For what it’s worth while we are waiting for Swampbear, I use small uncut pods and tempura batter. Last night I sliced them, mixed them with large pieces of chopped onion and mixed them in the tempura. The pieces of okra with onion stuck to them were particularly nice. I’ll try his green tomatoes and pepper next time.
Good friend Carnivorousplant, gotta have me fried okra w/ Comeback sauce. True for you???
I have made comeback sauce and wasn’t impressed. We ate the okra kast night without sauce. I don’t think I would want to hide the onion flavor, and the same when I add the tomato.
The last time I made sweet and sour chicken, I made this sauce with some Thai Curry paste added. I had some tempura left over, and some okra in the refrigerator…Sweet and Sour Okra is good. 
No, that ain’t the right one, rather dullard. Will post the good one tomorrow.
Thanks.
Give!
I am sitting here, okra, red bell pepper and onion in hand.
I have no green tomatoes; carnivorous plants, water lilies, lotus, orchids, I am your man. Tomatoes, I suck. Perhaps I can beg one from the neighbors…
Carnive, Honey, I’ve left you hanging here, sorry.
This is the recipe from Martha Foose, a great cook from MSPI, from her new book Sweet Tea and Screen Doors. And, here’s a recent article from the Raleigh N&O about her. Good gal I knew back in MSPI, nice to see her getting ahead on. The main differences in the recipes are the addition of hot sauce and paprika.
For me, with Comeback Sauce, I always add Tabasco, and then a dash of good balsamic vinegar, and some horseradish and chopped capers. The cocktail sauce is supposed to add the horseradish, but I like it better with some straight chopped horseradish. I want that whang!
It pays to do a vanity search from time to time. 
Here’s a more detailed recipe for the fried okra I was talkin’ about.
Slap Yo’ Mama Fried Okra
Two pounds of okra cut into pieces
1 small onion chopped fine
1 medium or two small green tomatoes chopped fine
Salt and pepper to taste
Flour and, if desired a little corn meal
1 clove of garlic chopped fine
1 banana pepper seeded and chopped fine and/or 1 jalapeno pepper seeded and chopped fine
Oil for frying
Mix all ingredients well. Mixture may be a little ooey gooey but that’s fine. Fry in small batches, covering the bottom of a hot skillet with oil. Drain well. The best fried okra EVAH!
NOTE: I like using half of a banana pepper and half of a jalapeno pepper personally. Gives it a little kick. The garlic is optional but, hey, is there anything such as too much garlic?
Sampiro there’s a little hole in the wall bbq place here called Kregg’s. It’s all take out though they do have a couple cee-ment picnic tables you can eat at outside. Gooooooooood bbq! Sonny’s is also pretty good but it’s gotten a bit too commercialized for my taste. Also, we have Wagner’s BBQ which is owned by a friend, so I might be a leeetle prejudiced here, but I think it’s really good bbq.
OOOH! Upscale Comeback Sauce! It sounds good.
Thank you. I have been through Waxhaw and I won’t go through there again without stopping by Big Dog’s. How I loves me mah biscuits and gravy.
Having come South from Ohio, I still enjoy Bob Evan’s sausage gravy with their delicious fat biscuits. I’m grateful to still be able to get it here. Other than that, my mother-in-law has just instructed me in the fine art of sausage gravy makin’. I’m told one of the secrets is special flour – don’t ask me any more than that, though.
Are these individual pieces of okra with the other stuff sticking to it, or is all stuck together like a pancake?
swampbear, that is righteous! I love okra and green tomatoes, but hadn’t seen 'em put together like that. I’d add that if you chop and freeze the okra just a bit before cooking, it won’t be so gooey.
“bless your heart”
HAH! Good one flickster
carnivorousplant and elelle ummmmm… it can be either way. If you use a bit more flour it won’t get all gluey. elelle also gave an excellent suggestion for makin’ it less gluey if that’s what ya want. Me, I like it all stuck together so it all fries together sorta like a pancake. That’s just me though.
I do guarantee that once y’all have done this, you will not ever want fried okra any other way. This is the way I grew up eatin’ fried okra. I admit I like battered deep fried okra but it just ain’t as good as this.
Three recommendations in Asheville:
- Moose Cafe. It’s a bigass place right outside of the Farmer’s Market on 191. Like the farmer’s market itself, Moose Cafe is a mix of tourist trap and efficient practical southern. Once you walk past the gift shop stocked with “How to talk Southern” books and similar crap, you’ll get to a pretty damned good Southern diner/cafe place. Excellent biscuits and gravy.
- Sunny Point Cafe. It’s on Haywood Road in West Asheville, and serves fantastic local food, although a lot of it doesn’t have much to do with quintessential southern food. Still, it serves stuff like local pan-fried trout with potatoes and fried grits, and its regular grits are heavily spiced with smoky peppers, and its angel biscuits are unbelievably tall.
- Tupelo Honey. It’s downtown Asheville, kickass biscuits, and much more Southern with just a hint of highfalutin about it. My favorite thing there is their tomato-soup-and-grilled-cheese combo.
Really, Asheville is stuffed to the gills with great restaurants. I don’t know what fools you talked to who steered you to McDonald’s and IHOP. There are plenty of other good places for a Southern breakfast: Early Girl and Five Points come to mind, and there are all kinds of other diners dotted around town.
Daniel
Southern cooking is a lot easier to find in smaller towns. Just about any town with, say, a population 10,000-30,000, will likely have as many restaurants serving “real” food as they have chain franchises.
And the locals will happily point you to where to go (although as mentioned above, it’ll probably be the place you’ve never heard of but where the parking lot is full.) 