After eliminating the last bits of the stuff with the aid of C-4 (ha, ha, just kidding, TSA), I consulted our Wok Wednesdays bible, “Stir-Frying to the Sky’s Edge” by Grace Young (Simon & Schuster, 2010). Young’s seasoning instructions – stir-frying sliced ginger and scallions for about 15 minutes and rubbing them all over the wok – were a breeze.

Our first recipe was a simple one: Stir-Fried Garlic Spinach. it was just, well, garlic and spinach (with vegetable oil, salt and a little sugar). I wondered what the big deal could be. I’ve made sauteed spinach and garlic hundreds of times in conventional frying pans. Honestly, it was different. The deep wok holds copious amounts of fluffy greens more easily than a saute pan. The greens didn’t collect liquid, like they do when I use a saucepan, probably because the wok can get super-hot very quickly. It got hot fast even on my electric range. And it took longer to wash the greens (I threw in some swiss chard, too) than it did to cook them.

Since the wok was there, after cooking the greens I cooked some diced tofu, onions and Japanese turnips in soy sauce, sesame oil and sherry. Frequent visitors here know that I am also attempting to embrace the bean curd. Cooking it in the wok gave it the crispy outside texture I’d been looking for.

She overlooked the single spot where good salads can go bad in both diet and flavor: The dressing.

I got on a salad kick a year or so ago. I just started wanting salads for lunch instead of sandwiches. Whatever kind of odd craving this is has continued, and I’ve drawn The Hub into the leafy green vortex. I quickly became disgusted with nearly all bottled salad dressings. Not only are they underground monsters of salt, fat and sugar, but most of them just don’t taste good – especially once you start making your own. Today, I can whip up dressing for two almost as quickly as I could grab a bottle from the refrigerator and shake it until its gelatinous goo manages to become liquid.

The first thing I did was purchase one of those powdered dressing mix-with-bottle sets at the supermarket. I threw out the mixes and had a lovely bottle with a tight-fitting lid, perfect for shaking. You can use any glass jar with a screw top, but this looks nice on the table and pours easily.

Then, I mastered the basic vinaigrette. For math fans, it’s a simple ratio: 3 parts oil to 1 part acid. Add salt and pepper to your liking, shake well. Some emulsion fans (that’s what a vinaigrette is) insist on using a food processor to make it all come together, but that’s too much trouble for a Tuesday lunch. Unless there’s a lot of chunky ingredients, shaking should do just fine.

The oil can be such things as olive oil, vegetable oil, avocado oil or walnut oil. Acids could be wine or balsamic vinegars, lemon juice, lime juice, or a combination thereof. You don’t have to spend a lot on fancy oils and vinegars – your fresh dressing will taste better than the bottle no matter if the ingredients are pricey or not. But you could splurge, if you like, on some good balsamic vinegar or an unusual oil.

Which brings me to the add-ins. You can toss in a crushed garlic clove, dab of Dijon mustard, chopped fresh basil or tarragon, dried herb blends, drained capers, sesame oil, grated fresh ginger, tahini paste, mashed ripe avocado – you name it, pretty much. If you have a reasonably well-stocked pantry and spice shelf, you can come up with a different dressing for every weekday lunch. Homemade dressing will keep in the refrigerator, but I prefer to make just what I need and use it fresh. Let it sit for a few minutes if you’re adding flavors – while you’re compiling your salad is a good length of time.

If you want a fancier dressing, this recipe from “Tupelo Honey Cafe: Spirited Recipes from Asheville’s New South Kitchen” by Elizabeth Sims with Chef Brian Sonoskus (Andrews McMeel, 2011) is lively and different. You will need the food processor for this one. It’s easy to divide in half if you don’t need so much dressing.

