Bacon Wrapped Apricot Bites —The Sweet Secret That Rounds Out the Heat

The Lowcountry boil is in two weeks and the surgery is in three, which means I have exactly one boil left on this knee before it gets replaced. One more boil. One more September day at First African with two hundred people and my seasoning and Gladys's cobbler and my cobbler and the smell of Old Bay and corn and shrimp and sausage and the sound of a community eating together the way we've eaten together for as long as I can remember.

I started the planning. The boil planning is different from the wedding planning — less controlled, more chaotic, more joyful. A wedding has a schedule. A boil has a vibe. You show up. You cook. People come. People eat. You argue about the seasoning. You argue about the cobbler. You hug people you haven't seen since last September. You eat standing up because there aren't enough chairs and nobody cares because the food is too good to sit down for anyway.

Miss Vernelle called to say the shrimp are running good this year. Creek shrimp, the small ones, the ones with the real Lowcountry taste that the farmed shrimp from the grocery store will never have. She's setting aside twenty pounds for me. Twenty pounds of creek shrimp for two hundred people plus corn and sausage and potatoes and seasoning and butter and the love of a woman who has been running this boil for longer than some of the attendees have been alive.

Gladys came over Tuesday. We sat in the kitchen and we talked about the boil the way we always talk about the boil — competitively. "I'm trying a new crust this year," Gladys said about her cobbler. I said, "Gladys, you've been trying new crusts for twenty years and my cobbler is still better." She said, "Dorothy Henderson, one of these years I am going to beat you." I said, "Not this year, Gladys. Not this year." We laughed. We both know. But the competition is the friendship, and the friendship is the competition, and neither of us would know what to do without the other.

Made a test batch of seasoning tonight. The boil seasoning — my blend, the one I've been refining for thirty years. Old Bay is the base, but I add cayenne, garlic powder, onion powder, celery salt, black pepper, a touch of mustard powder, and the secret ingredient that I have never told anyone and will never tell anyone and will take to my grave: a tablespoon of brown sugar. The brown sugar rounds out the heat. The brown sugar makes people say "What IS that?" The brown sugar is between me and God.

Now go on and feed somebody.

People always ask me what makes my boil seasoning different, and I never tell them — but I will tell you this much: it’s the same principle behind these Bacon Wrapped Apricot Bites, the ones I set out on the kitchen counter every time someone like Gladys comes over to argue about cobbler. A little sweetness doesn’t soften a dish; it sharpens everything around it, the same way brown sugar sharpens the heat and the Old Bay and makes people stop mid-bite and say, What IS that? If you’ve got a community to feed and you want something that disappears from the plate before the main course is even ready, this is the one.

Bacon Wrapped Apricot Bites

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 20 min | Total Time: 35 min | Servings: 24 bites

Ingredients

• 24 whole dried apricots
• 12 strips thin-cut bacon, cut in half crosswise
• 1/4 cup packed light brown sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
• 24 toothpicks, soaked in water 10 minutes

Instructions

1. Preheat oven. Heat oven to 400°F. Line a rimmed baking sheet with foil and place a wire rack on top. Lightly coat the rack with nonstick spray.
2. Mix the coating. Stir together the brown sugar, cayenne, and black pepper in a shallow bowl. Set aside.
3. Wrap the apricots. Lay a half-strip of bacon flat on your work surface. Place one dried apricot at one end and roll the bacon snugly around it. Secure with a soaked toothpick.
4. Coat in brown sugar. Roll each bacon-wrapped apricot in the brown sugar mixture, pressing gently so the sugar adheres on all sides. Arrange them seam-side down on the prepared rack, leaving a little space between each one.
5. Bake. Bake for 18–22 minutes, until the bacon is crisp and the sugar has caramelized to a deep amber. Watch closely in the last few minutes — the sugar can go from perfect to burnt quickly.
6. Rest and serve. Let the bites rest on the rack for 3–4 minutes before serving. The caramel sets up as they cool slightly. Serve warm.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 68 | Protein: 3g | Fat: 4g | Carbs: 6g | Fiber: 0g | Sodium: 118mg