'The Southerner's Cookbook' By The Editors Of 'Garden & Gun'

We're pretty obsessed with This Thing Now. Here's how to get it into your life.

"As anyone who grew up on the food can attest, life without a little South in your mouth at least once in a while is a bland and dreary prospect," journalist John Egerton writes. Even if you didn't grow up on the food, the new Southerner's Cookbook: Recipes, Wisdom, and Stories ($37.50) from the editors of the much-loved magazine Garden & Gun will make you long for a plate of fresh-from-the-fryer chicken, buttermilk biscuits and vinegar-laced collards.

The book doesn't stick to only old-school classics. There are also recipes for sweet tea granita that can be eaten plain or used in margaritas; duck and oyster gumbo that John Besh makes when he goes hunting; Korean fried chicken from the Korean American enclaves of Montgomery, Houston and Atlanta; and "devilish eggs" made with the usual mustard and mayo, plus bacon fat and Sriracha, from chef Trevor Higgins, who runs Roost in Greenville, South Carolina—to name just a few of the 100 recipes.

And for Yanks who might need an explainer on the foods of the vast South, there are essays from culinary luminaries like cookbook authors Matt and Ted Lee, director of the Southern Foodways Alliance John T. Edge and Charlotte-based food editor Kathleen Purvis. Oh, and if you're lucky enough to be from the South, these recipes might just make you homesick.