Typically the West Of Cookbook issues features recipes from local chefs and restaurateurs. But for this issue, we tried something different. Teaming up with local farm share program The Bounty Box, we offered eight local chefs eight boxes of locally-sourced produce and told them to come up with something. It was the perfect marriage of local and local.
The Bounty Box was created by local farmer Edward Hudson of Hudson Family Farm in Rowesville, who wanted to support South Carolina’s farms and offer people a convenient way to buy local produce and deliver it to their homes. All the fruit and veggies offered by The Bounty Box is either local or regional (from a neighboring state like Georgia or Florida) and is boxed up each week and delivered to hundreds of customers’ doorsteps across the Lowcountry.
The Bounty Box is a new way to get your local produce … Once you become a member, you choose which type box you’d like each week. The Bounty Box’s neighborhood coordinator delivers your box the following week to your doorstep. There are lots of fruits and veggies grown by local farmers to choose from, as well as add-on items like local coffee, sauces, and grass-fed meats and cheeses. For more information about The Bounty Box, visit www.thebountybox.com.
While West Of’s Bounty Box Challenge was certainly inspired by the popular Food Network show Chopped, there was no competition and no ticking clock. The only real rules were they had to use as much of the produce in the box as possible. They could add whatever they wanted to the ingredients from the box, which included radishes (tops and bottoms), potatoes (fingerling or purple potatoes), corn, jalapeño peppers, spring onions, citrus (grapefruit or oranges), green beans (Haricot Verts, if you’re fancy), strawberries, green leaf lettuce, tomatoes, broccoli, and more.
The eight chefs who are part of West Of’s Bounty Box Challenge ranged from different styles and backgrounds. The result is an awesome showcase of the creativity that West Ashley’s culinary scene has to offer. Thank-you to the eight restaurants who participated and to The Bounty Box for providing all the great local produce featured in this special issue.
Triangle Char & Bar
828 Savannah Hwy. (843) 377-1300 • www.trianglecharandbar.com
Chef James Sanders decided to focus the box’s content into one splashy, colorful, delicious dish – especially after finding some of the items had already turned.
Sanders turned out a chili-rubbed, grass-fed filet mignon served over purple potato puree, haricot verts, served alongside a corn-stuffed roasted jalapeño. He topped the filet with a fresh Pico de Gallo and a cilantro sour cream.
“I was inspired by it being Cinco de Mayo this week, and I wanted to create something hot, sweet, and LOUD. And to have as much fun as possible making it all come together,” he said.
For the dish, he incorporated from the box Roma tomatoes, yellow corn, purple potatoes, jalapeños, and the haricot verts. He included from his larder: Serrano peppers, onion, cilantro, lime, local grass-fed beef — a Triangle signature.
Sanders moved to Charleston to be head chef for Triangle in 2011, and wanted to give a “shout out to the farmers for being outstanding in their field!”
The Gathering Cafe
1124 Sam Rittenberg Blvd. (843) 297-8380 • www.gatheringwestashley.com
Chef/owner Nathan Conkle went all-out with his box, coming up with three dishes and a dessert, using every item in the box. “I took it as a challenge,” he said.
The biggest spread was a platter of grilled vegetables accompanied by a jalapeno compound butter, accompanied by a purple potato latkes. He also crafted a light spinach-corn-grapefruit-radish salad. He finished with a strawberry granita.
Yum.
To pull all that off, Conkle also used butter, olive oil, salt, pepper, sugar, breadcrumbs, sherry vinegar, lemon juice, flour and egg. “If I could have figured how to use the box, too, I would have included it,” he said.
Conkle’s background is as extensive as his menu. He studied at Trident Tech, and had worked at the Windsor Court Hotel in New Orleans, as well as Whole Foods in Mt. Pleasant.
