Everything’s Better With Butter
When I was growing up, my Mom liked to hang wallpaper. Not the self-adhesive, easy kind that was wet-and-stick-to-the-wall. No. Her daughter was adamant that she needed a vomit of blue flowers – PAPER blue flowers – spangling her bedroom walls. My Mother loved me so much that she bought that flimsy paper and shellacked strips of it vertical with globs of wallpaper paste.
That wallpaper paste haunted me, with its sticky consistency and glue-like scent. So, the first time someone slapped a plate of steaming Southern grits in front of me, I made an unfortunate association that could not be eradicated.
Grits = wallpaper paste
For close to two decades, I smiled and pretended to be a Good Southern Girl Who Liked Grits. I smothered them with blobs of butter. Doused them with piles of shredded cheese. Poured waterfalls of salt from the shaker. All behavior to make Southern wallpaper paste, AKA grits, palatable, because it was SUPPOSED to be.
At twenty-two, I moved to Charleston and began my Food Awakening. It took me several years to muster up the courage to order Shrimp and Grits, that staple of Lowcountry cuisine known the world over. I closed my eyes and pointed at the menu, thinking the perfect shrimp smothered in tasso gravy would make up for the cloud of pasty white stuff. When I opened my eyes, I’d cleaned my whole plate. To the horror of this fine dining establishment, I watched as my finger ran around the plate and popped without control into my mouth. Over. And over. And over again, leaving not one shred of ground hominy behind.
The secret to making edible grits is milk and more than a knob of butter. No wallpaper paste in sight.
MTM’s True Southern Grits
- 1 cup grits
- 4 cups milk
- 1 cup water
- 1/4 lb Wisconsin butter
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon fresh gound pepper
Combine all ingredients in a heavy-bottomed pot. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat; reduce heat to low, and simmer, stirring occasionally, for 30 minutes, or until the desired consistency. I use a cast-iron dutch oven, and set the cover on half-crocked to control the eventual spatters.
This post is part of my Torture Myself By Writing About Food While On the Dukan Diet Series. To eat these posts from the beginning, click here and read forward for some butt-kicking pimento cheese, some delectable pickled shrimp and some beautiful boiled peanuts.
Love grits in every shape and form, never had any until I was 38 years old and hope to make up for lost time.
Oh yeah, we have another meaning for GRITS around here…
Someone gave me that book once.
My first encounter with grits was on the tv show Alice, with Flo telling everybody to kiss her grits. Had no idea what it meant, but it seemed funny.
My first encounter actually eating grits came many years later. I was presented with a bowl of white, kind of grainy looking stuff that resembled cream of wheat and didn’t really taste like much.
Over the years I’ve experimented with different variants of making grits, and have been told I make a decent pot of them. High praise for a foreign northern boy
About the only time I eat grits now is if I’m cooking them for someone else. I prefer a more savoury style, and usually use chicken stock (homemade if I have it on hand) rather than milk/cream, and always lots of cheese.
I wrote this about grits in my blog several years ago
http://blog.imabug.net/archives/2003/10/grits.html
Your recipe on the link is also tasty-looking. Have you lived here a decade, Eugene?
This past April was 13 years of being in Charleston
I’ve been here for coming on 22. It boggles my mind. Longer than I’ve lived anywhere.
I adore grits and ate the “regular” variety until I met coarsely ground whole grain ones in my early 30s. I learned from the master of grits how to make them well. I met John Martin Taylor about that time and started purchasing his grits from his shop on Anson Street. The shop is now closed, but you can still order his grits online. (http://www.hoppinjohns.com/cgi-bin/screenbld.asp?Request=JohnsProducts&CN=20120713073523068058224164).
Like you and like Eugene, I make them with stock AND half-and-half (or milk if I don’t have half and half.) I use more chicken stock than dairy though. The half and half is only to give them a silky texture and rich um up.
Ummm, maybe I’ll make a pot of grits for breakfast this morning!
Are you eating grits RIGHT NOW? I could smell them cooking when I read Bill’s comment below.
Yes, made grits with ham and onions…really yummy!
MMMMMMMM. (She types as she slices another bit of steak and shoves it in her mouth……..)
MMMMM as she reads that you’re eating Steak! I’m hungry and need to go scrounge up some food…we’ve almost eaten to the bare walls of the pantry. Which means a trip to the grocery…not my fave place to go.
An ick place to have to go on a summertime Friday out that way.
I’m a texture freak when it comes to things I eat and drink…so, no, grits are not my favorite…yes, I’ve tried them…but yeah, no…
They’re not for everybody, though the shrimp and grits dish is delish.
