 On Friday, southern culinary connoisseur John Currence stopped by Eatocracy's 5@5 to decree the "Five Southern Dishes That Deserve a Comeback." And whad'ya know - gumbo groupies and aspic aficionados popped up in the comment section to show support of Currence's platform to bring these dishes back into the down-home repertoire. You asked for recipes, and in true southern hospitality form, Currence obliged. Time to spread the pimento cheese gospel one gallon at a time.
Tomato Aspic Combine above ingredients (except for gelatin, lemon juice, horseradish and Worcestershire) and bring to a boil. Simmer for 10 minutes over low heat. Remove bay leaf and blend. Force purée through a chinois/strainer and return to low heat. Dissolve gelatin in 1/2 cup of cold water and set aside. Stir Worcestershire, lemon juice and horseradish into warm tomato liquid. Whisk in gelatin and dissolve. Mold, chill and serve. Pimento Cheese Combine cheeses, mayonnaise, pickle juice and Tabasco in food processor and pulse until combined. Stir in the rest of the ingredients. Season to taste with salt and black pepper. Hoe Cakes Combine dry ingredients and set aside. Whisk together eggs, buttermilk, lard and butter until fully combined. Stir dry ingredients into the wet ones until fully combined. Blend in corn and onion and combine well. Season to taste with salt and black pepper. Cook cakes two tablespoons at a time in melted butter in a cast iron skillet. Brown on one side and flip to finish - like pancakes. Gumbo Z'Herbes Make a medium brown roux with the butter and flour. Stir in onion, celery and garlic - sauté until tender and set aside (careful not to burn). In a large soup pot, wilt greens and cabbage with bacon fat. Add chicken stock and simmer until completely tender. Blend with immersion blender until smooth and temper in roux mixture. Bring to a simmer and stir in Andouille, herbs, bay leaves and cayenne and simmer for 20 minutes. Temper in filé powder and simmer for another 20 minutes. Season to taste with salt and black pepper. Smothered Chicken Season chicken with salt, black pepper, cayenne, paprika and lemon pepper. Set aside in refrigerator and allow to marinate for at least two hours. Melt butter and bacon fat over medium heat in a large sauté pan. Dredge chicken in seasoned flour, knocking off the excess, and brown lightly in hot oil until browned on each side. Remove chicken from oil and reserve. Stir garlic, onion and celery into chicken pan and sauté until vegetables are tender. Stir in thyme, rosemary and bay leaves. Add white wine and chicken stock and blend until smooth. Return chicken to pan in a single layer and slowly return to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and allow to cook for 15 minutes or until sauce thickens slightly. Season to taste with salt and black pepper. Serve straight from the pot on mashed potatoes or rice pilaf. |
  Recent Posts
 |
 |
|
© 2012 Cable News Network. Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
| Advertise with us | About us | Help | Advertising Practices
Hi,happy to understand everyone for the very first time! It's good forum, I had been looking for something like this.
Some food fetishist has distorted the recipe for pimento cheese all out of recognition. You may be sure that decades ago when this was a real dish made by real people and served to real people, they didn't use havarti cheese, nor did they needlessly complicate the recipe to what's given here. Food fetishists can't leave well enough alone, and they think simplicity is a sin, so they invariably gussy up recipes to the point that whatever the modified recipe makes, it isn't what it is supposed to be.
Grated cheddar cheese mixed with chopped up pimento: that's all it takes. Add a little of the juice from the jar of pimento if you need to make it softer. A few drops of tabasco or a sprinkle of cayenne (not both) is permissible, but using both is redundant and the quantities stated are complete overkill. Southern cooking isn't a hot cuisine, people, nor is it complex cooking. Trust me on this: in the 1950s my grandmother's black cook was making superb food (fried chicken from birds that were killed only hours before eating, for example) and she was a simple country woman, quite possibly illiterate, but she sure knew how to cook! None of this fancy-pants nonsense for her.
Looking over the other recipes given in this article, it's clear that they too have been altered in the interests of food fetishism. But what else would you expect from a self-proclaimed "southern culinary connoisseur"?
Hoe Cakes came out of SLAVERY!
Slaves had to make tasty food from whatever scraps they had. They made the batter and then baked them on the metal part of a HOE over a fire!
Please check the history of where the hoe cake originated, which was mainly in the South!
I also make pimiento cheese as my grandmother taught me, with grated sharp cheddar cheese, diced pimentos and Dukes mayo. My other grandmother preferred using Hellman's., or Hellman's sandwich spread.
