold to businessman Mike Motwani who is known for converting businesses into tacky, touristy T-shirt and gift shops. Motwani supposedly will do the same, though the front part of the building, according to my source, might be used to serve fried chicken.

Laborde pulls no punches. "Preservationists and those who care about urban style and character," he explains, "have long despised Motwani’s businesses." He goes on with a plea to Mr Latter's surviving brother, Stanford, who owns the building itself: "Please Mr. Latter, keep the legacy of your brother’s restaurant alive. At the very least, don't let the builiding fall into the hands of those who don't give a damn about the character of the city."

Ann Tuennerman, founder of Tales of the Cocktail, wrote an open letter to Stanford Latter bemoaning the potential dismantling of such an historical New Orleans restaurant where, it's asserted, the grasshopper cocktail was invented. She writes:

Dear Mr. Latter, 

Let me start by saying how sorry I am about the recent loss of your brother, Steve. In the time I got to know him through my work with Tales of the Cocktail and the New Orleans Cocktail Tour two things always stood out-- his dry wit and his love for New Orleans. He clearly had a deep respect for the history and culture of our great city with the way he ran Tujague’s for more than 30 years 

Now, I don’t claim to be a real estate expert so I can’t speak to getting the most out of your investment. But as the founder of New Orleans Culinary and Cocktail Preservation Society, I do know about our city’s rich history of dining and drinks. Tujaque’s is the place that continued the legacy of Madame Begue’s legendary brunches and where the Grasshopper cocktail was invented. It’s the home of brisket and horseradish and the beautiful long standup bar that takes you back in time when you order a drink. It breaks my heart to picture the doorway of this landmark littered with Drunk 1 and Drunk 2 t-shirts. 

This city is in the midst of a renaissance — one that’s met with both excitement and fear. Every day brings progress that New Orleans hasn’t seen in decades. But the great fear, one that’s generations old, is that with progress comes a cleansing of the culture that makes this place not a just a great place to visit but, more importantly, a great place to live. Culture doesn’t just disappear in a day. Here one day, gone tomorrow. It erodes slowly as people put the bottom line ahead of everything else. But it doesn’t have to be that way. With what you choose to do with the Tujague’s building, you can stand for the peaceful coexistence between progress and culture. 

I know business is business. But sometimes selling to the highest bidder comes with costs that can’t be counted in dollars and cents. Like losing yet another of our beloved restaurants and a piece of the living history that makes New Orleans so special. If you sell the Tujague’s building to the wrong person, the rest of us will be the ones paying for it. So please, Mr. Latter, respect our history, respect our culture and respect the legacy your brother worked his life to build. 

Sincerely,
Ann Tuennerman, Founder of Tales of the Cocktail 

Thank you in advance.

Allow me to add my voice to those who decry the potential loss of such an historic place. If a restaurant must fail, then fail it must. But to sell the building to a businessman who has shown time and again his disdain for the culture and history of one of America's most treasured cities is a gut-wrenching prospect.

New Orleans needs another t-shirt tourist trap like it needs another hurricane.

Goes well with:

• Laborde's piece Save Tujague's — Please is here. 
• A visit to Tujague's while you still can.
• My review of Sara Roahen's Gumbo Tales. In 2008, I wrote "Those of us interested in the drinking and food cultures of New Orleans savor classic cookbooks such as Lafcadio Hearn’s 1885 La Cuisine Creole for shedding light on the origins of creole cooking. Others help explain the growth of both creole and Cajun cookery, such as Paul Prudhomme’s 1984 Chef Paul Prudhomme’s Louisiana Kitchen or John Folse’s recent encyclopedic tomes on South Louisiana cookery (all of which, by the way, contain an abundance of recipes for alcoholic beverages, sips, and nips from absinthe drips to brandy milk punches)." Roahen's book belongs on that same shelf.
• Another rumor circulating is that New Orleans chef John Besh is interested in purchasing the building. For what it's worth, I'm interested in purchasing the building. I'm interested in a lot of things I can't do. If you can't make it to Tujague's for a drink, grab a copy of Besh's 2010 cookbook, My New Orleans. Click for my review.

American Apple Spirits

In the airless, nearly gluey July night, black-suited pallbearers hoist aloft a plain wooden coffin and begin their walk. In their wake, solemn mourners march slowly, thick humidity muffling their every footstep. Musicians follow, their low, brassy dirge echoing off damp stones as they move toward the Vieux Carré. The somber mood doesn’t last; this is, after all, New Orleans, where funerals are as much a cause for celebration as they are for sadness. Within blocks, the band strikes up a familiar Dixieland tune. Smiles and whoops break out as the celebrants form a dancing, singing, handkerchief-waving “second line.” Hallelujah! The saints, those reliable old saints, go marching in once again. Once it reaches the French Quarter, the line spills into a Decatur Street café where liquor flows freely and the party begins in earnest. No one — not a soul — sheds a tear for the deceased.

How could they? It was the Appletini.

* * *

My piece on American apple spirits runs in the Summer 2012 Distiller magazine  — part thumbnail history of apple distillates, part overview of some of today's producers. The bit above is the original intro. Fun to write, but it took too long to get to the point, so I cut it. Ah, well. What's the point of having a blog if I can't occasionally post sweepings from the cutting room floor?

Some of the distilleries covered are Laird & Company, Germain-Robin, Osocalis, Harvest Spirits, Clear Creek Distillery, San Juan Island Distillery, and more. Applejack and apple brandy are the same thing (except, obviously, when they're not), but they're hardly the only apple spirits available. As much as we adore Laird's apple brandy — and make no mistake: we sincerely do — it's not the only option for those who hanker for a bit of the old apple palsy.

Here's a PDF of the piece from Distiller with interviews, historic and modern cocktail recipes, and a look at some of what's available for American consumers.

Getting a Grip on Smoke: an Idea from Chip Flanagan

Chip Flanagan is on my mind today. Flanagan is executive chef at Ralph's on the Park, a mid-city restaurant directly across the street from City Park in New Orleans. Catching a breeze on the upper story's wraparound porch after a meal is a thoroughly civilized — and mighty enjoyable — way to keep cool on sultry Summer evenings. Helps to have some whiskey in hand (which the bartenders downstairs will happily supply).

But it's the not drinks, the view, or the architecture that's got me thinking of Ralph's; it's what Flanagan has been doing with smoke that's got me mulling options for our new place in San Diego.

