Cheesy Grits

[Swing low, sweet chariot. Comin' for to carry me home.]

so, angus...you've moved on from bacon ice cream sundaes to cheesy grits.

[angus]

I've had the instant stuff from the grocery store before.  It didn't taste very cheesy at all to me.

I'm surprised you could find instant cheese grits in your local store.  Here, all I could find was regular grit and instant grit.  I know that there are some regions of the country where white people commonly eat grits, but yours isn't one of them  Neither is mine.  I suppose Hartford has a large enough black population to support a grit industry.  Maybe you can find a wider grit selection in your stores than we can.  The city I live in is 96% non-hispanic white--probably typical of Iowa--and the largest minority here is not black.  (There are far more types of soy sauce in my local market than there are types of grit.)

Ah, I still have 20 of my 24 ounces left.  I may just try cheese grits with some different cheese.  As you might well imagine, supermarkets in the Upper Midwest have many types of cheese on offer.


jmfcst,
I'm told that they're "Cheese grits" and not "cheesy grits."  Which also explains why Al Sharpton made such a big deal of it on his show a few nights ago.  He kept saying, "Well, there's something cheesy about Romney..." and kept using the word cheesy over and over, and emphasizing it when he said "cheesy grits" while simultaneously rolling his eyes.

I never did get around to trying the bacon sundae, by the way. 

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

I've had the instant stuff from the grocery store before.  It didn't taste very cheesy at all to me.

I'm surprised you could find instant cheese grits in your local store.  Here, all I could find was regular grit and instant grit.  I know that there are some regions of the country where white people commonly eat grits, but yours isn't one of them  Neither is mine.  I suppose Hartford has a large enough black population to support a grit industry.  Maybe you can find a wider grit selection in your stores than we can.  The city I live in is 96% non-hispanic white--probably typical of Iowa--and the largest minority here is not black.  (There are far more types of soy sauce in my local market than there are types of grit.)

Ah, I still have 20 of my 24 ounces left.  I may just try cheese grits with some different cheese.  As you might well imagine, supermarkets in the Upper Midwest have many types of cheese on offer.

Nah, the selection here probably wasn't much better.  My store only had the plain stuff and the cheese stuff.  I tried looking for the other flavors that the box listed since the cheese flavor sucked, but I couldn't find any.

I live in probably one of the whitest towns in the country.  But it's fairly rural, if that means anything.  I'm kind of surprised that a state like Iowa wouldn't have a whole lot of grits in store.

[angus]

I'm kind of surprised that a state like Iowa wouldn't have a whole lot of grits in store.

You'd think, given all that corn.  But here people only want their corn served in one of two ways:  on the cob or in the fuel tank.  

I've only ever seen a preponderance of grit (or grit-type foods) in the Greater South, in the Yucatan peninsula, in Guatemala, and in the northern part of Manhattan (north of 125th street.)  But I'd venture a guess that Compton, Philadelphia, Hartford, and Detroit also have their share of grit-friendly venues. Most other places it's a quirky thing.  In Iowa you never see them, not even on breakfast buffets.

Back to topic:  It wasn't the grit aspect of cheese grits that intrigued me, but the cheese aspect.  That's the part I'd never heard of.  The "fiesta blend" cheese Bacon King mentioned really piques my curiosity.

[7,052,770]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grits



For those of you who don't know what they look like.

[RI]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grits



For those of you who don't know what they look like.

So mashed potatoes meets cream of wheat or something like that?

[bgwah]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grits



For those of you who don't know what they look like.

So mashed potatoes meets cream of wheat or something like that?

I think it's the same thing as cream of wheat, except with corn of course.

[angus]

Okay, for the unitiated, I found this video of an industrial-scale grit manufacture:

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x55u2t_molinos-de-nixtamal_tech


mmmm, don't it look tasty, boys and girls? 

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

Mmmmmmm... heart attacks.

[greenforest32]

I've never eaten grits and after reading the description of what it actually is, I'm not inclined to either.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

It's just cornmeal.

[minionofmidas]

Grits? Dude, that's Canadian Moderate Hero food.

[angus]

Okay, so the boy is doing art class at a local museum on Saturday mornings now, and I figured it'd be a good chance to give it another go.  With them gone, I don't have to put up with his gagging.

I cycled to the local super and bought a block of Happy Farms sharp cheddar for today's experiment.  Following the Quaker Grits recipe for the second time, I added water and grit, and steeped it for five minutes.  This time, when I put it into the bowl, I added a little cumin along with copious quantities of black pepper and salt.  Also, I'm trying the cheddar instead of the Monterrey Jack this time.  I cut off approximately 30 grams of the cheddar and pushed it into the middle of the grit porridge, gave it a few minutes to melt, and stirred.  It ends up being a little yellowish.  Nothing bright orange, as is depicted in Ernest's signature, so maybe I'm not using nearly enough cheese, but I feel like I'm using enough to judge it.

