Damon Lee Fowler

One of our favorite meals at any time of year, but especially in the fall, is roasted chicken. Even though there are just two of us, I still crank up the oven and roast at least one a month—sometimes two. They're economical, easy to prepare, and, best of all, there's a stash of leftover roast chicken in the fridge, which is always a welcome thing.

There's so much one can do with a leftover roast bird beyond slicing it for sandwiches: Those slices can be reheated in leftover gravy; the meat can also be diced or chopped and folded into salads, casseroles pot pies, soups, or dumplings. And once the meat is mostly gone, the bones, skin, and scraps make exceptionally lovely broth with very little effort on the cook's part.

Still, there are days when we're craving roast chicken but I'm short on time (and regrettably, as I get older, energy), or Read More 

One thing I really miss about Savannah is the abundant seafood that we so took for granted in the Georgia lowcountry—especially the sweet inlet brown shrimp and blue crabs that teemed in the marsh creeks surrounding our city from spring until early December.

Unhappily, we can no longer take those things for granted. Our town doesn't have the luxury of a local seafood market selling fresh wild-caught shrimp or blue crab (even though we're within hollering distance of the Chesapeake Bay). So when we are near a reliable seafood vendor, I never miss the chance to buy a couple of pounds of shrimp. Read More 

Even though it's still technically summer for a few weeks longer, the unseasonally cool weather we've been enjoying here in Virginia has brought on a craving for the richer flavors of autumn.

One of the loveliest of those flavors is that classic Mediterranean combination for roasted and pot-roasted meat and poultry: garlic, rosemary, and white wine. It really knows no season, but especially when it's mated with pork, it becomes the very essence of fall and is one of the best ways I know to welcome the season.

My favorite way of pairing pork with those flavors is to coat a whole loin with salt, pepper, garlic, and fresh rosemary, then slowly oven-braise it in the wine until it's fork tender. Read More 

You might well wonder how a Southern boy with an English last name had the temerity to create a pasta dish and name it for a famous opera singer. If you aren't and couldn't care less, just skip to the recipe, which is awfully good if I do say it myself. But if, like most Southerners, you're a little curious (we prefer that to nosy), then here is how such an unlikely thing came about.

When legendary opera baritone Sherrill Milnes retired from singing, he and his wife, soprano Maria Zouves, founded V.O.I.C.Experience, an outreach training program for aspiring young singers. More than a decade later, they started working to bring that program to Savannah, Georgia. It took the form of The Savannah Voice Festival, and my musician husband helped to kick-start it at historic Christ Church, the parish he was serving at the time.

Thirteen years later, the festival is an established part of Savannah's summers. Timothy still produces the sacred music concert, accompanies singers, and offers vocal coaching. Meanwhile, I'm not a musician by any stretch, and my singing is like Scarlett O'Hara with her pistol: I can shoot straight, if I don't have to shoot too far. I'm just there to listen. And to cook.

Somewhere along the way,  Read More 

One of the things that gets Southerners through our infamously steamy summers is the abundance and almost endless variety of fresh produce that thrives in that moist heat. And while not all of it can be eaten right off the vine like a cucumber, melon, or tomato, it doesn't take much cooking to bring out the best in it.

One of my favorite ways to do that without having a kitchen meltdown is to cook the vegetables very simply and use them as a sauce for pasta. From artichokes to zucchini, if it grows in their gardens, Italian cooks have found a way to pair it with pasta. In Emilia-Romagna, their justly-famous velvety egg pasta, cut into long tagliatelle or fettuccine noodles, is frequently sauced with green peas or fava beans.

The idea is lovely with our native butterbeans (lima beans to some of you—but don't try to argue the point with a Southerner). Simply enhanced Read More 

It's cobbler season, when the fruit is at its peak and so is the heat and humidity. The last thing anybody wants to do is go in the kitchen, never mind a kitchen with an oven turned on. Still, Southern cooks will brave the heat for a cobbler just about any time, and after all, we don't have to stay in the room with it while it's baking.

This year cobbler season came just after I'd discovered that there was an actual, positive culinary reason for cinnamon-flavored whiskey to exist: it's the perfect flavoring for a lot of summer fruit, especially blueberries and stone-fruits such as peaches. Read More 

The up side of summer storms is that they often cool things down and offer some relief to that relentless, sticky Southern heat, however temporary. The wake of that tropical storm that blew through Virginia this week, however, has brought nothing but more withering heat and smothering humidity.