On a hot day, there was nothing better for lunch than pimiento cheese sandwiches, sliced tomato sandwiches, and sliced pineapple sandwiches. She would sometimes serve an salad made of chilled sliced cucumbers layered in a a jar and covered with vinegar and a tiny bit of sugar. Or potato salad if anyone was really hungry. Usually the sandwiches served with sweet tea or lemonade were sufficient. If my grandmother got fancy, she would serve one of 4 desserts: homemade ice cream (vanilla, banana, or peach) , strawberry shortcake, fruit pie, or a cake...caramel layer cake (usually 12 layers) or lemon cheese cake...also 12 layers or thereabouts.
Pimiento cheese is enjoyed all across the South and across its social strata, too. I've eaten it at the homes of my Ga. and Fla.farmer relatives and the NC country club set, too.
Now that I've married into a German family, I've learned to love radish sandwiches on rye, with Dukes mayo. And I've created my own favorite...Claussen sandwich sliced dill pickles on any kind of bread with, you guessed it, Dukes mayo!
I lived in NJ and NC and never heard of anything called a hoe cake. But if you google it, it brings up johnny cake. I did attempt making them after I saw an episode of Diners Drive Ins and Dives when they went to Rhode Island. They turned out ok. But cornmeal pancakes aren't terribly appetizing to me and they didn't cook in the middle very well.
My grandmother and mother still make and eat pimento cheese in NC. I won't touch it.
I am from MS and it has ALWAYS been Blue Plate Mayo. Never heard of Dukes and wouldn't go within a mile of Miracle Whip–>NASTY.
Conrad Hinkles in NC the ONLY brand that's fit to eat!
Aspic is in every old church cookbook I own but I've never personally given it a try. However, pimiento cheese and hoecakes have both been eaten my entire life and are homemade from traditional, simple recipes learned in the KITCHEN by watching or were passed down from generation to generation. These chef-altered overdone recipes that have more ingredients in them than I have cabinet space in my mobile home certainly do not represent the true spirit of southern cooking. Oh...and DUKE's mayo is KING!
in the south there are NO chefs, but a truckload of great COOKS and this clown should lock up his briefcase and find another job
in the south there are NO chefs, but a truckload of great COOKS
where does this author get it, the foods he's talking about are not the staples of the south, he talks like a blue bellied yankee, no real biscuits and gravy, no fried chicken, no greens with salt meat in em. throw that bum out
I live in New Orleans and don't think any of the above are outdated recipes. Had tomato aspic last Thanksgiving. I don't think my grandmother's had all those ingredicents but she has made it every year since I can remember. I know the Hoe Cakes but do you have to call them 'Hoe'. How bout Corn Cakes....sounds better, tastes better too especially with cane syrup. To the lady from Mississippi inquiring about Blue Plate Mayonnaise. There is a jar in my refrigerator. If you miss it, drive to a grocery store near New Orleans. It's in every grocery store I shop. One last thing. How can anyone prefer store bought pimento cheese from home made? I really want to know why.
Thanks for the info. I live in NC now and Duke's rules the roost, though it tastes oily to me. I use Kraft for most things now, especially potato salad.
A day old slice of buttered white cornbread in a bowl, hot butterbeans cooked with ham hocks ladled over the cornbread, and a dash of tabasco. Eat with a spoon and add more cornbread to sop the leftover juice. Sure better than that Healthy Choice thing I ate tonight.
Just had to weigh in here after reading all these comments. Nothing gets a bunch of Southerners riled up like adulterating our native cuisine! My momma made fried corn bread – we called it 'hushpuppies' but it bore no resemblance to those little wads of dough some restaurants try to pass off. Good as it was dripping with melted butter, it was manna from heaven when crumbled into a glass of buttermilk. Oh my goodness......
And white cornmeal, White Lily self-rising flour, eggs, milk, salt, stirred up with fat melted in the cast iron skillet it is baked in. It's 10:30 and I'm dying of hunger reading this blog.
Better hit the sack before I hit the pantry.
no wonder the the southern states are the fattest states....wipe the slobber off your chin
Sugar in Southern cornbread of any type is a mortal sin in the South...like serving "pimmna cheese" with anything other than cheese, mayo (i prefer Kraft), and chopped pimentos, unsweetened iced tea, and chicken fried in anything but lard – or Crisco in a pinch.
Whar's the Muscadine Jelly ?
Muscadines are wild grapes that grow in the south... we live in the upstate of SC and they can be found here I know and also in the mountains. My mother-in-law makes jelly with them. They are similar in taste to a red grape.
The best Pimento Cheese is made from VERY SHARP CHEESE and your own roasted peppers. Forget the "Bubble Gum" cheese as my mother would say and get something with some zip to it. Grilling the "samich" makes it so much better witht the melted cheese running out of it. YUMMY!!!
What are the sodium numbers per serving?
