Now I’m doing something similar with cornmeal, grits, and more made from USDA certified organic grains grown at my farm, Mt. Folly. Most of Laura’s family is from the deep south, and she grew up eating grits. “Cheese grits casseroles were a favorite for brunch,” she says. “We had sweetened grits for breakfast, grits casseroles on Sunday, and plain grits with salt and butter for weekday suppers.”

“We southerners had corn, not wheat, for our meals. We’ve been gluten free for 2 centuries,” she says.

Too Many Biscuits

But some of us have eaten too many bowls of grits, too many jelly biscuits. Sadly, this has impacted our health. Doctors tell us to limit our intake of sugars and carbohydrates. This certainly is has happened to my husband Bill. I started nagging, but then I learned that buckwheat is a “pseudo-cereal,” related to rhubarb and quinoa, and fits in the maintenance phase of a low-carbohydrate diet. So we have buckwheat pancakes for breakfast and supper now.  Bill is happy as a clam, as is his doctor. 

Also helpful, we use a stone mill to grind our grains. Unlike roller mills, stone mills crush the whole grain kernel, containing the endosperm and the bran, between two stones, just like two large molars. In contrast, by squeezing the grain kernel between stainless steel rollers, roller mills separate the endosperm from the bran. The endosperm is the living part of the grain, which means stone ground flours, which contain both parts, are more alive and have many more vitamins and minerals.

Spoonbread also is a classic polite-company southern dish. We’ve featured several versions, all requiring bringing milk to scalding, which means near boiling…but don’t let it boil!

If you are feeling adventurous and want to go deep south, try Cracklin’ Cornbread, made with pork fat. The same can be said of Johnny Cakes. Pinto beans and cornbread are real country cooking, and with a few flourishes the dish ventures into the territory of soul food. Many classic southern recipes were developed by black cooks, now acknowledged and celebrated for their singular achievements.

For its land base, corn belongs to our hemisphere. A separate culture of corn started south of the border, and we’ll be publishing Mexican and South American recipes later this year.

To start, though, I’ve chosen recipes from some of my mother’s favorite cookbooks, such Charleston Receipts, published by the Junior League of Charleston, South Carolina; Bluegrass Winners, published by the Garden Club of Lexington when my mother was a member; Holiday Recipes, published by the Birmingham, Alabama, Symphony  and compiled by my Aunt Elberta, and Recipes from the Homeplace, published by the family of Melford Cleveland, who is married to my Aunt’s sister.

Seed Savers To The Rescue

Not only is corn a staple in the south, but seed savers and local farmers have made sure that the old varieties remain. At Laura’s Mercantile, we feature Hickory King corn, an heirloom white corn, which we’ve milled into cornmeal, for cornbread, corn sticks, hush puppies and corn muffins, and Bloody Butcher corn, milled in the same fashion.

I like cream-style cornbread. My aunts, who I learned from, each have their own way of doing things. You can hear Mary Carolyn tell you how, right here.

One serving suggestion which has rescued many a hostess is this: for dessert, split open a corn muffin, warm it in the microwave (a nod to modernity), douse it with limoncello, and top with a scoop of ice cream. “It’s decadent,” says an older family member whose eaten plenty of desserts.