Restaurateurs are buying meats, fish, cheeses and other dairy products, eggs, vegetables, mushrooms, fruits, and more from local farmers and growers and creating some amazing dishes in their restaurants. The purpose is to provide customers with the freshest food possible while supporting the local food economy. Everybody knows that fresher is always better. Especially since so many of our food products are exposed to chemicals and lose much of their nutritional value before they reach our table.
We are living in a day and age where a vast majority of children think that milk and eggs are made at the grocery store. With the mass production of food these days, it seems that farming is a dying art. But, every day I hear mention of more and more farms across the state of Mississippi who are managing to survive and prosper. It's our responsibility to teach our children about where food comes from and how to make healthy choices when deciding what to eat.
Robert St. John of the Purple Parrot Cafe and Crescent City Grill in Hattiesburg is a big supporter of this sustainable food movement and is doing a great job getting the word out around the state. Last week, he announced on Facebook that the Purple Parrot was hosting its Inaugural Farm to Table Summer Supper. I'm always looking for a new culinary adventure and knew I had to be a part of this one.
The meal consisted of five courses with wine pairings for each one. Almost every ingredient was grown or produced within a 75 mile radius of Hattiesburg. Waiting on the table when we arrived, was a starter course of Proscuitto & Melon. It consisted of a ball of cantaloupe topped with goat cheese and proscuitto from Benton's Country Hams. The delicious blend of the salty and sweet flavors made a perfect summertime appetizer.
The real appetizer was Crystal Seas Oysters, which consisted of a half shell oyster with pickled watermelon rind, grilled oyster with spicy garlic butter, and a cornmeal crusted BLT oyster. Oysters are bought fresh from Quality Seafood in Biloxi. They go pretty much straight from the boat to the restaurant.
The next course was a Triple Tail, which was a ragout of local heirloom vegetables, fresh grouper, Mississippi shiitake mushrooms, and jumbo lump crab. The mushrooms come from right here in Lawrence County. Mississippi Natural Products in New Hebron is a co-op that manufactures blocks on which to grow the mushrooms. A friend of mine, Heather Smith of Smith Lake Farms in Brookhaven, was at our table and explained how, as members of the co-op, they get the blocks from MNP to grow the mushrooms, then send them back for packaging and distribution. It's an interesting operation that I hope to go see for myself very soon.
The Duroc Pork Belly was my favorite entree of the evening. The pork belly had been braised for 12 hours for ultimate flavor and tenderness. It was served alongside a succotash of fresh vegetables, crispy grit cake, and a poached egg. As my 5-year old nephew says, there was a party in my tummy. Needless to say, I all but licked my plate.
The final entree was Gumbo. This was not your ordinary gumbo, though. It was a "deconstructed" gumbo. The rice was surrounded by pickled okra, chicken, andouille, country ham, and a dark roux sauce. I can honestly say I've never had anything quite like it before in terms of flavor and presentation. It's a great way to turn a dish that's often thought of as cold weather food into a summertime dish.
And last but not least, my favorite course of any meal - dessert! The Peach Upside Down Cake did not disappoint. It featured a mini pound cake layered with a half of a peach that had been bruleed and topped with vanilla bean ice cream. It was a light and refreshing finale to a phenomenal meal. The peaches were grown just next door in Walthall County.
The celebrity of the evening was Allan Benton of Benton's Country Hams in Madisonville, Tenn. Benton, a self-proclaimed hillbilly, has been smoking and curing pork since 1973 in the countryside of Tennessee. He does it the way our forefathers did it by slow curing in salt and brown sugar for sometimes up to a year. I've visited his operation and it is the best bacon, sausage, and ham you will ever eat. He told me that it makes him so happy to hear Mississippi folks rave about his products. He says a New Yorker can be fooled because they don't know what good bacon tastes like, but Mississippians know their pork. So, if they say it's good, it must be good. Benton is an humble soul who is overwhelmed and amazed by the recent surge in his business. He now ships his products to gourmet chefs across the country. While he's proud of what he does, he gives credit to the chefs and what they do with it. His bacon and proscuitto are favorites among the chefs he sells to. Besides St. John, famous chefs like John Besh and Emeril Lagasse are some of his regular customers.
Purple Parrot Chef Jeremy Nottke outdid himself. He has a lot to be proud of these days, as the Purple Parrot recently received two coveted awards in the restaurant industry. PPC and its sister, Crescent City Grill, was awarded their second Wine Spectator "Best of" Award of Excellence. This is quite an honor considering that Louisiana has 11 winners, Tennessee three, Alabama one, and Arkansas zero. And to top that off, AAA just voted them the second-best fine dining restaurant in the South, just behind Commander's Palace in New Orleans. That's pretty impressive. Robert St. John, you make us proud to call you one of our own. Thanks again for a fantastic evening.
With summertime comes the abundance of fresh vegetables grown in your own garden or nearby. If you don't have a garden, find a local farmer or farmer's market and start your own farm to table movement - right in your own kitchen!
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