Saturday, October 3, 2009

Biscuits And Other Southern Things


Miss Lizzie is so funny. She just cracks me up. She called me this morning to discuss next weekend. There is going to be a wedding at Gator Bone and she is providing the grounds, the food, and I have no idea what all else. Months ago she asked if I'd come to help and I said I would if the baby was born and all was well.

And so I shall.

Lis said she'd started cleaning and we all know where it can lead when you suddenly look at your house with the eyes of someone who is expecting eighty people to suddenly appear on your doorstep. She'd begun with the china cabinet and then she'd gone on to take everything OUT of the china cabinet and I think that's probably already a good day's work, just going through all her beautiful treasures in there and cleaning things up and setting them right.

"I just want it to be clean!" she said to me. "It's a matter of southern pride. These people are Yankees!"
"Oh Lord, honey," I said. "Just don't clean and let them believe what all Yankees believe which is that we live down here sobbing into our heritage which is covered in cobwebs and dust. Forget southern pride. Let them see southern insanity."
"Yeah," she said. "They whipped our asses and we've never recovered. It's all their fault."
"Exactly," I said.

Well, of course we are crazy down here and as you know by now, things do tend to get covered in spider webs. I think we should present ourselves as we are- hospitable and crazy, funny and tending towards talking slowly. Hell, we're making angel biscuits (in fact, I believe my main job is going to be that of angel biscuit chef) and if I know Yankees (and I am not ashamed to say I do), they will be so overwhelmed with the hot light goodness of those biscuits that they won't give a damn about cobwebs or dust.

"More biscuits," they will moan, and they will reach for the Bradley's Country sausage and the cheese grits casserole and when they leave to go back up North, their tummies will be full of plain southern goodness and their hearts will have a memory that will last a lifetime. Of this I feel sure.

I hear that not only are these wedding guests going to be Yankees but they are NEW YORK Yankees, which is the Yankee-est Yankees of all. Well, maybe Yankees from Maine are more Yankee than NY Yankees. I don't know. I don't understand how this stuff works.

Just like I don't really understand what it means to be southern. I certainly don't have a Confederate flag in my possession but I am proud of my biscuits and I have been known to get drunk on moonlight and fireflies and Confederate jasmine. I've never had a mint julep in my life and I don't like bourbon but I grow mint in my yard and okra, too. I will never in my entire life vote for a Republican but I did muck out my hen house today and I've got meringues in my oven that I made from my own chicken's egg whites and a key-lime pie made from the yolks. I have absolutely nothing in common with the Beverly Hillbillies but I might as well live in Mayberry. I make pickles like Aunt Bee and I love nothing more than music being played on my porch like Andy did.

I don't wear petticoats but Lis does.

And we'll be doing our best to make this wedding a big ol' wing-ding. She assured me that there will not be SO much to do- only a dozen or so quiches and a fruit salad and yes, the biscuits and there will be a fish fry and Lon will be grilling the sausages and she'll make the wedding cake and there will be the cheese grits casserole.

"Are you freaked out?" she asked me as she told me all of this.
"Not yet," I said.

She knows me too well.

But here's what I know- when all the Yankees are gone and Gator Bone is empty but for the few of us southerners we'll have a martini and eat some of whatever is left and we'll put our bare feet up and we'll laugh like hell and we'll be glad it all went so well.
Someone will have gotten married and maybe the sandhill cranes will be calling or the owls and I will be with people whom I love with all my heart and I'll go to bed in their tiny guest room, exhausted and happy and feeling cherished.

And incredibly southern. I'll feel that too.

Because we are.

And no matter how well Lis cleans, there will be cobwebs and that's all there is to it.

And I'll sleep better knowing that there are, and I hope to be filled with southern pride and contentment on having spent a day feeding people well as a couple whom I do not even know pledge their vows in the beautiful land of Gator Bone.

They have chosen their marriage's beginning well and I feel honored to be a part of that.
Now wish me luck that my biscuits rise as light and high as love can, that our quiches and grits and fish and sausage fill bellies as happily as love fills hearts.

That we will show New York Yankees what the south is all about. And although they will not realize it, they will have been in the Church of the Batshit Crazy and blessings will have abounded. Southern and otherwise. Holy and delicious. Serious and as lighthearted as an angel biscuit, split and ready to receive its butter, ready to receive its pure cane syrup, its sweet golden honey.

24 comments:

  1. My God! Can I come over?!?!??!

    I didn't know southern cooking at all until I met my husband. In fact, truth be told, his rich rues and gravies and grits casserole snapped me right straight out of vegetarianism and right into his arms. I'm not even kidding.

    I'm sure the evening was all you hoped and more. And likely those yankees can't even quit talking about it. Some of them even fell in love, I bet.

    I love this post. Maybe my fave so far. Blessings!

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  2. I'm a Yankee, but I'll let you in on a little secret: There are spider webs here too! They annoy me to no end, mostly because I hate spiders.
    You can keep the grits,(and the boiled peanuts, I never did understand how anyone could eat those) but I'd gladly take some biscuits off your hands! In exchange for some fine Wisconsin cheese, of course:)

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  3. This NY Yankee girl loves southern cooking. When I first met my future in laws down in Nashville, my then future husband took me to the Loveless Motel one morning for biscuits and sausage gravy.

    YUM

    I'll just imagine I'm there in a pretty flowered dress walking barefoot and nibbling on one of your angel biscuits.

