Southern Appalachian Herbs: From The Omnivore's Guide to Home Cooking: What to expect in this book.

In this book, I will explain and describe a way of cooking that is very much a way of life. As an herbalist, I enjoy cooking with many medicinal herbs that also have culinary value. As for the foods used, they will be a mix of what one may buy from a store, grow/raise on a homestead type farm, or source from the wild. I like beef, pork and chicken, but I do not like it to the exclusion of wild game… not at all! I eat a great deal of wild caught fish and even though I live in the mountains, I am only a morning’s drive to the coast and I enjoy fresh seafood… I am oyster fanatic! I love to garden both herbs and vegetables. I also forage for many wild edible plants and mushrooms.

My culinary philosophy is to eat as seasonally as possible and to include the widest diversity of foods possible. I believe that fresh and well handled food has more than just vitamins, protein and carbs, fat and calories. I believe that real food has a life force to it that is lost when it is shipped long distances from where it is grown to where it is sold. My goal is, through careful cultivation and harvesting and the cooking and preserving techniques I use, to preserve and even enhance that illusive quality. That is about as “woohoo” or “far out” as I will get. I am a very conservative, practical man and a devout Christian. But, I firmly believe that the reason my great grandparents mostly lived to be around 100 years of age was due to that very diet. As the American diet has become more reliant on processed foods and even what we call fresh foods are shipped over thousands of miles before they reach the store, Americans have become less healthy, far more prone to diabetes, heart disease and cancer, and live shorter, less healthy and vigorous lives. Diseases that were once rare have become common. Obesity has become the norm.

This is not a recipe book, primarily. In this book, I will emphasize ingredients and seasonal options. The recipes given will be very flexible to the tastes of those who may cook them. The recipes are merely suggestions and are given for inspiration. The emphasis will be on ingredients and technique. The integrity of the ingredient is paramount. If I suggest wild greens that are out of season where you live, I encourage you to buy fresh spinach, lettuce or bitter greens if you can. Never be without cabbage, by the way. Such vegetables as cabbage, onions, garlic, potatoes and celery are indispensable and no kitchen should ever lack them. Let your taste tell you the right ingredient. By no means is this a “semi-homemade” cookbook. I cook from scratch in what many would consider to be an extreme version of that concept. But, I am not a fanatic. While I rarely mill my own flour, I do have a grain mill and use it occasionally. I don’t mind a few shortcuts, so long as the quality is not affected. For instance, homemade, naturally fermented sauerkraut is easy to make, taste far better than store bought and is much healthier - I don’t buy kraut and hope you won’t either.

This book will emphasize technique. Good technique is the mark of a good cook and what makes every aspect of cooking enjoyable. How you hold and use a knife, and the knife you use, makes a huge difference in how quickly you can prepare ingredients and the amount of effort expended. Good technique makes cooking faster, easier and more enjoyable… even safer. When you see a chef chopping through mushrooms at blazing speed, he is probably not showing off his knife skills. He is well trained and has chopped so many veggies with that knife that it becomes almost effortless and fast. He will likely be talking or thinking about something else as his hands work with the efficiency that comes from skill and muscle memory.

Good technique often makes food taste better. How often have I been disappointed in a meal I was served, because the meat was not properly browned or the onions not sliced and cooked properly? Such simple, seemingly “nit-picky” little things can make the difference between okay flavor and excellent flavor, or vegetables that are either enjoyable both in flavor and texture or that may cause indigestion. With good technique, it is easier to cook things properly than not. Learning those techniques does take a little effort in the beginning, but it is just a few extra seconds or minutes. Those who avoid using a cutting board because it is just one more thing to wash when cleaning up, or who use a dull or improper knife, may save a minute washing up but will pay for it in cut fingers…eventually. In butchering meat, the cutting board or block, the knife used, its sharpness and the skill of the butcher is even more stark, You must either learn to cut meat or pay someone else to do so if you want meat that is cut so it is tender and trimmed of silver skin, gristle, bones and excess fat.

Technique also saves money. I practice the French culinary philosophy of frugality. The best kitchens are those that waste the least amount of food. For instance, all vegetable scraps, bones and meat trimmings are saved for stocks.. Unless they are beginning to rot, which should never be allowed to happen. Food should never be wasted if possible. Good technique also allows us to utilize humble cuts of meat and vegetables a bit past their prime. It is a sin to waste food. I have been told that I “eat like a king.” Whether that is true or not, I do eat very well… better than I could buy in most restaurants, and at perhaps a 10th of the price of the average American who lives on fast food, prepared meals and grocery store fare. I am also stronger and healthier as a well fed omnivore in my 40s than I was as a vegetarian in my early 20s… I’m also a lot happier and enjoy my meals far more!

What is the style of this cookbook?

Well, it is basically anything I like that is seasonal. It is not overly fancy for fanciness sake. I love an honest meatloaf as much as I do a fine pate. I have a rural southerner’s love of fish roe, and appreciation for caviar. If I catch a trout loaded with roe, I will cook some with scrambled eggs and salt cure some to eat on crackers or bagels with cream cheese. Sometimes, my meal is fried chicken and coleslaw. Sometimes, it is a pork shoulder cooked low and slow, for 10 hours minimum, over hardwood coals of hickory and oak. Sometimes I do make a classic French sauce. Other times, it is simple pasta with garlic, parm and parsley. Fancy without flavor does not impress me. The stark elegance of raw oysters with lemon juice is something I crave. But, as comedian James Gregory said, “Where I come from gravy is considered a beverage.” I am gravy fanatic!

You will find me opinionated and perhaps even, occasionally offensive. I am not politically correct. But if I do offend, it is not intentional; it is just my honest opinion. In the immortal words of Justin Wilson, “I realize that I may have used some words and said some things that may have offended some of you good folks tonight. If I did, I did not mean to offend you. The words I use and the things I say are the way we talk where I come from. I did not mean to offend you, no. But if I did… I do not give a damn!”