By Chris Underwood
June 1, 2025 – It’s Saturday again, and the Bose booms Widespread Panic from atop the kitchen dish shelf as I cross into my bathroom and start the water.
Tsssss-Tssssss, steady drops on tile.
The music fades beneath the sounds of the shower and the sudsing shampoo on my knuckles. If I had nowhere to get to, I would wait until the song’s conclusion before cleaning, but I’m getting to the market early today. It’s summer now, and Billy and I have struck a common rhythm to our comings and goings to Forsyth Park.
He will arrive early, towing his slate black trailer to the small parking lot on Park Avenue. Just seconds after Officer Mark backs the tow cart’s hitch into position, Billy will lock his trailer to it and quickly jump into the backseat. With the trailer parked, he will run an extension cord to the outlets behind the tennis courts, and, though he won’t be in the park long, will stand a Bluetooth speaker, mounted on three legs, in the dirt and blast the best music, some songs familiar comforts to me and others that quickly become part of my daily soundtrack.
Billy knows the kind of maniacal cook I am and greets me with bagged tilefish carcasses and shrimp heads. He attends to some regular early morning customers upon the arrival of Kale, who helps Billy cut fish and sell at markets as he completes his marine biology degree. Billy puts two bags of free herbs into my backpack, directs customer questions to Kale, and goes back to Richmond Hill to be with Little Billy and Joey while Ana goes on her florist runs, beautifying Savannah’s most esteemed restaurant tables. How they manage all their work is beyond me. Then again, their relationship was forged in work.
They met working at a TGI Friday’s in Richmond, Va., picking up bar shifts after day jobs in advertising and dabbled with a hobby level aquaponics system once they came home for the night. With a family history of cancer, Billy strove to grow the purest food for himself and a few others, but he didn’t have the land to do it. When a five-acre parcel of family land became available in 2013, he and Ana moved to Richmond Hill with dreams of a fully scaled aquaponics system that could grow naturally fertilized produce that would, in the words of his favorite band, make himself, his family, and a few customers “whole again”.
They experimented those first few months, digging holes and placing pool liners in them to fill with tilapia, then digging channels to feed the fish droppings to garden beds, all the while working restaurant jobs to cover their expenditures into farm infrastructure. By February 2014, they had a proper pond and greenhouse and then a licensed seafood processing facility, just four months later. In the first year, he processed the surplus tilapia from the aquaponic system, but now that his relationships with fishermen along the South Carolina and Georgia coasts have grown, the tilapia are left alone.
Twelve years in, Ana and Billy have become central figures in Savannah hospitality. Their work can be found at just about any restaurant you’d like to dine at – in the salads, entrees and table dressings. The benefits they organize support ailing food and beverage professionals. In their world, family does not end at the farmhouse, and their love extends to all of us engaged in this work to feed people in a way that honors the earth and, by extension, ourselves.
Read more about Billy’s Botanicals at Billy’s Botanicals – Home.
About the author
Chris Underwood is a Fayette County native who once happened upon a used copy of Kitchen Confidential while picking up his 9th grade summer reading at the Omega Bookstore. He’s been fascinated with food and the people who grow and cook it ever since. On Saturday’s, he’ll probably be at the Forsyth Farmer’s Market buying fresh ingredients for delicious meals he posts to his Facebook page.
Pan Seared Tilefish and Sauteed Sugar Snaps over Carolina Gold Pilaf, with Yellow Miso Butter Sauce
Ingredients
Fish:
2 fillets of Golden Tilefish, 6-8 oz each
3 fat pinches coarse kosher sea salt, 1.5 pinches each side of fillet
2 heavy dustings espelette pepper, 1 dusting each side
2 tbsp high neutral, high smoke point oil, such as grapeseed or avocado
Sugar Snap Peas:
1 handful sugar snap peas, trimmed of strings, about 1/3 cup
1.5 tbsp oil
1 moderate pinch kosher sea salt
Rice Pilaf:
1 cup Carolina Gold rice
6 ramps, leaves removed and reserved
2 tbsp butter
2 pinches salt
Yellow Miso Butter Sauce:
2 tbsp neutral oil, like grapeseed or avocado
2.5 cups low sodium vegetable stock (I use CADIA brand)
5 oz oyster mushrooms, picked individually then diced
4 stalks green garlic, dark green parts removed then diced
2 small or 1 medium fennel, fronds removed then diced
4 shallots, diced
2 carrots, diced
5 coin-sized slices peeled ginger
1 bay leaf
4 sprigs thyme
4 sprigs parsley
2 black peppercorns
1.5 tbsp yellow miso (I use Miso Master)
2 tbsp unsalted butter, sliced into a few pieces
1 Meyer lemon, juiced and drained of seeds
Method
1) Since the sauce demands the most attention for the longest time, get started on it first. Heat the oil in a large, deep skillet over medium heat. Once hot, saute the mushrooms and vegetables, adding pinches of salt, until bronzed, softened, and reduced in volume by about one third.
2) Cover with the vegetable stock and put in the ginger, peppercorns, and herbs. Bring to a heavy simmer. Cook until liquid reduces by half.
3) Strain, reserve the liquid, and set aside.
4)For the rice pilaf, sauté the ramps in medium heat butter, until soft and opaque, adding pinches of salt. Pour in the rice and toast for a couple minutes, until opaque. Pour in two cups of water, bring to a boil, turn the heat down to low, and cover. Cook for 15 minutes.
5) While the rice cooks, sauté the sugar snap peas. Heat one tbsp of oil over medium high heat, put in the peas, sprinkle with salt. After a minute, turn the peas, and cook until nicely colored on both sides. Remove from pan and keep warm.
6) Heat 1.5 tbsp oil over medium high heat. It’s ready when a water drop sizzles when flicked into it. Season both sides of the tilefish filets with sea salt and Espelette pepper. Sear on one side until a crust forms. Turn stove heat down a couple settings, flip fish, and cook until a crust forms on the other side. When cooked, fish should be firm but slightly give to the touch. Remove to a plate.
7) Bring the strained liquid up to heat over a medium stove. Whisk in the yellow miso and Meyer lemon juice. Cook for a couple minutes. Remove from heat and drop in the butter, swirling until melted.
8) Put a nice helping of rice in the middle of a plate. Top with a piece of fish. Put the peas alongside the rice. Pour sauce around the rest of the plate. Enjoy.
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READ MORE BY CHRIS UNDERWOOD