The Gumbo recipe is absolutely the worse one I have ever seen. The call for 3/4 cup of bacon fat is unusual for a soup and I have never heard of using taragon (a strong tasting mint) in Gumbo nor spinach. Okra would be a more traditional vegetable however Gumbo's are typically filled with meat (Chicken, seafood, sausage) not vegetables.
No self respecting southerner would make a Gumbo like the author recipe dictates.
If it doesn't have okra it isn't gumbo. It may be sorta like gumbo, it may have been made with a roux but it isn't gumbo. Okra is gumbo; they are two words for the same vegetable. There are younger folks with different opinions but in Southern Louisiana in the 60's that was told as the truth.
I have been in a room having a discussion on how to make "pimmna cheese" with ladies with a combined talent of at least 200 years – NO cream cheese, NO relish or pickles NO havarti cheese. Chedda or velvetta (*possibly even just american – in a pinch – shredded) only. There was a polite yet heated discussion for Hellmans vs Dukes mayo – NO miracle whip ! will call it a draw on which to use. Mind you this was at a "covered dish" meal where this subject item was being served.
In Mississippi it was Blue Plate mayonnaise. Anybody else remember Blue Plate?
Agree with those on the no-pickles team (and no olives either!!) Just cheese, pimento (or pimiento – either spelling is acceptable) and mayo or Miracle Whip salad dressing. My family adds black pepper for heat – I sometimes shake in a few flakes of cayenne pepper.
I would rather eat pimento cheese sandwiches than corned beef ones any day.
Smothered Chicken? how about good ol' fried, and aspic is only served at country clubs, now jello with fruit is what I'm talking about.
Having lived in the South for 54 of my 66 years, I can tell you that the recipes above are not Southern recipes. They're chef created knock-offs with Southern names. Southern recipes are no nearly as complicated as the ones above nor do they use nearly as many ingredients. Pimento cheese is a case in point. Original recipes for that include only the cheese of your choice (usually cheddar or American), mayonnaise, and pimentos. What you see above is a high-brow knock-off using the name of the original.
Thanks to all who contributed the simple recipes. Pimento cheese sounds pretty easy. Maybe I can make it with lower-fat mayonnaise, or nayonaise or something. Personally, I LOOOVE mayonnaise...but it doesn't love me. Freezing the sandwiches also sounds like a great idea!
I'll have to commit another crime and make them on that extra thin whole wheat bread...My figure won't forgive me for eating white bread, sorry. :0}
I also agree, he should have listed the original recipe ingredients and then maybe listed his "jazzed-up" recipes.
Tomato Aspic is delicious...but why is there thyme in it?! Also, where is the tobasco?
You should try the pimiento cheese with a dash of roasted red peppers. Just a little kick and it so good. Also good with Fritos and Doritos.
Currence uses some mighty fancy products in our common Southern food! Havarti cheese and pickles in Pimento cheese spread....never heard of that! The massive quantities he makes are fine for a restaurant but how many people here want to make 2 1/2 gallons or even a half gallon of anything? If y'all are going to post recipes, how about some user-friendly good down-home recipes, not trendy new-age restaurant food! Thanks, Granny feels better now:)
I enjoy this blog but recipes can be confusing. Your hoe cake recipe sounds good but a hoe cake has only three ingredients; cornmeal, salt and water. It is cooked in a skillet with a small amount of oil and browned on both sides.
It is a native American recipe called Ash cakes and was adopted by European settlers who cooked them on their garden tool, the hoe...so the name.
WHO MAKES REAL PIMENTO CHEESE LIKE THAT??? THAT MUST BE A YANKEE RECIPE!!!!!
_GEORGIA GRANNY
I would not eat any of these so called 'recipes'. All that fat in bizarre mixtures? No thanks. Pimiento cheese?I swear that no matter what cheese I ate in US, it was absolutelly tasteless, whatever the name...Velveeta, Cheddar, Harvati. I guess Wisconsin cheese used to be good, but now all of them have the same cardboard taste. I prefer an honest slice of Eropean cheese than a pointlessly complicated mixture called Pimiento Cheese. And aspic is perfect but not with tomatoes...but country raiesd coq or pork.
wow you mean you've tried all American cheeses? There are hundreds if not thousands of Artisan cheeses in this country, and most of them are delicious. I can almost guarantee that you are just a snob, with no discernment whatsoever.
I had smothered chicken a few months back, it's really disgusting and looks unappetizing. No thanks.
Though shrimp and grits should be on this list. I'd never heard of it until I visited Georgia a few weeks ago and oh my it was so delicious.
I grew up in the Deep South. Aside from pimiento cheese (which makes me want to vomit), I don't recall having the others in my 63 years. They look disgusting. Why butter? Why all the fat? There are plenty of better things to eat in the South.
