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HUNTING

knew I still had it. You can take the chef out of Mississippi, but you can’t take the Mississippi out of the chef.” ​It was in New York where Rushing met his wife Allison Vines-Rushing. The two cooked together at Jack’s Luxury Oyster Bar, a New Orleans themed restaurant in New York where Vines-Rushing was executive chef and won a 2004 James Beard Award for her work. They opened Longbranch in Abita Springs in 2005. In 2007, they followed with MiLa in the New Orleans’ Central Business District.They also wrote a cookbook, Southern Comfort : A NewTake on the Recipes We Grew Up With , which was a 2013 James Beard Award finalist.The book is available online and at area bookstores. The couple shuttered MiLa in 2014 shortly after Rushing left to become executive chef at Brennan’s Restaurant in the French Quarter. Vines-Rushing wanted to be home for their two young children, Ida Lou and Rosco. But with the kids now in school, she’s back in the commercial kitchen, teaching private classes and doing monthly pop-ups at Jacques-Imo’s Café. The couple still cooks together at home in New Orleans, and quail is often on the menu. Rushing uses a variety of recipes. “I’ll make a simple marinade of olive oil and balsamic vinegar, then grill it.You get a great lacquer to skin. I also make a Vietnamese marinade with palm sugar or coconut sugar, garlic, lime juice, sliced jalapeños and fish sauce. I’d put that version up against any quail I’ve ever eaten.” Rushing was a James Beard Award finalist in 2015 and 2016.

A Quail of Two Cities by Marcy, Rouses Creative Director

I t’s not uncommon to see little quail families trotting along the side of the road in Tylertown, Mississippi, mom in the front, a row of babies following behind. Chef Slade Rushing recalls one such Sunday encounter. “We were driving home from church when my dad spotted a covey of adult quail walking next to the road. He got out of the car in his Sunday suit and cowboy boots, popped the trunk, grabbed his 12-guage, and boom-boom- boom-boom-boom-boom, he took out six quail. We had them that day for supper.” Mississippi quail is a popular selection in Rouses Butcher Shop, especially around the holidays. It’s available semi-boneless and deboned.“People expect quail to have a liver-y flavor like dove or wild duck,” says Rushing, “but it has more of a red meat flavor.” Tylertown is near the city of McComb, where Rushing was born. The area has the perfect climate and environment for bobwhite quail, with its hills and hollows (or “hollers” as Rushing calls them), trees (timberland, pine and oakwood), and fields of hay. “The quails like to nestle in the hay fields. You roam the hollows and when you hear them, you can send a bird dog in to wrestle them out of the grass.”

Rushing’s father Doug, owned a real estate company with offices in Tylertown and McComb. “He knew everyone in the state of Mississippi and most of Louisiana, too. He did some business with Donald Rouse and was very proud of the grocery’s success.” Doug Rushing taught Slade and his two older sisters and older brother how to fish and hunt. “Every time dad got a property listing, he’d finagle the hunting rights with it, or the fishing rights if they had a pond.” Quail hunting lessons started at a young age. “I probably went quail hunting for the first time when I was eight. I had a 4-10 single shot — it’s pretty hard to kill a bird with a 4-10. Eight-year-olds are pretty fidgety and quails are very skittish — they have good survival instincts. I didn’t kill anything. Over the years I’ve learned you have to be very stealthy when you hunt. And that you need a 12-gauge.” Doug Rushing passed away in February this year. “My dad really instilled in us a love of the outdoors. He took us fishing in Venice and Grand Isle. We’d run trout lines on the Bogue Chitto River. He took us elk hunting in Colorado. One November when I was cooking in New York, he flew my brother and me up to Saskatchewan to hunt whitetail deer. I shot an 8-point buck, and I couldn’t stop smiling because I

Slade Rushing photo courtesy Ralph Brennan Restaurant Group

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