Side

GINA Salad helps lighten the fare, and these green beans with cheese tortellini are a nice change from the traditional tossed salad. I am a big salad-eater, and there are a lot of women like me out there. Honey, we’re trying to stay as “fabulous” as we can, eating all those greens. We just have to mix it up a bit so we don’t get bored!

Rich pink dressing and lovely greens give this salad a splash of color. Remember: what the eye sees translates to greater taste and greater overall pleasure.

PAT Broccoli, broccoli, broccoli! We love this simple vegetable. Nothing is easier than blanching broccoli, and once this delicious dressing—a little sweet, a little savory, a little sour, and a little spicy—is added, the transportable dish becomes super-duper. As Gina always says, “A great dressing is like a great handbag and shoes. It makes the whole outfit look (taste) perfect.”

PAT Every Fourth of July, Mama Neely made her famous baked beans: she’d brown ground beef and then doctor that beef with molasses, brown sugar, and plenty of spices. Let me tell you, those beans were good. And so are these. We’ve found that using smoked sausage in place of the ground beef (or pork shoulder, as in our restaurant recipe) adds a smoky depth to the dish. Once you make these beans, there is no going back. If you want to put your own spin on it, you can use kidney beans instead of pork and beans, but I say my mama’s way is best.

PAT Grilled corn is good enough all by itself. Here we feature it in a light, slightly smoky salad with rice, bell peppers, cherry tomatoes, and kidney beans. It’s an awesome combination, but once you add in the feta cheese, “Girl, you did that!” That’s what Gina’s mom always says. We used white rice, but brown will work just as well and give it an earthy, nutty flavor.

PAT I told y’all, I can’t have steak without potatoes, and fingerling potatoes are my choice. These rich and creamy little darlings are about the size of my fingers, and they are firm enough to withstand the heat of my grill. A great tip for grilling potatoes is to boil them a bit first; this will give you faster and more even grilling. The olive oil will keep them moist and let the rosemary and garlic do their aromatic thing.

PAT I refer to this dish as “sophisticated cheese toast.” Gina and I actually got the idea from a famous Memphis restaurant, though in our version we make it with baguettes, because we are going to grill these puppies, and baguettes can withstand the heat. Now, you can use any cheese you like, but on my spicy grilled cheese bread, we must have Parmesan and mozzarella.

This dressing is so easy and flavorful, with lots of tang as well as creaminess. Dress your greens just before serving, to avoid that limp and soggy salad sadness.

Everybody in the South has their own potato-salad recipe, and our version, using red potatoes and the coarse-ground, zippy Creole mustard, makes this a winner. Be sure to drain your potatoes thoroughly, because additional water will dilute the fantastic ingredients in the salad. It’s best to dress the potatoes while they’re still warm, so they can fully absorb the flavors.

There is nothing like grilled corn. Ours calls for butter spiked with lime, which gives it a citrus zing that acts as a perfect complement to smoky grilled corn. Rolling the husk back over the cob after adding the lime butter helps keep the corn from drying out. Some people prefer to soak the corn in a water bath beforehand, but this gives off steam when the corn is cooking inside the husk, and we prefer having the extra-smoky flavor instead.

This is it: the famous sweet and spicy slaw from the restaurant that people come and buy by the bucketful. Make extra; trust us, you’ll need it!

One of the essential Southern side dishes is fried onion rings, and the key to great ones is the batter. Ours calls for buttermilk, cornmeal, hot sauce, and cayenne. The buttermilk and cornmeal will create a thick golden crust, and the hot sauce and the cayenne pepper give the rings a little kick.

The little zing of this crunchy mustard slaw is just the right thing to round off the kick of cayenne in the catfish and the bite of cheddar in the hush puppies.

We grill anything, and potatoes are no exception. The simplest way to grill sliced potatoes is to parboil them first. This makes for fast and even grilling. The calling card of these tasty taters is the appetizing grill marks that make them irresistible. That, and our house seasoning, when Neely’s barbecue rub makes its annual spring debut.

PAT Gina loves the daintiness of these “baby reds,” and the garlic, rosemary, and olive oil pop on your palate. But Spenser and Shelbi inherited their need for some potatoes with most meals from their daddy. We love us some taters.

It’s springtime, y’all! So—sauté these peas in butter with onions, and a hit of red-pepper flakes, and your kitchen will fill with the smells of this wonderful season. It’ll put you and your guests in a happy mood and put a spring in everybody’s step.

GINA Who doesn’t like a good potato? I know I married a meat-and-potatoes man, and so does Tanya. She always finds a way to make great potatoes, and these are some of her very best. Buttery and garlicky—yum. PAT Baby, you can’t do pork chops without mashed potatoes. There’s something about taking your fork and getting a bite of pork chop and garlic mashed potatoes at the same time. You just take both of those jokers and let ’em hit the palate!

This is what we mean about keeping it light and sexy: we all know asparagus is good for us, but it’s also known to be an aphrodisiac. So we’re not only enjoying our holiday but we’re also paving the road to romance. The smokiness of the roasted tomatoes, the tender crispness of the asparagus, and the bitter and sweet flavors of arugula—all of that says L-O-V-E to us.

PAT In our house there’s always some barbecue going on (even if we’re not grilling, we’re adding the spice). These chips are dusted with paprika, garlic, sugar, and salt, and once they’re out of the fryer, they quickly disappear (so make two batches!).

Broccoli is Spenser’s favorite vegetable, and she’s partial to this recipe. It’s a beautiful dish that’s also very flavorful, not to mention healthy.