Bacon, Collard and Manchego Melts

This is my first shot at trying to reproduce my absolute favorite sandwich from famous New Orleans eatery Cochon Butcher.  Their Buckboard Bacon Melt is unbelievable; I’m not quite there, but even part-way there is pretty damned good, especially on a brisk day early in the sailing season.  Early season also means the collards–one thing…

Plum Cornmeal Cake

On the hook in Pelican Bay — a remarkably beautiful 85% protected anchorage on the southeast corner of Dauphin Island at the mouth of Mobile Bay — this was supposed to be dessert at dinner our first night.  But the incredibly long and harrowing passage (getting INTO a narrow-inlet barrier island anchorage in a boat…

Beef Mushroom Soup

This is one of my best original concoctions to date, full stop.  Truly delicious.  We are in a strange and somewhat insulting weather pattern down here on the Gulf, with lows in the 40’s at night, but also hurricanes … kinda like having wrinkles and acne at the same time in life … just totally…

Thai Mango and Sticky Rice

In March, just before we all went into lockdown, this pirate spent two weeks in northern Thailand eating her fill of delicious khao soi, som tam and khao niao mamuang every day.  Grateful to make it home before borders were closed, she nonetheless went into Thai food withdrawal, and the first dish she was compelled…

Crawfish and Asparagus Risotto

We hope you all are well.  Social distancing and self-isolation being a normal, periodic thing for sailors, the day to day of this challenge has been manageable for Upward Wing.  Grocery store shelves are a bit stark, but if you shop local, you can find a breath of spring and down here on da bayou,…

Gumbo Des Herbes

Or as they call it colloquially, “Gumbo Z’herbes” or just green gumbo.  Sure, it’s the Friday before Superbowl Sunday and we would normally be serving up a recipe for your game day snacking: something like our bourbon shrimp pops, crab stuffed mushroom caps, jalapeno poppers or — if the Saints were playing — oysters rocketfeller…

Curried Chicken and Greens

Well.  After all my whimpering last week about how not-carefree the year had been, as I prepared my lucky peas for New Year’s Day, I turned the corner into the new year with a resolution to simply incorporate a little more paradise wherever I can.  So for a beautiful southern winter day and a late…

Peas, Greens, and Andouille Stew

One of the challenges of food blogging is how to select the photo that makes the food look best empirically vs. the photo that makes it look genuine in the context of your own reality (and, if you are remotely calibrated to your readership, their own).  I am going to be abruptly honest here: 2019 has…

Gingerbread Crew

If there is one thing the internet has done, it’s to bring home the fact that, with 6+ billion of us on this planet (most of us with smart phones), there is very little new under the sun.  That said, I just had the opportunity to wonder if I was the first person in the…

Dirty Bird

This pirate is not much of a sports fan.  I like sports … just don’t have the time or bandwidth to follow them fanatically*.  But Louisiana has this fabulous tradition of cooking the opposing team’s mascot — mostly a college football thing, they roast a Cochon de Lait when they play the Razorbacks, alligator when…