Food Gentrification

gen·tri·fy

ˈjentrəˌfī/

- to renovate or improve. 

Folks, while the world is concerned about the macro issues of world wars, economic recession, and health crisis, perhaps we should look closer and consider a micro issue that is slowly overtaking our society.

Now, I only speak for those of "us" with good taste, who were brought up, not necessarily in a wealthy home but one with a rich heritage of good food. Where the meals consisted of a cuisine anyone would kill to enjoy. These repasts were based on a heritage of the land and the sea, local herbs and spices, along with those brought from Africa and the Caribbean. 

But now these rich dishes are being reduced to simple boxes and disgusting cans. Instead of a slow cooking dutch oven, a cast iron frying pan, or good ol' pyrex dish, now a microwave and a can opener can (supposedly) reproduce these southern delicacies in minutes.

This is what our "society" has stooped to. I will warn you, the following images are very disturbing. 

Our collard greens, fresh from the fields, that we cook (using everyone's "secret" recipe) adding a ham hock, strips of bacon or fat back,

Have now been reduced to this:

Boiled peanuts should be dug up, rinsed, then cooked in a large pot over a gas burner. Part of the glory of this dish is the camaraderie around the cooker, telling stories, adding salt, and tasting the peanuts to see when they are done.

And, now some poor children think a can opener is all that is involved in "preparing" and serving boiled peanuts. Worse yet, can you imagine what they taste like?

My Mama and my dear mother-in-law both made the best macaroni and cheese. It was a serious rich cheesy casserole so thick is was cut and served in squares. This dish was as good the next morning (if anything was left over) as when it was first served. 

And now, "The" Blue Box is what this generation equates to "Macaroni and Cheese". Oh, the inhumanity!!

But the worse casualty, what someone should be tied and quartered for is that sweet succulent crab that we grew up eating. As a child, we used to use chicken necks tied to string to catch them in the inlet between Sullivan's Island and the Isle of Palms. Then that night we would sit on the front porch and pick and eat crab until we were full. Or Mama would make her rich crab casserole. After I learned to cook, I would use the fresh crab meat to stuff large shrimp, then wrap them in bacon to be grilled.

And today - mock, fake, crab like, style food ...

I know I have offended many, confused some, but hopefully I have opened the eyes of a few to the true southern food that is now "Gentrified" by these feeble fake foods.

Bon Appetite or, as we say down here, pass the biscuits and butter, please.

Cured or Not

Cure  ( kyo͝or)

- to preserve (meat, fish, tobacco, or an animal skin) by various methods such as salting, drying, or smoking.

Call me behind the times, but I am always amazed by what I don't know, and worse, yet, how long it takes me to find out what I am missing.

In the grocery store yesterday I notice "Uncured" bacon. Now for those of you already enlightened about this, stay with me here. Like many of us, I was raised reared in a world of "Cured" meats. The salty and smoky flavor of cured ham is unmistakable. When you are cooking collards, do your throw pieces of sandwich ham from your Oscar Mayer package into the pot?  Oh, no. You want that a piece of ham hock from a cured ham to give that unique salty smoky flavor.

This brings us to the types of curing: salting, sugaring, and smoking. There is hot smoking, cold smoking, and smoke roasting. 

All this is based on chemistry, a subject  I avoided like the plaque once I got to college after surviving Mr. Allen's Advanced Chemistry class in high school. Centuries ago, man, in all his wisdom, concluded that spoiled meat contained something very bad (botulism) that would lead to death.  The idea of vegetarianism not being appealing, through trial and error (thanks to Harold's camp fire and Eric's salt seller) they found that by "curing" their meats they could both enjoy their kill and avoid botulism. 

All this brings me back to the meat counter in the market and the "Uncured" bacon. If bacon by definition is "cured meat from the sides and belly of a pig (ie pork belly)", does not that make the term "Uncured Bacon" an oxymoron? 

The official definition of “Uncured” bacon is "bacon that hasn't been cured with general sodium nitrites (salts), flavorings, and other things." Even as we delve into the belly of the issue, the semantics of  it gets murky. While "Cured" bacon is soaked in a brine of flavorings and salt - which contain nitrites, the definition of "Uncured" bacon continues as "[usually] cured with a form of celery juice, which contains natural nitrites, and plain old sea salt, as well as other flavorings like parsley and beet extracts". 

This all begs to ask the obvious - if it is still "cured" with sea salt..... 

I'll spare you an opus on nitrites and nitrates. The long story short - both "Cured" and "Uncured" bacon are cured (yes cured) with these "chemicals". The "Uncured" version can say that their process uses natural nitrites from celery juice and beets. But we live in a world of nitrites and nitrates. Many green leafy vegetables have more nitrates per serving than bacon (of any kind). Heck, nitrites are part of the powerful antimicrobial agent in our saliva. 

So much for all the hullabaloo about the nitrites/ nitrates in bacon. This new "Uncured" epithet looks to be just lipstick on a pig. Whether "Cured" or "Uncured", neither makes bacon more healthy. All this mess about curing aside, just start talking to the health nuts concerned about fat. Suddenly nitrites look like super complex mega vitamins. 

