Citizens in the U.S. South often get a bad rap. But it’s not due to lack of humor. In a sense, they’re very much like the Swedish pop group, ABBA; where we think we’re laughing at them, but they’re really laughing at themself, and asking us to join along.

I just received this from Amber Sutton of It’s a Southern Thing. It’s devoid of any recipes, but filled with good old fashion Southern fun.

But, first, here’s my little story, a story about mayonnaise when I once took a delightful trip to Mahón, the capital and second largest city of Menorca, Spain. A chef presented a sauce, which he referred to as, mahonnaise. It was created with only two ingredients: eggs and oil. And the result was, as I should say in Dixie, Southernly Good!

Nevertheless, many places lay claim to be the birth of mayonnaise, with southwestern France as the most vocal. But, I still really think its origin can be traced to Mahón, which is also the home of Mahón Gin, made from high-quality wine alcohol, mixed with Pyrenean juniper berries, as well as other aromatic herbs.

Now that I’m at it, there’s Avarcas – also known as Abarcasor Menorquinas – the traditional sandals of Menorca, where the soles are made from the rubber tread of a used tire. They last forever, in fact, yesterday I had planned to wear my life-long pair for an afternoon of beachcombing along Seattle’s Golden Gardens – but as a rather rain intolerant Angelino, I cancelled my trip due to reports of bad weather. This was much to the chagrin of my Seattle friends, where daily bad weather is not unusual and something to be ignored. They also don’t seem to mind wading in rock-infested waters with old tennis shoes to avoid blood on their feet, and then staggering out of the frigid NW water, and tangled in seaweed, too.

Okay, that was fun, now back to Potato Salad, but not necessarily Southern.

There’s a particularly tantalizing French potato salad from France, which we curiously refer to here as French Potato Salad, which is made with plenty of mayonnaise and delicately chopped hard boiled eggs. But, there’s also another, which stems from Eastern Europe, without eggs and mayonnaise, but with an abundant amount of more potatoes, vinegar and mustard. It can taste a bit harsh to the innocent palate, but I find it to be equally tasteful and, well, invigorating.

And how could I forget…

Yes, that I had forgot that there was a carefully cultivated root, high in the Peruvian and Bolivian Andes, that over many millenniums, became what we know today as the Potato. And through the Columbian Exchange – from the New World to the Old- life in the European nations of the North transitioned to a new form of nutrients,no longer having rely on wheat from the warm Mediterranean climate.

But, in the end, whether it’s mayonnaise or mustard with plenty of vinegar in your potato salad, it’s all about your preference of the palate, but for me; I seem to adore them all.

And, I try not laugh when I read about Southern Things; for it’s far more than finger lickin’ good, getting too drunk and laughing too loud, and hitting on a cousin at a family barbecue — how could I even dare, with the names of William Faulker, Mark Twain, Thomas Wolfe, Flannery O’Connor, Tennessee Williams, William Dickey, Pat Conroy, William Saroyan, John Kennedy Toole, Walker Percy and Truman Capote, with his blemishes and all. Now, I’ve just stolen and revised a line from and Adam Sandlers’ Chanukah Song: “And what do they all have in common? All Southerners!”
— Audrey

In defense of Southern ‘salads’ because who needs lettuce anyway?

By Amber Sutton

We Southerners get a lot of grief for a lot of things when it comes to our common kitchen practices, and one of those things is our affection for throwing the word “salad” into the name of dishes that aren’t really salads (to them) but are really delicious (to everyone).

I should start off by saying as someone who has lived my entire life in the South, it’s something I hadn’t honestly given a-whole-lot of thought until I started working at It’s a Southern Thing and realized that calling things that seem to involve every ingredient under the sun except lettuce a “salad” is, well, a Southern thing to do.

This is where I get stuck, though. Who said lettuce is a necessary ingredient when it comes to making a salad in the first place? After all, the official definition of a salad, according to Oxford Languages, is “a cold dish of various mixtures of raw or cooked vegetables, usually seasoned with oil, vinegar, or other dressing and sometimes accompanied by meat, fish, or other ingredients,”

Potato salad, strawberry-pretzel salad, pasta salad, tomato-cracker salad, egg salad, chicken salad, tuna salad, pear salad, Coke salad, ambrosia salad and many other iconic Southern salads easily fit that description, so the conclusion I’ve drawn is that Southerners actually just have a better grasp on what a salad can be.

