Down Home with the Borzoi Cooks

This past Fourth of July weekend called for a cookout of epic proportions—and who better to supply the vittles but Pat and Gina Neely? I’ve been working on their fun new cookbook, Down Home with the Neelys, since its publication in May, and I was itching to try out a couple of their recipes.

The gang and I eventually settled on the following menu:

Fried Green Tomatoes with Basil Mayonnaise
Memphis-Style Strip with Beer and Molasses Sauce
Peabody Mint Juleps

I am lucky enough to live in one of those rare New York apartments with a backyard. Okay, maybe “backyard” is overstating the truth—it’s really more of a blocked-in courtyard, ringed with barbed wire. But it has a grill, and where there is a grill, there is a Neelys recipe aching to be made.

I’ve learned the hard way that the key to a successful dinner is doing the prep work in advance. So two nights before I invited the Knopf gang over to my place, I prepared the basil mayonnaise.

2 cups loosely packed fresh basil leaves
1 cup mayonnaise
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1 tablespoon Creole mustard
Kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper

Pulse the basil, mayonnaise, lemon juice, and mustard in a food processor fitted with a metal blade until smooth, then transfer to small bowl. Season with salt and pepper.

The Basil Mayonnaise can be made 1 day ahead. Cover and refrigerate.

(Recipe excerpted from Down Home with the Neelys by Patrick and Gina Neely. Copyright 2009 by Patrick Neely and Gina Neely. Excerpted with permission by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced without permission in writing from the publisher.)

In the first of many small disasters orbiting around this cooking attempt, my ancient food processor would not turn on! The ole processor had been in rather obvious distress for some time, but I obstinately believed in its ability to process food indefinitely. Fortunately, I complained loudly enough that my boyfriend took apart the food processor, looked at the pieces, and put it back together again. Magically, the food processor worked! Funny how kitchen appliances work that way. All the same, I have since ordered a new food processor.

There’s my stalwart processing friend in the background.

On the day of the actual cooking, we began—as any cook should—with the cocktails.

1/3 cup water
2/3 cup sugar, plus more for garnish (oops, in retrospect, I forgot the sugar garnish)
2 bunches fresh mint leaves, roughly torn and bruised, plus additional sprigs for garnish
One 750 ml bottle (!) of Maker’s Mark whiskey

Bring the water, sugar, and mint leaves to a boil in a medium saucepan. Reduce the heat and simmer briefly, stirring, until the sugar dissolves completely. Cool the syrup completely, then strain it into a large pitcher. Add the whiskey, and stir to combine. Serve immediately in chilled julep glasses with crushed ice and fresh sprigs of mint, for garnish. You can also return the whiskey/syrup mixture to the empty whiskey bottle and freeze overnight. It will freeze to a nice slushy consistency for serving on scorching afternoons.

(Recipe excerpted from Down Home with the Neelys by Patrick and Gina Neely. Copyright 2009 by Patrick Neely and Gina Neely. Excerpted with permission by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced without permission in writing from the publisher.)

The Neelys write that this mint julep recipe came from the Peabody Hotel in Memphis. The grand lobby of this hotel is called “the living room of the South,” after all the julep-drinking that goes on. My apartment was about to become “the living room of the Upper West Side.”

We had a special guest for tonight’s activity: a mini-dachshund named Frank. I had never tried it before, but cooking is much more fun with a dog!

Here’s the two bunches of mint, all boiled down.

And here’s an empty bottle of Maker’s Mark. I look a little nonplussed, because I’ve never poured bourbon straight into a serving pitcher before. True, we’re adding 1/3 of a cup of simple syrup, but…that’s it!

Do you want to know how ice cubes become crushed ice? Watch this informational video!

Sadly, I do not have julep glasses, so I had to substitute with Scotch glasses. I don’t believe the end result was any less classy for it.

On to the beer and molasses steak sauce! Lauren shows us the secret ingredient:

Every great journey, culinary or otherwise, rests on the shoulders of a great navigator. Mary, with Xeroxed recipe in hand (my secret for not getting sauce all over my nice Knopf cookbooks), shepherds us through the sauce-making process.

