Post Modern BLT ideas wanted

[Marybeth]

The heat of summer approaches. And with the heat come homegrown tomatoes. Bursting with juice. Sweet and fluent. Paired with country-cured bacon and a sheath of iceberg lettuce, the whole affair layered between shingles of white bread.

Last year, at an event in Napa, California, chef John Currence of Oxford, Mississippi, threw down the gauntlet with a fine catfish BLT. We were impressed. So at the August 11-12 Camp Nashville we'll serve catfish BLT's from chef Sean Brock, a onetime Nashville resident now cooking at McCrady's in Charleston, South Carolina.

Though we recognize that the marriage of bacon, lettuce, tomato, and catfish is inspired, we are wondering how you accessorize and improvise your BLT's.

Thus this call for recipes.

Tell us your tricks. Share your embellishments. Send us your recipes and be sure to tell us a story of how and why this recipe came to be. We'll report back later this summer, just in time for the East Nashville Tomato Art Festival.

Please be sure to include your name and a contact address (e-mail and USPS address) with each recipe and story. Submitted entries may be published by the Southern Foodways Alliance at the University of Mississippi.

Send entries to:

Mary Beth Lasseter

Southern Foodways Alliance

Barnard Observatory

P.O. Box 1848

University, MS 38677

or e-mail to sfamail@olemiss.edu

[Mayhaw Man]

I have moved this from SFA into cooking for the purpose of getting some great minds working together on this fun project. This idea is similar to the "Call for Deviled Eggs" that the Southern Foodways Alliance had last year before the October Symposium and not only was it fun, if you happened to be in attendance, the results were pretty tasty, as well.

So put on your thinking caps and get out the bacon, lettuce, and tomatoes (or not, use something else, just make it interesting and in the spirit of the BLT) and come up with the recipes and, better yet, the story behind the sandwich.

[judiu]

Ohhh, one of my FAVORITE things: thick cut crispy-chewy bacon with summer fresh tomatoes, iceberg lettuce with sliced avocado on whole wheat tosat. First toast the bread (LIGHTLY, if you please), lay a nice leaf of lettuce on each slice, cover each leaf with sliced avocado, sprinkle with Lawrey's Seasoned Salt (again LIGHTLY!)lay on the bacon over the avocado on both slices, and top one side with the beautiful tomato slices. DROOL... Either that or mash the avocado with the finely chopped tomato, crumble the bacon in it and use as a filling for lettuce roll ups. We don't need no stinkin' bread!

[carpetbagger, esq.]

looks like i'm off the to the market this weekend. i have an idea for something, but have no clue as to how much or little i need of the various ingredients.

[evilhomer]

I recently had a Clubhouse of sorts in Toronto which included a fried soft shell crab - plus lettuce, tomato, thick cut bacon, on lightly toasted white bread liberally spread with a sriracha mayo. It was simply fantastic.

[Bombdog]

A couple of weeks ago we stopped at The Hominy Grill in Charleston where I had a fried green tomato BLT.

[joiei]

The Grapevine in Tulsa does a grilled salmon BLT with hand cut fries.

[Jaymes]

Sign me up with the avocado crowd.

Also, a BTPB. No lettuce. Bacon, tomato and crunchy peanut butter.

I guess you could add lettuce, but that's just weird.

[ludja]

I can't recall where I've seen this, but one variation that sounds good is to make a standard BLT and use basil mayonaise. I could also picture the substitution of a more assertive green like arugula or frisee for the iceberg lettuce.

I personally haven't experimented much b/c the classic is so damn good. The avocado and the fried green tomato versions also sound tempting though.

Ok, maybe another good variation would be to include a fried egg in there... Or to make a cross between a frisee aux lardons salad and a deconstructed BLT with greens, tomatoes, bacon lardons, croutons, basil vinagrette and a fried egg.

No interesting stories or experience with these versions yet, though. It sounds like the premise of a satisfying summerlong experiment.

Edited June 15, 2006 by ludja (log)

[rabidscottsman]

This sounds like a crazy idea but i wonder if you took a block of cream cheese and mixed in raspberry balsamic vinegar dressing and then schmeared it onto toasted white bread for the BLT's.

I might just have to give that a try this weekend.

[The Hersch]

Use raw lardo instead of cooked bacon.

[jgm]

Thinking out loud. . .and salivating:

Bacon's awfully good with stuff like broccoli and brussels sprouts. So make a salad (as in chicken salad, tuna salad, egg salad--that kind of salad) of chopped up bacon, chopped seeded tomatoes, chopped broccoli (roasted, maybe?). Add some red onion, maybe. Could add diced cheese of some sort. Bind together with mayo, and borrowing ludja's idea of basil mayo might not be a bad idea. One broccoli salad recipe I make contains sunflower seeds, and my husband's suggested pine nuts as a substution in that salad, so maybe either of those could be added in this concoction.

No reason you couldn't have lettuce on this sandwich if you wanted to.

This should be a fine weekend for experimenting!

[Toliver]

Lots of ethnic spins...

One example: bruschetta BLT

A garlic crostini, topped with tomato, pancetta (Italian bacon), basil leaves or basil mayo (as mentioned by another poster) with, of course, a nice fat slice of mozzarella.

Mexican version - whole wheat tortilla spread with some chipotle mayo, slices of crisp bacon, a nice tomato salsa and the green of your choice, though I would lean towards finely shredded cabbage, all rolled into a wrap or held as a soft taco. You could always wilt the cabbage briefly in a sauté pan before adding into the mix.

Lots of other possibilities...

[Meez]

Use raw lardo instead of cooked bacon.

←

NOW we're talking.

Did anyone see the extra stuff on the DVD for the movie Spanglish? It's got Thomas Keller making "the best sandwich in the world," which is basically a BLT with a soft sunny egg and some sea salt.

I'll draw my line in the sand: lettuce has no place in sandwiches.

[petite tête de chou]

Make a batch of cheddar/apple cornbread. Slice in half- making two "slices" of bread. Mayonnaise, a pretty thick layer of crispy bacon and sliced tomatoes. Cook in (on?) a panini grill that's been oiled with bacon grease.

[racheld]

Over in the "3 a.m. Party Grub" thread---Post #39, to be exact, Daniel makes a late-night kitchen foray, in which he constructs a smoked eel BLT.

The lily being not QUITE gilded to his satisfaction, he made another, in which he added a fried egg. And on this one, if that were not enough, he FRIED the LETTUCE.

So there you have perhaps the world's first SEBFLET. Hold the mayo.

Reason for making sandwich:

a). He was hungry

b). It was 3 a.m.

Reason for making THAT sandwich:

a). He'd been drinking.