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  4. Chris- It's not until next Sunday. Plenty of time for me to obsess. And make the angel biscuit dough. How nice to have a husband who knows what roux is.

    Ms. Rachel- We would put that cheese right into the cheese grits casserole. Yum!

    Michelle- And how I wish you were going to be. But I'd probably snatch you away to the kitchen to help me roll out biscuits. We'd have the MOST fun there.

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  5. I'm sorry, I got side tracked at Key Lime Pie. Yummy.

    The wedding will be great.

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  6. Cheese grits casserole, biscuits, sausage, yum. I love all of that. What about sausage cheese balls? Ever had those?

    I grew up in the south and love the food -- but I think I'm a Yankee in my heart.

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  7. Here in Kentucky, we aren't southerners, necessarily, we are just Kentuckian and that's a mix of southern and mountain and something else we just can't put our finger on, but something that we surely feel is uniquely ours.

    But we love our biscuits. And our sweet tea and fried anything. And this Kentuckian sure loves you! I was just thinking the other day that I might try to make your angel biscuits someday soon and see if I can do it.

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  8. Michelle, I live near Nashville and know the Loveless Motel.

    Ms. Moon, I'm Southern like you are. All those contradictions and complexities and simplicity that we are!

    Love this post!

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  9. Sounds like a grand time!

    kisses to all.
    xxxxxx m

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  10. ps... I've learned to appreciate those little spidies. Without them we'd all all probably die of malaria.

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  11. Steph- Key Lime pie is really the best dessert ever.

    Elizabeth- Sausage cheese balls are good but really? Try pig candy instead. If you're going to sin, do it with bacon and brown sugar. That's what I say.

    SJ- And I love you too. Try those biscuits. You will not be disappointed.

    Joy- Sometimes I wonder if southerners are really as crazy as we think we are or if we just juice our reputation for all we can get.

    Ms. Fleur- You've come a long way in the bug department. Which is good. Because otherwise, you'd have gone insane here in Lloyd.

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  12. I happen to adore bourbon AND my own front porch is covered in spider webs the SECOND after I clean them down. I call that chore "cobwebbing." Also, I'm as Yankee as they come, but I swear, I'm as friendly as you can imagine.

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  13. I don't know southern cooking at all, but this sounds like the best way to dive in. angle biscuits sound amazing. Do you share your recipe?

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  14. Aunt Becky- And when I said I know Yankees, I meant that they are some of the nicest people in the entire world.

    J.- Sure- I share. If you click the link in the body of the text, you'll get right to a recipe.

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  15. Good luck with it!

    A tendency to talk slowly...? Is there a film or sound bit of you online somewhere? I have absolutely no idea what that would sound like. Do you sound like the Southern people in that old program with Patrick Swayze? You know - the swashbuckling one where the North and South were fighting all the time.

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  16. Either you're very powerful or I have an eating disorder (which actually I do). I went and made some scratch biscuits, I think my first. Topped them with preserves, Yum. Born and raised in Calif. My darn Mom didn't make biscuits. We had to have wheat- germ on our wheat toast. No wonder the eating disorder.

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  17. Mwa- No. But here's a secret: I am going to record my book on CD and present it for sale. YES! Lon and Lis are going to help me do this. And I might fool around with a video blog post one of these days. I think they might call these vlogs.
    And by the way- EVERY goddam movie in the world gets southern accents wrong, wrong, wrong.

    Robyn- And were your biscuits lovely?

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  18. Christ, I love cheese grits. The food here in the North SUCKS.

    Love,

    SB

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  19. Ms. Bastard- Again. Noted. Cheese grits. Love you....Ms. Moon

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  20. First the Angel Biscuits and then talk of cheese grits - I'm drooling. And this weekend, I'm cooking. Thanks for sharing that recipe.

    And a recording of you reading your book? I'm in!
    It would be lovely to hear what you sound like, I can just imagine.

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  21. Hello my dear Mz. Moon and all y'all, I'll bet we'll have plenty of pictures of food in a documentary fashion, don't you think? And Mary, thank you for being the kind of friend that when I spring the news that I need you to help me throw a wedding brunch for eighty people that you just go, "okay, when should I be there?" instead of OMFG or some such thing. :)

    I must also say it's been great to read everyone's background and thoughts about food in general. My we do love to talk about food!

    I also wanted to say that this will be by far the largest gathering of Northern folk that will have ever crossed the threshold of Gatorbone, that many of them are unbelievably talented musicians that I have admired for years. I would imagine the music making is going to really be the topper of the day besides the actual wedding and, okay the biscuits, sausage and fish fry and oh yes, cake. :)

    Love You Mz. Moon! Can't wait to see you and we are honored you are joining us, especially with Owen looking so incredibly adorable. I love him already. Please kiss him and his Mommy and Daddy for us.

    Now onward through the cobwebs!

    Lizzie xo

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  22. Finally came back to check your answer (yes, I'm still thinking about your accent - you sure get under my skin ;-) ) and please tell me when you've recorded that, because there is something I would love on my iPod.

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  23. Mary,

    So nice to chat with you while you prepared fruit salad for the Yankee hordes. Lon, Lis, and you were the fabulous hosts, cooks, and souls. Thanks so much for sharing that recipe too--I'll see what a Brooklyn oven can do with it!

    Owen looks beautiful!

    Best,
    Charles

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  24. Charles- It was so nice to meet you and I can't believe you actually visited the blog. Thanks! Now go make some biscuits!

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