1/4 cup pecans

1/4 cup cider vinegar

1 clove garlic, minced

2 1/2 teaspoons Dijon musterd

2 1/2 teaspoons whole-grain mustard

1 tablespoon plus 1 1/2 teaspoons tupelo honey

2 teaspoons sugar

1 teaspoon sea salt

1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1 cup canola oil

1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil

Roast the pecans on a rimmed sheet pan in a 350-degree oven for about 20 minutes, or until the pecans are roasted or slightly browned. Remove, cool and grind in a food processor until the mixture resembles coarse cornmeal. Transfer the pecans to a small bowl. Puree the vinegar, garlic, Dijon mustard, whole-grain mustard, honey, sugar, salt and pepper in a food processor and while the machine is running, drizzle in the canola oil and olive oil. Remove and pour into a container. Stir in the ground pecans and serve. Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 30 days. Makes 2 cups.

On the complete opposite of the dining spectrum is Oakleaf in Pittsboro’s Chatham Mills. The focus is on local and sustainable ingredients, and I’m pleased the see the sample menu here includes unusual fish like tilefish, one of my favorites. The children’s menu isn’t the usual chicken fingers and fries, either. (What part of a chicken is the finger, anyway?)

soft-shell crab at magnolia grill

A call this morning: Cancellation for Magnolia Grill tonight. The reservation was for 5:30 p.m., but I didn’t care if it was the senior-citizen early-bird special – we got in during its last month. The server meeting was breaking up when The Hub and I arrived, and chef Ben Barker came over to the table. I’ve known him since I was a fairly ignorant new food writer 15-some years ago. I gave him a hug, and said that this certainly won’t be the last time I see him. “It’ll be the last time you’ll see me wearing this,” he said, tugging at his white chef’s coat with “Magnolia Grill” stitched on the front.

The place felt like any other Friday night, with full tables, noise and great food pouring from the kitchen.

lamb with couscous at magnolia grill

The Hub and I considered ordering one of everything on the menu and a large doggie bag, but ultimately decided to narrow our choices. I grab soft-shell crab whenever I see it, so I took the starter of tempura soft shell with a red cabbage slaw; Hub went for smoky grilled shrimp. Since at least one thing I ordered at this last meal needed to be pork (Ben is a man who does love his pig), I got a pork rib chop with cabbage and beans in a sweet sauce. Hub pondered many options (guinea hen? beef short rib?) and came up with lamb and couscous.

All the dishes were perfect. As they’d been at each anniversary, birthday and fun time dinner we’d ever had there.

yes, three desserts

When the dessert menu came, we did something we’d never done before: Ordered three desserts. We felt so naughty, like conventioneers in a city we’d never visit again. Our choices were lemon chess pie with berries, toasted chocolate chip pound cake with banana ice cream and chocolate waffles with mint ice cream. Hub’s favorite was the pound cake. I liked the freshness of the mint flavor in the ice cream – no neon green artificiality. The lemon chess was not teeth-cracking sweet, like some.

The receipt said “Not Afraid of Flavor” across the bottom, just like always. And it made us laugh, like always, thinking about people we have known who are afraid of flavor. On the ride back from Durham, Hub remembered a book on magic he got as a kid. He found it when we got home, and near the end it says: “One of the greatest lessons for any would-be magician: Know when to stop…That way his magic was remembered as a delightful series of surprises, and by stopping before his audience was sated, he knew that he had made a good impression not only for himself, but for his art.”

Thanks for the decades of magic, Ben and Karen.

fried sea mullet with miso-cucumber tartar sauce & crisp lemon slices

When I told Ben Knight that I smelled smoke when I walked into Chef & the Farmer, his eyes got as big as saucers. I guess it was a little soon to make a fire joke – and I knew the scent was from the new wood-fired oven. The acclaimed Kinston, N.C. restaurant, where Knight is manager and his wife Vivian Howard is chef, was heavily damaged in a January fire. It reopened on Tuesday with a shiny new kitchen, redesigned server station and some different things on the menu.

Howard used the forced closing to read up on new techniques and hone her skills at a Chicago whole-animal butcher. He goal was to add eastern North Carolina-style charcuterie to the menu, and it was already present. She turned two pigs, who had been born the week of the fire, into items on the opening-night menu: pork belly skewers with candied bell peppers, “canadian bacon” (more like prosciutto, and awesome) with new potato and pickled ramp salad, and green garlic sausage with red peas and cabbage. Sausage from the piggies also was in a new item, the Pimp My Grits menu of creamy grits with additions like pimento cheese and greens.