Not bad, but it still doesn't knock my socks off.  Oh, also I served myself a delicate Pinot Grigiot with the grit mixture today.  I can safely say that the pinot grigiot is a much better match for the grits than the red wine was.   (I don't usually start drinking alcohol at 10:45 am, but I really needed to find out what wine works best with grits.) 

At this point, I'm still convinced that I prefer my grits sin queso.  Still, perhaps I just haven't found the perfect cheese accompaniment yet.  Perhaps I'll go with something savory next time, like a freshly-grated romano.  Maybe next weekend  I still have about 3/4 of the contents of the package of grits left, so he search can continue!

[Tender Branson]

Don't know if that counts:

My mom used to cook polenta sometimes and little pieces of cheese or butter or marmelade was put inside, to get some flavor.

[angus]

The cheese counts.  Not the butter.  Polenta is grits, so if Mama put cheese in the polenta then you have had cheese grits.  How'd you vote?  Do you prefer your polenta with, or without, cheese?

Marmalade, on a separate note, is interesting, but not as interesting as cheese, imho. 

I'm leaning toward putting some animal product in it.  Grits are cholesterol free, and it just didn't do it for me as a filling lunch.  It's 6:00 now and I'm starving.  Normally, I'm just sort of hungry and ready to eat dinner at 6, but today I'm weak and can't think straight.  Gonna need something in my grits besides marmalade, I'm afraid.  I'm still not sold on the idea of cheese grits.  Bacon grits, maybe?

[memphis]

You'd make a poor field hand, angus.

[angus]

You'd make a poor field hand, angus.

indeed.  

Tried that one summer.  Tried cowboy work too.  And convenience store clerk, floral delivery, fast food frycook, pizza delivery, waiter at a seafood restaurant, metalworker, woodworker, welder's assistant, cable TV installer, engineer's aide, document deliverer, chicken inoculator, election return reporter for the AP, math tutor, science tutor, Spanish tutor, English/Spanish interpreter, and telemarketer.  Though I wasn't particularly adept at pulling in the crop, field hand was far from my least favorite blue-collar job, by the way.  That honor goes to telemarketing.

[angus]

Garlic and roasted eel!

That's the best topping I've found so far for grits.  Take a clove or two of garlic and slice it very thin, or dice it, then just put it into the boiling water.  Don't sautee it or anything, just drop the garlic slivers in raw.  Then add a can of roasted eel just about a minute before you take it off the heat.  Or you can use sardines, but not the ones in mustard sauce.  I suppose any canned fish will work, but I wouldn't recommend kippers, because that's smoked herring and I should think that it would clash with the white corn flavor.  I've tried both sardines and roasted eel so far, and they're both excellent with grits and garlic, but I think I have a preference for the eel.

I still haven't found any way to make cheese taste good with grits.  I've tried mozarella, swiss, parmesan, queso fresco and cheddar, and it's just nasty.  It always adds a fatty filmy consistency, the way melted cheese always does.  I guess if you're a fan of melted cheese, then that might be okay.  I don't like it.  Garlic and canned fish is the way to go.

[opebo]

I've never eaten or as far as I know even seen 'grits', which may be a little strange growing up in Missouri, but you'd be surprised, the upper-middle classes of that state are largely un-Southern.  However I do remember there being cans of plain 'hominy' in my mother's secondary pantry (down the hall quite far away from the main kitchen, between the sort of 'workaday' or kitchen dining room and the laundry room), which no one ever ate, except for me.  I would take them down warm them up and eat them with sandwiches.  But those were actual little hunks of corn if I remember rightly.

That pantry was funny - rarely used, and there were a lot of very odd canned goods in there.  There was also an odd sort of structure built into the wall of that 'kitchen dining room' which contained about 30 bottles of Jim Beam and Johnny Walker, which my father had received as gifts over years.  We were such weird kids we never drank any of it though it sat there unattended through years of adolescence.

I can remember that the real dining room with the fancy 'antique' table, and.. oh what are those things called, the big low furnitures in a dining room along the walls.. anyway that dining room was only used for our private family meals or special occasions, while the other one was used just for guests, which if you think about it seems very backwards, as it looked really quite poor - it looked like a traditional farmer's dining room, complete with a metal-and-formica table and linoleum floor.  But somehow it was just the place for people to pop by for cups of coffee, sandwiches, or coco in the winter - everybody from guys just back from hunting or dirty from working on the farm, or kids who'd been sledding.  Dad even did a lot of business in that back kitchen - it had enormous windows, so it was just the location for rolling out subdivision plans or deeds or contracts. 

Damn, missing dad and that old table, he's dead now and I don't doubt my terrible sibling has thrown out the table.  It looked a little like this, only longer: http://www.flickr.com/photos/14477776@N03/6281488307/

[angus]

 what are those things called, the big low furnitures in a dining room along the walls

There are buffets, sideboards, and console tables.  What you describe sounds like a sideboard.  We had one as well for a number of years. 

