I don’t cook with grease for seasoning the way my mother and aunts did. It’s not healthy. I usually don’t cook my vegetables to death, either. But I do occasionally want some bacon grease for my cornbread skillet, and if there will be any old-school Southerners at my table, I like to add a bit of flavor to peas or beans with it, too. (Aside: After a hurricane, when you’re without power and have to cook all your food so it won’t go bad, if you fry your okra in bacon grease, even Mark G. Harris will eat it. Should any of you ever be in that situation when Mr. Harris is a guest in your home. Your hurricane-impacted home. Did I mention there was a hurricane?)
I have confessed on here before that I usually buy my own Christmas presents and tell Tom his part is to wrap them. I know that doesn’t sound exciting, so this year I decided to live dangerously. I told him to buy creative things to put the presents IN. Decorative boxes and such. Proving that men do, in fact, sometimes hear what we say, he remembered that I sometimes opined about the good old days when I, and other family members, used to keep little containers designed for filtering and saving bacon grease. Tom went to an antique store–this is NOT to say that my family members and I are antiques; I’m thirty-five–and found this adorable container to hold one of my presents, which I thought was quite clever.
If you would like to comment with a page number between 1 and 611, and another number between 1 and 25, I’ll find something in the happy book for you. Maybe it’ll be clever and adorable, as well. And it won’t clog your arteries.
I adore your grease container!
I’ve been determined to find an enamel pot like the one which stood on my grandmother’s stovetop and proudly held her skimmed bacon grease. My family (both sides) was six generations of Southerners. I was the first generation (again: both sides) to be born out of The South…but, still. Southern roots run deep. I adore Southern Cooking far more than a person with heart disease should.
So may I please request numbers 20 and 10 for their kinder-to-the-arteries wisdom?
Thank you so much!
🙂
I love those things in our kitchens that remind us of our parents and grandparents. Good luck on that enamel pot! It’s also cool how many people I meet online who live out of the South but have deep roots there.
The book gives you (deep-fried) “Adirondack yellow birch.”
Watercolor by Chris Carter
What a guy that Tom is to find that for you!
My mom used to put bacon grease on her corn on the cob every once in a while. I can’t say I was ever interested in trying that.
Meanwhile, could you give me page 411, number 14 please?
I don’t believe I’ve ever seen that done–though my mother did fry corn that she sliced off the cob, possibly in bacon grease, and it was the best thing I ever ate. I’ve never had any or been able to cook any like hers, sad to say.
The book gives you a biscuit along with “the yelp of a puppy.”
Pixie and Puddles at play
Awww…Perfect, thanks!!!
Lovely story, Becky…. sometimes men do listen 🙂
My grampa–who lived to be 97, I might add–saved bacon drippings in a jar in the refrigerator to fry with.
Could I have p. 416, #3 please?
My grandfather lived to be 96 eating all those things that are “bad” for us. Some differences between their lives and ours are that we are for the most part far more sedentary; they didn’t have all the additives in their foods (and didn’t eat processed foods or fast foods) that we do; and in his case, he never smoked. I’m trying little by little to emulate more of his lifestyle choices.
Meanwhile, how ’bout an RC Cola with the book’s “popcorn-and-tears movie?”
That’s a fancy grease jar you got thar, Ma’am. My mama always used a Maxwell House can.
Good to the last drop.
oh great coldren pot tell us what happyness got
481 17
Re: oh great coldren pot tell us what happyness got
The book provides “manicotti, the pillows of pasta stuffed with pully cheese and covered with bubbling red sauce.” Maybe it’s from SOUTHERN Italy.
Re: oh great coldren pot tell us what happyness got
Hmmm…. That would be too much cheese for me, too much makes me feel ill.
Re: oh great coldren pot tell us what happyness got
I’ll have you know that this entry forced my Mom, my Dad and I to venture out in the freezing wasted lands of Northern Virginia (ick) in search of Olive Garden for Dad’s birthday, last night. Uh Huh. =)->-< ’twas a most excellent adventure.
Oh yes please! 125, no 4 thank you.
The book says “a twenty-question marathon in the car.” Good game for driving along those Alabama backroads.
Photo by Wes Thomas on Flickr
Grease is the word!
Page 439, #17 please.
Earwormer! The book gives you “sliced leftover lamb with mint jelly.”
And grits.
I better hurry up and eat my grits before MGH gets ’em!
Haven’t seen that varmint in these parts lately. Must be hibernatin’.
I hope it is not too late to ask for page 76 page 17. I was out on thw town last night.
Very cute container. Mom still uses grease in her cornbread pan, fried corn and beans. She keeps it in a mason jar.
It’s never too late to be happy. The book suggests that you might find happiness in “a wood-paneled saloon.”