I love grits in almost all forms, but the best are the stone-ground variety made with thick cream. The Post Office restaurant on Edisto makes some of the best I know of. They just make me feel all warm and happy.
Now shrimp & grits is not my area. That is a subject for my wife…
I have never been to the Post Office. Every time I have been out that way, it has been closed.
Shrimp and Grits is one of my favorite meals. The grits have to be stone ground and creamy. They need to be firm enough to hold the gravy and the shrimp but not heavy enough to make a shelf out of. (Yes I have had grits so hard and heavy they could stand up by themselves.) There has to be tasso gravy, onions and red peppers. The shrimp need to be from the Atlantic Ocean, Not a FARM from China or some other foreign local. The perfect meal. Poogan’s Porch make a very good shrimp and grits. The best I have had came from a restaurant called the John’s Island Cafe which is no more.
MTM makes a dang good version of them. The link on the words ‘shrimp and grits’ actually goes to the recipe he follows. You’re right, Nancy. There are rules for these things.
Wow, you went from my least favorite food in the south (Boiled Peanuts: yuck) to my most favorite (Shrimp and Grits: food of the gods!) overnight!
And Cheryl makes the best grits I’ve had anywhere AND the best Shrimp and Grits as well (she claims it’s just Chef’s recipe from SNOB, but I eat S&Gs at SNOB almost every time I’m there and Cheryl’s is better).
Right now I am smelling that pot ‘o grits that’s cooking for breakfast – can’t wait!
Speaking of butter… Forgot to mention Bill’s #1 Rule of Cooking: To make anything taste better, add fat (butter)!
Also MTM’s number one rule of cooking, Bill. Which is why we are now on a diet.
Now, with a recipe like that, even I might try and like grits. Sounds heavenly, Andra.
Here’s a place near you that has them, Penny. http://www.wishbonechicago.com/ Several places came up in a Google search, so you could try before you made the mess at home.
I didn’t have grits until much later. Not sure why I didn’t have them when I was going to school in Oklahoma. They made them there all the time. With shrimp – even better!
How’s the diet going?
Down another pound this week. I seem to have leveled off at that, and it’s a healthy rate. A little over 9 pounds to go. Thanks for asking.
I
Love
Grits.
I live for them. I’m so sad for your wallpaper paste. But MTM’s sounds like heaven.
I love grits now, done well. Just didn’t care for them so much as a kid.
My mother (God rest her soul) forced my sister and I to eat cream of wheat and oatmeal until it was coming out of every orifice in our bodies. I swore that I would not eat either of them EVER again after I became an adult. I guess grits was categorized in with those two since it looks very similar. It took me many YEARS but I am now back to eating oatmeal. Mostly because it is better for me than most of the other crap I have been ingesting all these years.
Give grits another try, James. Cream of wheat makes me gag, and I can still eat grits.
I have never had grits, Andra. Their name does not ring with inspiration, but after your post I am tempted to give them a go!
When we were in England in November, we made shrimp and grits for some of our friends. We called it ‘prawns and porridge.’ Your porridge is very similar, I’m sure. My friend Shelly requested the recipe so she could make it more often. By now, I suspect lots of folks around Thorney know all about grits.
Thinking of my Mom . . . We were told that she, when quite young, was asked whether she liked some food (I think it was green beans), and sweetly quipped, “We eat green beans, but we don’t LIKE green beans.” That’s kinda how I feel about grits. I COULD eat them, but since I’m not REQUIRED to eat them, I’ll pass, thank you very much!
I pretty much only eat them as part of shrimp and grits.
I was only in Charleston once, Andra, but I ordered shrimp and grits from one of the better restaurants. I had to have it from the real deal! I do enjoy grits, and was surprised to find them in the breakfast buffets in Hawaii. They aren’t served in California much, if at all. I’m happy to have a little recipe, since I don’t really make them with any particular sense of order. And my mother who was probably more or less force-fed them as a child, can’t stand them. I wonder if they reminder her of wallpaper paste, too!
Debra
If you click on the shrimp and grits link in the post, the recipe MTM uses for that is there. Your mom might enjoy eating grits that way.
You have several variations of grits-making to try here. I hope one of them turns out for you. Please let me know if you try it.
I have never had true southern grits. It might be something to try the next time I am south
In a decent restaurant, they are always worth trying.
Very good to know
I cannot tell you how many times I have thought the title of your post. Or told it to other people. It is a fundamental fact.
I personally like grits best with garlic and cheese.
I really am missing butter right now. It adds so much to any dish.
I wish I could eat garlic. I like it, but it doesn’t much care for me.