Smoked pork belly at Ralph's

Back in December, we bought a 1914 Craftsman house. The sellers had hidden the pad for the original garage out back under a layer of new mulch next to loquat and lilly pilly trees. It was well disguised and we took nearly a week to discover the deception.

The options, as I see them, are two; (1) keep it or (2) get rid of it. The area gets a lot of sun. If we rip it up, I can plant avocado or citrus trees in the 180 square feet. If we keep it...what to do?

And then I remembered Chip Flanagan: I could turn the pad into the foundation for an outdoor kitchen, starting with a smoker. From little more than an old proofing box and a couple of hot plates, the chef has rigged a respectable smoker that he showed me when I was visiting. At the time, a few pork bellies hung within, each slowly acquiring a mahogany mantel. Not long afterwards, I greedily tucked into some of that unctuous, soft, sticky swine.

A flare up in the smoker

Yeah. That's what I want.

Smoked meat is the birthright of every Kansas City native and ever since I was a kid growing up in that town, I've wanted a smoker of my own. When we lived in places a smoker was either impractical or illegal, visions of home-smoked hams, sausages, bacon, chickens, and more have kept me up at night — but the obsession over smoked meats didn't abate. Now that I own the ground under my feet, it's time to decide not whether to build one, but what kind to build. Flanagan's steel box is a compelling design — it's simply a bakery proofing cabinet with the electrics removed and it's on wheels already, so it's mobile(ish). Flanagan uses old skillets with wood chips heated on portable hot plates and for the smoke. The thing would have to have vents to control the flow of air. Add a few cross bars for hanging meats, maybe a wire shelf for smoking cheeses or salt, and we're on to something.

That's it.

With such a simple box, the chef makes great stuff for the restaurant. There's the smoked belly, of course, but also cauliflower, which he uses in soups, salads, and custards. Right now, he's got an oak-smoked pork chop on the menu and he also sometimes cold-smokes tuna with hickory.

Tonight, I'm picking up a little bullet-shaped smoker from a guy who's never used it. That will hold me until I figure out whether I take the Flanagan route or take the plunge and build something more substantial.

But mark this: come Monday, we'll have smoked chicken gumbo for the first time in many years.

Ralph's on the Park
900 City Park Avenue
New Orleans, LA 70119
(504) 488-1000
www.ralphsonthepark.com

Tales of the Cocktail Update. I'm Out; Rupf and Heugel Are In

Missing a Tales of the Cocktail weekend is not something I do lightly. Yet for the first time in years, I'm out. Whether I'm at the podium or in the audience, the annual fête in New Orleans has been one of my must-do events for almost a decade. If you look at the schedule for this year's sessions, you will find me listed once again as a presenter, this time with Paul Clarke of Imbibe magazine and the Cocktail Chronicles.

Well, grab onto your seats, kids — the lineup just changed. The session on American non-grape brandies is still on, but if you've already bought a ticket with hopes of seeing me in New Orleans, you just got an upgrade; Paul will be joined by not one but two others on the mic.

Bobby Heugel of Anvil

First up is Houston bartender Bobby Heugel, co-owner of Anvil Bar & Refuge. Bobby will be on hand to offer the thirsty crowd brandy-based libations and a bar owner's perspective on using these American fruit spirits. We've mentioned him before for his rum, Averna, buttermilk (yeah, buttermilk), and Chartreuse cocktail, the Vanderbilt Fugitive.

Jorg Rupf and Lance Winters next to an Arnold Holstein

Paul and Bobby will be joined by pioneer California distiller Jorg Rupf. Rupf founded St. George Spirits in Emeryville, California in 1982, twenty-five years before most of today's distilleries even existed. His masterful eaux de vie are exemplars of the craft and have racked up award after award. Twenty years after the founding of the distillery, he and distiller Lance Winters blended American wheat and viognier grapes to create a new vodka they dubbed Hangar One.

You may have heard of it.

Rupf is now officially retired. But some people just can't leave work behind when they call it quits; we are pleased that he still has some skin in the game and will be sharing over three decades of distilling knowledge.

Regrettably, a conflict has arisen that precludes my joining this august triumvirate in New Orleans. A shame. It sounds fantastic.

Weekend Grillades and Grits

I dote on grillades. Whenever I'm in New Orleans, I try to squeeze in at least one meal of the long-simmered veal — or sometimes pork — slices served over grits. Even, as it occasionally happens, if they're dished out over plain buttered rice, they're a fantastic way to ease a languid morning into a lazy afternoon.

Elizabeth's in the Bywater neighborhood serves a respectable, chunky version (get a side order of praline bacon). Any number of places in the French Quarter serve them; Green Goddess, for instance, or Arnaud's. EAT New Orleans, just a block down from Good Friends (site of the notorious Chicken Drop from Chickenshit Afternoon), is another good one.

Perhaps the best, though, I ever had was when chef (and James Beard Award winner) Ann Cashion cooked a batch one morning when we were in town for Carnival. Cashion was visiting as well and she cooked up a stunner of a New Orleans breakfast for a group of mutual friends. A pot of stone-ground grits burbled and plopped quietly to one side of the stove while a huge old Magnalite oval roaster held  perhaps two gallons of long-simmered chunks of tender meat in a dark brown sauce.

Yeah, yeah. Yellow grits was all I had. Still good.

It is possible, though not likely, that Ann, too, will come to your house to cook grillades. In the event that she doesn't, I have a solution that's a very good second choice and that still puts smiles on my family's faces. In fact, they've been observed moaning barely articulate sacrilegious oaths while tucking into broad bowls of the grillades I make at home. 

When there's a crowd to feed for a weekend breakfast and I want to get a taste of New Orleans, I work up a big batch of grillades that's based on John Besh's door-stopper of a cookbook, My New Orleans. Besh calls for boneless veal shoulder, a traditional choice. Slightly adapted from his, here's how we're making grillades around the Whiskey Forge.

That is, at least until Cashion comes a'calling and takes over my stove while I mix drinks.