There's just so much cooking one can do under those conditions, and what little I have been doing involves things that I don't have to stand over, or that are in and out of the pan in a hurry: that cold summer squash puree from last month, cold minestrone finished with a spoonful of pesto, my grandmother's salmon cakes, Mrs. Randolph's whole okra that's done in four minutes and best enjoyed at room temperature, quick pasta sauces like zucchini sautéed with garlic and oil, and, of course, those lovely, cooling composed salads like salmagundi and salade nicoise.

But most composed salads require at least some cooking and for beating this heat, the ones on my mind now are those that don't require any cooking at all.

A favorite of those that has refreshed my appetite and gotten me through more oppressively hot summer afternoons than I can count Read More 

A sure sign of summer in a Southern kitchen is a bowl or window ledge full of vine-ripened tomatoes from the garden. But an even surer one in mine is a jug of cold soup in the refrigerator. From early June (May when we lived in Savannah) until well into September, there's at least one such jug or bowl of a soup that's as good cold as warm. Though it can be heated to warm us on the odd cool evening, it's mainly there to have cold, to soothe and stir heat-blunted appetites.

At the moment, there are actually two: this summer's first batch of vegetable soup (still not quite like my grandmother's, but getting there) and a summer squash puree with leeks and thyme.

I don't really follow a recipe anymore. It's the same basic formula Read More 

As the intense heat of summer blasts its way through Virginia, temperatures here are already hovering on the edge of record-breaking three digits and it's not even July. This is the very kind of heat we moved away from South Georgia to escape. But contrary to what some of our friends back in Savannah seem to think, The Old Dominion is still The South, and we were well aware that it never has been immune to that infamous Deep South summer heat.

One lovely way that old Virginians once dealt with that heat at the table was Salmagundi, an elegant composed salad that was as beautiful to look at as it was delicious.

Composed salads like this one seem quite modern, and yet people are often surprised to learn that it was old when English Colonials first settled in this place and decided to call it "Virginia." The reason for that surprise is the popular supposition that the progress of cooking through history has been linear, advancing in a straight trajectory Read More 

The way each of us meets summer is often wrapped in nostalgia. No matter what our age, we anticipate it as we did in childhood, as if we can play our way through its long days in carefree, barefoot abandon, refreshed from the heat by endless wedges of cold watermelon and dripping cones of ice cream. It's a bit odd, then, that for most of my adult life, I've welcomed summer by making something I never had in my childhood: a classic French salade niçoise.

In a convoluted way it does go back: As a boy I loved canned tuna and olives, and this is both—with a French accent, no less. But that's a real stretch.

After all these years of making it, like most who love it, I've of course developed some very definite ideas about what belongs in a good salade niçoise—and doesn't. But Read More 

No matter who we are or how experienced we are as cooks, rarely do our kitchens remain static. Even the simplest jobs evolve. I've been roasting pecans for half a century, and have included recipes for them in several of my books, but no two are the same. That's because my method has evolved over time as I've tried not only to keep my eyes open to what's happening in the pan, but also keep my ears open to the hundreds of other cooks who've shared what they've learned. Read More 

For years, every single Easter I sang in choir for as many as three services and still managed to host a formal lunch for as many as eight people. The menu rarely varied: it began with chilled carrot puree, followed by both a roast leg of lamb and ham, potato gratin, and asparagus—either with Hollandaise or finished "alla parmigiana" (layered with butter and Parmesan cheese and baked).

But then a pandemic, our move to Virginia, and the ugly reality of getting older descended on me, and that Easter lunch has gradually shrunk. This year it was to just the two of us.

But dwindling numbers and stamina weren't the only things that changed. Read More 

You may have noticed that new Recipes and Stories entries have been rather sporadic over the last couple of years. That's because now that I'm no longer teaching and writing a newspaper column there's just so much to say about the cooking that goes on in my kitchen day-in-day-out. A lot of it I've already written about more than anyone needed to read, and the rest isn't easy to put down—not because it's complicated, but because it's just cooking—without a recipe either in front of me or even the front of my mind. Things are measured, though not with scales, cups, and spoons but with my eyes, tongue, and hands, relying on five decades of experience. That's something a teacher can tell students about, but the only way to really get it is by doing it.

It usually evolves along these lines: last week was St. Patrick's Day, which is a big deal where we used to live. You couldn't miss it in Savannah if you were blind and deaf. Well ahead of time, Read More 

If you've followed this page for any time at all, you know that the fall of 1978 was a pivotal time in my life. That was when I was lucky enough to begin my graduate architectural studies with four months in Genova, the capitol of Liguria and heart of Italy's Riviera. That's where Clemson owns a modest Renaissance-Revival villa in the hilly suburb above the old city.

