Friday, July 03, 2009

Good Ol' Southern Grits-n-Gravy

Somehow I'm stuck on breakfast blogging lately. Perhaps because summer's laid back schedule allows time for things other than Cheerios and rice-milk.
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Grits, though not exactly a familiar food in the Pacific NorthWest, are, ironically one of my kids long-time favorites...
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For the uninformed, "grits" (or "traditional hominy grits") are somewhat different than cornmeal.

Alton Brown explains it best: Cornmeal (like you'd make polenta with) is made from ground dried corn. Grits are made from ground, dried hominy (which is still corn, but treated slightly different). To make hominy, you start with field corn that's dried. Then the dried corn kernels are soaked in a solution of baking soda, lime, or wood ash ("lye water") for a day or two. (Sounds yummy, huh?) The kernel's shell pops off, and the kernel swells to twice its size. Kernels are rinsed more than once, then dried again, and finally ground into grits.

The directions for grits are on the box. Go buy a box and try them. Very warm, creamy, homey "comfort food" sort of stuff but with more texture and character than, say, Cream of Wheat....

My gravy is the same-ol', same-ol' stuff I make to smother just about every breakfast item I can think of.... COUNTRY GRAVY from a past post, with some of my smashed up, and browned HOMEMADE SEITAN SAUSAGE added in. Sausage is optional, it's good without too!

I'll leave you with this hilarious picture of our cat contemplating life from atop HIS precious pot of fresh catnip... of which he indulges in fairly often!!
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Have a great Fourth of July. I'm headed to the Seattle Vegan Meet-up group's Potluck. Pictures to follow, there promises to be lots of yumminess.

7 comments:

Sheree' said...

Happy 4th to you and your family. Breakfast looks wonderful. We love grits, oh so good! Enjoy!

Kitty looks so out of it..lol.....

Cynthia said...

Happy 4th July!

Amy said...

I've never had grits. I've never been able to find them here :( They sound yummy though!

Haha, I love your kitty! Mine eats the leaves (well he kind of nibbles them) then he goes mad and starts tearing up and down the yard like somethings chasing him!

T said...

Its so true- summer is breakfast and brunch season. I love grits but am trying to come up with a way to make them cheesy (but still vegan) like I used to love. Gravy is another great idea.

Adorable cat!

the twins said...

that looks great! i never had grits until i went to south carolina 2 years ago, and i really like them. hard to find here in california though =)

Erin said...

Grits are the best! I've never thought to top them with gravy though, that sounds great.

Bethany said...

i love grits because I love polenta because I love grits. mmmm...