Slow-Cooked Grillades

4 pounds boneless pork [or veal] shoulder, sliced into thin cutlets
Salt
Freshly ground black pepper
2 cups flour
2 teaspoons basic Creole spices
¼ cup rendered bacon fat
1 large onion, diced
1 stalk celery, diced
1 red bell pepper, diced
2 cloves of garlic, minced
2 cups canned whole plum tomatoes, drained, seeded, and diced
2 cups basic chicken stock
leaves from one sprig fresh thyme
1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
1 bay leaf
1 tablespoon Worcestershire
Tabasco*
Two green onions, chopped
Prepared grits

Season the pork cutlets with salt and pepper. Whisk the flour together with the Creole spices in a medium bowl. Dredge the cutlets in the seasoned flour and shake off excess. Reserve a tablespoon of seasoned flour.

Melt the bacon fat in a large skillet over high heat. Fry the cutlets, several at a time, until golden brown on both sides. Take care not to overcrowd the skillet. Remove cutlets from skillet and continue to cook in batches until all the pork has been browned. Set the pork aside while you continue making the sauce.

Reduce the heat to medium-high, add onions to the same skillet, and cook, stirring with a wooden spoon, until they are a deep mahogany color, about 20 minutes. Add the celery, bell pepper, and garlic, reduced the heat to moderate, and continue cooking, stirring often, for about 5 minutes. Sprinkle the 1 tablespoon of reserved seasoned flour into the skillet and stir to mix it into the vegetables.

Increase heat to high, stir in the tomatoes and stock, then cook until it comes to a boil. Reduce the heat to moderate and stir the thyme, pepper flakes, bay leaf, and Worcestershire into the vegetables. Add the pork cutlets, cover, and simmer until the feel is fork tender, about 45 minutes.

Season with salt, pepper, Tabasco, then add the green onions. Serve over grits.

 *Besh serves this over cheese grits flecked with jalapenos and calls for Tabasco. We go for Cholula hot sauce and, like Cashion, omit the jalapenos. Normally, I use white grits, but today all we had were yellow. Still very good.

Goes well with:

• Long-simmered stone-ground grits are what you want here. Anson Mills will ship theirs right to your door. My advice? Save on shipping by ordering ten pounds and split the costs with a friend or two.
• Don Rockwell has an online AMA-type interview with Cashion here.
• John Besh's My New Orleans is not the last word on New Orleans cooking. But it's an excellent place to start. I drop a few plaudits on his book is here.
• Sara Roahen's Gumbo Tales is a must for understanding food and local mentality in post-Katrina New Orleans.

Rowley & Clarke on American Brandy at Tales of the Cocktail 2012

Last July, Dan Farber objected — politely, gentlemanly, pointedly — to the tight focus of Paul Clarke's session on applejack at Tales of the Cocktail. Clarke, an avuncular editor of Imbibe magazine and a frequent speaker at Tales, stayed on topic. Where are the European-style eaux de vie in this conversation? the California distiller wanted to know. Where are the other orchard spirits that American distillers have been making?

Farber's challenges sounded an awful like like an invitation. Even at the time, I recall, Clarke beamed and responded with something like "You're absolutely right. That's a great idea for a session next year." I had already wrapped up my own standing room only session with Max Watman on new American distilleries and could only smile as Clarke and I exchanged glances. You see, I dote on bourbon, I drink an awful lot of rum, but brandy? Good brandy makes me go weak at the knees.

In the intervening seven months, the two of us kicked around the possibilities for a session on American brandies. Not the whole time, mind you, but enough to agree on a pitch. Word came from New Orleans yesterday: we're on.

Plenty of details to be ironed out in the next few months, but here's the session in broad strokes:

For much of the nation’s history, applejack, peach brandy and other fruit spirits were key characters in the realm of American drinks. Today, bartenders and craft distillers are rediscovering the appeal of fruit spirits, and this is the most dynamic era in generations for the production and use of these brandies.

This session will cover some of the background of spirits made from apples, peaches, pears and other fruits, and the ways these spirits were historically made and consumed. The session will also explore today’s realm of American-distilled fruit spirits, from the rich character of aged apple and peach brandies to ethereal eau de vie, with an emphasis on the ways these spirits are produced and a look at some of today’s most distinctive distillers of fruit spirits. Panelists will also discuss the use of fruit spirits in cocktails, from classic drinks made with aged apple and peach brandies to special considerations that should be taken when mixing with eau de vie.

Location, date, time, etc. to come in early March. All I know for now is that I'll be back in New Orleans' French Quarter this July 25th-29th.

[edit: The brandy session is still on, but there's been a change in the lineup. See here to see who's on deck.]

Goes well with:

• Tales of the Cocktail is a nonprofit based in New Orleans dedicated — in its own words — to the advancement of the craft of the cocktail through education, networking and promotion. Check out its website and Twitter feed. Its name is also dropped occasionally as Shit Bartenders Say.
• Dan Farber makes brandy in California, including a lovely French-style brandy made from California apples that's been sleeping in barrels since Roseanne last aired. Check out his distillery at Osocalis.com.
• As @cocktailchron, Paul Clarke is also on Twitter. Paul's not only a friend of mine, but one of the first journalists who actually got the story right of what modern the American moonshine scene looks like in a 2009 issue of Imbibe. For that alone, a gold star always appears next to his name in my book.

Hurricane Season

Photo: Ryannan Bryer de Hickman

As Hurricane Irene bears down on the Eastern seaboard, I understand the concern that friends and family back East feel. Powerful cyclones can be frightening and this one looks like a doozy. At last word, New York City hospitals were being evacuated. My advice? Get to a safe and secure place with whatever supplies you need. Then turn on some music, break out the rum, throw yourself a little New Orleans-style hurricane party, and wait it out — with the appropriate cocktail.

In the Winter 2011 issue of The Zenchilada, I wrote a column about an iconic New Orleans cocktail, beloved by visitors, if not necessarily by each and every local.

It’s not true, as some claim, that Crescent City natives neither eat Lucky Dogs nor drink Hurricanes, but that drink is a decidedly tourist affair aggressively seasoned with dark rum. After that, opinions diverge on ingredients. If you order a Hurricane in New Orleans today, you likely will be served a strong red drink. None of what you’re likely to get is particularly good. Whether from a bar or a clandestine street vendor, the rule for concocting one seems to be “Make it red, make it rum”—but that’s not how it started, and that’s not what growing numbers of drinkers around the world are mixing when they want to evoke the French Quarter and Mardi Gras.