With its sun-drenched terraced gardens and incomparable views of the bay, It was an idyllic setting for studying architecture—and I did. Some. Half my time was spent either in studio or tramping, sketchbook and journal in hand, around that ancient city, the other picturesque towns of the Riviera, and some of Europe's oldest capitols.

The thing that changed my life, however, and eventually took it in a completely different direction had nothing directly to do with ancient art and architecture. It was the way I spent the other half of that four months: in the kitchen with our beautiful cook, Ilda Gemme Torti.

That kitchen was an experience all by itself:  Read More 

Back when I was still writing a column for the Savannah Morning News, I planned one on hearty winter soups made in a slow cooker and asked friends to share their favorites. Cherie Bailey offered this hearty, warming stew from her friend Amanda Hoven Havelin—who with good taste like this, quickly became a friend of mine.

It has been a winter comfort staple in our house ever since.

Below are two versions, the recipe as it was given to me (for 6 servings), and the way I make it now. The original Read More 

One of the things I love about living in Virginia is that we actually have winter here.

As much as I loved the Georgia Lowcountry, its version of winter was brief and left a lot to be desired for someone who actually enjoys cold weather. Yes, I realize that a mild, short cold season appeals to a lot of people. But the tradeoff is summers that are long and brutal, with air so humid and thick that one can almost chew it.

Here in Southern Virginia, winter is relatively mild, but consistently colder, and lingers until just before the spring equinox. We usually get at least one good snow, which always has the good grace to melt before we get tired of it. And while temperatures may dip into single digits, they don't get stuck there. It's just right for the kind of comfort cooking that I love best, lots of warming soups, stews, pastas, pot roasts, and casseroles.

One favorite of those comfortable dishes is bean soup,  Read More 

We've all encountered those cooks who operate on the maxim "if a little is good, a lot will be better," who never seem to know when to leave well-enough alone and quit while they're ahead.

If we're honest, most of us have been that cook at one time or another, taking a dish one step, one minute, one ingredient (or two or half-a-dozen) too far. But if we're paying attention, these moments of going too far can inform us and make us better cooks in the long-run.

But then there's the other extreme, the cooks who never go far enough, who've gotten fixed on a number. Read More 

[Nathalie Dupree, the undisputed Grande Dame of Southern Cooking, died on Monday, 13 January 2025, at the age of 85.]

Nathalie Dupree was the big sister I never had. And while I was never one of her "chickens" (her nickname for the many young interns and students that she mentored), over the more than thirty years that we knew one another, she was indeed a mentor that I was lucky enough with time to know as my colleague and friend.

Our acquaintance began when I was still trying to practice architecture while working on my first cookbook. I'd written to her about her then new book  Read More 

We woke up this morning to one of the prettiest snow coverings we've had since we moved to Virginia. But this season, the beauty is tempered more than usual. While we're cozy in our well-heated home, as always we think of the many who have inadequate shelter—or none at all.

And then there are those images of the wildfire devastation on the other side of the country from us, not to mention continued heartbreak, illness, and just plain disappointment among our family and loved ones here at home.

Right now all those people with short fuses for food "bloggers" who go on and on with convolutions of memory before they get to a an equally convoluted and overwrought recipe are tuning out. Well, if that's you, bless your heart and bye-bye.

But seriously, all that Read More 

If your idea of a good time is to meet the new year by drinking yourself into a stupor surrounded by a big drunken crowd of people doing the same, well, bless your heart: have at it. Frankly, the only thing I can think of that would be less fun is prepping for a colonoscopy. And the older I get, the less it appeals.

Ever since we bought our house in Petersburg, our tradition for meeting the new year has been to spend it with our two oldest grandchildren, eating tacos, watching favorite old Christmas movies, playing Scrabble, and toasting the new year Read More 

Eleven dozen Christmas star-shaped cheese straws later, my holiday baking is beginning to get caught up. Next is the daunting job of baking the fruitcake. Daunting not because any step of it is all that difficult, but because it's a bit messy and does take three days.

Once upon a time fruitcakes took longer than that: The citrus peel (assuming one could even get oranges and lemons), had to be cleaned, blanched, and candied. The raisins, currants, and other dried fruits had to be "stoned" (not like we mean it nowadays—they didn't come already seeded), then reconstituted  Read More 

One of the things I love best about cooking is that it's predictable (to a point) and yet always evolving.

Yes, there are certain reactions that are basic and scientific. If you add this to that, you'll get a predictable result. Handle pastry dough with tender finesse and it'll be delicate, flaky, and tender; treat it roughly and it'll be hard and tough. The opposite is true for a yeast bread dough. But even with things we've made a thousand times and gotten the same result for almost every one of those times, there's always the opportunity for that unexpected "aha" moment.