This is gross!! No wonder all those rednecks waddle around and kick the bucket so young.
I agree with you, NaMie, I can't believe anybody woul d want to mix so many ingredients in such strange combinations, like mayonaise with ...more fat?
You may be right, but people all over the world eat fatty food like that, and they're not overweight. I suspect that so many people in the US are overweight because of a lack of exercise. I'm not from the South, but I bet you can make pimento cheese with lower fat cheddar and vegan mayonnaise and eat it on wheat bread to make it more healthful.
I'm not a vegetarian, but I dated a vegan for a while, and Nayonnaise tastes pretty good. It's like Miracle whip, but without the animal fat. I abhor "low-fat" mayonnaise, but you could use that, too. You can also use lower-fat cheddar, or even organic cheddar and I bet it would taste delicious.
I bet any creamy French cheese has as much fat as that pimento cheese stuff.
I, Mufti Jack bin-Jack al-Griffini, issue a fatwa proclaiming John Currence is no true Scion of the Southland and he should be shunned and abjured by all true Southerners. He has committed many and shameful crimes against true Southern food, including: Specious ingredients in pimento cheese and falsely calling some cockamamie corn pone hoecake.
To Wit:
In the first: Pimento cheese contains only three ingredients, orange-colored cheese, mayo, and chopped pimentos. John Currence has caused to be published a false recipe for this Southern classic.
In the second: He has added many and specious ingredients to hoecake. Hoecake contains corn meal, water, and a little bit of lard for the cooking surface.
May he see the error of his ways before he is forced to move to New York and eat bizarre Asian fusion cuisine.
I'd say "Amen!"
LOL You almost made me have a heart attack!
In certain parts of the South (I'm referring to the Ark-La-Miss region) if you fail to have tomato aspic on the table at the house after a funeral you may not be issued a death certificate for the deceased. And it's quite delicious topped with a dainty dollop of mayonnaise and maybe some pickled shrimp on the side. Pimiento cheese should only be made with homemade mayo - really, it doesn't take an act of God to make homemade mayo - but Duke's or Hellman's will work just fine, too. Pimiento cheese on small squares or triangles of bread topped with crumbled bacon and toasted under the broiler is a perfectly acceptable dish to pass at a cocktail party. But Miracle Whip, havarti or cream cheese in pimiento cheese? No, thank you. Serve that down here and you will be discussed.
And banana pudding homemade and it better not have meringue.
Hoe cakes? I prefer whore pies.
Is this the same as "hair pie"?
Pimiento cheese – You are preaching to the choir! I LOVE the stuff!!! Amen! Amen! (Never made it with pickles.) Try crumbling bacon in the cheese mixture for a truly sacred experience!
Know what's good? Dip those chips called "Bugles" in pimento cheese. Yum!
ugh – called it puckmento as kids – still do. i'll take my cheese grilled :) thnx
One version of truly southern pimento cheese is made with hoop cheese, grated onion, pimentos, s&p and hellmans mayo.
IDK about Hoe cakes, but the receipe is pretty close to Johnny Cakes.
I can assure you that my grandmama never put Havarti or cream cheese in her pimento cheese but it does sound delicious.
BACON FAT! GLORIOUS BACON FAT!
I'M HUNGRY!
I heard OBAMA likes Pimento Cheese.... SOCIALIST LIBERALS all love PIMENTO CHEESE!!!
Let's hear it for bacon fat! I'm from Texas, now in CA, and yet I still maintain a can of "drippins". Finally, a way to use them up on other stuff besides greasing the cornbread pan.
Ok, Rachel, you and I have switched places. I was born in CA, raised in TX, but all my folks are from Arkansas. I KNOW southern cooking. I keep drippin's in the freezer just to make sure they stay good. I use them in everything – green beans, black-eyed peas, cornbread, pinto beans, gravy, etc.
I'll tell y'all about a great dinner to help stretch between paychecks – slice a piece of good 'ole southern cornbread with a ladle-full of pinto beans over it. Now THAT is a good dinner! Of course, the pintos have to have some bacon or ham hock in 'em.
What about a tomato sandwich?!?! Can't be it or a fried pie!
Sorry...my connection is slow...I meant to type "Can't beat it..."
I'm from Mississippi and "piminna" cheese went everywhere. However, it's a white trash food and it was made to stretch suppers between paydays. The real recipe? A block of velveeta and mayonnaise beaten until smooth in a mixer, 1-2 jars of chopped pimientos, and if company is coming then add a handful of chopped green olives and a tablespoon of olive juice. My mother would give me the heel of bread to wipe the bowl clean. It's still my favorite sandwich.
Me thinks that the amount of pimento cheese is off. Even if it magically puffed up like a souffle, I doubt that amount of ingredients could yield anything close to 3/4 of a gallon. My blender only holds a quart.