The article traces the history of the drink and gives five recipes from the original 1940’s version (that was not red, though it was rum) to modern interpretations and quotes from tiki historian Jeff “Beachbum” Berry, “King Cocktail” Dale DeGroff, and Matt “RumDood” Robold. Rounding out the pack of drinks authorities is Tiare Olsen, the Tiki Queen of Sweden, with her “Funky Hurricane” bolstered with Smith & Cross, a funky, funky pot-stilled Jamaican rum.

For the article and recipes, go to The Zenchilada.com, and navigate to page 32 of the Winter 2011 issue about carnivals and feasts. Or download the PDF here.

Even the Ten Dollar Whore Sneered at Me

These days, it's not uncommon to find white whiskeys in the fanciest of American cocktail bars. These clear, unaged (or minimally aged) whiskeys were little more than curiosities 10 years ago. Even five years ago, you generally had to know someone with a connection to a distillery to get a taste of one. The stuff was a little too close to moonshine for most drinkers' tastes. Now you can walk into almost any well-stocked liquor store and make your selection.

What a difference a few years make.

In 2005 I was spending a lot of time on the road interviewing moonshiners, home distillers, federal agents, and anyone else with a connection to illicit distillation in the United States. Naturally, I spent a lot of time in the South. Whenever I found myself near New Orleans, I would find an excuse to drop in for a few days or a even few weeks at a time. Cooling my heels one afternoon at the Bourbon Pub, I was approached by a hustler.

I knew he was a hustler from the very second I laid eyes on him. Handsome, mid-20's, jeans, white tank top, muscled but skinny. He was leaning against a brick wall, scoping out the room. Given my line of research, a certain amount of criminality is expected. This guy was screaming it. I avoided eye contact. That is, until I forgot about him and happened to look across the bar directly into his eyes.

Shit. Within seconds, he had disengaged from the bricks and appeared at my side. I rested my forearm on the wallet in my front pocket. He clearly figured me for a mark. I glanced at Kevin, the bartender I had known for more than 15 years, and flicked up an eyebrow. Kevin glanced at the hustler, gave an almost imperceptible shrug, and went back to cleaning a glass. Ok, so the guy wasn't dangerous.

He introduced himself, and launched into a well-oiled anecdote about how his mother and father — a nun and a priest — had met when their motorcycles crashed on a Guatemalan mountaintop during a rainstorm. It was all bullshit, of course, but the kid had a gift for storytelling. He finished his beer. I bought him a new one. What the hell: It was a great story and happy hour beers were cheap. After I bought him the beer, he tried so hard to get me to admit I was a cop. Convinced, finally, that I wasn't, he shifted closer and had a proposal.

Ah, I thought with the familiar lump of my wallet under my arm, here it comes.

"You know, I can get us some weed."

"I'm cool," I told him. "And I'm still working on the beer."

"Yeah, that's cool." He paused a few beats. "You know, if you want something harder, I know where we can get some cocaine." That's not how I thought the sentence was going to end.

Kevin was watching while not, you know, watching. "Naw, seriously," I demurred. "I'm good."

"Yeah," he agreed. "That's cool."

But he wouldn't drop it. "I've got a place nearby. It's not my place, but we can go there. I know a guy who can get us some heroin if you want." Yeah, ok. "We" can get some heroin. After turning down weed and coke from a complete stranger, I'm going to shoot for heroin. When I declined, his demeanor changed.

Kevin came over and placed his hands, palms down, on the bar. "Everything ok here?" I asked for another beer. "Just one."

The hustler edged a little closer. I found myself ready to strike while trying to look very casual. "Look." He was trying a different approach. There was a plaintive softness in his voice now, as if on the verge of a confession that everything up until now was all just a smokescreen. "I just got out of lockup yesterday." Probably a lie, but maybe not. "I could really use some money." There. This was beginning to sound true. He was also getting fidgety. I saw no track marks on his bare arms, but his toes were likely another story. "I do have a place we can go. We can't stay there. It's kinda like an alley by where my friend stays. But if you want" — and here he looked down and away before plowing on — "but if you want, I'll let you fuck me there for ten dollars."

The proposal didn't shock me. The price, though, was breathtaking, the desperation almost heart-wrenching.

"No," I said as gently and quietly as I could. Even junky hustlers have dignity. "No, I'm good right here."

He sat back on his bar stool, deflated. "I don't understand. What do you want?"

I cocked an eyebrow. "Honestly?"

He perked up, leaned in again, and started to bring the beer bottle back to his mouth. "Tell me. I can make it happen."

"I'm looking for moonshine." The bottle stopped cold inches from the hustler's face. He turned to face me, his lip curled in a snarl of disgust. He let out a grunt and heaved himself away from me: "Ugh. Nasty!"

The kid who held forth promises of weed, coke, heroin, and — for ten measly bucks — his own body had standards after all.

When I see so-called "legal" moonshine in chichi bars serving white Manhattans and other such concoctions, I can't help but think of how far our American white spirits have traveled in just a few short years.

Shoot, these days, whatever else it may get you, ten bucks might not even cover the cost of your drink.

Ah, New Orleans. I'd say this is where I make a pig of myself, except that would imply that I do not also do so in other towns and, as those of you who know me may attest, that's just not true. We landed Tuesday for the annual Tales of the Cocktail ho-down and it's been non-stop go-go-go.

Friday morning, I'll share the podium with Max Watman for a sold-out session called America's New Distilleries. Because so many of today's distilleries are small businesses, it seemed more fitting to gather together a group of them to sponsor the session rather than one of the larger distillery groups that produce millions of cases a year.

Those who abed this day will miss a chance to sample products from nine separate new American distilleries. Spirits will range from aged peach brandy (which readers of David Wondrich's excellent book, Imbibe, may think is extinct) and triple-smoke whiskey to sarsaparilla-tinged gin, 100-proof cherry hooch, and a chai liqueur that just grows on me more and more.

If you're not in the room drinking learning with us, here are links to their sites;

• American Fruits Distillery
• Artesian Distillers
• Corsair Artisan Distillery
• Dancing Pines Distillery
• Death’s Door Distillery
• House Spirits
• Peach Street Distillers
• Piedmont Distillers
• Tuthilltown Spirits 

Bookshelf: America Walks into a Bar

Years ago, during one of my extended stints in New Orleans, the city was struck by a tropical depression. Wave after wave of winds and driving rain buffeted us and water began rising ominously. This was before Katrina and, while everyone was monitoring the situation, few seemed concerned that the weather would actually turn dangerous. Many did, however, rule that things had become entirely too treacherous to stay at work or at home.