In defense of the real thing (not that I would take sides here), I did read a recommendation to buy and eat "Cured" bacon due to the rare chance of contracting trichinosis from the pork in "Uncured" bacon. But I would not worry about. After all, there are folks injecting botulism in their face daily. Who knows, in the future the rage could be capsules containing yersinia pestis (Bubonic Plaque) to ensure eternal youth. And, I don't think that can be cured.

Why mess with a sacred food, especially one of the southern trinity: Bacon, butter, and gravy?

A True Southern Cook

I was talking about southern cooking with a friend of mine recently. She was asking if my mother taught me to cook. I explained that no, in fact she never let me in the kitchen. When I got married boiling water was a challenge.

She went on to talk about how she was now cooking new cuisines such as Asian Fusion, Tapas, Thai, and Ethiopian. Even though she did not articulate in so many words, she was saying, "Southern is so yesterday".

"But I know you like true southern food. In fact every thing I have eaten you fixed was quite tasty. There is an art to true southern cooking. So many people these days think they are southern cooks but they don't know what they are talking about."

Wow, I thought, here was a compliment. After all I had watched my Grandmama and Granny cook as a child.

She continued, "Nothing irritates me more than cooks who profess to be true 'Southern Cooks' but when you get down to brass tacks, they are cooking out of Junior League cookbooks, using instant rice, and still feeding their children that disgusting stuff from that Kraft blue box they call macaroni and cheese."

I agreed and we went on to discuss our childhood memories of being in the kitchen with our grandmothers, watching them carefully make biscuits, fry chicken, and bake cakes. She did have me when it came to watching her mother. My childhood memories of Mama's cooking were more of burnt roasts discovered the next morning. (Although my Mama could fry the best chicken I ever had despite her state of sobriety (or not) at the time.)

That evening while I was fixing supper I started thinking about my cooking. I will not deny that I feel as if I am a fairly good cook. One exception, in full disclosure, I cannot fry chicken. Everyone has a character failure - this is mine. There are worse. I can make macaroni and cheese that is rich with sharp white cheddar and cream with a touch of truffle oil, blacken salmon filets like a seasoned chef (no pun intended), bake a Lemon Doberge cake with homemade lemon curd between each of the 4 layers, to name some of my favorite recipes. 

I love good cornbread with bits of jalapenos and cheese. Collards are always a good green vegetable to add to any meal. I only use real creamy butter, never never never anything else. Anything, short of dessert, can be enhanced with the addition of bacon. I never learned how to cook a potato until I was married (and started reading about cooking) because I grew up with rice at every meal.

I make a mean roux that can be used as a base for gravy, gumbo, etouffee, or bechamel sauce. My pimento cheese is rich with real roasted peppers (that I roast myself) and sharp cheddar. 

My cooking is truly southern. I liberally utilize the two of the three food groups: butter and bacon.

OK, my conscious is heavy here. I spent years trying master collards only to finally learn the secret from a newly published cookbook - oh the humility of it. I tired of my biscuits being the butt of family jokes, so I resorted to the bagged frozen ones from Pillsbury. Grandmama, forgive me, I have failed you. My cornbread starts with a 45 cent box of Jiffy mix - shoot me now. But I have no apologies for the truffle oil in the macaroni, it is just damn good.

Now that I have confessed my sins in the kitchen, I can cook, bake, baste, braise, simmer, broil, and saute with pride. Everyone has skeletons in their pantry. I am just happy to put on an apron and dance with mine.

The Trinity of Southern Food

The term "Healthy Southern Cooking" is the ultimate oxymoron. Folks from up north often comment on Southern Cuisine and how much they love it. They also lament, it just doesn't taste the same "up there". Well there is a simple reason for all this, down here we have three main food groups, Butter, Bacon, and BBQ. (BBQ alone deserves its own post to do it justice.)

 Part of southern cooking, let's say the heart of southern cooking, is the flavor. And that flavor is not something you can bottle (short of someones secret BBQ sauce) or put in a flavor packet. The collards taste just right because of the thick pieces of bacon, hunk of fat back, or piece of salted pork you browned in the pot before you threw the collards in. 

Biscuits will not work correctly without Crisco or lard. (And for the record, I seriously doubt Bisquick contains dehydrated lard.) OK, you can fry chicken in vegetable oil and it will taste great. But I can assure you it tastes better fried in Crisco. 

There is a reason Butter is a food group down here. For instance, a decent biscuit is not decent without a pat of sweet creamy butter. "I can't believe it's not butter" isn't - just in case your mother never told you. Margarine is blasphemy. 

And there is little argument that bacon added to anything tastes better. This can be a sandwich, a casserole, or a pot of green beans, to name a few. One of newest fads on gourmet menus is Pork Belly. One again we are way ahead of you. Pork Belly is nothing more than extra thick slabs of bacon.

There are several truths in southern fare: Real Macaroni and Cheese does not come from a blue box. There is no such thing as "Oven Baked Fried Chicken". Powered gravy should be outlawed. Canned collards and boiled peanuts are disgusting. And the words "turkey" and "bacon" should never be associated with one another. 

I realize that due to heart health issues some folks need to abstain from the saturated fats. Everything in moderation. However, anyone who knows anything about the south knows moderation is not in our DNA. The only time southern women use moderation is in their words when writing a note of regret to the hostess of a party they did not want to attend in the first place.