I was raised in the kitchens of my grandmother and her sisters. While none was a gourmet chef, these Georgia natives understood and mastered the fundamentals of traditional southern cooking. Through their work as domestics they also learned to prepare items favored by their employers. Aunt Frankie could prepare a Seder table fit for a Rabbi and Aunt Letha’s stuffed cabbage was a favorite of the family whose kitchen she ruled for three generations.
My grandmother, being the youngest and the laziest by all accounts, usually kept meals very basic, never straying too far from that which was most simple and familiar. Although our family moved to a predominately Italian neighborhood in the 1950s, she did not seek to learn what Mrs. Fornicola next door or Mrs. Cammarano across the street fed their families. Her spaghetti sauce was awful. Hampered by the lack of formal education, she was limited to the most basic recipes. Most everything prepared she learned through observation, including the southern dishes she fine-tuned throughout her years in the kitchen.
Each sister had a dish that was a favorite among the family. Aunt Zora’s banana pudding and pineapple upside down cake are remembered nearly four decades after her death. Aunt Viola is lauded for her potato salad and sweet potato soufflé. Aunt Frankie alone prepared souse meat, a gray, gelatinous mess she achieved by running a hog’s head through a manual meat grinder. Road trips “down home” were fueled by gas to power the vehicle, but also my grandfather’s desire to taste Aunt Iola’s fried okra. With the exception of head cheese, which no one else really wanted to make, each sister prepared the same basic dishes with their own individual flair.
Fried chicken helps form the foundation of traditional southern cuisine and most everyone in my family prepares a good yard bird. Periodically, from my circle of friends comes a request for mine, which incorporates Aunt Letha’s thorough cleaning, Aunt Sarah’s seasoning and my grandmother’s extra-slow fry. It’s a winning combination that I’m told elicits the desire to slap one’s own momma, which I don’t recommend or encourage, but I am proud of what I have learned through observation and experimentation. I absolutely love my own fried chicken and promise to share what I’ve learned, but right now I want to discuss another staple of the southern kitchen.
Though native to Central America, the sweet potato is cultivated widely in tropical and warm climates. African slaves called them yams because they looked somewhat like those yams, which are native to Africa. This very versatile root vegetable is prepared in a variety of ways. In our family it was sometimes whipped into Aunt Viola’s sweet potato soufflé or the pies that my grandmother and Aunt Beulah prepared on festive occasions. Most often, it was rubbed with oil, baked and served as the perfect side to nearly every entrée, especially stewed pork neck bones.
My grandmother would beat and season soft-boiled potatoes, eggs and butter, filling frozen pie shells with smooth, rich, orange-colored custard. I was often called to taste if it was spiced right. She worried about nutmeg, fearing there may be too much, but I never found need for concern. Decades of observing and assisting prepared me well for my first attempt at Sweet Potato Pie; Thanksgiving 1996 in the makeshift kitchen of my Emerson College dormitory on the banks of Boston’s Charles River. I was a second year resident assistant and opted to remain on campus with students unable to return home over break.
The decision to prepare a Thanksgiving feast was as much for my benefit as theirs. While sharing a cultural tradition, my holiday away from family could include all the trappings I’d grown to love. The meal met with favorable reviews from an appreciative audience, but the pies were an absolute rave. Recipe requests followed, at which point I realized I couldn’t share because I didn’t have one. I knew four eggs were absent from the dozen and a quarter of butter remained from the pound, but had no clue how many pounds of potatoes I’d purchased or the amount of vanilla extract or nutmeg I’d used. I promised to write out the recipe, but amidst the flurry of final exams and holiday break preparations never got around to it.
I recently connected with one of my former dorm mates and the very first thing she asked about was the pie recipe. I panicked a little, because not only had I failed to record the recipe as promised, I hadn’t baked a sweet potato pie in nearly a decade. Armed with my memory I crept into the kitchen to make it happen. Nearly 15 years later, I’m pleased to report to those Thanksgiving participants the work is in process.