The books and papers in my cloth satchel were bound to be ruined by the torrents of rain, so I quickly ducked into the Bourbon Pub, an old gay bar at the corner of Bourbon and St. Ann. Taking refuge in a neighborhood bar, I realized, wasn’t my solitary genius idea. The place soon filled with locals. As much time as I have spent in New Orleans, I had never — to that point — been to a hurricane party. Everyone in the bar knew the weather was bound to get bad before it got better. Clearly, these locals felt, no work could be done while the storm raged and the rain blew nearly sideways. So, what better way for the community to come together then within the bowels of an old brick building where video poker, indoor smoking, and a seemingly endless supply of liquor that fueled a convivial — yes, even party — atmosphere?

Face it, when the power fails, the phones go down, and the streets are filling with water, where would you rather be: your office or a bar?

We may have no hurricane parties in San Diego, but gathering in bars and taverns in times of turmoil is nothing unique to New Orleans or, indeed, new. In her new book, America Walks into a Bar, Christine Sismondo places the bar squarely at the heart of American social life. Call it the tavern, a pub, a saloon, or any other style of watering hole, the bar has for centuries been where Americans gather to share news, hatch plots, settle wagers, and predetermine the outcome of political races.

The book covers political intrigue, secret societies, court officers, and unionists all brought together in front of the brass rail. Sismondo also writes about marginalized populations who have assembled and amassed in bars for most of the last three centuries. The Molly Maguires are there, as are feminists, African-Americans, and gays. One hears about New York’s famous Stonewall Inn and how a police raid there resulted in riots that helped launch the modern gay rights movement. What we hear less about is what the place was actually like. Sismondo digs up historical references that make the mob-run bar sound every bit as dangerous and squalid as a Luc Sante opium den.

Ms Sismondo would like her drink refreshed

Inadvertently, perhaps, Sismondo drops one of the most useful bar tips I have ever heard. Over the last decade, I’ve noticed an increasing number of thirtysomething hipster parents bringing their young children with them to bars and gastropubs. Now, I’m not one of those crusty old curmudgeons who hates children in every setting. I adore some babies and don’t even mind kids in bars. However, when the place gets a reputation among young parents as child-friendly, it’s only a matter of time before strollers, booster seats, escaped Cheerios, and the stomach-churning smell of vaguely sour milk comes to define a place. That’s fine. I just don’t want that place to be my neighborhood bar. Sismondo, writing about the “nonbreeding” parents of Park Slope, opines that, faced with a similar choice, such “residents seemingly have no choice but to retreat into upstairs spaces that can’t be accessed…”

I enjoyed the book's breezy, almost conversational tone, its historical anecdotes, and its look into how America’s bars have long stood as a vital “third space” in our communities, but that bit about retreating into upstairs spaces is one I’m going to put to use. I’ve always quite liked second-story bars for the views they offered of the surrounding neighborhoods, but I realize now something else has always nestled in the back of my brain: not many parents will schlep a stroller up a flight of stairs.

Christine Sismondo (2011)
America Walks into a Bar: A Spirited History of Taverns and Saloons, Speakeasies and Grog Shops
314 pages (hardback)
Oxford University Press
ISBN: 019973495X
$24.95

For those of you attending Tales of the Cocktail in New Orleans, Christine Sismondo will be speaking next Thursday, July 21 on The Bad Bad Boys of Saloons and signing books at the popup bookstore in the lobby of the Hotel Monteleone. See www.talesofthecocktail.com for details.

Bread Pan Ice Blocks

It's been so goddamned hot this week. Friends in other parts of the country regularly beset with summer scorchers have no sympathy.

"How hot?" they ask. "Seventy-seven degrees? Eighty? Poor you, living in paradise all year. You can't take a little heat."

Yeah, they're cloudy. Know what else they are? Cold.

To an extent, they're right. San Diego just doesn't get more than, say, nicely warm most of the year. But when the mercury spikes, we're not used to it. Even locals like me who've come from sultry — even swampy — places and know the soul-sucking power of truly hot days and nights have grown accustomed to the temperate year-round pleasantness of it all.

I only remind friends who expect unbearable heat in the summer and whose houses are built to deal with it: most San Diego homes seem not to have air conditioners. Us? We have a window unit that sits in storage 10 months out the year. The two months it's installed, we turn it on maybe a dozen times.

We're due to set a record this year. That contraption is on every night now. When I'm not sleeping directly under its cool airplane engine gusts, I'm keeping the heat at bay with uncharacteristic shorts, a nearly unheard-of and ungentlemanly bare chest, and ice. Big chunks of ice.

Rather than fuss with fancy silicone ice cube trays that still wouldn't yield enough ice, I simply filled two large bread loaf pans with filtered water and froze them. When I need a cube or three, I break the thick ice logs into rough blocks about 3" to a side with a stainless steel surgical hammer. In they go, into a sawed-off spring water bottle I now use as an iced tea glass. Top off with cold tea from the fridge and — for a while, anyway — stave off the worst of the San Diego sweats.

It's good practice for New Orleans.

Meanwhile, I leave you with a short, short clip based on H. P. Lovecraft's 1926 story Cool Air.  I'd even take on Dr. Muñoz's ailment if it meant I could have continuous, blessed cool air.

Distiller Wanted: New Orleans

Celebration Distillation, the makers of Old New Orleans Rum, is looking for a new distiller. Parker Shonekas sent me the job description this morning. As usual, when I note distillery job openings, I have nothing to do with the company (other than, in this instance, a deep appreciation for the Cajun spiced rum and admiration for [edit: former*] head distiller Chris Sule). Just passing on information, so it's no use asking me questions about the position or applying for it by sending me your resume. For that, you've got to get in touch with Parker Schonekas (parker@oldneworleansrum.com). 

If I lived in New Orleans, you can be damn sure I wouldn't be posting this. I'd be at the distillery this very minute.

Barrels o' rum at Celebration Distillation

 Production Team: Distiller

Celebration Distillation, the makers of Old New Orleans Rum, is seeking a motivated and hard working individual to work with our Production Team and to train to become an Old New Orleans Rum Distiller. We are the oldest premium rum distillery in the United States, and we produce three distinct and delicious rums - Old New Orleans Rum - Crystal; Amber; Cajun Spice.