I've been making cheese straws for my entire adult life—longer if I count the hundreds of my mother's  Read More 

The difference between a good Thanksgiving dinner and a great one is homemade broth. But it's Thanksgiving morning and you're on the internet. If you don't already have the stock pot simmering, it's still possible to have homemade broth, but you need to get cracking.

It would help if you'd bought extra turkey parts for making said broth, but you probably didn't. Don't worry, if you've got a whole bird, you're in business.  Read More 

26 November 2024: Thanksgiving Cranberries

In the best-laid plans department, this essay was intended for posting on Monday, but we had some last minute changes to our plans for the week and I had to shift gears with the intention of posting it early this morning. But then the electrical company shut off the power to work on our area's grid for several hours, so I'm awfully sorry to be several hours late with it.

The reason it ought to have posted yesterday was because the recipe that follows needs to be made at least 24 hour ahead, and is all the better if it's made 36-48 hours ahead.

Cranberry relish has been a standard in our family for almost as long as I can remember. But the traditional recipe makes more than half a gallon of the stuff Read More 

Over the more than three decades that I've been teaching and writing about cooking, the biggest challenge has been coming up with fresh ways to talk about coping with our big cook's holiday, Thanksgiving. In all that time, the focus, both in my work and most everyone else's, has been on tackling a feast for a crowd without killing ourselves.

It never occurred to me—or apparently anyone else—that, as challenging as cooking for that crowd might be, it's nothing to the challenge of The Dwindling Thanksgiving Table. That, I had to learn the hard way.

When we moved to Virginia, I happily imagined our dining room table at Thanksgiving, Read More 

Tomorrow is my birthday, and ushers in the last year of my sixties.

It's a milestone I suspect none of us is ever ready to face, and is coming at an especially difficult time for my family and for our country. Consequently, that need for comforting soup in my household hasn't lessened; if anything, it's only gotten more pronounced.

Whenever that need becomes acute, the soup that provides it best isn't, oddly enough, one I grew up on, but a classic Italian minestrone. True, it's a kissing cousin of my grandmother's vegetable soup, but its comfort isn't rooted in childhood memories as are most other "comfort foods." When I was traveling to teach a lot, Read More 

Usually Autumn is a season that fills me with hope, a time of golden light, of doors opening on new beginnings, and of joyful anticipation as we look forward to the winter holidays. But this one has been dark, a season of endings, sadness, and anxiety, of doors not just closed but slammed in our faces. We've needed comfort in large, hefty doses, and while it's been tempting, not all those doses could take the form of ice cream and bourbon.

Yesterday's comfort came in the form of a velvety butternut squash and leek puree. Of all the winter squash, butternuts produce Read More 

My mother's cornbread, while I was growing up, was like so many other Southerners' bread back then, a round cake baked in a preheated iron skillet, just as her mother's and grandmother's and probably her great- and great-great-grandmother's had been before her. Cut into wedges and passed around while it was almost blistering hot, we eagerly risked a burn to split our steaming wedge and stuff it with as much butter as we could get away with.

It was the quintessential accompaniment for Mama's pots of greens, beans, field peas, and vegetable soup.

And yet, oddly enough, when I'm missing her and craving her cornbread, it's not a round skillet cake that I make, Read More 

Maybe it's all that going back to school in my formative years, but as the nights cool and the leaves turn and fall, autumn has never felt like an end of anything.

Until now.

This month, as always, has been filled with the usual transitions and milestones. But not all of them have been welcome or joyful, and the cool, clear air has brought with it a sharp, bittersweet reminder that I am no longer approaching the autumn of my life, but am deep in the middle of it.

Earlier this month, my husband and I marked our twenty-fifth anniversary and the beginning of our fourth year in Virginia. After a more than two year search, our parish here has welcomed a new rector who is filling us with fresh hope.

But in August we got the news we've dreaded for more than twenty of those years, Read More 

We're having our first hint of autumn here in Virginia, but in the Carolina and Georgia Lowcountry where I spent four decades of my life, summer lingers well into October. And even though autumn is whispering in our ears and we're now more than four hundred miles away from the Lowcountry, this is still when we begin to crave one of the lovely staples of the region's late-summer tables: butterbeans over rice.

Actually, beans or field peas with rice are staples down there throughout the year, but mid-to-late summer is when butterbeans (both the pale green and brown speckled varieties) are seasonal.

You may, by the way, call these broad, flat beans "limas" out of a Southerner's hearing, but don't do it in front of us. Read More