So, are all those salad cynics just jealous because Southerners don’t have to settle for sad salads consisting of a handful of lettuce and raw vegetables coated in ranch dressing? Because the South had the audacity to see the potential for salads to be treated as what they basically are — casseroles you keep cold? That’s definitely what it seems like.

Now the next argument that will likely be made is how salads are supposed to be healthy and the South’s most popular salads typically aren’t on account of usually involving a heavy helping of mayonnaise or cheese or sugar. And there’s probably some truth to that — with lettuce coming in at all of five calories per cup, there’s not much out there that is as healthy as your standard garden salad. There’s also not much on its level when it comes to lacking in flavor.

See, we like to start our salads off using a healthy(ish) ingredient, and then add a kick of taste so that we, believe it or not, actually want to eat it. That’s the goal, right? Because many folks spend the entire car ride to the potluck daydreaming about getting a scoop or two of Granny’s famous potato salad, but we’re pretty sure no one in the history of time has said “man, I have been thinking about this garden salad for days.”

So yeah, we may coat the broccoli in our broccoli salad with bacon, cheese and a sweet, creamy dressing before we eat it, but we also enjoy eating it. That’s the real difference between Southern salads and the salads you’ll find elsewhere — we’re not eating them because we’re trying to be healthy. We’re eating them because we want to.

So, you know what, y’all can keep giving us grief about what dishes we call salads if it means we get an extra serving of Mama’s macaroni salad. We imagine swallowing your pride is pretty hard to do when all you’ve got to wash it down is some boring lettuce and a couple grape tomatoes anyway.

The post The Southern Potato Salad of the Great U.S. South appeared first on Traveling Archive.

In fall, 2019, I set out for the West Village in a monsoon. It was the last night of a small, culturally significant exhibit that I wanted to catch. At the designated address, I walked into a darkened courtyard, seemingly the patio of a shuttered restaurant on the far side of the enclosure, certainly not a gallery. More perplexingly, the doors to the eatery were locked. I looked at the address again, walked back out to the street, hunted for the building number, scratched my head, and plunged into the shadowy patio again. Where the heck was this elusive exhibit? Aha! I spied a doorway, kitty-corner, and when I opened the door, I figuratively tumbled through the looking glass, into the gallery!

Well, expect the reverse prelude to your dining experience at Frevo, (a Portuguese word meaning to boil, simmer, seethe), and, indeed, this boite percolates with appetizing, mouthwatering offerings. You’ll hit the proverbial jackpot if you can score a reservation here (the restaurant serves dinner only, see below), as The New York Times gave it two stars, when it opened in spring, 2019. Be forewarned to expect an experience that is the polar opposite of my autumnal outing, when I went from a barely lit restaurant into an art gallery.

At 48 West 8th Street, you’ll commence your evening in a jewel box of an art gallery. Barely six paintings hang on the white plaster and red-brick walls. The brightly lit space is no larger than 14′ x 18′. This is a restaurant? Here, a gracious young woman will greet you when you query, “I was looking for Frevo. I’m not sure I’m in the right place.” “Yes,” she’ll retort. “You’re here!” But, you’ll wonder, just where is the restaurant? Well, voila! An outsize canvas, hinged to the wall, swings away, and there you are, in the entryway of Frevo. Glide through the doorway and into the atmospherically lit, intimate dining room, and experience the transformation.

Frevo is an unusual restaurant, in that it seats a mere (but, certainly fortunate) 18 diners at a long, bar-style counter; there is a chef’s table in the corner, accommodating up to six. (COVID restrictions are enforced, so, at present only 10 may dine at the counter.) I was wondering just how could someone truly relax sitting on a bar stool long enough to appreciate a multi-course, haute cuisine meal? However, rest assured, the charcoal-gray, upholstered stools have seat backs, and are extremely comfortable. During non-COVID times, Frevo has two seatings, each with a slightly flexible window for arrival; with the dining times staggered, there is no orchestrated banquet-style service, where everyone is presented each course in an assembly line, as they would be at a banquet for 500 at a wedding, say. (During this COVID-altered time warp, the restaurant has changed its policies, to include one seating weekdays, and two seatings, weekends; see the info below.)