It’s hard for me to walk by pork belly, and this one paired not-too-salty belly with sweet-spicy peppers. On

'canadian bacon,' new potato-pickled ramp salad, horseradish-bacon vinaigrette, crackin' cornbread

the Share Plate menu was mullet, which you rarely see in restaurants and I’d never tasted. It was crispy fried with a miso-cucumber tartar sauce. She had also fried paper-thin slices of lemon, giving the hint of citrus you find with squeezing lemon over fried fish, but better, like lemon potato chips. I had expected mullet to have a strong flavor, but it was mild and moist, with a firm texture.

Also irresistible to me is tilefish. It’s another little-known seafood that I rarely see outside of the coast. It’s a thin, flat fish with a light, sweet flavor. The vegetables in the entree dish were as good as the fish – caramelized little carrots and turnips, with bok choy. The Hub’s shellfish dish, which included clams, mussels, shrimp and a giant soft-shelled crab, all over Carolina Gold rice, was reminiscent of bouillabaisse, but with less liquid.

So, they’re back and cooking on all burners. And don’t worry if you get a little whiff of smoke when you walk in. No need to grab a fire extinguisher.

Quitting to spend more time with family is usually the sort of suspect thing a senator says when he gets caught with the babysitter. But for these two, it’s the truth. And they deserve a new turn in their lives, no matter how much it saddens those of us who have enjoyed their meals.

Magnolia Grill was eat-local long before it was cool. Ben started having farmers grow for him when people thought that was the strangest thing ever. Through all the changes in the Triangle dining scene, Magnolia Grill has stayed true to itself, along with seeding restaurants all over with graduates of its kitchen. It’s the only restaurant where I know walking in the door that I will have dessert, because anything Karen has produced will be good.

I can’t imagine that Ben and Karen will disappear completely into time with grandchildren and aging parents, so I look forward to the other ways in which they’ll be a part of the community. For now, I’ll miss you. And all that pork, and Coca-Cola Cake with Peanut Ice Cream.

I’m attempting to embrace the curd as part of a plan to work more vegetarian meals into the home eats. No, I have no plans to give up burgers, soft-shell crabs or deep-fried turkey. This is a guilt-lessening strategy. Complicating matters is The Hub. His dairy allergy means that I can’t add cheese as a protein option, and he dislikes most beans. That leaves eggs and tofu.

The cause was helped considerably when I discovered packages of super-firm tofu already cut up into cubes – just drain and toss in. For stir-frys, I have marinated the cubes in a combination of soy sauce, lemon juice and garlic. This time, I added them right out of the package to a vegetable curry. Making curry easy and quick depends on finding good spice blends which add flavor without a lot of work. I used a blend called Vietnamese Sweet Lemon Curry that I got at Savory Spice Shop. It contains sugar, lemongrass, coriander and other spices.

Veg Curry with Tofu

2-3 tablespoons olive oil

2 large onions, chopped

3 cloves garlic, chopped

1 teaspoon chopped fresh ginger

1/2 teaspoon dried aleppo pepper (optional, makes it hotter)

6 cups assorted chopped vegetables (I used peeled sweet potatoes, sliced bell pepper and zucchini)

1 (15-ounce) can chopped tomatoes with juice

1 package extra-firm tofu cubes

1 (14-ounce) can coconut milk

3 heaping teaspoons Vietnamese Sweet Lemon Curry

1 teaspoon turmeric

1/2 teaspoon salt or to taste

Heat the oil in a large saucepan and cook the onion until it’s golden. Add the garlic, ginger and aleppo pepper, cook briefly. Add the vegetables, tomatoes, tofu, coconut milk and 1 can of water or a bit more to make a not-too-thick consistency. Stir in the curry, turmeric and salt. Partially cover and simmer 20-30 minutes or until the vegetables are tender. Serve over rice.

The program explores seafood caught on the coast, the challenges facing those who harvest it and the place of fishing in the state’s coastal heritage.

