good southern girls

I've only lived in the South for ten years; before that I lived in Oklahoma. Even though Oklahoma technically isn't the South, my grandmother, Willie Ruth Abbott (or Mee-Mo, as my cousin Kitty dubbed her), was a true Southern cook, making fresh sausage gravy and biscuits every morning, pouring cornbread batter into hot bacon grease in her cast-iron mold. What I learned about Southern food early on in life was all due to spending time in the kitchen with Mee-Mo, crimping the edges of her fried pies. When I was growing up, we'd travel every few years to family reunions held at Pleasant Hill Cemetery in Durant, Oklahoma--a densely green and hilly area in the southeastern corner of the state. Long tables would be set up in the covered pavillion of the cemetery, loaded with every cook's most-requested dishes:  fried chicken, dilly bread, peach cobbler, macaroni salad, angel biscuits, fried pies, baked beans, and several potato salads. Just writing this list makes my soul ache for those sweltering afternoons of paper plates weighted down with so much good food.

Mee-Mo had one of the most popular potato salads. Sometimes she'd get a little carried away, adding black olives or tomatoes or other oddities, but she could make a tasty dressing, which is really what potato salad is all about. I'd like to think that all "good southern girls (or boys)" can whip up a potato salad from scratch simply by birthright, but the reality is that it takes a little practice. You need to overseason the dressing a bit, because the potatoes are going to zap up some of its zing as soon as they touch it. You need to make more dressing than you think you'll need, because the potatoes will soak up a good deal of it while the salad chills. These are the tips you learn from a good-southern-girl-turned-grandmother, and we're all lucky if we've had the chance to know one.

*Note: Here in Louisiana, a popular home-cooking treat is to make potato salad to eat with your gumbo. Put some potato salad on your spoon, dunk it in your hot gumbo, and enjoy. I've tried it, and it's pretty awesome.

Good Southern Girl Potato Salad

• 4 pounds red-skinned potatoes, peeled and cut into 1-inch chunks
• salt and ground black pepper
• 2 stalks celery, minced
• 1 bunch green onions, sliced (both green and white parts)
• 2 T. sweet pickle relish (optional)
• 3 hard-boiled eggs, peeled and chopped (optional)
• 3/4- to 1 cup mayonnaise
• 3 T. grainy mustard (I use Creole, but Dijon or deli or plain old yellow are fine)
• 2 T. extra-virgin olive oil
• 2 T. red wine vinegar
• 1 t. fresh thyme or 1 t. chopped fresh dill

1. Bring about 4 quarts of well-salted water to a boil in a large pot. Add potatoes and bring back to a boil. Reduce heat to medium and cook for about 9 minutes, or until potatoes are tender but not mushy. Test one by poking a sharp knife point into some of the bigger pieces: if there is no resistance, they're done.
2. Drain potatoes into a colander. Place them back in the pot, where the residual heat will help dry out some of the excess water. Let cool for about 10 minutes.
3. Meanwhile, make the dressing. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the mayonnaise and mustard. Slowly whisk in the olive oil, then the vinegar. Season well with salt and pepper and add the fresh thyme. Taste for seasoning: it should have a good amount of zing. If not, adjust it by adding little bits more of salt, pepper, vinegar, mustard, or whatever you think it needs.
4. Add potatoes and all the other ingredients to dressing, stirring gently with a rubber spatula to avoid breaking all the potatoes. Taste for seasoning again and adjust. If it seems dry, go ahead and add more mayo or oil and mix it in--it's better to do it now than after chilling.
5. Chill, covered, in refrigerator for at least an hour and up to a day.