Seated at the bar, you face the work counter where the kitchen staff of four (sous chef, pastry chef, and two line cooks) in long white aprons are busy getting toothsome meals prepared and plated. They do this seamlessly, quietly, like ninjas. I swear, I never even saw an open flame, and I’d testify in court that there isn’t one! There is, indeed, a tiny kitchen in the back netherworld of the restaurant, but it is used, at least during meal service, for dishwashing, and earlier in the day, for prep. All the action, intriguingly, takes place right in front of you, yet you do not see it happening. A black-cloaked busman removes plates and restores flatware magically. (And, a propos flatware, the gorgeous dinner knives are distinctively unique, and each is perched on a cross-section of polished bone, so that the utensil stands at attention.) Two maître d’s do the more serious menu consulting with diners, in case you don’t or can’t eat one of the courses. (There are always substitutions for particular courses for those who have dietary restrictions—as in, “I can’t eat oysters,” or some such—although during this altered time, Frevo cannot accommodate a vegan, vegetarian, or lactose-free diet for its multi-course meal.)

Inspired by classic French cuisine, Frevo’s co-owner and chef, Brazilian-born Franco Sampogna, has crafted a menu that changes seasonally. Simplicity is the keynote, but that refined menu is exquisitely nuanced, with surprising flavors. For example, the night I dined in the spring (just before lockdown), the second course was seasonal (and prized) white asparagus, with sorrel and blood orange. At another time, that course was a cup of remarkably tasty and creamy hummus, accented with crispy quinoa and chives. Our first course was hamachi, with coconut and sea urchin, topped with golden kaluga caviar; I passed on the raw hamachi (but my dining companion raved), while I was offered one of the most mouthwatering dishes I’ve ever savored—a thick  artichoke soup, smothered in black truffles, punctuated with foamy, ethereal truffle juice and bread crumbs. I can still taste it and am still dreaming about it. I did not have to dream long—as I returned for the take-out Christmas menu and ordered extra soup!

After culinary school, Sampogna further advanced his education, working under Michelin-starred chefs Fabrice Vulin (at a Chèvre d’Or in the South of France); Guy Savoy (at the Rue Troyon in Paris); and Alain Ducasse (at the Hotel Plaza Athénée, also in Paris). His extensive in-kitchen training is apparent in the artful amalgam of flavors he has melded into each course.

I could not believe how tasty the celery root tagliatelle pasta course was, and, as it was accented with black truffles, it was all the more satiating. That was followed by a delectable scallop dish, with crispy salsify, resting on an airy cloud of roasted salsify. When the main course arrived, chicken Albufera (named for the Duke of Albufera), it looked like a chocolate brownie, smothered in hot fudge sauce, bisected with thin, striated lines of vanilla crème. Of course, it was not; it was a lovely three-inch square of poached, tender chicken, in a blackened (with squid ink), cognac-infused cream sauce. It was simply heavenly. Celestial is also an adjective suitable for the luscious dessert — dulce de leche gelato, hazelnut foam, with caramel and a sugary tuile.

A cheese course, 36-month-aged comté de garde from French cheese monger Fromagerie Antony, was served with a giant, crispy, house-made, tuile-like bread-cracker, the perfect accompaniment to the paper-thin, nutty cheese.

And, oh, yes, if you are interested, the paintings in the foyer-entryway are for sale. They have been created by the French artist Toma-L., whose work Chef Sampogna discovered in Paris. When Sampogna and his partner, restaurant manager, Portuguese-born Bernardo Silva, were planning Frevo, they invited the painter to the city to create art for the restaurant and gallery (which, parenthetically, was previously a panini restaurant). The idea was to create artwork that reflected the constant state of vibrancy and exhilaration that Gotham engenders, and that would suggest the simmering or bubbling spirit of the restaurant.

If you opt to buy the painting that is Frevo’s front door, then Toma-L. will simply have to create a new doorway for Alice and her anointed guests who are lucky enough to snag some of the precious seats at Frevo.

The Details:

Frevo Restaurant, 48 West 8th Street, New York City, NY  10011; 646-455-0804

Open for dinner only: Tuesday through Thursday, at 7 pm; Friday and Saturday, two dinner seatings, 5:30 and 8:30 pm.

Reservations, a must. The tariff for dinner is $138 per person; an additional $88 for the basic wine-pairing; $220 for the premium wine-pairing.  There are a few other supplemental fees for extras, if desired, such as additional caviar.  (Frevo, however, is a non-tipping restaurant.)

View the current menu

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