Job Description:

• Work in the production of Rum and other products
• Run Stills
• Perform fermentations, filtrations, and final blends
• Upkeep and Maintain Equipment
• Keep facility and workspace clean
• Assist in the analysis of process and equipment efficiencies
• Assist in the analysis and installation of upcoming expansions
• Occasionally work events or parties hosted at the distillery

Expectations:

• Work Flexible Hours
• Time Expectations: Minimum of 40 hours per week

Qualifications:

• Commitment to Quality
• Any knowledge or experience in alcohol production or food production is preferred
• Any technical experience in pipe fitting, welding, process engineering, chemical or mechanical
  knowledge is preferred.
• 21 Years of Age and Over 

*My thanks to Todd Price who clued me in that, as of two days ago, Chris is now working at NOLA Brewing. A quick phone call to Celebration confirmed it. Good luck brewing them beers, Chris.

Bookshelf: My New Orleans

I met John Besh in Oxford, Mississippi about two months after Hurricane Katrina. Although he is known as a New Orleans chef, Besh hails from Slidell, Louisiana where I had family before the storms.

Before floodwaters had even begun to subside, I had spoken to all my friends and relatives in and around New Orleans, making sure everyone was okay. It wasn’t until I saw so many in one place a few months later — the Southern Foodways Alliance’s annual meeting — that I realized everyone was not okay. Good friends had put on weight. Others had shed pounds they didn’t have to lose in the first place. All were in various degrees of shock and many were self-medicating with too much liquor.

Besh was there with a burning ferocity. He told stories not just about of people surviving, but of people determined to rebuild their homes and their city. During the time when many Americans — even, I'm saddened to say, friends — argued against ever repopulating New Orleans, he was practically galvanized by the challenges ahead. While so many of my New Orleans friends seemed almost overwhelmed by the devastation, the former Marine set to work. He famously navigated streets of the flooded city in a boat, bringing red beans and rice to those who needed it. I don’t go much for heroes or role models, but John Besh might be a bit of both. I'm not interested in his stints on Iron Chef, his appearances on Bravo, or the other aspects of his celebrity. When it mattered, when the world seemed like it might have ended, he rolled up his sleeves and he fed people.

And he’s been doing it ever since. Of course, he was a chef before Katrina, but since then, he has become arguably New Orleans’ most well known outside the city. I’ve eaten uncounted times at his restaurants and will undoubtedly end up in one before Tales of the Cocktail is over this month. As often as I visit, I don’t, at the end of the day, live in New Orleans. That may change one day. But until then, one of the touchstones of the city’s cookery is Besh’s massive cookbook, My New Orleans.

In it, Besh writes about the aftermath of the storms:

The story of our city is greater than those storms. We have been here for over 300 years, and we'll be here for another 300. Maybe it's about my children's generation, and their children's. Will they still eat red beans on Mondays? Make St. Joseph's Day altars? Will they still love the Saints? Will we ever win a Super Bowl? All I know is that I cook New Orleans food my way, revering each ingredient as it reaches the season of its ripeness. No other place on earth is like New Orleans. Welcome to the flavors of my home. Welcome to My New Orleans.

In short order, I will share with you one of my favorite recipes from Besh’s book. But in the meanwhile, I’ll leave you with this: The Saints did win the Super Bowl. Red beans still get made every Monday. And, by god, New Orleans will most assuredly be with us for another 300 years.

John Besh (2010)
My New Orleans: The Cookbook
384 pages (hardback)
Andrews McMeel Publishing
ISBN: 0740784137
$35.00

Chris Hannah’s Mardi Gras Punches

For the last few years, New Orleans bartender Chris Hannah has pushed a grocery cart around the French Quarter. Has he lost his home? His faculties? Not at all. He doesn't push it year-round, but during Carnival, when such sights are commonplace. Like so many others in Quarter and along St. Charles Avenue, Hannah uses the cart to haul around a cooler sloshing with beverages on Mardi Gras day. Each year the contents change, but the last three times he’s made what’s growing into an institution, his bright orange cooler held tiki punches made with rum.

There’s been the Nui Nui, an orange and lime concoction with allspice, cinnamon, and vanilla — and rum. In 2010, Hannah made gallons of Chief Lapu Lapu, a sweet/tart punch made with passionfruit, orange, lemon, simple syrup — and rum. This past year, he handed out cups of good cheer in the form of Pago Pago punch with orange, lime, grapefruit, honey — and rum.

Can we get this guy a sponsor? Zaya, you rock out in a Nui Nui. Appleton Estate, why not contribute some bottles and throw a little cash his way to gussy up the cart? Next year, I want to see a grocery cart-sized float and the Chris Hannah Mahalo Gold Dancers.

From Jeff Berry’s Tiki+ app, here’s a more modest-sized version of the1960's era punch from Tucson's Pago Pago restaurant. Scale up if you require more.

Pago Pago Punch

1 oz orange juice
¾ oz fresh lime juice
¾ oz grapefruit juice
¾ oz honey mix*
1 oz dark Jamaican rum
1 dash Angostura bitters

Shake well with plenty of crushed ice. Pour unstrained into a pilsner glass.

*Honey mix is a 1:1 mix of honey and water, more readily mixable than straight honey.

Goes well with:

• Taking a Tiki Shortcut with Simbre Sauce, our own take on the Nui Nui which we have been known to drink in such quantities that we require a pre-batched spiced syrup dubbed (around here anyway) Simbre Sauce.
• Mardi Gras with Rowley, Wayne, and Chris, a short post on bumping into Hannah and writer Wayne Curtis on Mardi Gras last year. The photo above is from that day (with Curtis in the exterminator getup).

National Absinthe Day: The Start to Finish Cocktail

March 5th, for those who mark such things, is National Absinthe Day. This is not, you understand, an official American holiday so much as an informal recognition of the four years that proper absinthe has been once again legally available in the United States.

As the Wormwood Society puts it,

No regulations have changed. Prior to May 2007 it was not widely known that the tolerance for official method of thujone analysis—10ppm—is such that it effectively legalizes many European absinthes. This was a major breakthrough. It also means that a number of pre-ban era absinthes would be legal in the US by modern standards, including the definitive premium absinthe brand, Pernod Fils.

Official holiday or not, the fact that Americans can now legally buy a range of imported and domestic absinthes does seem reason to raise a toast to that green fairy. And because I’m headed to New Orleans for Mardi Gras, I’ll let a New Orleans bartender give a recipe for a mixed drink. Rhiannon Enlil from the Uptown cocktail bar Cure created a cocktail that’s a really nice play between bitter and sweet across the palate, truly a taste for adults.