All of the people who are complaining about the ingredients in the pimento cheese should probably take a look at John Currence's bio. He is a James Beard Award – South winning chef, he's not just some home cook spreading the word about southern cooking. He does traditional southern fare with a gourmet twist. If you're ever in Oxford, MS, stop by City Grocery, Boure, Snack Bar, or Big Bad Breakfast, his four restaurants. You can read about the chef and his restaurants here, http://www.citygroceryonline.com/
that maybe true but as a Southen homemaker, I find that you dont need all the extras to make these simple "homemade" dishes. If I go to a nice restaurant, I expect their dishes to be more "jazzed up", but at home, KISS, please. A lot of us live on a food budget so simple is best.
I am from the south and have never heard of some of these dishes. Grits, Fried Chicken, Collard Greens, Sweet Potaters and field corn is what we eat. Sounds like a northern that is a wanna-be southern that is sharing these recipes.
There used to be a large department store in Norfolk Va called Miller & Rhodes that served in there very Southern lunch room, Chicken Salad (made with baked chicken and homemade mayo) accompanied by a square of Tomato Aspic. Delicious, delicious, delicious. I used to take an hour bus ride to get there and I would always get the same thing. Now I try to make it with unflavored gelatin and V8 juice. Just not the same unless I can peer down on the first floor shoppers and gaze at the hat department with its colorful little buckets with matching netting, flowers and feathers. I am a northerner and we always ate pimento cheese (and loaf) at home in Indiana. You don't know what you are missing.
I've made gumbo de fine herbs twice with mixed results. Have any of you made it???
Re: Chicken dish - you did not include the amount of white wine and chicken stock in the list of ingredients.
Wish I could type better on my computer.
in parts of SC you can find Pimento Cheeseburgers on the menu!
I topught my Jpanese wife pimento cheese and she sends a sandwich with work to me at least once a week. I agree with KISS. K has it just rightexcept Hellman's mayonaise.
I wonder who in New York is making up all these "Southern" Recipes? For all of us down here, those look like Pig Latin written in Arabic. Nothing we make in the South has as many ingredients as any of that stuff up there. Havarti?!?! Cheddar or Velveeta, son. I'd never heard of an aspic until I saw "Julie and Julia". I sure wouldn't eat one. If you're going to post a mini-series about Southern cooking, ask a Southern cook... a COOK, not a chef.
Check out your local town/church cookbook and you will see numerous jello (aka aspic) receipes... blame the ATL not NYC for the "fancy" stuff.
Aw hell – half the people I know in NYC are Southern ex-pats. I'm married to a North Carolina native, even, and the pimento cheese we make in Brooklyn is just as good, or even better, than any I've had in NC or my native Kentucky. What I've gathered from these friends and my husband is that even when you're no longer physically there, Southern is a state of mind.
And John Currence is most assuredly Southern - unless New Orleans and Oxford, Mississippi have seceded to the North.
Nothing like the pimiento cheese sandwich and pink lemonade they serve at the Masters.
Purists would howl, but I like mine with a little diced jalapeno mixed in.
I'm with everyone else. I'm from the south, with my family heavily rooted in SC, and grew up in DC and lived in NYC for 5 years and am now back in the south in GA. Pimento cheese never went anywhere and all of the additional or non-traditional ingredients are unnecessary and are ruining a classic. Sharp cheddar + S&P + pimentos and Dukes mayo. That's it. Serve on crackers, white sandwich bread, or toast if you're getting fancy. We ate it when were kids because it was cheap and easy. Sadly, It's the drive to be subversive in the food world that is ruining classic foods and mixing up the traditions and standard recipes of the regions they come from.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pimento_cheese
I would add stuffed green peppers to the list of things southern. Fried potatoes and onions with homemade ripe tomato ketchup some collard greens cooked with a ham hock and a hoe cake!!! THAT is good eatin' ...my doc would say unhealthy eating
I agree on all of the above
You are talking good eating there!!! My grandparents and parents were from Atlanta and Alabama and they brought some good recipes with them. Everything has bacon grease in it. It gives things so much flavor.
i eat a pimento cheese sandwiche probably once or twice a week. love the gunky stuff
BTW i love fried egg sandwich with pimento cheese. mmmmmGoooood
Im from the South and I haver never heard of tomato aspic. I cant stand pimento cheese either. I also have never put greens in my gumbo. However smothered chicken is delicious although you dont need all those additional spices to make it.
Another thing, is it just me or does anyone else from the South find these recipes have way to many ingredients?
I agree. These recipes have way too much $#!+ in them.
