May 11, 2019, 04:58 PM
BamaJeepsterInteresting sandwich from back home - Collard green melt
I wonder what my Mom would think? I grew up eating collard greens all the time, but never thought to put them on a sandwich!
https://www.al.com/life/2019/0...dBLMczloFy8FSmpTs1rQ
Collard greens. On a sandwich.
It’s the hottest item on the new lunch at Lucky Cat Rolled Creams in Homewood, which is otherwise best known for its organic ice cream and milk shakes.
Lucky Cat started serving lunch in early March, after musician-turned-chef Trey McLemore came in as a limited partner with co-founders Hannah and Greg Slamen, who opened their rolled ice cream shop in February 2018.
"No one eats ice cream for lunch," McLemore says, "so we saw an opportunity to fill a hole there and generate some revenue at lunchtime."
The collard green melt -- which features braised collard greens, an Alabama white-sauce slaw and Swiss cheese on grilled rye bread -- has fast become the star of the new menu.
"That was one of the flagship items because that's something I've been wanting to do," McLemore says. "So far, everybody who's had one has cleaned their plates, so I've been happy with the results."
To give credit where credit is due, McLemore readily admits that he borrowed the idea from the celebrated New Orleans restaurant Turkey and the Wolf, which began serving its popular collard green melt a couple of years ago.
"As soon as I saw it on their menu, I thought, 'Oh, my God, I've got to do that,'" he says. "Having said that, I've never had theirs before, so I have no point of reference.
"Mine is a little different," he adds. "Theirs may be better because they are real-deal chefs doing some pretty amazing things."
McLemore, in fact, ran into Turkey and the Wolf sous chef Nathan Barfield, a University of Alabama graduate, at the wedding of a mutual friend, novelist Caleb Johnson, this past summer in Laramie, Wyo. He told Barfield he was planning to put his own spin on the collard green sandwich.
"I was like, 'I'm totally going to rip off that sandwich; you know that, right?'" McLemore recalls.
Among the most notable differences, the Turkey and the Wolf melt uses Russian salad dressing while McLemore’s features Thousand Island.
The origins of the sandwich, though, go even further back to the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina, who served collard greens between two rounds of fried cornbread so that they could eat the greens with their hands. The collard sandwich has since become a regional delicacy in Robeson County, N.C., the ancestral home of the Lumbee Tribe.
"I don't know how long they've been doing it but longer than Turkey and the Wolf," McLemore says. "I had that when I was living in North Carolina, and I thought, 'Wow, this is amazing.""
McLemore’s collard green melt is a double-decker sandwich that features a bottom layer of Swiss cheese and shredded cabbage tossed in a house-made Alabama white barbecue sauce, and a top layer of braised collards, a house peppadew Thousand Island dressing and another slice of Swiss cheese -- all served between three slices of grilled Jewish rye bread. To make it official, he spears the sandwich with an Alabama state flag toothpick.
Think of it as soul food on a sandwich.
McLemore gets his collard greens from the Alabama Farmers Market on Finley Avenue West, and the shredded slaw is an homage to the old, iconic John’s Restaurant in downtown Birmingham, he says.
“The hard part is to get the collard greens to taste right,” McLemore says. “A lot of love goes into the collard greens. I cook them with a bunch of onions and garlic, and then I add some Crystal Hot Sauce and some cider vinegar. The key is not to overcook them.”
It tastes a lot like a Reuben sandwich, but with collards and cabbage instead of corned beef and sauerkraut.
Vegetarians and meat-lovers alike are digging it, McLemore says.
"Honestly, it's not meant for a vegetarian audience," he says. "It's just meant to be good. But the vegetarian friends I have are going crazy because you get to pick it up and eat it like a gnarly cheeseburger."
In addition to the collard green melt, some of McLemore's other creations on the Lucky Cat lunch menu include black-eyed-pea tamales, a smoked pork Cuban sandwich, and a gluten-free pizza with Conecuh Sausage, blue cheese and sweet potato pesto.
McLemore, who was formerly a guitarist and vocalist in the Birmingham-based Southern rock band Lee Bains III & The Glory Fires, says he started working in restaurants to support himself as a musician.
Some of his sandwich ideas, in fact, spring from when he was living in Portland, Ore., and working at Bunk Sandwiches.
"I was in a bunch of bands for years, which kept me in the restaurant industry a lot longer than I intended to be," he says. "That's how I learned to cook, basically. That, and my grandmother, of course."
McLemore's maternal grandmother, Beverly Lee, who he calls "Grammy," used to let him hang out with her in her kitchen in Vincent when he was growing up.
"I was the only son in my family, so I got special attention and all the extra love," he says. "I was the only one allowed in my grandma's kitchen."
His paternal grandmother, Maxine McLemore, who he calls "Max" and who lives in Vestavia Hills, is also an inspiration. That's her painting on the wall at Lucky Cat, along with a love note that says, "This pretty lady eats here for free."
"I'm big on grandmas, in case you haven't noticed -- mine and everybody else's," McLemore says. "I try to channel that granny love into the restaurant. That's why we have the old-school dining ware with real plates and real forks. I want it to be like eating in my grandma's kitchen."
And neither "Grammy" nor "Max" needs to remind their grandson to eat his vegetables.
"I've been eating collard greens five days a week my whole life," McLemore says.
And now, he's discovered an even better way to eat them.
