Crab Cakes

With quinoa and salad of cherry tomatoes, cucumbers, and salata cheese. Very good, but the real news was the Sunday lunch we had at Miss Melissa's Cafe, about 20 minutes outside of town. Friends, this is Southern food as I'd never had it before. Absolutely traditional menu and technique (I had roast pork, fried catfish, black-eyed peas, collard greens, and corn bread) but with meticulous attention to fresh ingredients, cooking times, and flavor balances. It was a revelation: I always thought I wasn't a big fan of the salt-and-sugar laced flavors of southern cooking, but it turns out I'd just never had anything but the cafeteria version. The real thing is out of this world.