The Start and Finish

1.5 oz Averna
.5 oz Lillet Blanc
.5 oz dry vermouth
.5 oz Pernod absinthe
1 dash orange bitters

Stir ingredients over ice, strain into a chilled rocks glass, and garnish with a lemon twist.

If you’re in New Orleans, do try to stop by Cure. I don’t make it Uptown absolutely every single trip, but when I do, I drop by this former fire station for some great cocktails and late-night bites.

Goes well with:

• A visit to Cure at 4905 Freret Street in New Orleans. Give 'em a call (504) 302-2357 or check out the website.
• Another visit — to the Wormwood Society’s FAQ about absinthe. You’ll hear a lot of hooey and misinformation about absinthe, but these guys are some of the most trusted voices out there. You can read what users have to say about Pernod and many more brands, extinct and extant. 
• Bookshelf: A Taste for Absinthe, a rundown of R. Winston Guthrie and James F. Thompson's 2010 book on the spirit and cocktail recipes that call for it.

America's New Distilleries at Tales of the Cocktail

This summer, Max Watman and I will be joining boozy forces in New Orleans for the annual Tales of the Cocktail celebration. Max is the author of Chasing the White Dog and me — well, I wrote a book called Moonshine that advocates an America where craft distilleries are as commonplace as craft breweries.

Watman

Our topic? What else might it be? An overview, analysis, and samplings from America's new distilleries. All across the United States, new distilleries are cropping up. Some enjoy international success while others merely dream of such distribution. We'll take a look at who's who, where they are, what they're making — and where it's all going.

And we're trying to do something new: throw open an unusual sponsorship opportunity for those same distillers who usually wouldn't be able to sponsor a seminar. Each year, sponsorships for sessions at Tales are snapped up by large liquor companies to showcase their portfolios. That's great. I love those sessions. Learn about the history of Cointreau? Sure, I totally want to. Sample unusual whiskeys from Heaven Hill before they're rolled out to the public? I'd be a fool to pass up the chance.

Rowley

But smaller distilleries typically couldn't afford to be single sponsor. Unless, that is, a small band of them joined to form a consortium or a, hell, let's call it a syndicate where each contributed a smaller portion. If ten distillers got together and split the cost, each could come to Tales and help get their stories and their products in front of an audience thirsty for information on spirits.

I posted a more detailed discussion about this on the forums of the American Distilling Institute. If you're interested, check it out here.

America's New Distilleries (abstract):
In the last ten years the number of American distilleries has grown from a few dozen to over 200. All around America, people are re-inventing gin, delivering exciting new brandies, expanding the spectrum of American whiskey. At the same time, the industry is full of paper tigers, false starts, and vanity projects. We’ll separate the wheat from the chaff in the current scene, and look out in to the future. Big spirits companies have started buying the little guys: what will that do?

Batida Paulista from The Zenchilada

The newest issue of The Zenchilada is out with two articles by yours truly. One is on using raw eggs in drinks and the other about Lancaster-style beet pickled eggs (there’s an egg theme at work for the entire issue). I’m pleased to have worked one more with photographer Douglas Dalay for the pickled egg shots. He’s the one who captured this fireball while barman Martin Cate made punch at the 2010 Tiki Oasis.

The cocktail article has three drinks; a batida Paulista, a golden fizz, and a fantastic smoky drink from New Orleans bartender Danny Valdez called “That Night a Forest Grew…” with Del Maguey Chichicapa mezcal, a brace of hot sauces, and Pedro Ximenez sherry.

In the article I specify Leblon cachaça, a widely available sugarcane spirit from Brazil, for the batida Paulista. If you have access to other brands, feel free to use another or even a young rhum agricole. From The Zenchilada (Fall 2010 issue):

During the Truman administration, Brazil’s ambassador to the United States was Mauricio Nabuco…Margarette de Andrade credits him with this São Paulo cocktail in her 1965 Brazilian Cookery: Traditional and Modern. It’s exactly the kind of drink, made one at a time, that suits small gatherings. The batida (or “beaten” drink) calls for cachaça, a sugarcane spirit from Brazil gaining popularity in the US. A rhum agricole from the French West Indies makes a passable substitute.

Batida Paulista

2 oz cachaça (Leblon preferred)
1 tsp egg white
1 Tbl superfine sugar
.5 oz fresh lemon juice (or lime)
Sugar for rimming

Wet the rim of an old fashioned glass with fresh lemon juice and dip in sugar. Combine ingredients in a cocktail shaker with ice cubes and shake hard until blended. Strain into the prepared glass.

For the rest of the article (and the issue), check out The Zenchilada. You may also want to check out the Corn Tassel cocktail, one I made featuring white corn whiskey, orgeat, and Cointreau.

If It’s Monday, We're Eating Red Beans

Around New Orleans, respectable bowls of red beans and rice may be had any day of the week. It’s been that way since before my grandparents were born. The combination is so interwoven into the fabric of the city that hometown son Louis Armstrong declared his loyalty to the place by signing off his letters red beans and ricely yours.

Many aficionados of the local legume maintain that Monday — blue Monday, the old traditional washing day — is the proper day for red beans and rice. With minimal up-front preparation, some spicy meat and almost Spartan seasoning, a pot of beans can bubble away on the stove quietly while housekeepers tend to other household chores.

It’s true that I’ve made red beans on Wednesdays, Fridays, and other heretical times of the week. So bet it. Calendrical orthodoxy is not one of my virtues. But tonight, a large cast iron pot of red beans and another of South Louisiana medium grain rice will grace our table for dinner. There will be sausage and hot sauce as well.

Below are two recipes: one from Camellia, the go-to brand found in nearly every New Orleans grocery store, and one the way I (more or less) do it. More-or-less because I tend to eyeball ingredients rather than measure them in neat teaspoons and ounces, so the taste is always familiar, but rarely exactly the same. I like mine more aggressively seasoned than the company’s recipe, but not so much that I obscure the taste of the beans themselves.

