Dear friends,
I’m lucky to have a friend like Jan Norris, whose family goes back five generations in Florida. Not only is Jan deeply rooted in the state, she knows just about everything worth knowing about its food. She was the food editor of the Palm Beach Post before she retired, and one of the finest reporters and food writers of our era.
Jan and I met on the road. We have shared cocktails in Dallas, nectarine and blackberry crisp in Portland, Ore., and squab baked in acorn squash in Atlanta. We ate all over North America together in pursuit of food stories. But we never met on home ground until Tony and I began spending winters near her digs in Riviera Beach, Fla.
Having a food editor as a tour guide is as exciting as it sounds. Sunday she took us on a multi-hour food tour with a stop for a stupefying Southern brunch that began with a warm cinnamon roll as big as a softball, with caramel sauce on the side.
Jan promised to sketch a map of all places she pointed out during our tour — the Cuban bakeries, European delis, German grocery stores, the best bagel shop, tea houses, fish stores, top sushi restaurants and best waterside spots for cocktails. She also promised to give me the recipe for her mother’s famous Fresh Florida Orange Cake, made every Christmas Eve for the buffet spread to which half the town was invited. I’ll let Jan tell the story:
My mother, Nellie Harrelson, from Pensacola, Fla, made this cake every
Christmas — and only at Christmas. It requires fresh Florida juice oranges, and never out of season navels or others. Certainly none from California. Native Floridians make
several versions of this: I like this simple one best.
Our family lived in Wilton Manors, Fla., a town adjacent to Fort Lauderdale. My
parents would hold an elaborate open-house buffet each Christmas Eve in our small
home.
This party with family, friends, neighbors, and my dad’s clients (he was a painting
contractor for the well heeled) went on for 15 years; no invite was required. Everyone
knew to just show up. Judges, doctors, attorneys – roofers, dockhands, it didn’t matter.
My father told everyone to “come for a drink and a bite.”
On the groaning round table would be a fresh ham, a cured ham, a turkey and a
roast beef. Dozens of Southern sides — mom’s cornbread dressing, sweet potato
casserole, green beans with tiny potatoes, ambrosia, and so on would be crammed on the table in our small dining room.
But the crown jewels were the cakes.
My mother was not a baker: It’s the only time of year she’d make these cakes.
Her buttermilk pound cake sufficed the rest of the year, and usually for picnics and
funerals. Every now and then, she’d make a pie or cobbler.
But for this feast, she would make the fresh orange cake, a traditional Southern
coconut cake, a boozy, beautiful Lane cake, and long before it became a fad, a red velvet cake. It took days to complete all this cooking and baking— especially the Lane cake with all the fruit and nuts that had to be chopped. The house smelled sensational.
The orange cake was made last: It was always fresh, and she kept spooning the
syrup up over it till the first guest arrived.
She would bake extra cakes, and trade a Lane cake and a coconut cake with a
cousin and an aunt. They made duplicates of their 12-thin-layer chocolate glazed cake,
and a pecan-studded German chocolate cake, respectively, so everyone had a variety.
Six cakes in all stood lined up on the bar. There were pumpkin and mince pies,
too, and someone always sent a bar of fruitcake, but those homemade cakes were the
“show” — and the reason many showed up for this affair that rocked until midnight. A
couple arrived in the wee hours one year, catching my parents putting together toys for us girls. My always-gracious mother fixed them a plate and they ate while helping Dad build a tricycle.
We’d eat for a month, entertaining others, on all the leftovers. That fresh ham
went into a pot of turnip and mustard greens for New Year’s Day — another party for our
Southern friends and kin.
My parents started to plan a move to Hawthorne, Fla., as they aged and we girls moved
out with our own families. They discontinued the open house tradition sometime in the
1980s.
But every Christmas Eve while they still owned the house, a few people would show up, expecting it, and my mom would feed them with whatever we had — and
always a piece of cake.
I make all the cakes now in the family: My sister doesn’t bake. It’s a warm and
very tasty connection to my mom.
NELLIE’S FRESH FLORIDA ORANGE CAKE
For the 1-2-3-4 cake:
3 9-inch cake pans
1 cup unsalted butter (2 sticks), softened slightly
2 cups white sugar
4 eggs
3 cups sifted all-purpose flour
1 tsp. salt
3 tsp. baking powder
1 cup milk
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
For the orange syrup:
1 12 oz. can frozen orange juice concentrate with pulp, thawed
Juice of 6 Florida juice oranges (small, thin-skinned)
Grated zest of 6 oranges (about ½ cup)
1 ¾ cups white sugar
Directions:
Prepare three 9-inch metal cake pans: Spray with baking spray or use a thin coating of
shortening and flour to coat sides and bottom. Set aside. Heat oven to 350 degrees.
For the cakes:
Cream butter and sugar on medium speed of an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, beating after each addition.
In a medium bowl, whisk flour with the salt and baking powder to combine.
Briefly beat the vanilla extract into the creamed eggs and sugar. Alternately add milk and flour to beater bowl, a little at a time, mixing on medium-low speed just until combined.
Mix at medium speed for 1 minute, scraping sides of bowl.
