Mustard Greens And Corn Bread (Click To Zoom)

Mustard Greens with Sweet Cornbread & Hot Pepper Vinegar

I grew up in the southern United States.  My hometown, Fort Smith, Arkansas, is famous for Judge Parker’s hanging court and mentioned in the movie, True Grit. Greens such as mustard, collards, turnip, kale, and chard are a staple of southern cooking. According to The Gift of Southern Cooking, “Greens should always be accompanied by some type of cornbread.” Cornbread is important for sopping up the “pot likker”, which is the tasty broth left behind once the greens are cooked.  Mustard greens are traditionally cooked low and slow in smoked pork stock. However, these greens are also delicious quickly sautéed in bacon grease, garlic, and onion.

In The Gift of Southern Cooking, Scott Peacock writes that hot pepper vinegar is “the essential condiment of the Deep South, used to season greens, other vegetables, and meats.” When I think back to my childhood and going out for supper with my family, I remember hot pepper vinegar on every table, next to the ketchup. I don’t remember ever trying it, or maybe I did give it a taste and I just didn’t like it. My mother never once cooked greens in our house. Growing up in the big boom of convenience foods and the microwave, the only green leafy thing I ever ate was iceberg lettuce salad with supper each night. I did, however, grow up eating (sweet) cornbread. To this day I love it with butter and honey, just like when I was little. I haven’t had cornbread since moving to Colorado three years ago. While researching this article I came across the recipe my mother used to make. As my kitchen filled with the aroma of sweet cornbread baking in the oven, I realized how much I’ve missed it. Everyone is so obsessed with sourdough…is cornbread just not cool? I would like to start a petition for more cornbread please!

Corn Bread (Click To Zoom)

Cooking Mustard Greens

Feeling quite southern and charming I picked up a ham hock weighing no more than two pounds at the grocery store. Then I boiled it in a big pot with some onions and carrots for a couple of hours. This is the liquid I used to simmer  the greens. As if that wasn’t enough, I couldn’t resist garnishing my cooked greens with diced bacon. This probably wasn’t necessary, as the greens were flavorful enough, but more pork is always better, right?

My Mother’s Cornbread

For the sake of nostalgia I keep a copy of Better Homes and Gardens New Cookbook (the one with the red and white tablecloth cover) in my library. Its pages contain comforting classics I grew up on (a whole nother blog post). I have adapted the Corn Bread recipe for baking at an altitude of 5,000 feet by decreasing the leavening, adding more milk and more flour. I love the Better Homes and Gardens recipe because it doesn’t call for fancy ingredients like buttermilk. It’s simple and straightforward, a true pantry bread.

Corn Bread Slices (c)2011 LaDomestique.com

1 cup plus 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour

3/4 cup cornmeal (I used coarse ground but you can use whatever you like)

3 tablespoons sugar

2 teaspoons baking powder

3/4 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon butter

2 beaten eggs

1 cup plus 1 tablespoon whole milk

1/4 cup melted butter

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees fahrenheit. Combine the flour, cornmeal, sugar, baking powder, and salt in a medium bowl. Toss 1 tablespoon butter into a 10-inch cast-iron skillet (or a 9 1/2 x 1 1/2 inch round baking pan). Place the pan in the oven for a few seconds to melt the butter, then swirl the butter to coat the bottom and sides of the pan.Stir together the eggs, milk, and 1/4 cup melted butter. Add this mixture all at once to the dry ingredients and stir just long enough to combine the two. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 20 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Serve with butter and honey.

Corn Bread Slices (Zoom)

Hot Pepper Vinegar

After searching Boulder high and low for Hot Pepper Vinegar (like this one) I finally gave up and decided to try and make my own. The Gift of Southern Cooking contains a very simple recipe for homemade Hot Pepper Vinegar that calls for fingerling peppers, cider vinegar, and salt. Of course there are no fingerling peppers around here, so I went with the only similarly shaped pepper I could find, serrano. Was that a bad idea? I will let you know in a week when these little guys finish curing. My Hot Pepper Vinegar will certainly be hot.

Hot Pepper Vinegar (Zoom)

This post reminded me how meaningful American cooking can be. I was also disappointed in the fact that it’s easier to get ingredients from Italy or France than an ingredient so used in the southern United States. Cooking exotic food inspired by far away lands is great, but let us not forget the cuisine of our own backyard.

What did you grow up eating? I would love to hear about your regional cooking in the comments section.