Chefs from Lone Cedar Cafe in Nags Head and Sammy’s Seafood House and Oyster Bar in Morehead City, along with people from coastal seafood markets, talk about using local seafood – and how to tell that it’s local in the first place.

That’s always the question, isn’t it? Even on the coast, I’ve learned to ask questions about menus and which restaurants are really dedicated to local seafood. Not everything you eat on the coast is locally caught. For example, the season for N.C. shrimp doesn’t start up until the summer, so if you see fresh shrimp in January, it’s unlikely that it’s local. I’ve been told by coastal restaurants that because flounder is so popular with diners, they feel they must have it on the menu, even out of its local season. (I usually order whatever the special of the night is, because it’s most likely to be local and unusual.)

Educate yourself about local seafood by looking at the North Carolina Seafood Availability Chart from North Carolina Sea Grant. Sea Grant’s site has additional information about local seafood and efforts to promote and preserve it. It also participated in funding for “North Carolina’s Local Catch.”

Based on my cooking knowledge at the time, me having a wok made as much sense as using a Lamborghini as a church van.

In college, my friends and I had discovered Asian food and vegetarian eating. Not that we were going to give up our burgers or frozen waffles, but it became “the thing” to have a wok.

So, there it was in my kitchen, with a round bottom, a metal ring to sit it over my lame rented electric range, and no directions. Seasoning? Nobody told me about that. The ring made the wok hover so high over my limping burner that it barely got hot. Food stuck to it like wallpaper. Then, it started to rust. I believe I converted it to a planter in the back yard.

Since then, I’ve done any Asian-style stir-frying in either a saute pan on the stove or (don’t throw things at me, now) an electric frying pan. I’m still working with electricity, although my range cranks out the heat now. (There’s no gas line to my house, and it would cost a stupid amount of money to get one.) My results haven’t been like the real stuff, but I was content.

Until today. The story in today’s Raleigh News & Observer here made me long for that crack and sizzle of properly stir-fried food. The article made it sound easy, with simple instructions. Most of all, the article made it sound like I could, indeed, wrestle that wok (a flat-bottomed one) to the ground and make it do what I want.

I bought a wok this morning, before I could weaken. And I signed up for WokWednesdays, a locally spurred plan for a group to cook its way through Grace Young’s “Stir-Frying to the Sky’s Edge.” Find out about it here.

I can’t wok away now.

easter sunday potato salad

Potato salad, ham and deviled eggs are the holy trinity of Easter Sunday dinners. A friend who wanted to be sure she had plenty of potato salad for an Easter brunch once made 10 pounds of it. Even with a lot of big-eating guests, that mound of tater salad melted slower than a slush pile in January. She ended up carrying the bowl from table to table, pushing the salad.

It was grilled chicken rather than ham on my menu, but potato salad works with that, too. Although I did write an entire cookbook on potato salad, I came up with a rogue recipe using what I happened to have in the house. Cooked green peas would be good to use instead of the edamame, but I had edamame in the freezer – and The Hub is anti-pea.

Easter Sunday Potato Salad

2 pounds Yukon Gold potatoes

1/2 cup olive oil

2 tablespoons white wine vinegar

1 tablespoon lemon juice

1 heaping teaspoon of lemon pepper

1/2 teaspoon salt, or to taste

1 tablespoon chopped fresh chives

1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley

2 large spring onions, sliced

2 ribs celery, chopped

1/3 cup cooked, shelled edamame

Put the potatoes in a large pot and cover with water, bring to a boil, and simmer for about 20 minutes, or until a knife passes easily into a potato with a bit of resistance. You may need to use tongs to remove the potatoes as they cook, if they’re different sizes. Drain and let cool until you can handle them, then peel and cut into pieces. Put the potatoes in a large bowl.

In a small bowl, whisk together the olive oil, vinegar, lemon juice, lemon pepper and salt until combined. Add the remaining ingredients to the potatoes and toss gently to combine, then pour on the dressing and toss to coat all the pieces. Refrigerate several hours or overnight before serving.