Buxton Hall Barbecue, shares his consid-
erable knowledge on the craft of Carolina
pit smoking, known for its delicate flavors
and the use of freshly charcoaled wood
rather than live fire. This book has
instructions for constructing large and
small versions of backyard pits made of
cinder block, and Moss also shows how to
convert aluminum hotel pans, or even a
Girl Scout mess kits, into portable
smokers. Next, bring on the pig, or the
chicken, or the smoky tofu with mush-
rooms. Ribs, wings, pulled pork, and, of
course, a whole hog are offered up in the
first half of the book. Going low and slow,
baby backs reach perfection in five to six
hours, and a lamb shoulder takes about
four before its ready to be sauced. The
book’s second half is filled with side
dishes such as sour cream potato salad
with freezer peas and basil, desserts such
as buttermilk pie, and a chapter titled
“Buxton Favorites,” featuring treats from
the restaurant such as catfish stew and a
fried chicken sandwich. Art director
Cindy Samargia Laun employs some 150
color photos to make sure that smoke gets
in your eyes in pleasing ways, with close-
ups of nearly all the eats. (Oct.)
¡Cuba! Recipes and Stories from
the Cuban Kitchen
Dan Goldberg, Andrea Kuhn, and Jody Eddy.
Ten Speed, $30 (256) ISBN 978-1-60774-986-8
Photographer Goldberg, art director
Kuhn, and food writer Eddy made three
visits to Havana and its environs over a
five-year period, feasting on the local cui-
sine and
meeting the
proud cooks
and farmers
of the area.
They now
report back
on their
sightseeing,
with scores of
photos and
75 recipes in tow. Among the many inter-
esting insights into Cuba’s culinary iden-
tity are a look at the Santeria religion,
which advises that animals should be
appreciated “from conception to con-
sumption,” recognition of the black
market as an essential source for dessert
ingredients, and a brief history of
Havana’s Chinatown, once the largest in
Latin America, now down to a single
Chinese chef. An accompanying egg roll
recipe calls for hot chiles, chorizo, and
black beans. Other treats spread across the
10 chapters include ropa vieja sliders from
a section on sandwiches, ribs with guava
BBQ sauce, and a shrimp and scallop cev-
iche. Caffeine and rum duke it out in the
beverage chapter, featuring those two
classic quaffs, café cubano and the mojito.
(Sept.)
Big Bad Breakfast
John Currence. Ten Speed, $30 (272p)
ISBN 978-1-60774-736-9
If the title is not enough of a hint, the
very first recipe in this mega-hearty
Southern-style collection tells you all you
need to know about what chef Currence
has in mind: it’s sausage cinnamon rolls, a
salty-sweet belly bomb topped with
cream cheese icing. Big Bad Breakfast is
also the name of a Currence restaurant,
one of six he oversees in Oxford, Miss.
Though Currence later settled in
Mississippi, his New Orleans upbringing
is evident throughout the 75 recipes presented here. Across nine chapters, covering everything including omelets,
breakfast sandwiches, and morning cocktails, Currence brings on the flavor and
forgoes the calorie count, with choices
such as a Creole skillet scramble, a cheese-and-fried-chicken biscuit, and the
Decatur Street gutter punk, with equal
parts gin, heavy cream, and espresso. The
section on pancakes offers two extremes
side-by-side: peanut butter and banana
pancakes, and shrimp and pickled onion
crepes. Perhaps the ultimate gastronomic
collision, though, comes in the Breakfast
for Dinner chapter, in the form of a meal
called the pylon (for pile on ). It’s a Belgian
waffle, topped with hot dogs, chili, sweet
slaw, cheddar, and a squadron of condiments. As filling as the foodstuffs, the
pages themselves feel stuffed, with ingredient lists, directions, and the chef’s
entertaining stories all thrown together.
This approach leaves room for the irresistible full-page color close-ups of each dish
from photographer Ed Anderson. (Sept.)
; The Fire This Time: A New
Generation Speaks About Race
Edited by Jesmyn Ward. Scribner, $25 (240p) ISBN 978-1-5011-2634-5
In this timely collection of essays and poems, Ward (Men We Reaped) gathers the voices of a new generation whose essays work together as one to present a kaleido- scopic performance of race in America. The 18 contributions ( 10 of which were written specifically for this collection) cover topics deep in history as well as those in the
current culture. One, for example, reveals fresh insight
about Phillis Wheatley, the first published African-American poet, and her husband, while other essays are
situated in the present, taking readers on a tour of street
murals in N. Y.C. and exploring the music of hip-hop duo OutKast. One entry
evokes the experience of a young college student exploring the streets of a new
city as he learns “what no one had told me was that I was the one who would be
considered a threat.” Over the course of the collection, readers engage with the
challenge of white rage, and learn about the painful links between Emmet Till’s
open casket and the black bodies on today’s streets. The two concluding pieces
provide a profoundly moving view of the future deeply affected by the past,
through a husband’s letter to his expectant wife, followed by a mother’s message
to her daughters. Ward’s remarkable achievement is the gift of freshly minted perspectives on a tale that may seem old and twice-told. Readers in search of conversations about race in America should start here. (Aug.)
