Every May and June I look forward to the fresh influx of Vidalia onions into the supermarkets.  Being a Georgia girl, I took them for granted when I was down South; now that I live far away, I greedily fill up my grocery buggy and usher them into their new home … aka my pantry.  In fact, I’ve started to hoard them a bit already – resorting to the old fashioned storage option of hanging in pantyhose legs even though they feasibly will be available through the late fall thanks to advanced storage technology borrowed from the apple growers.

But for the benefit of non-Southerners, let me first help out with some general info points & phonetics here.  Vidalia is a town in the state of Georgia, about an hour or so due west of Savannah.  It is pronounced with three syllables as [vuh-DAL′-ya] or [vy-DAL′-ya], the variance between the two pronunciations being the first syllable and what type of Southern accent you sport – a soft uptown drawl or a back country twang.  For my Yankee friends, this is NOT pronounced as if it were a town in Italy or a botanical flower.  Pronunciation here in New England has been bastardized by many into four syllables with the inflection on the wrong part (so, so harsh on my tender Southern ears!).  Getting away from the pronunciation thing though, you should know that Vidalia onions are trademarked similar to French champagne, as only certain varieties grown in a specific production area in Southern Georgia can be identified, marketed and distributed as “Vidalia onions.”  The distinguishing attribute of this onion is that it has a high level of sugar and is thus incredibly sweet tasting – due largely to the sandy, low sulfur soil it grows in, as well as the mild climate.  You can further impress your friends at the next cocktail party with the knowledge that the Vidalia onion is Georgia’s official state vegetable.

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This is one of those unusual finds that I just had to try and share with the general public.  Chile heads will love this post; for others, this may be a fluffy read but with no real life application.  Think on it …

I was on another Google safari when I came across an article titled “The Lip-Smackingly Top 10 Most Unusual and Strange Foods Around the World.” In this blog line of work, one can’t pass up such an opportunity for weirdness!  So I quickly scanned some really nasty looking stuff; it even had pictures to further engage the casual reader.  As I was about to click away in disgust, I saw the name ‘Bloody Leroy’ and found myself hooked … and had to read further.

But I found myself reading teaser material with no background and better yet, no stinking recipe!  All I could latch onto was:  “it has a unique combination of tomatoes and black coffee.”  So OK, tomatoes and black coffee, but what is the drink?  What for?  Who invented it?  Why?  When?  How?  Well folks, I didn’t get too far in the search, and the mystery will have to remain.  The best I’ve been able to collect from my reconnaissance is that the Bloody Leroy is some second cousin to the Bloody Mary (once removed).  It is a concoction that is described in Wikipedia land as having the tomato juice replaced by barbeque sauce.  Before you totally gross out, it’s not a situation as in grab a bottle of your favorite ‘que sauce off the grocery shelf and add alcohol.  It’s a bit more sublime, and closer to where one might make a barbeque sauce from scratch:  a little ketchup, vinegar, mustard, brown sugar, lemon juice, Worcestershire, spices, etc.  But, it has the addition of heat; think of it as a kick ass bloody, appealing to a crowd that would be apt to add extra hot sauce or horseradish to their classic cocktail.

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Complementing last week’s appetizer of Benedictine, Derby revelers will no doubt want something a bit more substantial.  After all — drinking, socializing and horse racing can run a body down!  Meet the Kentucky Hot Brown:  chunky roast turkey slices, layered over slices of white bread, cloaked in a cheesy Mornay sauce, then topped with sliced tomatoes and cooked bacon.  The entire piece is then broiled for a few minutes to give everything a bubbly, suntanned look.  Sound tempting?  Then read on …

As the story goes, the Kentucky Hot Brown was an invention of The Brown Hotel of Louisville during the Roaring Twenties.  The chef there, Fred Schmidt, needed something to please the hotel’s dancing party crowd and guests that would want to nosh something late at night; nothing as heavy as a dinner, but different from breakfast.  The sandwich was a hit, and soon became a draw unto itself.  My personal guess is that the revelers were toasted and needed tasty grub to combat the pending hangover – similar to any college student these days headed out to Waffle House at 2am after a frat party.  At any rate, the specialty open faced sandwich had staying power, living long after The Brown Hotel closed down for a period in the early 1970’s.  And somewhere along the way, it became a culinary symbol of the Derby.  Of course, the recipe has mutated and changed over the decades with exponential variations.  Many Kentucky housewives and beyond have made their own version, culled from different Junior League and community cookbooks.

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Let’s just call it as it is:  the biscuit is a pretty & social gal.  And what’s the Homecoming Queen without her homecoming court? We’re talking gourmet beauties like butter, jams & preserves, honey, country ham as well as gravy.  And as a perfect follow up to my last post, “Biscuits from Scratch,” it seems fitting to showcase the biscuit’s “BFF”:  Gravy!

I’d hazard a guess that the two most popular Southern biscuit gravies are “sawmill” gravy which is a white, milk-based gravy of sausage bits and their drippings, and then there is “red eye” gravy which is made from country ham drippings and leftover breakfast coffee.  While they are both delicious accompaniments to biscuits, I wanted to share two other recipes that don’t get quite the same attention, but are equally tasty:  tomato gravy and chocolate gravy!

TOMATO GRAVY

Interestingly, I did not grow up on tomato gravy.  In fact, it wasn’t something my mother ever cooked, nor do I remember it as a menu item when we all went out to dine on those breakfast or brunch occasions.  I stumbled onto tomato gravy in my late adult life, perusing a magazine that spotlighted chef Scott Peacock of Atlanta’s Watershed restaurant and his recipe for ‘”Fried Chicken & Tomato Gravy.”  I know Scott Peacock (clarification, I know OF him), and felt compelled to give the recipe a go.  As I recall, my fried chicken needed improvement but the tomato gravy was spot on … so, how could I have been missing this treat for all my years?

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