Posted on 12/28/2020 4:33:17 PM PST by mylife
New Year's Day is approaching, which means we need to have a little talk about Hoppin' John. A savory blend of rice and black-eyed peas, it's served alongside collard greens as the traditional New Year's Day meal in the South and, increasingly, in other parts of the country. Eating those two dishes will ensure prosperity in the new year, and the collards represent greenbacks and the black-eyed peas coins. Or so they say.
For a long time, if offered a plate of collards and Hoppin' John on New Years, I would have been inclined to say, "keep the change," for I never understood why anyone made a fuss over a mushy mound of rice and black-eyed peas.
My own initial effort at making the dish began with a can of black-eyed peas and store-brand white rice and ended up in the garbage. Later, seeing the error of my ways, I tried starting with dried black-eyed peas, cooking them in homemade chicken stock and goosing them with onions, garlic, and a parade of herbs in a futile attempt to impose flavor on a fundamentally mild dish.
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Well, that explains my poverty. I am a G.R.I.T.S., but there is no way I will eat Hoppin’ John, nor Hawg Jowl.
My husband always does pork and sauerkraut.
My family (Virginia) always had straight Blackeye Peas. I liked them, but later I discovered this recipe for cakes made of the peas, with a mayo salsa; it’s one of my favorites, and might change your mind about Blackeyes:
http://saramoulton.com/2013/12/black-eyed-pea-cakes-with-salsa-mayonnaise/
I live a true Hoppin John and Limpin Susan
German background?
Mine simmers alone for an hour or so and then you remove it and cook the greens in the hock “pot liquor.” Then you tear the hock apart, throw out the skin, bones and gristle, chop up the meat and toss it in the other pot with the peas & rice. I will add a splash of either balsamic or cider vinegar to the greens before serving. If my mom didn’t freak out about red pepper flakes, I would add those too...but she hates cayenne, so we serve it with lots of Tabasco on the side.
No. It’s kale.
It’s ironic that hocks and fatback are what people of limited means bought from the butcher. Yes, pricey from your butcher, but rationalize you paid for the special labor to prepare and smoke. And if you’re getting a pound of meat from each, that *is* good eating. A happy & prosperous New Year!
Yes, Partly.
Also English; but the most pronounced part is Italian. They have spaghetti with special Christmas Sauce for Christmas dinner :-)
(We’re very eclectic, here...)
We often had neckbones and sauerkraut, but not for New Years. For new years it was Navy beans and smoked ham hocks, with lots of onions and celery, and a dab of fresh raw horseradish.
Sara Moulton? do I have to squint when I make it?
Collards are usually very smooth and clean, unlike kale which has lots of curls to hide sand...though like everything in the same damily as cabbage, they can host hard-to-detect green cabbage moth caterpillars.
I have no idea what you mean; but it’s a very tasty recipe.
I will add a splash of either balsamic or cider vinegar to the greens before serving.
good call, I add crystal or tx pete.
I had many discussions with my dad about hog killings and butchering because he grew up on a farm where they had to slaughter their own hogs. They never had or used “bacon” the way we do now. I guess bacon didn’t even come about as a cut of meat until it was a marketing ploy sometime in the 1940s? He told me they ate salted ham...kept a big side of it hanging in the smokehouse and they would cut chunks off it for breakfasts. The hocks, fatback etc. were used for flavoring stewed dishes and usually weren’t consumed directly. I think he told me they usually gave away the tripe, chitlins and jowls because they didn’t eat them, but often other neighbors who had helped with the hog killing would take them.
She squints all the time LOL
I remember the hog scraper
As a Yankee, blackeyed peas were an acquired taste for me - took quite awhile, too But after many years I have completely embraced them, and love them.
For New Year’s I will be cooking a dish I learned from a Cosmo recipe many years ago. It’s pork and sauerkraut, with an apple, an onion, and some white wine. And spices - this is where I got off the track. I don’t remember what the original recipe called for - suspect sesame seeds, which I didn’t have. Just looking around at what I had, I substituted pickling spice for the sesame or whatever it was. And I loved the result, and still use it to this day.
Collards cooked in a hot and spicy vinegar- the best! Was in a production of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, so this is the second time I’m hearing about this Hoppin’John! I may need to try it because it keeps coming up in my life.
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