The Green Goat
1300 Savannah Hwy. (843) 737-0820 • www.greengoatcharleston.com
Chef Daniel Sinclair ain’t skeered. He, too, threw the whole box into the mix, as well as whatever he had in the kitchen, and came up with three complete dishes.
Not surprising for a chef who lists “trial and error” as his professional background.
“I was given a box of beautiful, locally-grown ingredients and was excited to find a way to showcase all of them,” said Sinclair.
His three dishes included a grilled flounder with a spicy fruit-and-tomato pickled relish, accompanied by garlic and rosemary roasted purple potatoes with fresh green snaps on a bed of fried spinach.
His second dish was a yogurt soaked cumin chicken fresh veggie rice pilaf wraps. And, finally, he simply fire-roasted the corn on the cob.
Sinclair added flounder, champagne vinegar, yogurt, lemon juice, ground cumin, cinnamon, cayenne pepper, ginger, salt, pepper, chicken, and rice.
Swig & Swine
1217 Savannah Hwy. (843) 225-3805 • www.swigandswinebbq.com
Upon receiving his Bounty Box, Swig & Swine co-owner and pitmaster Anthony DiBernardo knew exactly what he wanted to do with it. “I’m going to smoke the hell out of it,” he said. And why not? DiBernardo has made a name for himself and his West Ashley barbecue joint as a go-to spot for high quality smoked meats.
His custom-built smokers have billowed so much delicious smoky goodness across West Ashley that it has casued several false alarms, bringing the fire department out the popular Savannah Highway restaurant. We’re starting to think that the firemen know it’s just pork butts, beef brisket, turkeys, and chickens that are in peril, but they come out anyway just to have a reason to visit Swig & Swine.
DiBernardo used just about everything from the box, including the fingerling potatoes, radishes (tops and bottoms), corn, spring onions, jalapeños , broccoli, green beans, tomatoes, and oranges. DiBernardo double-fried the potatoes and topped some of the other fresh veggies with a house-made citrus vinaigrette, made with the oranges. He topped that all with a half of his signature smoked chicken
Originally from New Jersey, DiBernardo is a Navy veteran with more than 25 years experience in food, performing every imaginable role in the food business. Prior to Swig & Swine’s launch in 2014, DiBernardo was the head chef and operating manager at Rita’s Seaside Grille on Folly Beach, and ran his own catering business on the side. These days, he’s busy keeping up with the demand Swig & Swine has generated and is in the process of opening a second location in Summerville.
Three Little Birds
65 Windermere Blvd. (843) 225-3065 • www.threelittlebirdscafe.com
Chef Chrissy Schnarr, a longtime friend of Three Little Birds owner Meridith Satterwhite, learned to cook helping her Momma in the kitchen starting at age 5, and started cooking in earnest at age 16 in a private club. She later worked as a banquet chef, which she continued for 17 years before moving into the local food scene, helping open Lost Dog Café on Folly Beach. A longtime resident of Folly, Chrissy, bartended at various beach restaurants and bars for another 13 years.
“I really wanted to go back to being a chef,” she says. “And I really have to thank Meridith for getting me back into the kitchen.”
Schnarr used everything in The Bounty Box to create a roasted vegetable quiche and paired it with a farm-fresh salad with roasted beets, strawberries, jalapenos and cucumbers over radish greens and leaf lettuce. Schnarr finished the salad with a honey vinaigrette garnished with tomatoes on radish towers. The only ingredients not from the Box were the pastry for the quiche and honey and oil for the vinaigrette.
“We didn’t think this challenge was limiting at all,” says Satterwhite. “We had to narrow down the possibilities. We loved this It was a really cool idea.”
The Taco Spot
1301 Ashley River Road (843) 225-7426 • www.thetacospot.com
Jason “JV” Vaughn is a 1996 graduate of Johnson & Wales, back when the culinary school still called Charleston home. Prior to opening The Taco Spot in West Ashley, Vaughn worked in a bevy of Lowcountry kitchens, including Charleston Grill and Garibaldi’s downtown, Café Suzanne on Folly Beach, and Mondo’s Italian Restaurant on James Island. But he really found his niche with tacos.
