{"id":4601,"date":"2011-07-29T08:50:42","date_gmt":"2011-07-29T12:50:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/?p=4601"},"modified":"2011-07-29T09:36:11","modified_gmt":"2011-07-29T13:36:11","slug":"a-master-chef%e2%80%99s-guide-to-cooking-local","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/2011\/07\/a-master-chef%e2%80%99s-guide-to-cooking-local\/","title":{"rendered":"A Master Chef\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Guide to Cooking Local"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong><em>by Vicky Dickson<\/em><\/strong><br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/02\/reader.100.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/02\/reader.100.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"reader.100\" width=\"100\" height=\"100\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-4092\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/02\/reader.100.jpg 100w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/02\/reader.100-80x80.jpg 80w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 100px) 100vw, 100px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>It took a trip to Italy to make Sheri Castle appreciate her own culinary heritage. The discovery the Chapel Hill cookbook author and cooking teacher made in that country was, she says, a real epiphany:<!--more--> Though she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d put Italian cooking on something of a pedestal and had come to Italy to learn how to be a better Mediterranean cook, Castle began to realize that the cooking she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d grown up with in the Blue Ridge Mountains was just as worthy, just as important a reflection of heritage and culture, as anything she encountered overseas. The best Italian meals she ate echoed Castle\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s grandmother\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s insistence on using only the freshest locally grown produce, as well as the Southern cook\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s use of meat as a condiment rather than as a main dish. So Castle returned home a better Southern cook as well as a Mediterranean one.<br \/>\n<figure id=\"attachment_4602\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-4602\" style=\"width: 350px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/Reader.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/Reader.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"Reader\" width=\"350\" height=\"348\" class=\"size-full wp-image-4602\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/Reader.jpg 350w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/Reader-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/Reader-300x298.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/Reader-301x300.jpg 301w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/Reader-80x80.jpg 80w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 350px) 100vw, 350px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-4602\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sheri Castle       Photo by Stewart Waller<\/figcaption><\/figure><br \/>\nCastle didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t originally set her sights on a cookbook-writing career. As the first person in her family to go to college, she was regarded as the one \u00e2\u20ac\u0153who wouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have to cook.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d But even though she majored in journalism and went on to jobs where she wrote legal briefs and conducted computer-based training, Castle was always \u00e2\u20ac\u0153the one who cooked\u00e2\u20ac\u009d in her workplace. So it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not too surprising that after her daughter was born, Castle decided to take a break from the corporate world to teach cooking. <\/p>\n<p>Her cooking classes led to a column for the Triangle\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s now-defunct Spectator, and then to other food columns, as well as ghostwriting and recipe-testing jobs for cookbook writers like Crook\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Corner\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Bill Smith and Foster\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Market\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Sara Foster. That experience probably made it inevitable that Castle would eventually dedicate herself and her kitchen to the year\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s worth of shopping, prepping, cooking and cleaning demanded by the recipes that would become The New Southern Garden Cookbook.<\/p>\n<p>It was a process that involved winnowing somewhere between 1,250 and 1,500 different recipes down to 350. Working in her kitchen with two computers, a notepad and different-colored pens, and full sets of both English and metric measuring tools, Castle tested as many as eight different versions of each recipe. (Sometimes those eight versions made up her family\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s dinner that night.)<br \/>\nThe result is a cookbook that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a true pleasure to read and to cook from. The way it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s organized, in chapters that are centered on ingredients rather than dish types (with titles from \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Apples\u00e2\u20ac\u009d to \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Zucchini\u00e2\u20ac\u009d), makes it perfect for cooks who want to base their meals on what they find at the farmers\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 market or in their CSA boxes \u00e2\u20ac\u201c who want to cook with the freshest, locally grown produce.<\/p>\n<p>If you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re beginning to suspect that Castle is something of an evangelist for locally grown food, you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re right. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t continue to live on the opposite side of the country from where our food is grown,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she says.<br \/>\nShe\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not rigid in that philosophy: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Eating local isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t all-or-nothing.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d (And who out there wants to give up banana pudding?) But being a person who \u00e2\u20ac\u0153can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t walk through a market without grinning like a fool,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she wants to help people share her love of good, healthy food. <\/p>\n<p>With <em>The New Southern Garden Cookbook<\/em>, Castle wants to remedy the fact that \u00e2\u20ac\u0153a lot of people have given up on certain foods because they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve never had a good version.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Her succotash recipe will do just that, so give it a try. <\/p>\n<p><strong>Lit Notes<br \/>\n<\/strong>Local <strong>Clyde Edgerton<\/strong> fans have a great opportunity coming up this weekend, with the acclaimed North Carolina writer, artist and musician scheduled to make four Triangle appearances to read from his new novel, <em>The Night Train<\/em>. He\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll be at Raleigh\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Quail Ridge Books at 7:30 p.m. July 28, Durham\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Regulator Bookshop at 7 p.m. July 29, McIntyre\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s at 11 a.m. July 30 and Flyleaf at 6 p.m. July 30. Since Edgerton is just as entertaining to listen to as his books are to read, you won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t want to miss the chance to see him.<\/p>\n<p>Young-adult author and musician <strong>John Claude Bemis<\/strong> will be at Flyleaf at 2 p.m. on Aug. 28 to present The White City, the conclusion to his thrilling <em>Clockwork Dark<\/em> trilogy. The event, which is open to all, is the wrap-up to Flyleaf\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Summer Readers club, and is sure to include music and other fun.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Vicky Dickson It took a trip to Italy to make Sheri Castle appreciate her own culinary heritage. The discovery the Chapel Hill cookbook author and cooking teacher made in that country was, she says, a real epiphany:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[319],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4601","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-featured"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4601","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4601"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4601\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4608,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4601\/revisions\/4608"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/mill\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}