I agree! Lived all of my 59 yrs. in Tennessee. Never seen any of these recipes in my life. REAL southern cooks only need salt and pepper, maybe some bacon grease or fatback for flavoring. MY peminto cheese os grated american cheese, jar of drained pimentos and MAYO, NEVER salad dressing. Delis and stores use salad dressing because of the shelf life.
I agree...most of the time some gourmet type starts messing with recipes that originated with people who didn't have access to all the extras. If a recipe has more than 5 ingredients it's been tampered with.
I'm pretty sure the Baptist Church owns the sole rights to all pimento cheese recipes and as such may come after you for publishing their secret recipe. When I was growing up in the South you couldn't go to a church function where food was served and there wasn't at least 100 little pimento cheese sandwiches cut in triangles piled high on a platter out on a picnic table under the oak trees. I still eat it today and enjoy the Ruth's brand we get here in NC but I'm going to try this one now. I'll modify it slightly by changing the pimento peppers to red jalepeno peppers.
see you are in NC so am I. Harris Teeter carries their brand of pimento cheese in the deli section that is so close to homemade! really good on a sandwich with fresh farmer's market tomato and Dukes...good lord it's good yall.
If you have to buy it, yeah, get it with jalapeno from Harris Teeter -
The use of Havarti cheese in pimiento and cheese is surely forbidden by law! If not, it should be. It is certainly a crime.
Aspic is one of those things that was especially popular years ago–as in the 40s thru 60s. I don't think I've seen it since at least the early 70s. It's one of those "congealed" salads that were popular then. Smothered chicken, gumbo, and pimento cheese are still around and never left. We always put jalapenos in our pimento cheese. Havarti cheese?? Why oh why would you put Danish cheese in a southern classic? I always thought of "hoe cakes" as a yankee thing, aka "johnny cakes".
The Smothered Chicken recipe calls for white wine and chicken stock but the ingredient list doesn't include either. How much is needed of both or is it just a guess?
Smothered Chicken should not have white wine in the gravy!
I'm from ND-just recently became acquainted w/pimento cheese, but I love it! Can't see myself making enough for a family of 54 though.
I'm from the South and have never heard of Tomato Aspic or hoecakes either. Maybe they're specific to a certain region of the South (the "South" is FAR from homogeneous you know, *big* difference between New Orleans and Nashville)
hoe cakes are what I call "fried cornbread" and they are delicious
Tomato Aspic is usually served at teas and bridal showers. It is like tomato Jello with a green olive. I generally just push it around on the plate so the hostess thinks I ate some of it. If you do not want to make pimento cheese there are a few good brands with the prepared potato salads and cole slaws.
Tomato aspic is most popular in the Mississippi Delta region. My grandmother would add the tiny cocktail shrimp and serve it at "ladies' luncheons," bridal and baby showers, etc.
Tomato Aspic looks disgusting, but it's quite delicious! We have it every year at Thanksgiving to go with the Turkey and Cornbread Dressing.
Anyone who's following that recipe should definitely add a dash or two of Tabasco in...takes it to a whole new level.
I had never eaten tomato aspic until I found a good-sounding recipe in a cookbook a few years ago. I make it every Christmas and am the only one in my entire Mississippi-born-and-raised family who will eat it.
Just got back from Alabama where I throughly enjoyed a grilled pimento cheese and bacon sandwich at a pretty upscale restaurant. TO DIE FOR!!! This sandwich needs a place up North!!
No it does not. What you ate is chock full of fat and salt. Except for the aspic–which used to be sold in cans–every recipe here is a heart attack-in-waiting.
Pimento cheese dissappeared?? I eat it like at least once a week!! What kind of recipe is that anyways? Sharp Cheddar cheese + pimentos + Duke's Mayo + S&P = Good pimento cheese :)
I totally agree. You should ask a southerner (who has made and eaten pimento cheese for many years) how to prepare it. You absolutely MUST use Duke's mayonnaise.
OMG–Duke's Mayo!! I'm from Texas, but my dad was born and raised in NC. We'd spend 2 weeks every summer in NC, and bring some Duke's Mayo back to Texas. I hadn't thought about Duke's in awhile, but now I'm craving it. Must. get. Duke's! Oh–and Banner Sausage!! In a can!! Does that still exist?
@Jeff I think what atxitmom is getting at is wondering what you do with some of this stuff, a la "What do you do with pimento cheese?" Do you serve it on something, or eat it straight? The recipe makes no mention.
Make sandwiches or grill it open-face on any kind of bread. Spread it on crackers or veggies – usually celery.
I'm a foodie from the north and love Southern cooking, but both tomato aspic and ESPECIALLY pimento cheese look utterly disgusting. I can't understand the appeal of something that looks like vomit. I can just imagine how unpleasant it tastes. As for the hoe cakes, well, I think Mel Gibson's found his new term of endearment of the week.