Red Beans Rowley Style

1 lb red kidney beans, rinsed and soaked overnight
1 lb heavily-smoked andouille sausage*, diced

The Sofrito
Vegetable oil
1 large onion, diced
1 handful (less than 1 cup) celery, diced
5-6 cloves of garlic, minced
1 red bell pepper, diced

The Seasonings
2 tsp salt
1 tsp black pepper
1 tsp white pepper
1 tsp onion granules
½ tsp hot chile powder (cayenne, Aleppo, or pasilla de Oaxaca)
2 bay leaves

Preheat a large Dutch oven, add a splash of oil, and add the andouille. Brown the sausage and set it aside. Add a bit more oil, then sauté the sofrito ingredients until limp. Add the soaked beans and the browned sausage, all of the seasonings and enough water to cover by 1-2 inches. Bring the pot to the boil, then reduce to a simmer and cook, stirring now and then, until the beans are soft and creamy, but still hold their shape. This will take an hour and a half to two hours. Something like that. Serve over hot cooked white rice and toss on a grilled or sauteed pork sausage if the feeling grips you.

The recipe that appears on bags of Camellia red beans is a stalwart washday recipe, a little more streamlined than my version.

Camellia's Famous New Orleans Style Red Beans

1 lb Camellia Brand Red (Kidney) Beans
1/2 lb ham or seasoning meat
8-10 cups water
1 onion, chopped
1 toe garlic, chopped
2 Tbs celery, chopped
2 Tbs parsley, chopped
1 large bay leaf
Salt to taste

Rinse and sort beans. Cover beans with water and start to cook over low fire. Render meat in skillet, remove and set aside. In skillet, sauté onion, garlic, parsley and celery in meat drippings. Add meat, bay leaf, salt and pepper to beans. Boil gently, stirring occasionally for about 1-1/2 hours, or until tender. Add water while cooking if necessary. Serve with long grain rice.

Goes well with:

• In her book Gumbo Tales, Sara Roahen devoted an entire chapter to red beans and, specifically, to New Orleans author and raconteur Pableaux Johnson who makes something of a fuss about them. Johnson (whose red beans I’ve had at a great big table filled with guests) offers yet another version with canned red beans. Check out his recipe at Red Beans Roadshow. 
• When I'm in South Louisiana, I often hit the town of LaPlace, about a half hour west of the New Orleans Airport, to load up on heavily smoked andouille sausage. If you can't get there yourself, Jacob's will ship. cajunsausage.com. 
• I am a Meat Wagon — a story about getting stopped smuggling andouille after a trip to LaPlace. 

New Orleans Water Meter Coasters

Spend any time at all in New Orleans and you’ll encounter the city’s water meter covers. Not quite as common as Tabasco, slightly less popular than crawfish, the round iron covers themselves may be a bit scarce these days if you don't know where to look. Their image, however, is everywhere — on floor mats, as jewelry, garden flags, t-shirts, prints, cuff links, and postcards. Hell, you can even get shoes emblazoned with their 1920's crescent moon-and-stars design. Though I haven't seen any (yet), I'd lay money on odds that water meter tattoos are out there.

If your passions for New Orleans don't include ink, you can hit up funky t-shirt designers Dirty Coast and score a set of neoprene coasters with Edwin Ford’s nearly century-old design. Dirty Coast also sells Save the Sazerac t-shirts, water meter floor mats (it’s where I got mine), and a load of other great shirts that are so local, they're almost in-jokes. If you missed Tales of the Cocktail this year, these coasters will hold you over until next.

Neoprene water meter coasters. $20 for a set of four at Dirty Coast. They’ll ship.

Dirty Coast
5704 Magazine Street
New Orleans, LA 70115
(504) 324-3745

Sweet New Orleans: Calas

If we don’t eat them, how are we going to save them?

~ Poppy Tooker

Sure, surviving New Orleans’ annual Tales of the Cocktail takes a defiant liver, iron kidneys, and a healthy dose of prudence. But the Crescent City’s liquid offerings aren’t all that require heroic constitutions — its pervasive sweets are anything but trifling.

Since Katrina, the obscure little fried cakes known as calas have undergone a revival. Definitely a fritter, arguably a donut, and with a lineage that reaches back to Africa, calas are little wads of rice held together in a custard-like batter, deep fried, and — more often than not — dusted in confectioners’ sugar.

A street food, calas were sold by women of African descent, but by World War II, they had become less common. Enter food preservationist Poppy Tooker who, as head of Slow Food New Orleans, championed the little fritters and who continues to make them in cooking classes and demonstrations. Savory versions do pop up on local menus and in Louisiana cookbooks now and again; the WPA-era Gumbo Ya-Ya listed calas made of cow-peas and modern chef Donald Link makes a version with corn. But hot, sweet calas are what you’ll most likely find.

This is a very flexible recipe. Once you bite into a cala, you realize that it’s not unlike deep-fried rice pudding. Then, suddenly, you understand that it practically begs to be tinkered with. Cook the rice in water? Yeah, you could do that. You could also cook it in milk. Or coconut milk. Lighten the batter with yeast, give it an overnight ferment, or use the more modern baking powder. Season with vanilla and nutmeg? Why not? But…what about cinnamon? Soak currants in Old New Orleans Rum, and fold them into the batter. Make the batter, chill it, cut it into cubes, and then fry? Sure. The end result won’t necessarily be 100% authentic, but it might be pretty damn tasty.

Here's Tooker talking about calas (recipe below the video)


Here’s a version I put together that combines recipes from Tooker and historian Jessica Harris. It yields about 18-20 calas.

Calas

3 cups/480g cooled cooked rice
9 Tbl/90g flour
4.5 Tbl/60 sugar
1 Tbl/10 baking powder
.5 tsp/5g salt
Nutmeg — a few scrapes
3 eggs, beaten
.5 tsp/2.5ml vanilla extract
Canola oil for frying (lard if you've got it)

Combine the rice through nutmeg in a large bowl. Add the beaten eggs and vanilla and gently mix into a homogeneous mass.

Heat oil to 360-375°F. Working with two large spoons, make loose balls of batter from heaped tablespoons (about the size of a ping-pong ball). Drop each one as it’s made into the hot oil, being careful not to splash. Fry until golden brown (or darker, for a more pronounced crackle). Drain on paper towels and dust them with confectioners’ sugar like you're trying to hide a crime. 

Eat them as soon as you can stand the heat.

Goes well with:

• Poppy Tooker's site
• The full text of the 1945 classic on Louisiana folkways, Gumbo Ya-Ya
• An earlier post bringing together Jessica Harris and my homemade watermelon pickles