TheSunNews.com: Food

DHEC inspections for restaurants in the Myrtle Beach area for May 17-23

Thu, 24 May 2012 12:12 EDT

May 17-23

• 3500 North Ocean Grill, 3500 N. Ocean Blvd., North Myrtle Beach, F, 93

• 52 Station and Store, 2700 Williamsburg County Highway, Greeleyville, F, 100

Dining notes for the Myrtle Beach area

Tue, 22 May 2012 08:11 EDT

Canning

Savor homegrown flavor year round

Love fresh fruits and vegetables and wish you could enjoy them all year, but don’t know how?

Cast-iron skillet remains the pan of choice in the South

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 14:44 EDT

As interest continues to grow nationwide in all things Southern food – restaurants, chefs, cookbooks – there’s a “natural curiosity” about the humble yet iconic cast-iron skillet, said Virginia Willis, the Atlanta-based authority on the region’s cooking. The cast-iron skillet’s virtues, and utility, can’t be underestimated, in her view.

“If you have a cast-iron skillet, you can make so many things in it for breakfast, lunch and dinner,” said Willis, author of “Basic to Brilliant Y’all” (Ten Speed, $35). “It’s a roasting pan. It’s a baking dish. It’s a skillet.”

So symbolic is the cast-iron skillet in the South that Paul and Angela Knipple chose to title their new book after it: “The World in a Skillet: A Food Lover’s Tour of the New American South” (University of North Carolina, $35). The book tells the stories of people from around the world who’ve settled in the South and are helping to change how the region’s food is defined. Although not every recipe calls for a skillet, each has “the same sense of enduring heritage and family,” according to the authors.

DHEC inspections for restaurants in the Myrtle Beach area for May 9-16

Fri, 18 May 2012 17:44 EDT

May 9-16

•

• 52 Station and Store, 2700 Williamsburg County Highway, Greeleyville, R, 96

Dead Dog Saloon officially reopened

Thu, 17 May 2012 11:55 EDT

Charlie Campbell, owner of the Dead Dog Saloon, said it’s a miracle his restaurant on the Murrells Inlet Marsh Walk has reopened so soon. The doors opened for a private party Wednesday with a mixture of the firefighters and construction crews that restored the building, along with some of their most loyal customers.

Bobbie and Ray Todd said the Dead Dog Saloon is one of their favorite restaurants. They typically eat dinner there every Tuesday where they split the jambalaya. “We’re very happy they’re open again,” Bobbie Todd said. “We’ve been lost and didn’t know what to do with ourselves.”

The Todd’s said they’ve been eating at the restaurant for five or six years and love the food as much as they love the entertainment.

Blue Crab Festival to showcase crafts, blues and local seafood in Myrtle Beach area

Thu, 17 May 2012 11:52 EDT

Festivalgoers can expect more selected vendors, Top 40s and blues music in addition to beach music and local seafood at this weekend’s Blue Crab Festival, which almost didn’t happen this year.

About 220 arts and crafts vendors signed up for the two-day annual event and about 30 food vendors, including eight local restaurants, said Tracie Waller, director of the Little River Blue Crab Festival committee, which put together the festival in just a few months after an Horry County councilman pushed to have it and waterfront businesses didn’t want to see it canceled.

“We were a little more selective this year [with arts and crafts],” Waller said. “We didn’t want it to be something you would find anywhere. It’s a little more upscale arts and crafts.”

What anchovies are and how you can use them

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 11:57 EDT

If anchovies gross you out, know this – compared to what people ate before there were anchovies, they’re practically cake and ice cream.

Because until about the 16th century there were no anchovies as we know them today. That is, small silvery fish that are boned, salt cured and packed in oil.

Instead, there was garum – the juice of salted and fermented fish guts. Garum lost favor about 500 years ago when people learned how to make anchovies.

Wake Mom to croissants on Mother’s Day

Wed, 25 Apr 2012 08:09 EDT

No matter how much she would appreciate it, and no matter how much you love your mom – or the mother of your children – you aren’t likely to make her croissants from scratch.

Add eager young children who want to help make breakfast in bed for their mom, and the odds get even worse.

And yet it can be done with a minimum of fuss, trouble and time. With a few carefully chosen ingredients, you can prepare delicious impossible-to-mess-up freshly baked pastries, even with the “assistance” of an army of little helpers.

Dining notes for the Myrtle Beach area

Mon, 14 May 2012 10:44 EDT

COOKING

Demonstration offers step-by-step tips

There will be a free cooking demonstration at the Pawleys Island location of The Fresh Market on May 26 from 3-6 p.m. Attendees can watch a step-by-step presentation of how to prepare Grilled Pound Cake and Chocolate Berries by chef Betsy Liles.

Chefs’ moms were inspirations

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 10:49 EDT

When he was about 12, Hugh Acheson’s mom went through a cooking phase: recipes from magazines, nice pots and pans, and exciting new dishes, like her signature chicken piccata.

“It had that tenderness and crispness and this very simple, but very bouncy sauce,” said Acheson. But it wasn’t the pop of lemon and capers that impressed the now acclaimed chef-proprietor of three Georgia restaurants as much as the meal’s large dash of happiness. “That’s one meal that was always welcomed by everybody and it was a simple celebration.”

Even though most moms won’t cook on Mother’s Day, their food often holds unparalleled sway over their children, even as adults.

Food-packaging chemical could lead to breast cancer, study finds

Mon, 07 May 2012 18:40 EDT

A new study of fetal exposure to BPA, a plastic additive found in some food packaging, shows that the chemical altered the mammary gland development in monkeys. The researchers reported that the changes they observed in the monkeys reinforce concerns that BPA – bisphenol A – could contribute to breast cancer in women.

The research was published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

For this study, the researchers fed pregnant rhesus macaques a piece of fruit containing BPA every day during their third trimester of pregnancy. The monkeys' blood levels of BPA reached about the average level that BPA has been observed in human blood in the United States, said Patricia Hunt, a geneticist at Washington State University and one of the study's authors.

Dead Dog Saloon nearing completion, now looking to open by the end of the month

Thu, 03 May 2012 13:32 EDT

Though the official date has not been announced, the Dead Dog Saloon’s target reopening is just around the corner.

Restaurant owner Charlie Campbell said the grand reopening of the restaurant destroyed by a fire is slated for the third week in May. The first night will be a private party and Campbell said those who earn the invite won’t need their credit cards, the meal will be on the house.

In total, 300 people are expected to be served at the private dinner and 100 of them will be local fans of the popular Murrells Inlet Marsh Walk restaurant. Campbell has been running quizzes on the restaurant’s Facebook page under the name of “Dudley Deaddog.” The winner of the quizzes, which will be 50 in total when all is said and done, have been invited with a friend or date to that opening.

Cocktails fit for a healthy Cinco de Mayo

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 19:04 EDT

It’s easy to love a great cocktail. Until you look at the numbers.

Some margaritas, for example, can pack upward of 1,000 calories. That’s an awful lot of empty calories for something that truly is just a minute on the lips. So with Cinco de Mayo coming up, we decided to give healthy makeovers to some suitable refreshments.

The key to preventing cocktails from becoming calorie bombs is to take care when selecting the base for the drink. Juices (even unsweetened ones), sodas, anything with a syrup in it, and most liqueurs all pack tons of sugar.