You should actually taste something before you comment on how it must taste like vomit because "it looks like vomit." I have never seen pimiento cheese that looked like vomit, and boy are YOU missing out!
I'll pass, trust me. Besides, I never said that it "must taste like vomit." I did, however, say that "I can just imagine how unpleasant it tastes." I just never understood the appeal of some regional cuisines. Maybe it's for some people, but I don't consider myself as missing out so much as OPTING out.
Pimento cheese doesn't look anything like what is pictuered above. You are missing out without knowing it!!
I'm from the South too and make pimento cheese often. It tastes much better better without the pickles and pickle juice. And you should use the sharpest cheddar you can find! (And if you use a sharp cheddar, you definitely don't need any salt.) Yum!
I'm with you. Pimento cheese should follow the KISS principle. Oh, and you MUST use Duke's Mayo!
Pimento Cheese has been a favorite in my family for at least 50 years. But I would never put pickles or pickle juice in it. Also I use Miracle Whip instead of mayo, yum.
Pimento cheese should never contain cream cheese.
Or Havarti.
Totally agree - no cream cheese!
Agree. Also no pickles.
I was born and live in the south and never heard of Aspic. I didn't know pimento cheese had gone anywhere. Yummy.
I have a few posts about pimento cheese on my blog. Check them out for some good ideas: dembellyfull.com
nice site fernando. i am a foodie and a lover of all things kitchen as well.
@atxitmom You mean like a recipe?
No, like a brief description, may contain a brief histoy (appropriate in this context) how/when/with what is the item served... that kind of thing. We can all read the recipe provided, but it doesn't provide any background info.
Why are all the recipes for a crowd gathering? How about for 2-4 people? And what are hoe cakes anyhow? Each recipe needs a brief description of what the food is.
There's Hoe Cakes because hoes gotta eat too.
Shame on you!
That's a good one...and I needed a laugh today.
What makes my stomach turn is the amounts these recipes make.
I can be of assistance on origins. Hoe cakes long ago were cooked on the flat surface of a hoe. It was sometimes too difficult to leave the field in the middle of the work and these items were easily mixed together and cooked. The hoe provided a flat surface to use over a fire. The cooking was quick and easy.
Hoe cakes are like cornbread but they are fried in little patties. You can cut the recipes down by using math to make smaller batches. If you followed the articles on eatocracy you may see that there was a previous article on these items.
Looks like it's pretty simple to divide everything by four.
Just FYI, this is a follow up to an article from late last week. This author talked about each of the dishes and how they have each sort of disappeared from the Southern menu. There is a link up at the top so you can see a description of each of them there.
Simple explanation for the reason its for a crowd of people is because You never know who might show up and when so you always have extra on hand to feed anyone in a southern home. A southern lady is taught to have an open door policy when it comes to friends and neighbors...and even strangers (but no one is truly a stranger in the south). You are always welcome in a southern home and you can always expect to be asked if you want something to eat and a glass of cold sweet tea!
I'm from the south. Pimento cheese never went anywhere and neither did hoe cakes
GOOD pimento cheese did. The stuff at the supermarket is awful. Most of it isnt even real cheese. I'd rather make mine instead.
You ain't really from the south then. What a shame.
I'm from Mississippi and "piminna" cheese went everywhere. However, it's a white trash food and it was made to stretch suppers between paydays. The real recipe? A block of velveeta and mayonnaise beaten until smooth in a mixer, 1-2 jars of chopped pimientos, and if company is coming then add a handful of chopped green olives and a tablespoon of olive juice. My mother would give me the heel of bread to wipe the bowl clean. It's still my favorite sandwich.
Pimiento cheese is even better when it's between heels from the same loaf of bread...
I'm from TN and that's EXACTLY how my mother made it. Throw a slab of fresh tomato on there and you got heaven between two slice of [Wonder] bread. Also, thanks for finally spelling "pimiento" correctly.
Just a comment on Miss Pearl's use of the term "white trash" from a white guy born and raised in Alabama. It's rather ugly sounding, so I prefer to look at it as being pretty much a sociological term differentiating the poor white folks from the upper class Southern whites who ran everything and looked down their noses at everyone else. I was born white trash and am not ashamed of it. And having moved out west 37 years ago, I sure as heck miss the food that we were raised on.
My mom made it with grated Velveeta, pimentos, mayo, a little bit of sugar and sweet pickle relish. The chopped olive idea sounds interesting.
Amen! I remember those days!
Amen...that's the REAL pimeno cheese I grew up on!
I think Vicki means "never went anywhere" as in they are so well liked, there's no need for them to make a comeback, since they never went anywhere. Personally, I've lived in NC for 15 years and never heard of a 'hoe cake'. Sounds interesting though.
