Lee Baileys Southern Food And Plantation Houses – LEE BAILEY

The day was warm, but there was a constant cur- rent of air moving the limbs to cool us. As you see, we started off with a smooth carrot and sweet red pepper soup. I like it.served slightly chilled, but it is also very good at room temperature—and on this day, it got that way fast.

Soup was followed by the star of the meal, a seafood salad made from typical Natchez ingredients: spicy boiled shrimp, crabmeat, and crawfish tails. Everyone down here is partial to seafood, and their salads are delicious; but what I think made this particular version so tasty was that the shrimp were boiled in that fiery mix of herbs and spices so favored in the Gulf states. After cooking, the shrimp were added to the onions and marinated overnight. The crabmeat one buys in Natchez is backfin lump, which is precooked but unseasoned—just as well, because the shrimp is so potent it can stand a milder ingredient for balance.

And of course the ubiquitous crawfish tails have a very strong and distinctive flavor no matter how they are prepared. Along with the salad were fresh bread sticks with Tabasco butter. I have a real weakness for this butter and like it on almost anything. Finally, dessert was melon with blue- berry sauce. Melons are particularly sweet here, where the summers are so hot. It’s said that the hotter the weather, the sweeter the melon—one of nature’s thoughtful compensations.

Edgewood. precepinc SPREAD, ABOVE: LJnder the cedar trees. PRECEDING SPREAD, BELOW: Bearded iris. FAR LEFT: Carrot and Sweet Red Pepper Soup under the trees. teFT: The serene drawing room. PEPPERAs.O.U Pe For a slightly heartier soup on an- other occasion, you might try adding cooked shrimp and serving it warm.

6 cups grated carrots w cups milk nN sprigs fresh savory a cups homemade or canned chicken stock 4 large sweet red peppers Y, cup coarsely chopped red onions 2 teaspoons freshly squeezed lemon juice Y4 teaspoon each salt and freshly ground black pepper, or to taste Sour cream, plain yogurt, or créme fraiche, for garnish reer E. Ran EO). OFe Combine the carrots, milk, 1 savory sprig, and half the chicken stock in a saucepan.

Simmer: for 15 minutes over medium heat.

has often visited Natchez, Mississippi, home of his favorite Aunt Freddie and her family. And on every visit he has been struck anew by the warmth and charm of the place, and by the fresh, wonderful food to be savored there. So it was that on a recent trip he decided to put together the best recipes of Natchez into menus and photograph them in nineteen of the city’s majestic antebellum plantations.

Mr. Bailey enlisted the help of the Pilgrimage Garden Club, which has been organizing tours of these homes since 1932, and the result is a glorious celebration of Natchez and its long tradition of great American cooking. Simple and satisfying, the food of Natchez makes use of an abundance of fresh fruits and vegetables, game, river fish, and seafood from the Gulf. Consider such delicacies as Pan-Sautéed Catfish Fillets with Parsley-Pecan Sauce; Tarragon Creamed River Shrimp and Chicken; Roast Venison with Hunter’s Sauce; Gumbo Pot Pie with Salt Corn Bread Crust; Sweet Potato Biscuits; Corn and Oyster Chowder; Deep-Dish Dewberry Pie with Cream; and Bourbon-Mint Ice Cream.

Some of the recipes are traditional and others are updated versions of down-home favorites. There are casual lunches under the trees, elegant dinners in the library, Sunday sup- pers and fish frys, barbecues, buffets, a hunt breakfast, and more—all photo- graphed in lush surroundings that remind ~ us of a time when the pace of life was slower and entertaining was gracious and dignified. (continued on back flap) – a as a oF oe =.

ab Me eee LEE BAILEy’s Southern Food Ere PLANTATION HOUSES LEE BAILEYy’s Southern Food ery PLANTATION HOUSES Favorite Natchez Recipes by Lee Bailey and the Pilgrimage Garden Club Photographs by Tom Eckerle Design by Hans Teensma Clarkson N. Potter, Inc./Publishers This book is dedicated to the memory of that small band of purposeful ladies who began the Natchez Pilgrimage almost a half century ago— and to all the warm and generous people of this lovely river city.

Endpaper design: “Cornwell’s Journey” wallpaper from the Historic Natchez Collection by Schumacher. Copyright © 1989. Used with permission. Text copyright © 1990 by Lee Bailey Photographs copyright © 1990 by Tom Eckerle All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

> Published by Clarkson N. Potter, Inc., 201 East 50th Street, New York, New York 10022, and distributed by Crown Publishers, Inc. CLARKSON N. POTTER, POTTER and colophon are trademarks of Clarkson N. Potter, Inc.

This is a short excerpt from the opening of “” by Unknown, quoted for review and introduction purposes. All rights belong to the copyright holders.

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