Grits with Cheese

INGREDIENTS

INSTRUCTIONS

We are not talking about a food product here so much as we are talking
about a memory, a life-style, a childhood, a commitment, a dish that was
popular during the worst times in the history of the South. When there was
little else to eat one could always have grits. Following the War Between
the States everyone ate grits--poor white trash, landowners, black
farmhands. Now it is eater, not because one has to but because one can
choose to eat this old recipe left over from difficult times.
I can just hear you grits lovers yelling that I am being unfair. No, the
truth of the matter is that I love grits. When I was in graduate school
studying theology, the inevitable would happen each evening. Several of us
could take only so many hours of studying, so we would run out to eat an
extra meal about ten or eleven in the evening. We found a place in Chatham,
New Jersey, called Mother's, though Mother was a Greek fellow who bore no
resemblance to my mother. None at all. He would cook us fried eggs and
potatoes for very little money, and we went often. One night Carrol, a big
lad from the South, yelled, "I can't stand it any longer. These eggs are
perfect but there are no grits." I did not know what grits were, so he
wrote to his mother and she shipped us a box. Since we had no kitchen we
took them to our Greek "Mother" and Carrol taught him how they were to be
prepared. At last we sat down to grits and eggs. Carrol smiled and said,
"That's better!" I then realized that he was not hungry for grits as much
as he was lonely for home. That's what grits are for.
Buy a box in the supermarket and cook according to the instructions on
the box. You cook them just like cream of wheat. A puddle of grits is
placed on the plate and topped with butter and black pepper. Fried eggs and
toast go on the side. The egg yolk must run into the grits. . . . Oh, I
think I'll go call Carrol.
This is another treat from my Texas cook, Harriet Fields. You will know
that it is Harriet's recipe because she puts Tabasco in it . . . for
breakfast! Harriet puts Tabasco and hot green peppers in everything, so
this dish should not strike us as strange. It is unusually good and she
serves it as a side dish at dinner as well as at breakfast.
Cook the grits according to the directions on the package. Blend the milk
and egg together and stir into the grits. Add remaining ingredients. Be
careful with the salt as the cheese makes it a bit salty to start with.
Pour into a greased 8X8-inch glass baking dish and bake at 375° for 45
minutes, stirring once after the first 30 minutes.
From <The Frugal Gourmet Cooks American>.  Downloaded from Glen's MM Recipe
Archive, http://www.erols.com/hosey.

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