By Sharyn Ellison
For Coastal Senior

Rowland Washington is an entrepreneur who sells the hot stuff, sauce that is. His "We Island Gumbo 'n Tings," is a catering business that also sells gumbo from a roadside tent.
Michael Ellison photos

On-the-backroads, S.C.

'Tis the season - the summer season, that is - the season of suntans and flip-flops, beach parties and barbecues. Summer also heralds the arrival of the Lowcountry's roadside culinary entrepreneurs, those seasonal highway vendors, those purveyors of every summertime gastronomic delight known to man.

Folks headed back up North stop at the roadside stands to load up on tomatoes, butterbeans and cantaloupes - produce that won't be ripe in the hinterland until the first of August.

It doesn't take a tourist, however, to appreciate South Carolina-grown fruits and vegetables hauled fresh from the dewy fields on early summer mornings. Southerners are, by nature or genetics, epicureans of the bounty of the earth and sea. They know instinctively when the strawberries are ripe or the first sweet corn is ready for the pot or when the shrimp are tastiest. This time of year, the "U-pick" and "Fresh Shrimp" signs spring up like crocuses, and the signs at the produce stands list home grown peaches and assorted vegetables.



Leisha Golden and her daughter, Heather, have set up shop in the back of a red pickup truck where they peddle fresh shrimp that Leisha's husband catches fresh each morning

At the St. Helena Market, Gary Bennett's fruits and vegetables are as multi-colored as the potted zinnias and hanging baskets of vincas. Tables bulge with bins of yellow, red, and green peppers; purple and white eggplants; yellow crookneck squash; bright red tomatoes; white and yellow onions; silky-skinned plums; and aromatic cantaloupes. On a recent Saturday, Becky Koontz and Ed Pyles stopped by to stock up on a few more cantaloupes before embarking on their grueling 10-hour drive back to Maryland.

Now, any Southerner who has ever been confined with a ripe cantaloupe in the heat of summer knows that Becky and Ed will need to stop a couple of hours up the road to consume or eject their purchase, or risk a fruity asphyxiation.



Further along Sea Island Parkway, Arthur Moultrie displays his watermelon and tomato harvest beside the road in the cool shade of a giant oak tree, an enticing arrangement that calls to passers-by like the songs of mythical sirens. On this particular day, a man wearing wrap-around sunglasses got out of a green convertible bearing New Jersey plates and, pulling money from his pockets, walked eagerly toward the inviting tableau. He quickly selected three seedless melons and left with a smile that only the anticipation of pure pleasure can bring.

Besides watermelons and tomatoes, Moultrie plants his 100 acres in a wide variety of crops, including peanuts. When the peanuts are harvested, they'll wind up in the cooker next to the tree, whereupon a "hot boiled peanuts" sign will beckon to those in the notion for that purely Southern treat.



Ed Pyles loaded up on cantaloupes to take home, but was also admiring the crop of tomatoes.

The boiled goober, however, is one local delicacy that confounds our Northern brethren. Boiled shrimp they'll eat with gusto; and the Lowcountry boil is a dish they're catching on to. But boiled peanuts still leave them scratching their heads.

Twenty yards away from the peanut vat and the watermelon display, Leisha Golden and her daughter, Heather, have set up shop in the back of a red pickup truck adorned with a hand-lettered "fresh shrimp" sign. The shrimp are, indeed, fresh daily because Mr. Golden takes his trawler, the Miss Hazel, out around 3 o'clock each morning and hauls them in himself. You can't get any fresher than that.



Everyone gets in on the act when the sweet corn is ripe.

The Goldens' business has always been shrimp, but this is the first year they've sold their product roadside. It was the right move - business is good.

Down the road, Rowland Washington is an entrepreneur of another sort. A former Prudential insurance agent, he now runs a successful catering business.

Last September he expanded his enterprise to include "We Island Gumbo 'n Tings," a weekend carryout business that he operates out of a white tent, from which the spicy aroma of gumbo and the sensual sounds of soul waft into the sultry summer air. Mr. Washington says his gumbo recipe "evolved" over the years as a result of cooking every Saturday at the insurance office. There's no use in trying to figure that one out. The important thing is that the offspring of that unlikely union is so outstanding that Mr. Washington sells 50 gallons of his tasty gumbo each week.



Arthur Moultrie displays his watermelon and tomato harvest beside the road in the cool shade of a giant oak tree

At Dempsey Farms, the U-pick strawberries sign was posted roadside in April. In June, the Dempsey's swapped it out for the U-pick tomatoes sign. And there are lots of tomatoes being picked, some the size of softballs. If you aren't inclined toward picking your own, however, you don't have to. There are plenty of already-picked tomatoes, as well as other tantalizing gifts from the earth, available.

Davis Dempsey says he has been farming for 40 years, but it was a trucking strike in the 1970s that changed the way he did business. In a desperate attempt to sell his crop, he stuck a U-pick sign out by the road. Out of desperation success was born, and the family U-pick business has been pulling in customers ever since.



So remember, 'tis the season. If you have a mouthwatering desire for Lowcountry cuisine prepared with fresh local produce (this time of year it would be a sin if it wasn't), get in the car and drive out Sea Island Parkway. The roadside entrepreneurs are waiting for you. Happy motoring - and bon appetit!