Follow along with us here:

Three 16-ounce, 1/2-inch-thick prime-aged New York strip steaks
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
Kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper
2 teaspoons butter
2 strips thick-sliced bacon, cut into ½-inch pieces
½ medium onion, finely diced
1 garlic clove, minced
1 cup ketchup
¼ cup molasses
¼ cup apple cider
¼ cup lager-style beer
1 tablespoon honey
1 tablespoon prepared yellow mustard
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
1 ½ teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
½ teaspoon cayenne pepper
½ teaspoon paprika

Rub the steaks with the oil and season generously with salt and pepper.

Melt the butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Add the bacon, onion, and garlic, and sauté for 3 minutes, or until softened. Add the rest of the ingredients, bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to low, and simmer until the sauce is reduced and thickened, 15 to 20 minutes.

Preheat the grill or a grill pan to medium-high. Grill the steaks for about 3 minutes per side for medium-rare; brush the steaks with sauce during the last 2 minutes of cooking time. Allow the steaks to rest for 10 minutes, then slice on the diagonal, and serve with the remaining sauce on the side.

(Recipe excerpted from Down Home with the Neelys by Patrick and Gina Neely. Copyright 2009 by Patrick Neely and Gina Neely. Excerpted with permission by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced without permission in writing from the publisher.)

Voilà, the sauce. My kitchen never smelled so good as when this sauce simmered on my stovetop. Let’s review what was happening in the backyard while the sauce was thickening:

Please ignore our very dirty grill rack.

Every BBQ needs a cheerleader to keep the grillmaster pumped and ready for action:

Meanwhile, we had some tomatoes to deep fry. Fried tomatoes generally rely on hard green tomatoes, but we had a great deal of trouble finding them. We checked Westside Market, the Chelsea Market, Trader Joe’s, Fairway—no dice! It appears that New York City, where you can find almost anything for the adventurous palate, does not keep any green tomatoes in stock. In lieu of the elusive green tomato, we used yellow tomatoes, which were slightly harder and less juicy than the red kind.

Remarkably, the tomatoes held up rather well.

Here’s how to prepare the tomatoes—no fryolater necessary:

6 hard green tomatoes, sliced ¼ inch thick
Kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper
¾ cup all-purpose flour
¾ cup well-shaken buttermilk
Dash hot sauce
¾ cup yellow cornmeal
1 ½ cup Japanese panko bread crumbs
Vegetable oil, for frying
1 recipe Basil Mayonnaise

Season the tomatoes with salt and pepper. Place the flour on a plate. Whisk together the buttermilk and hot sauce in a shallow bowl or a pie tin. Whisk together the cornmeal and panko bread crumbs in a separate pie tin.

Working with one green-tomato slice at a time, coat the tomato first in flour (knocking off excess), then in buttermilk, then finally in the cornmeal-bread crumb mixture. Transfer the breaded slice to a baking sheet, and repeat with the remaining slices.

Preheat the oven to 200?F. Line a second baking sheet with paper towels.

Heat ¾ inch of vegetable oil in a medium skillet to 350?F. Working in batches, fry the tomato slices until golden brown, about 2 minutes per side. Using a slotted spoon, transfer the cooked tomatoes to the prepared baking sheet, and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Keep the cooked tomatoes in the warm oven while you fry the remaining slices. Serve the tomatoes warm, with a generous dollop of Basil Mayonnaise.

(Recipe excerpted from Down Home with the Neelys by Patrick and Gina Neely. Copyright 2009 by Patrick Neely and Gina Neely. Excerpted with permission by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced without permission in writing from the publisher.)

Time to bring everything together: the strips, the tomatoes, and the juleps.

Everything tasted just as good as it looked. The tomatoes were a crowd favorite, although Frank clearly had a preference for the steak.

In the end, we cleaned our plates, with nothing but some sauce to spare—and thank goodness, because I can’t wait to pour that sauce on everything I make!

Pat and Gina, we salute you. Thanks for helping us kick off our Fourth of July weekend in delicious, finger-licking style.

Until next time,
Amy, Mary, Pam, Lauren, Bridget…and Alfred A. Knopf!