Greens and those sorts of things.

We eat funny things in the South, this is true. Some might gawk (indeed, most do!) at the thought of eating the world's ugliest bottom feeding fish, the catfish, but we eat it all the time. In fact, Mississippi is the world's #1 exporter of this heinous little creature. This, of course, means that someone, somewhere also enjoys this fish!;...I just haven't met them yet. We also eat squirrel and boudin and crawfish and hushpuppies. The list could go on of my native foods, but one thing is for sure: nothing defines the South quite like collard greens and black eyed peas. Yum, Yum...come and get you some!

It is a unique thing that we have in the South, that being our cuisine on New Years Day. Every good Southerner knows what they'll eat on this day: collard greens, black eyed peas, cornbread and iced tea, plus a little hog jowl for those not-so-faint at heart. "Ain't nothing quite like it no where." It is a funny yet sacred held truth of ritual, tradition, and custom where I come from. It stands for good luck, prosperity, a little kookiness and a whole lot of good eatin'.

Like clockwork, early every New Years morn, my dad (or more likely, my uncle!) pulls out the 'ole cast iron pot, blows off the dust and turns the stove on low. It requires a whole day of cooking for the big family meal on this day. The key to greens, or so I've been led to believe my whole life, is to let them simmer ever so slowly - the longer the better. You can literally cook them all day. I met an old negro farmer one summer at the Farmer's Market who confirmed: "there ain't no otha way to cook 'em!", he told me. That was all I need to believe.

For hours and hours they cook, taking over the whole house with their distinctive smell. A bit fresh, a bit tangy, a whole lot of muskiness, an overall deep, rich smell. To the pot, one usually adds bacon grease or unidentifiable pieces of pork (a la ham bones) for 'simmerin. Even to this pseudo-vegetarian, I can confirm it makes all the difference! We even add a penny to the pot as part of our family lore. Alongside the greens is a equal sized pot of black-eyed peas. The two pots just steadily bubbling away for most of the day. Southern cookin' at its finest!

Greens are an acquired taste.Dousing them with hot pepper vinegar is not uncommon, and quite frankly, part of our ritual. I love it when the green tinted juices of the collards mix nicely with the black eyed peas forming the perfect mixture to sop up with cornbread. If the cornbread is made just right, it's crispy on the outside, light and fluffy on the inside -- perfect juice soaking material! It is an art, or so I like to consider it, to make cornbread to perfection. As many times as I've been schooled on the how to's of warming a cast iron skillet and mixing the right cornmeal w/ the right this and the right that, I still am useless. My mother claims she can make it in her sleep as many times as she's made it in her married life. Is that what a Southern lady is supposed to aim for, I ask?



To complete this meal is usually several strips of fried hog jowl, which literally is the back part of the jaw on a pig. The big meaty part that I used to grab on my own Bella & Porkchop when I told them how stinkin' cute they were ended up sliced and fried the following New Year. It tastes like chicken (just kidding.) -- no, it tastes like pork, like bacon w/ a thick rind. It's pretty good...if you're into that kind of thing.

So, that's it. Fill up your plate, gather all 'round the big family table and talk about how good everything tastes. That's what it takes to start the year off right in the Deep South. If you're lucky enough to get the penny w/ your serving of greens, it means the southern stars are shinin' bright on you and you'll have an extra special year.

Happy New Year, y'all!
      

                                        _____________________________________

I obviously gave alot of thought to this meal this year. Where in the hell did it come from?, I wondered. I figured it was a mishmash of African American tradition adapted by southern whites that could probably be traced back through the Civil War and, most likely, the Great Depression.



I went online to see what I could learn and found many reasons:

There are also stories that American slaves stayed up on December 31, 1862 waiting for the bill that President Abraham Lincoln signed - the Emancipation Proclamation – to go into effect. They celebrated with what they had – black eyed peas, greens, and fat back.

This fits nicely with the fact that peas and greens and parts of pigs are all part of what was left to slaves -- that which the masters didn't want to eat.

Some stories say the black-eyed peas became the South's salvation after Union troops destroyed other crops.

Others trace the peas themselves to Africa and speculate they made it here during the slave trade. Yet, Jewish people were eating black-eyed peas for good luck in their New Year's celebrations about 2,500 years ago.

And, finally, most traditions hold that the black-eyed peas represent coins and collards can represent cash signifying a prosperous year if consumed on New Years day.


In the end, I discovered no one really knows, and from my experience, no one really cares. Collard greens in Mississippi is like Lobster in Maine. Doesn't matter how they got there, they're good and that's all that matters.My conclusion is this: creative and smart and with a great sense of taste the enslaved people made some great dishes from what was rejected. That along with the fact that black eyed peas store well and collard greens are a seasonal green (Dec/Jan) in the South, it makes sense it is the perfect New Years meal representing times long gone.

Like a true Southern lady (!), I planted my own 'greens patch this year before leaving for Australia. Beautiful and green and up in perfect time!

(...this is my collards corner. Along with turnip and mustard on the other end, I had the winter greens covered!)