Black Eyed Peas and Cornbread?
Feb 26 '01
The Bottom Line Southern cooking is a way of life, albet one that is losing except in the restaurants, it has been replaced with McDonalds.
I was born and raised in GA then moved to SC in 1975. Anyone would think that southern cooking is the same no matter where in the south you go. This is not so, just as the accents change from one state to another in the south, so does the cooking.
When I was growing up it was Lima beans and rice along with homemade biscuits, the protein was the ham hocks in the beans, macaroni and cheese was the other staple along with iced tea, winter or summer.
All of the vegetables were cooked with fat back. I know it is bad for you but the veggies were so good. I did not know what Broccoli and Cauliflower were. Vegetables were potatoes, and green beans, tomatoes, and corn collards and turnips. Fruit tarts fried and lemon pie or chocolate cake were rampant. Fried sweet potatoes was the norm along with fried chicken and dark brown gravy and of course rice.
Every year my granny would buy a hog head to make home made souse meat and hog head cheese. I had to help and I hated it. I can still remember the brains and eyes in that hog head. I would hold the meat grinder steady while Granny would put the cut up pieces of cooked hog head into the grinder.
One of my moms favorite dishes was brains and eggs. UGH.
When I moved to Charleston SC I was into a whole new cusine.
Here it was She Crab Soup. Everything was cooked with a pinch of sugar. Collards and turnips along with ham hocks or hog jowl. Rice was a must for every meal except breakfast. Grits and eggs along with sausage or ham was the breakfast norm..
Have you ever eaten fried fat back. I know that health wise it was the worse thing you could ever eat or cook with, but along with biscuits tasted like ambrosia.
I see in all the magazines that the dish we southerners eat for breakfast is shrimp and grits. Well I have lived in the south all my life and have still to eat shrimp and grits. I take my grits with eggs and butter thank you.
Macaroni and Cheese is always a main stay and Okra soup and rice a delicious offering. Fried potatoes along with onions and squash was every Sundays meal along with rice and fried chicken and gravy. The gravy was always brown. I did not know there was such a thing as white gravy until 1980 when someone visiting me asked for it to be made, to go along with their biscuits.
I finally found out what those Darn Yankees(just kidding) eat when I married one. Now I have to cook potatoes and pasta instead of rice. I did not know there was anyone alive that did not eat rice 2x a day. I fix him Pasta but I still cook my rice and eat like a good southern girl should.
I have long given up the fat back in favor of beef and chicken broth but if I shut my eyes, I can still imagine myself in Grannies kitchen with the fat back and biscuits and that black cup of coffee that had just boiled on her wooden stove.
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Epinions.com ID:
disartain
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Member: Diane Sartain
Location: Somewhere in SC
Reviews written: 374
Trusted by: 549 members
About Me:
Every day my children play is a good day. :)
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