Smoke, Roots, Mountain, Harvest

Starred review from April 15, 2019
Harvest and Honey blogger McDuffie puts her talents to use in this excellent debut collection of more than 70 recipes inspired by her childhood in the mountains of southwestern Virginia. Evoking an Appalachian lifestyle, McDuffie organizes the chapters by season. For example, she discusses the pleasures of a fall campfire and creates an autumn menu titled “For Ghosts and Their Stories,” then offers up fire-roasted stuffed pumpkins filled with sausage, bread crumbs, goat cheese, and Gruyère; pasta with scallion and black walnut pesto; crispy-skin trout with lemon brown butter sauce; and s’mores from scratch. Several entrées can be prepared indoors or outdoors, many in family-style portions, and some present a fusion of American and international sensibilities, such as the bold miso-bacon moonshine mussels. Sweets are especially notable, in terms of both their flavor profiles and photogenic appeal: grapefruit and vanilla french toast soufflé is pictured amid a snow flurry of confectioners’ sugar, and triple orange cake with honey-lavender buttercream is captured in the ornate and contemplative style of a Vermeer painting. McDuffie mesmerizes in this intimate and charmingly rendered collection of inspiring recipes.