We never had the chrome/formica table, although they were popular in my youth. 

Never had grits at home till I bought that can of them a couple of months ago, but I'd always see them on the buffet lines are certain restaurants and hotels.  Still see them, in fact.  In april I stayed two nights at a Quality Inns & Suites in Norfolk and it came with full breakfast.  They had grits there.  I always try a spoonful of them when I see them on the buffet, because it's something we never had at home, and it's something that my folks never would have ordered for me when we went out for breakfast, so there's the exotic quality.  Like egg rolls, really.  I always eat at least one of them when I'm at a chinese buffet, not because they're good.  In fact, they're usually not good, but they are exotic.  It's something we never eat at home.  Even though I'm married to a citizen of China, and much of what we eat is what some would call exotic, we never have egg rolls.  And in all my trips to China I never encountered an egg roll.  The only time I ever see them is when I'm at an all-you-can-eat Chinese buffet in the United States, and I always eat one.  Same for grits.  Only time I ever see them is at all-you-can-eat buffet places in the United States, and I always try a spoonful.  Now, when I finally finish this little 24-ounce can that I bought a couple of months ago for the specific purpose of trying them with cheese, I'll probably not ever buy it again for home use, but I will still, from time to time, grab a spoonful of them when I see it on a buffet.  Although, I'll certainly not put cheese on them.  I'll cover them in hot sauce like I always do, and, given my newfound knowledge, if there happens also to be roasted eel on the buffet, I'll put some of that on them.

[opebo]

There are buffets, sideboards, and console tables.  What you describe sounds like a sideboard.  We had one as well for a number of years. 

We never had the chrome/formica table, although they were popular in my youth. 

Hey, thanks, yeah that's it - it was a sideboard on one side, and a 'buffet' on the other.

Those chrome/formica tables were were fantastic for a room that didn't have to be too 'dressy' - they were very cleanable, very durable..

[John Dibble]

Grits are pretty good when prepared correctly. Shrimp and grits is actually quite a classic dish.

[angus]

Grits are pretty good when prepared correctly. Shrimp and grits is actually quite a classic dish.

ooooh.  hadn't thought of that.  I still have a couple of servings left in my canister, and we always have shrimp in the freezer, so maybe I should whip up some of that. 

Not tonight, though.  Tonight is Hot Pot.  Three kinds of mushroom, two kinds of bracket fungi, three kinds of leafy green vegetables, thin-sliced chicken, thin-sliced beef, thin-sliced pork, with meatballs, porkballs, fishballs, and shrimpballs, all added to a pot of boiling water which has previously been spiced and oiled.  Good eats.  Messy, though, so we only do it about once every couple of months or so. 

[opebo]

...Tonight is Hot Pot.  Three kinds of mushroom, two kinds of bracket fungi, three kinds of leafy green vegetables, thin-sliced chicken, thin-sliced beef, thin-sliced pork, with meatballs, porkballs, fishballs, and shrimpballs, all added to a pot of boiling water which has previously been spiced and oiled.  Good eats.  Messy, though, so we only do it about once every couple of months or so. 

I hate that hot-pot.  People are always eating that stuff in big buffet-style restaurants here, where you boil it up at your own table in a little charcoal fire.  Its hot, smokey, you're toiling (cooking your own food), and worst of all it doesn't taste good at all.  Restaurants where you cook your own food offend me.

[angus]

Ha!  I noticed that in Shanghai.  Shanghai is about 34 degrees north latitude and on the sea.  It is comparable to, say, Savannah or Charleston in climate.  Hot, wet, sticky.  And their favorite food seems to be hot pot.  And, unlike Savannah or Charleston, Shanghai isn't necessarily air-conditioned.  Oh, the hotels have adjustable units in the room, and the western franchises like Burger King, Starbucks, and McDonald's have AC, but most of the restaurants along Nanjing Lu (the strip) are not air-conditioned.  So you are basically in a hot, sweaty, sticky, moist restaurant where every table has a big hole in the center with a big bowl of boiling water.  Electrically heated in china.  I've been to many such places, in several cities, and never saw any charcoal, but the effect is the same. 

I always went back, though.  It's so tasty.  And talk about fresh!  When you order shrimp, they bring it to you still moving.  You get a little tin containing about fifty live shrimp, squirming and jumping over each other, and you take the top off and they jump into the pot of boiling water.  My son loved it the first time he saw it.  First time I saw it I was 41, so it seemed kinda weird.  First time he saw it he was 4, so to him it's normal.  I'm glad he had that experience.  For his whole life, it'll be the most normal thing to be served living shrimp that jump into the pot of boiling water at your table.  The Chinese have a healthy respect for fresh seafood, and it doesn't get any fresher than that.