Serves 5-7

good southern girls

parts of a whole

I wouldn't call myself a fan of green beans. There's something about them I just don't really care for--too much "green," too much "bean," too much of each of those combined. And green beans and potatoes? There seem to be many calls for these two items together, in curries, stews, or pasta dishes, and I just don't get excited. For whatever reason, though, I can abide them both in a good, solid niçoise. Perhaps it's the way, in a niçoise, they are two components among several others which are all considered important and equal. Perhaps it's the relentless individuality they retain when grouped this way, much like the way people on a team know, deep inside, that even though there's no "i" in "team," there's a "me."

A niçoise is a pretty forgiving square meal. It's meat (traditionally, tuna), veg (green beans), and potatoes, along with various accompaniments that kind of add up to a plate of hors d'oevres, and it's meant to be served at room temperature, which is always a comfort when you're not really up to finishing several different cooking times at once. There are some steps, but they're basic as basic can be: boiling, steaming, baking, and vinaigrette making. It can be served over greens or not, tossed or not, and made expensive or not (one of the perks of living in New Orleans is freshly caught catfish). It can even be seafoodless and still be very satisfying. There's hardly even a recipe to follow, once you've got the basic idea down.

A More Local Niçoise

• 4 portions of seafood (something inexpensive and local, if possible): shrimp, scallops, catfish, crawfish, tuna, salmon, bass, etc.)
• 12 small red boiling potatoes, scrubbed but not peeled
• 2 big handfuls green beans, trimmed
• 1 large ripe tomato, or 1 pt. cherry tomatoes
• 3/4 cup pitted olives (preferably niçoise, but kalamata are fine too)
• 4 eggs
• 1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil
• 2 lemons
• 2 cloves garlic
• a few teaspoons of wine vinegar (white, red, or champagne)
• 1-2 teaspoons Dijon or grainy mustard
• salt & pepper
• salad greens (optional)

1. Make the vinaigrette first, which is the unifier of this dish: Mince the garlic and place in a bowl or measuring cup large enough for a whisk to move around in. Juice the lemons and add the juice to the garlic. Shake in a little wine vinegar and plop in the mustard. Start whisking this mixture with one hand, and with the other hand, slowly pour in the olive oil. This doesn't need to be perfectly emulsified; you'll keep whisking it every time you use it. Taste it, and add salt and pepper and additional vinegar until it tastes like a strong salad dressing. I like it slightly overseasoned, because the potatoes and beans are going to break it down a little.
2. Potatoes: Bring a pot of salted water to a boil and boil them whole until a knife will almost go into the center of one easily. Take them off the heat, drain, and return to the pot and add the lid. Let them steam in the pot (no fire underneath) for another 10 minutes to finish cooking. Let them cool for a bit, then quarter or halve them, depending on size. Toss them in a bowl with some of the vinaigrette and set aside.
3. Green beans: Put about 1 cup water in a medium saucepan, salt it, and bring to a boil. Add the beans and cook them the way you like them: really crunchy, slightly crunchy, soft, or cafeteria-soft. Drain them, cool them for a long minute, then toss them in a separate bowl with some vinaigrette.
4. Seafood: Decide how you want to cook it: bake, broil, grill, saute, poach, etc. Season it with salt, pepper, and anything else you like (I used catfish & some seafood grill seasoning I had on hand). Drizzle it with a bit of olive oil (or another kind of oil) and cook it the way you like it (I baked it at 400 for about 12 minutes) and let it rest for about five minutes for most of the heat to leave.
5. Eggs: Hard-boil, cool, peel, and halve.
6. Tomatoes: Cut into 8 wedges (if you have cherry tomatoes, you can halve them or leave them whole) (as you might notice in the photo, I forgot to buy tomatoes).
7. Olives: Snack on a few and then just keep them at the ready.
8. Greens (if using): Make these ready to use as a bed for the other ingredients: wash & tear the greens and toss them with some of the vinaigrette, as you would for any salad.
9. Compose: On each plate, place greens, potatoes, green beans, two egg halves, two tomato wedges, several olives, and a portion of seafood. Drizzle a little more vinaigrette over the whole dish and serve.

Serves 4.

parts of a whole