Recipe Pairing for 'Palmetto Moon'

Food plays a big part in Kim Boykin’s new book Palmetto Moon, on shelves this week. Love interest for main character, Vada Hadley, is Chef Frank Darling. He runs the local diner in Round O, where Vada has escaped to, and makes a mean crab cake. It’s love at first sight for Frank when Vada takes a seat at his counter. She orders “crab cakes, grits, and tea — with milk of all things” and Frank fries up the cakes from his daddy’s secret recipe on a griddle with extra butter.

As a treat at the end of the book, Boykin offers recipes for crab cakes, fried chicken, fried okra, peach cobbler and salmon croquettes. Chef Frank Lee of Charleston’s Slightly North of Broad stands in as the real-life Frank Darling, providing the recipes and inspiration for Boykin, who admits the usual reader questions in the back of the book weren’t cutting it for her.

We chat with Kim Boykin tomorrow on Twitter from 1-2 CST (2-3 EST) using the hashtag #southernlit. Whip up a batch of crab cakes before the chat, pour a tall glass of sweet tea and ask Boykin whatever your heard desires. We’ll be talking about Southern food for sure.

Slightly North of Broad Devil Crab Cakes

1 lb. crab meat
1 Tbsp. yellow mustard
1 egg, beaten
4 dashes Tabasco
1/4 cup bellpeppers, diced
1/4 cup red onion, diced
1 Tbsp. Worcestershire sauce
1 lemon, juiced
2 Tbsp. parsley, chopped
1/2 Tbsp. salt
1/4 Tbsp. pepper
1/4 cup cracker meal or panko bread crumbs

Pick crab meat from shell. Gently mix all ingredients together in a large bowl. Let sit for one hour. Form into 5 oz. cakes. Heat oil in a large skillet over medium heat. When oil is hot, carefully place crab cakes, in batches, in pan and fry until browned, about 4-5 minutes. Carefully flip crab cakes and fry on other side until golden brown, about 4 minutes. Makes 4 cakes.

Recipe courtesy of Chef Frank Lee and Slightly North of Broad.