Vaughn opened La Cocina, a popular taco and burrito joint on James Island, on the way to Folly Beach. But when the building’s owner did not renew the lease he and his now-wife and Texas native Lindsey Collier Vaughan opened The Taco Spot on St. Andrew’s Boulevard in West Ashley. They’ve opened a second location downtown, near MUSC and also own the adjacent Apartment A bar and restaurant on Coming Street, where they serve up tamales and tequila.
Last year, the husband and wife team expanded their West Ashley restaurant, taking over the tuxedo shop next door to make The Taco Spot a proper sit-down restaurant with a full bar.
When given his Bounty Box, there was no doubt that Vaughn was going to put his Tex-Mex spin on things. Using nearly everything in the box, the only thing he added to give it that signature Southwest flair was cilantro, cumin, and garlic. The centerpiece to Vaugh’s Bounty Box dish was a cumin-roasted radish and haricots verts taco salad. He flanked the salad with a trio of sides, including a fresh made salsa from the tomatoes, creamed elote (Mexican corn dish), and Texas-style potato salad with the purple potatoes.
Voodoo Tiki Bar & Lounge
15 Magnolia Road (843) 769-0228 • www.voodootikibar.com
Chris “Toker” Smith describes himself as a “delicious Johnson & Wales dropout that found home at Voodoo almost 10 years ago.” He’s South Carolina born and raised and has lived in Charleston since 2002.
Toker used parts of every ingredient from The Bounty Box. Using these, he created a baba ganoush without eggplant, instead utilizing the purple potatoes spiced with jalapenos. He pickled the green beans and radishes. “My dad has been pickling a lot lately, and I’ve picked it up,” he says. He added honey to the fresh strawberries and oranges to create a vinaigrette, and used the leafy greens, tomatoes, and cucumber for a salad. “I felt like a salad was a bit of a cop out, but the vegetables were so fresh I didn’t want to do anything else,” he says. Toker topped the dish with a protein: fried duck leg and thigh. “I like to bake the duck until almost done, then cool it down in the fridge,” Toker says. “Then you deep-fry it cool, which crisps the skin without having the meat fall apart.”
Toker says some of The Bounty Box ingredients will go into the week’s specials at Voodoo. As for inspiration for the dish, Toker is never one to mince words. “We used to do a purple potato baba ganoush here at Voodoo years ago,” he says. “When I saw the purple potatoes … well, that and having the munchies led me to this dish.” After all, his nickname is Toker.
The Glass Onion
1219 Savannah Hwy. (843) 225-1717 • www.ilovetheglassonion.com
The Glass Onion head chef and owner Chris Strewart knows a thing or two about true homegrown southern cooking. He’s an eighth generation Alabama native who got most of his cooking knowledge firsthand from his grandmother Jennie Ruth Haley, who ran a small “meat and three” restaurant in Birmingham.
He attended Johnson & Wales University while working fulltime in the kitchen at Magnolias under the leadership of executive chef Donald Drake and then sous chef Craig Diehl, now executive chef at Cypress and Artisan Meat Share. After graduating, Stewart worked at Caneel Bay Resort in the U.S. Virgin Islands before moving back to Charleston in 2004 where he worked at both Slightly North of Broad and FIG before opening The Glass Onion.
For his Bounty Box Challenge, Stewart used the corn, cucumber, tomato, scallions, jalapeño, and green beans. First thing he did was put a quick pickle on the peppers and the green beans. Then he took the corn off the cob, chopped the tomatoes, and sliced the cucumber. He sliced the pickled vegetables thin and tossed everything together with salt, black pepper, red wine vinegar, and olive oil. He put some sliced scallions on it and then topped the whole thing with some fried chicken livers. “I liked this so much it made the menu,” said Stewart.
