October 22, 2013: Ms. Nathalie Dupree, best-selling author, television star, and founding Board Member of the Charleston Food & Wine Festival, was the guest speaker at the Historic Charleston Rotary meeting on October 22, 2013. Ms. Dupree is a prolific author, and her latest book, “Mastering the Art of Southern Cooking”, earned her a third James Beard Award. Rotarian Mike Sabo (another founding Board Member for the Festival), who introduced Ms. Dupree, noted that when any major food industry writer, chef, or restaurateur visits Charleston, their first stop is always Ms. Dupree’s house. She has been featured in the New York Times, and various other major publications, and has performed segments on all of the major morning shows such as Good Morning America in addition to her own cooking shows on various networks.
Ms. Dupree noted that she had two main messages for the day, first she wanted to address the issue of “food deserts” in Charleston and then discuss Southern Cooking. On the issue of “food deserts” (holes in an urban environment where traditional grocery stores are not present – thus forcing local residents to shop for food at available convenience stores) Ms. Dupree reported that she was working with the Charleston Food Bank, as South Carolina has 80 food deserts in the state, to try to help facilitate lower-income folks being able to get better food than available at convenience stores. She drew the comparison of food to power – indicating that to have control of access to food was power, and that lack of availability leads to poor choices when it comes to shopping. She also challenged everyone to try to shop for their staples for their families by taking a taxi or a bus so that they could see just how hard it was to effectively procure what you would need in a weeks’ time. She also linked misuse of assistance programs like food stamps to lack of availability of shopping options. She reported that she was working to get a bus for the Food Bank to facilitate donation pick up and taking people who need food to locations where they could get it. She stated that we need to make sure that we are working to feed “our entire community”.
Ms. Dupree then shifted her focus to the Southern Cooking Movement, noting that she had participated in the Cook It Raw event held that week in Charleston. She stated “Southern food has a rhythm of its own”, and by her estimation Charleston had the richest cooking history in the nation. She recounted owning her first restaurant, for which she grew her own food and had to locally source what she could find. This led to an ever changing menu, but she learned she could put anything together understanding the basic methods of Southern Cooking.
Biscuits were a trouble for her at first. She said that she would watch a woman who worked for her, Kate, use a wide bowl to mix her ingredients, realizing the wide bowl allowed for an even mixing of the ingredients and a consistent combination of them – which led to “a perfect symmetry of liquid and flour resulting in a perfect dough, formed into perfect biscuits”, but that it took her a long time to observe and understand it all. “It took forever to make biscuits like Kate”, she said. Ms. Dupree suggested that if you want to learn how to make perfect biscuits, that you get a $10 bag of flour and lock the door to the kitchen until you have perfected it. Her quick recall of the recipe for Best Biscuits is as follows:
INGREDIENTS
Whipping Cream
Self- Rising White Lily Flour
INSTRUCTIONS
Combine in a 2:1 ratio & mix (in a wide bowl)
Pat out
Fold
Repeat
Repeat
With ½ inch thick dough – cut out your biscuits
Place close together in a baking pan
Bake
Ms. Dupree also discussed fried chicken and why she did a book on it. “No one knows how to cut up a chicken anymore”, she said was the reason why people don’t cook it themselves. Also, grocery stores don’t sell small chickens that are easy to cut up. When talking about pre-cut chicken she said, “Those legs haven’t ever seen each other before!” She stated that she was next going to focus on Low Country Cooking as her next project.
She directed the audience to look for a Charleston Magazine story next month on the history of baking in Charleston and its rich story. When asked about her favorite Charleston restaurant, she demurred, “I hate to list them, but I can tell you that I have never had a bad meal at Hominy Grill or SNOB”. When asked how a chef puts their signature on food in a big restaurant she said, “It’s hard, I’m not sure, but I’ve had three restaurants – and I’m over it!”
Author’s Note-Ms. Dupree’s Books are available for sale at the Charleston Preservation Society, and she will happily sign it for you if you place an order there.
Submitted by Christine Wilkinson