Here’s the one recipe Ouita Michel wishes had gone in her new cookbook, but didn’t
Six years in the making and 200 pages long, Ouita Michel still thinks her first cookbook is missing one thing: Kilt Salat, an Appalachian standard also known as wilted lettuce salad. A blending of spring greens and onions, bacon, vinegar, mustard and brown sugar, Kilt Salat is a salty and sweet, crispy and soft celebration of spring.
“Every spring we make this salad,” Michel said, “and we get asked a lot about it.” But, alas, “Just a Few Miles South” is organized around meals, dishes and restaurants – think, breakfast, Po-Boys and Wallace Station – and in the final winnowing the seasonal Kilt Salat didn’t make the cut.
Michel, describing herself as “an introverted extrovert,” said Monday that she was a little anxious about the meet-and-greet of a book rollout, particularly after a year of pandemic-induced shutdowns. “My god, what am I going to wear,” at three launch parties this week, she wondered.
No worries, cooks, eaters and people who simply like to read will be drawn to this beautifully written and illustrated book regardless. Michel, a James Beard semifinalist and Central Kentucky’s best known chef, has a busy schedule of three rollout parties this week and the books will be available in all seven of her local restaurants as well as in bookstores and on Amazon.
“Just a Few Miles South” is much more than a cookbook, it’s the story of the philosophy Michel and her husband Chris brought to their restaurants: locally sourced, fresh food, cooking to celebrate a place, welcoming new ideas while honoring culinary history. Ouita Michel’s distinctive voice (she was a national debate champion in college at the University of Kentucky) illuminates her memories of food, family, co-workers, farmers and friends who have joined in their journey.
If you’ve ever had any concern about whether “locally sourced” is just a marketing ploy for Michel, reading this book will quickly disabuse you.
Pity the poor young chef who one day told Michel he’d gotten a great deal on Asian catfish. “I went ballistic,” Michel writes, not only is that not true catfish, “fish coming from Vietnam and China can be contaminated with carcinogens, banned antibiotics, and salmonella.” Instead, her restaurants source channel and blue catfish from Lake Barkley and Kentucky Lake that are processed in Calhoun, Kentucky.
This book is the history of Michel’s search for local suppliers during her two decades of growing Kentucky appetites and the successes they’ve shared together. It offers some insight into the complex business of building a local food economy.
In the chapter “Burgers,” she writes “the local hamburger is a marker of success for me.” When she started out most restaurants weren’t serving them and although Holly Hill Inn served local steaks, “we had no outlet for ground beef.” But over time, as Windy Corner came online and the opening of the Midway School Bakery made room to cook burgers at Wallace Station her restaurants bought more local ground beef which helped create an affordable supply. Now, she says, her group of restaurants sells 100,000 burgers annually, “not to mention the ground beef used for chili and meatloaf.”
Michel describes the state’s Kentucky Proud and Buy Local programs to market and encourage purchases of locally produced food. Kentucky Proud incentive money “paid for Holly Hill Inn’s first website,” she notes.
The state made a good investment. “Our family of restaurants is closing in on $3 million in Kentucky Proud purchases since 2001, helping to fulfill one of my missions as a restaurateur: to increase farm income in Kentucky.”
There is one item that’s not locally sourced: the bread used for Po-Boys. Ouita and her husband Chris traveled to New Orleans about the time they were planning Windy Corner. Touring that culinary wonderland, “we realized that the humble Po-Boy sandwich was a great vehicle for Kentucky-raised pork, chicken, country ham, beef, and catfish,” and so it became a signature on the new restaurant’s menu. But the bread is pure New Orleans, shipped from Gambino’s Bakery there. “It has a very thin, crispy crust and a soft interior,” Ouita Michel explains, “so it encases the filling without dominating the flavors.”
The humble kilt salat (read killed salad, describing the wilting when the hot dressing is poured over the tender spring greens) is likely to earn its spot in a cookbook one day, Michel said. The next book, focused on Holly Hill Inn, her white-tablecloth, fine dining signature restaurant, will be organized around the seasons, she said. And nothing says spring like Kilt Salat.
Recipe: Kilt Salat or Wilted Lettuce
Recipe courtesy Chef Ouita Michel
Yeild: 4 servings
- One pound or more of nice spring greens: Bibb lettuce, dandelion greens, blanched poke leaves, arugula, and any other tender leaves
- ½ cup spring green onions, sliced thin- tossed with the lettuces.
- ½ cup thin sliced radishes for garnish
- For the dressing:
- ½ cup minced bacon
- ½ cup apple cider vinegar
- ¼ cup salad oil
- ¼ cup whole grain mustard
- 1 tbsp. brown sugar
- 1 tsp. salt- or to taste
- ½ tsp. freshly ground black pepper- or to taste.
- Wash and spin all the lettuces and put into a bid salad bowl with the green onions.
- Brown the bacon with the salad oil in a skillet until crisp, and fat is fully rendered.
- Whisk in the mustard and brown sugar.
- Whisk in the vinegar.
- Pour hot dressing over the greens, add salt and pepper and toss.
- Garnish with thin sliced red onion
Just a Few Miles South: Timeless Recipes from Our Favorite Places
Written by: Ouita Michel, Sara Gibbs and Genie Graf
Illustrated by: Brenna Flannery
Foreward by: Silas House
▪ Hard-cover, 200 pages, 100 illustrations: $24.95
▪ Available at bookstores and on Amazon.
▪ Signed copies will be available at all the Ouita Michel restaurants.
This story was originally published April 22, 2021 at 6:00 AM.