Jan-Feb-2016_Final-1-4-16-attempt2

the Around the World issue

the Crescent City, plays the hard-working host and civilizing influence — turning over a chunk of her busy restaurant to a single- seating culinary experiment. It’s our first attempt at translating the weekly New Orleans tradition to a usually fancy-dress restaurant context, and once we get the cornbread cooked and cut (four skillets time three batches equals twelve), we’ll see if we can pull this off. How did I end up in a commercial kitchen 1500 miles from home, cutting hot cornbread for a hungry crowd? Funny story …or, actually, several in a row. Early Days: The One-Box Travel Kitchen Like a lot of South Louisiana folks, I grew up in the kitchen breathing onion fumes and knowing that there’s no such thing as a “quick roux.” Simple one-pot cooking

ROAD BEANS & RICE

Taking a local favorite on the road. by Pableaux Johnson I t’s a balmy October night in Washington DC — clear, quiet and about 65 degrees. Folks tell me they feel the winter coming and that snow will come soon enough.The early guests started showing up at about 6pm, coming straight from work, and I’m in the kitchen at Johnny’s Half Shell doing cornbread math. “Four skillets per batch, we need 10 ... maybe 12 to be safe?” I’m watching the heavy black iron skillets for signs of smoking oil as I whip up a quadruple batch of my grandfather’s cornbread batter with an oversized whisk. Clackclackclack. Sizzlesizzlesizzle. And the oven door closes with a solid THUNK. It’s the inaugural run of the Red Beans Road Show — a Louisiana- themed pop-up that brings a local culinary tradition to cities outside south Louisiana. Like the home-style Monday night tradition, the Roadshow showcases a simple dish and brings folks to the table for a night of good conversation and everyday revelry. Anyone who’s been to my house on a red beans Monday would recognize the setup — casual table for 8-10 folks, set up family style with minimal fuss, muss or bother. Except tonight,

ended up being a practical second language, an ingrained survival skill that only really blossomed when I got my first real post- dormitory apartment kitchen. I learned how to make the simple, filling dishes that are the backbone of any Louisiana repertoire — red sauce, gumbo, smothered steak and (of course) red beans. The historical joy of red beans is that the dish makes it easy to feed a table full of hungry people for (as the commercials put it) “pennies on the dollar.”With a little good sausage and a few hours of cooking time, I could feed 10 folks in a way that would make my mama proud. The whole event took a little sauté time, a long slow cook and a loaf of French bread. In 1991, after a couple of years in California, I lit out on a year-long road trip in my first actual vehicle — a dirt-colored, 1979 Datsun pickup truck with no AC and a copious amount of body corrosion. Its name was Bootsy BLT (named after Mr. Collins of Funkadelic fame and its tagline “Built Like a Tank”). During the yearlong trip, this trusty steed would carry me on a 30,000-mile mosey through 39 of the 48 contiguous states. During this long-form road trip, I essentially couch-surfed my way across the country — visiting friends and relations for a few nights at a shot — so I decided to pack a little kitchen crate inside the cab of my truck. Just the hardware fundamentals — a big pot, good knife, cast iron skillet, cutting board and small rice cooker — all of which fit nicely in a double-width

at Johnny’s Half Shell on Capitol Hill, we’re setting 10 tables instead of one and the dining room is a stone’s throw from the iconic, brightly lit Capitol dome. 80 folks — many friends or friends of friends, Louisiana expats or other interested parties — circulate with a glass of wine, taking an occasional deviled egg from a passed tray and relax a bit. Ann Cashion, a native of Jackson, Mississippi, and long-time lover of

plastic milk crate. With this bare-bones kit, I could roll into just about ANY friend’s kitchen and whip up dinner (as it turns out, one of the most appreciated Cabana Boy skills of all).

During that year, I honed my few on-demand dishes that my hosts repeatedly requested. I did a gumbo for 20 in a Brooklyn apartment that was basically a shoebox with a fire escape. I learned the value of checking pilot-light status after triggering a VERY MINOR gas explosion in my cousin’s grad school apartment.

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MY ROUSES EVERYDAY JANUARY | FEBRUARY 2016