Food & Drink

Now, Just Who is Basil?

Broadstreet Bakery at Banner Hall, 362-2900, has among its November specials three low-carb alternatives, some new chicken dishes, a Lemon-Basil Pork Loin Sandwich and the return of Shrimp Pasta. … Flashbacks Espresso Café, 5620 I-55 South, 372-3220, brings a bit of nostalgia as well as a large variety of cappuccinos and lattes to the South Jackson area. About time, I'd say. There are lots of us sophisticated people out south of town, not that I drink coffee, but I've found out you can get those Italian-sounding cuppas (oh, I just love to hear Italian) minus the coffee.

Breakfast Worth Waking Up For

Nothing worth knowing about happens before noon; and if it does, someone will tell you about it. Thus, I carefully arrange my schedule to begin the awakening process around 11 in the morning. On the rare occasions I cannot avoid an early appointment, I follow a strict routine I recommend to all who wish to enter the day gently. The routine begins as my wife brings me a glass of fresh squeezed seasonal fruit juice while I am still in bed. As I shower, she fluffs my towel in the dryer (there is nothing worse than a cold towel) and irons my shirt so it, too, will be warm and fresh when I dress.

Eat Free or Die

Radio ads announced a once-every-four-year opportunity for free food: the GOP candidate forum to be held at the Sports Museum on Lakeland Drive. A sucker for free food, I have subjected myself over the years to fried string cheese, frozen egg rolls, stale chips and bland salsa at many a Happy Hour buffet. Since political party registration would not be checked at the door, I headed for the museum.

Misery on the Bounty

The splendor of the season's bounty thrills thousands at the open-air farmers market. More than ever, people prefer purchasing their produce directly from the farmers who grow it. You can pick up fresh fish, shrimp and oysters from reputable fishermen just back from trolling, or taste organic, artisanal cheeses made from grass-fed sheep, goats and cows. During this time of the year, the farmers market is a lush and lavish multi-sensory spectacle.

General Gourmet

You would never guess that the man standing at attention—waiting for me on the sidewalk, dressed in a crisp linen short-sleeved shirt and cuffed khakis, cordovan wingtips softly gleaming—is 90 years old. His bearing has none of the surrender to gravity that usually accompanies that venerable age. Yet, indeed, retired Marine Corps Major General Carey Randall will be 91 in November.

A Tale of Four Buffets

As one who always aspired to the ruling class, I seldom found myself at odds with the rules I would one day be destined to enforce. On the rare occasions I committed an infraction, my mother administered a particularly harsh sanction: I was required to eat lunch in the school cafeteria, a Dickensonian chamber with such horrors as the "lunch room lady," Tater Tots and fish sticks. Culinary considerations aside, school cafeterias are a vulgar representation of how the other 90 percent live.

Truth in Barbecue

One of my favorite college professors, Lee Rackstraw of Booneville, once told me, "If a restaurant doesn't have enough respect for the art of smoking meat to advertise EITHER proper spelling of the word: Barbeque or Barbecue, then I don't bother to stop by and see if it's good or not. BBQ doesn't spell anything!" Well, Spooney's spells out the word BARBEQUE and does a respectable job of smoking of meats on the grill.

FOOD: Leave No Sushi Behind

"Don't even try the stuff if you're not gonna be able to afford it," they warned me. Young, brash and eager to experience big-city life, I recklessly plunged into the nether world of the South Florida bar scene. Sushi bar, that is. I had just moved to Miami and was already hooked. While the hoi polloi of Coconut Grove were blowing hundreds of dollars up their snouts, I was developing an expensive sushi habit.

FOOD: Monroe's Holey Trinity

"Take the first step in faith. You don't have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step." —Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

FOOD: Family Recipe

When Eda-Mae LaBranche came to Jackson more than seven years ago, she already had four biological children whom she nourished with oxtail and curry goat, mangoes and plantains.

Ellington