Then you're not really from the south...you've only lived in NC, you're not from there...I grew up in WNC and I have always enjoyed hoe cakes as well as the other foods mentioned in this article albeit without some of the "fancier" ingredients. I have read some of the comments about aspic and while I never knew it as “southern,” I have seen several recipes for it in old cookbooks owned by my grandmother. Perhaps it was more popular years ago.
I'm from Alabama and never saw a hoecake growing up. Spent some time in some really small towns too. I did eventually run into a hoecake at a family owned restaurant. Ate my share of buttermilk cornbread and many many more southern goodies. I'm still a fan of fatback and biscuits, mustard greens, collard greens, and many many other foods that my doctor is not a fan of me eating. My grandmother made biscuits for every meal. I don't think you should be telling someone they are not really southern if they didn't eat them. Heck I'm from a lot further south than that and never had them in a home setting. oh well. Time to go dig into some fried okra. Bon Apetit!
The term Hoe Cakes I think is pretty much East Coast. I ate plenty of pan fried cornbread, but we just called it cornbread, not hoe cakes. We also had biscuits at pretty much every meal when at Grandmother's, cornbread only when we were having fried potatoes and onions and pinto beans. And potato pancakes with leftover mashed potatoes. Oh, and hushpuppies with fried catfish are always a must. Oh, I'm so homesick right now...
What – Bless your heart! Actually, I based my assumption of Don not being a true southerner on personal experience and data read in printed/online publications – not just the fact that he doesn't eat a particular food or hasn't heard of a hoe cake. Most folks who live in WNC, and much of NC, didn't grow up in the state or the south. At least in WNC, most people are retirees or transplants from up north. They live half the year in the mountains and the other half in Florida. Besides I wasn’t being derogatory to Don. Hell, I married someone born in Ohio.
Ohio is the Alabama of the Midwest.
I lived nearly my whole life in Alabama and never had a hoe cake either.
JustChris – too true!
I grew up in eastern NC, and we didn't eat anything called hoecakes. However, the recipe looks like it would make hushpuppies or fried cornbread. Among the things we did eat were biscuits, fried chicken and collards.
What are you going to do with 3/4 gallon of pimento cheese? Give heart attacks to horses?
Pimento cheese freezes well. Make your pimento cheese sandwiches. Wrap each sandwich individually. Put all sandwiches in a ziplock or plastic container and freeze. When you want to take a sandwich to school or work for lunch, remove it from the freezer that morning. It will have thawed, but still be cold by lunch time.
As a southern girl, I think this is a great idea!
oh, GREAT!! idea!!
Sandwichs don't freeze well. The moisture content is too high. When they thaw out, all you have is a SOGGY samich! Hot water ho cakes are good. I make potato pancakes using left over mashed potatoes. This is an old post on CNN, but if anybody reads this, check out allrecipes.com!!! I love it! It's recipes by normal folks, you can comment and make suggestions about the recipes. I use this website all the time! They are the best! You can also submit your own recipes and pictures of your dishes. It's all free.
Why, Cher ... you can make little finger sandwiches and invite your friends over for a sociable afternoon ... or you can simply scale down the recipe. And if your use raw milk and/or organic cheeses, roast and peel your own pimentos or red bells, and make your mayo from scratch, especially with walnut oil, you won't be giving a heart attack to anyone.
SHARE! Make a great big batch of it and share with friends or co-workers.
Horses, BAH-HAHAHA
Pimiento cheese already *is* making a comeback, from Cambridge, MA's Hungry Mother to Denver's Beatrice & Woodsley—as is Southern food in general, at least in Boston/NY.
I'd check elsewhere for recipes, I've found missed steps is several of these.
As for Pimento Cheese, why bother making it, they sell it at the grocery store in jars and maybe even in the Deli section.
Phil, You are kidding right? Buy pre-made pimento cheese? That's like cheese coated cottage cheese. Do you consider tv dinners as 5 star meals?
store bought pimento cheese is nasty! What are the cottage cheese chunks in it and why is it so sweet? make some from scratch and you will find out what it is really supposed to taste like. Try it on a hamburger, make grilled cheese with it or just a good ol' sandwich on white bread.
I guess CNN cannot afford a coy editor.
"Coy"? Did you mean to check your COPY before posting?
I'd rather eat cardboard than store-bought pimiento cheese! That stuff is disgusting! BTW, I live in Mississippi and have been eating pimiento cheese all my life. I do not consider it a white trash food in the least.
It never went away!!
Substitute Neufchatel for the cream cheese to make better pimiento cheese spread.
thank you
I'm not so sure about Havarti in my pimento cheese...it's a bit exotic for a simple cheese spread.