Spoon 1/3 of batter into each cake pan. Knock bottom of cake pans on counter to release air bubbles.
Bake at 350 degrees in center of oven for 25-35 minutes, or until cake tops are browned
slightly and center springs back to touch. Let cool in pans 10 minutes, then turn out onto rack to complete cooling.
While cakes cool, prepare orange syrup:
Pour orange juice concentrate into medium bowl. Add freshly squeezed juice and orange zest, using wire whisk to combine.
Add sugar, ¼ cup at a time, stirring well after each addition with spatula to get sugar
from bottom of bowl. (This takes time, but sugar must be incorporated thoroughly.)
To build the cake:
For the least mess, use a cake plate with a lip. Slice cake layers in half horizontally.
Begin with a cut side up, placing in center of plate. Spoon syrup over cake surface, poking holes in cake as you go with a medium-sized skewer. Cover cake surface with syrup thoroughly.
Continue with remaining layers, saving a rounded layer for the top. Place rounded side up. Poke holes all over cake top. Spoon all remaining syrup over top, and let drip down sides. Spoon syrup that pools on plate over top of cake, allowing it to soak into cake.
Let rest, then sprinkle reserved zest, tossed with a little sugar, over cake.
Refrigerate cake and leftovers. This cake freezes beautifully (wrap well) and is delicious directly from freezer.
GUT CHECK
What I cooked recently:
Black bean soup; oatmeal with raisins; pan-grilled hamburgers; chicken noodle soup (homemade stock, purchased noodles) for Oscar, who had 11 teeth pulled; pan-grilled filet mignons, stir-fried sugar snap peas and baked potatoes with sour cream; chicken salad with pecans and dried cherries.
What I ate out/carried in:
Pepperoni pizza from Big Star in Copley; ham and cheese sub from Subway; pulled pork and slaw sandwich, corn bread and potato salad from Smok’n Pig BBQ in Valdosta, Ga.; jerk chicken, fried sweet plantains, cooked cabbage and a meat pie from Sweet Jamaica Flava in Morrow, Ga.; marinated quarter chicken, yellow rice, black beans from La Granja in Riviera Beach, Fla.; beef empanada, alfajores cookie and cafe con leche at Tulipan Cafe & Bakery in North Palm Beach, Fla.; marinated, roast chicken quarters and fresh corn tortillas from Tortilleria Gallo de Oro in Port Salerno, Fla.; cheese arepa from La Granja; cinnamon roll with caramel sauce, grilled ham steak, eggs over easy, grits and seeded wheat toast at Butterfields Southern Cafe in Royal Palm Beach, Fla.
THE MAILBAG
From Joy in British Columbia, Canada:
Hi Jane. Hope you had a good Christmas considering the restrictions we have to adhere to if we hope to stay safe from the godforsaken, unpredictable virus.
How is your Oscar doing? Still giving his Mom lots of doggie hugs and kisses?
I thought I’d do a little search after receiving your second email regarding not using the black bean soup recipe in your Dec. 29 newsletter because it was not complete. I came across a black bean soup recipe created by you in a 1999 Chicago Tribune link. You mentioned the inspiration for your black bean soup came from Sarah Leah Chase’s “Cold Weather Cooking.” I have the same book and it’s a lovely book, actually.
Anyway, I hope this will be of help and perhaps bring back a few fond memories.
All the best in the New Year, Jane, and let’s hope 2022 brings a complete turnabout for the good in everyone’s lives. Enough is enough.
Dear Joy:
You said it — enough is enough of this virus. l stayed home on Christmas rather than visit family, who were all ill. I’m grumpy about it.
The soup recipe I shared and then jerked back was more than just incomplete. It was embarrassingly bad. I plead age-related mental lapse. My former favorite soup, the one I compared my latest to, is the one you saw based on a recipe from Sarah Leah Chase’s terrific book.
I created the recipe for my latest black bean soup in November, and it was so delicious I couldn’t stop eating it — even cold, for breakfast. But Thanksgiving loomed, and then I had to come up with Christmas recipes, so the bean soup newsletter was put on the back burner. I didn’t write down the recipe because I was sure I would remember it.
When I finally wrote the newsletter, I was fuzzy on the recipe but sent it to my publisher anyway, figuring I’d have time to re-test and amend the recipe if necessary. I retested and the soup was awful. Worse, I didn’t know why. Even worse, my publisher said the newsletter had already been sent.
So there you have it — yet another sign that I should hang it up. As you can see, I’m still writing but wary of brain slips. I’ll continue as long as I don’t make an utter fool of myself, because I do get encouragement from readers to keep going. I’ll try.
By the way, Oscar is great now, after having 11 teeth pulled the Tuesday after Christmas. We had held off on dental work because anesthetic can be dangerous for old dogs (he is 15). We shouldn’t have. Thanks for asking.
From Sandy H.:
I wondered if you have Shisler’s Chicken Salad recipe (from Copley)? If so, can you print it or send it along?
Dear Sandy:
I don’t have it but I know a lot of people do. If someone would send the recipe to me, I’ll share it for everyone to enjoy. I was too late to copy the recipe from the page posted in the kitchen when the deli was closing. How nice that the opportunity was extended to everyone who dropped by.
See Jane Cook 