Sunday, May 2, 2010
Hominy with Bacon - A KISS Dish - Keep it simple silly
Now and then I've come up with dishes that are so simple to make that I'm calling the KISS Dishes. Today's dish is just that and I've named it -
Hominy with Bacon (even the name is simple)
1 can (15.5 oz.) Hominy, drained
4 slices pre-cooked bacon, crumbled
1 Tbl. butter
1 Tbl. cheddar cheese
salt & pepper to taste
In a small frying pan, heat your pre-cooked bacon. Add the drained can of hominy and butter. Cook on med. heat until hominy is hot. Remove from heat and immediately fold in cheese. Salt & pepper to taste.
I've not tried this yet but I think this would also be good with a little sauted onions. I'm also going to try this using sausage instead of bacon.
Don't know what Hominy is?
American colonists used the words "hominy" and "samp" interchangeably to mean processed corn. The colonists, unfamiliar with corn, had to learn from the Indians how make the tough grain edible. The pioneers prepared hominy by soaking the kernels in a weak wood-based lye until the hulls floated to the surface.
Colonists usually kept both a samp mill and an ash hopper near their kitchens. A samp mill was a giant mortar and pestle made from a tree stump and a block of wood, which was hung from a tree branch. The branch acted as a spring. The samp mill was used to crack hard kernels of dried corn into coarse meal. The ash hopper was a V-shaped wooden funnel. Wood ashes were put into the funnel, and then water was run through the funnel to make lye. The lye was then used to soften the corn hulls and create hominy.
An English traveler in 1668 once described hominy as similar to the English dish, "Hasty Pudding." Hasty pudding and hominy were the instant cereal of colonial times.
The word samp fell out of use but the word "hominy" was eventually joined with the word "grits" in the American South. In the rest of America, hominy referred to the whole kernels which were skinned but not ground; in most of the South, "hominy" came to mean the coarsely-ground skinned kernels used to make the dish known as "hominy grits" or plain "grits."
In New Orleans, the whole kernels are still called "big hominy" and the ground ones are known as "little hominy."
In the American Southeast, grits are eaten with everything--country ham, shrimp, fried fish, eggs, cheese, gravy, etc.--to this day.
In the Southwest, big hominy is called "posole," and it is used to make hearty stews of hominy, chile peppers, and pork. Southwesterners and Mexicans will also grind small hominy until it is very fine and use it for tamale and tortilla dough.
The essence of good grits lies freshly milled whole-grain products, which helps to retain the flavor. Quick or instant grits are available in cans but the quality seems to suffer in the canning process. The result is grits that are usually described as tasting like "library paste."
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Labels:
Bacon,
cookbooks,
hominy,
Hominy with Bacon,
Martha A Cheves,
simple dishes,
Stir Laugh Repeat
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I'm from Georgia, moved to North Carolina by way of Florida. I've been in Charlotte for 14 years and love it. The recipes in my book Stir, Laugh, Repeat are all tested by "Food Testers" of which I now have 24. They try a dish and rate it from 1-10 with only those scoring at least an 8 making the book. My website is a holding place for my 2nd book Stir, Laugh, Repeat... Again. Please visit my site to find new recipes and tips. All recipes are easy, using common ingredients and according to my testers, great!
When I wrote my introduction about a year ago and a lot has happened since then. I now have 5 blog sites that keep me pretty busy. Two of my sites are dedicated to nothing but recipes. Martha's Recipe Cabinet holds recipes that will be included in one of my upcoming cookbooks. Martha's Kitchen Korner consists of recipes that are good but still need just a bit of work. On A Book and A Dish you will find my book reviews and the author's favorite recipe. Stir, Laugh, Repeat holds reviews written about my cookbook Stir, Laugh, Repeat and the site you are now on is the "mother" site for all of these. Here you will find cooking tips, simple recipes and updates for additions to the "offspring sites." So, enjoy!










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