Mess of Greens, Peas & Cornbread - Oh My!

Southerners love their greens.  And their beans (AKA cowpeas AKA Southern peas).  Pair them with cornbread and you'll hear rapturous sighs throughout the whole room.  You really can't get much more iconically Southern than these three dishes, except maybe for fried chicken.  There's a million ways to cook collards and shelly peas and the only right way is the way your grandmother cooked them.  However, if your grandmother didn't cook them, then you get to make up your own recipes without horrifying your extended family.  Just don't ever cook them for the in-laws!

I'll be honest - I was never a fan of either dishes.  The only greens I had ever had tasted really bitter and I didn't understand what the big fuss was.  Even though I grew up in the South, my family hadn't so the only times I ever had these dishes were when my aunt {very badly} attempted them or when we ate a chain known as Po' Folks.  My husband grew up eating all three of these dishes and while he'd stuff himself with his weight in cornbread, he was never a fan of greens or beans cooked Southern style.

I think these dishes depend very much on the way the main ingredients are grown.  Organic collard greens always taste better to me than un-organic ones - we've done taste tests at our house.  In the fall and winter, I can eat collard greens out in the garden because they're that sweet.  During the summer, they're a bit too strong flavored to eat raw but the farmers at our market know how to grow these greens without the sulfurous nastiness of a lot of grocery store collards.  Just a tip - collards are easy as pie to grow in a home garden.  I usually wait to plant them in fall but I have grown them in the summer and as long as they get some shade and plenty of water, they taste just fine to me.  If you don't like any bitterness to your collards though, I'd wait to make this until after frost or see if you can find "baby" collard greens.

Both dishes seem to have a natural affinity for smoked pork.  We usually use a little bit of country ham or bacon.  But if you're a vegetarian, you can still enjoy them with one little trick - smoked paprika.  If my husband's grandmother knew that I just typed that, she's go into paroxysms of grief.  But smoked paprika is a wonderful trick to add the smokiness of smoked pork to dishes without the pig.  Just use olive oil instead of bacon and add a little extra smoked paprika in the recipes below.

The last thing I'm going to type might very well send my husband's grandmother over the edge just because it's so against every fiber of her being.  Greens and beans do not need to be cooked until they're almost unrecognizable.  Shelly peas are often cooked until they're just mush floating in a sea of bacon grease.  I never knew that these peas had a natural sweetness to them before I got brave and tried cooking them myself.  Collard greens are supposed to be....duh....GREEN!  Not brown and decomposing.

The two recipes below contain all the soul of the Southern kitchen without letting tradition mire them down in 8 cups of bacon grease.  I love these so much that every year, I grow collards in our garden and shelter then with makeshift hoop houses and row cover fabric and blanch bags of shelly peas in the summer so that we can eat these in the dead of winter. 

Come back Thursday when I'll post our favorite cornbread recipe. You'll want this to soak up all the delicious potlikker.

Shelly Peas

3 cups shelled shelly peas (approximately 2 pounds unshelled)
4 strips bacon (half is for the collard greens)
1 medium onion, diced (reserve half for the collard greens)
1 large red bell pepper, diced (reserve half for collard greens) 
1 tablespoon minced hot pepper - optional
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 teaspoon smoked paprika
1/4 teaspoon thyme
1 1/2 to 2 cups chicken broth
1/4 teaspoon salt or to taste

Shell your peas/beans.  These gorgeous beauties are pink eye purple hulls.  2 pounds of un-shelled beans turned into about 3 cups of shelled beans.

Render bacon in a non stick skillet over low heat.  This will take about 15-20 minutes.  You're going to be cooking enough bacon for both dishes here.  If you already have bacon grease, just cook 4 pieces of bacon.  Make sure to add in a couple of extra pieces for the bacon tax.  Dice bacon and reserve half for collard greens.

Measure 2 teaspoons of bacon grease into medium saucepan on medium heat.  Saute onion, red pepper & hot pepper until onion is translucent.  

Add garlic, smoked paprika and thyme.  Saute for 30 seconds and add chicken broth - 1 1/2 cups if you don't like really soupy beans, 2 cups if you want them soupy.  We always go with soupy.  Add beans and diced bacon.  

Cover and simmer for 35-40 minutes.  You want to cook them until they're tender - this will take longer if the beans are older so you'll need to test them periodically. Serve!

Collard greens

1 large bunch collard greens
2 teaspoons bacon grease
1/2 medium onion, diced
1/2 large red bell pepper, diced 
1 tablespoon minced hot pepper - optional
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 1/2 cups chicken broth

Pull the collard greens off the stems and wash well.  The easiest way I've found to cut collard greens is to roll each leaf into a roll and cut into long strips. 

On medium heat, heat 2 teaspoons bacon grease in a saucepan big enough to hold the collard greens.  When grease is hot, add onion, red peppers and hot pepper. Saute onion, red pepper & hot pepper until onion is translucent.  Add garlic and saute for 30 seconds.  

Add broth and add collard greens.  Cover and simmer.  Again - I hate to drive anyone nuts by not giving exact times but our collard greens were a bit older and coarser tonight.  I've had them take 30 minutes to cook until tender but tonight it took a little over an hour for them to tenderize.

When greens are tender, serve!

Note - don't ever say you're having greens.  You're having a 'mess of greens'.  If you don't say it like that, bad things will happen.  Really bad things.  Things so bad that they'd rival what would happen if you said you didn't like UT football and you lived in Knox Vegas.  And we all know how bad that is.

This is my entry for week three of Summerfest.  Join in the fun!

For a printable recipe, click here!

Comments

[Chef Gwen]

Smoked paprika! What a neat trick to pass along to my vegetarian friends (I'll stick with the bacon).

Here's my Summer Fest post on Sesame Soy Glazed Green Beans:

http://penandfork.wordpress.com/2009/08/11/sesame-soy-glazed-green-beans/#comments

[Alta]

I love greens and peas. I grew up in Texas, but my parents are from the Northern part of the US, so we didn't grow up eating "southern" foods. And I never liked blackeyed peas, until I bought fresh ones. Wow, what a difference. And collards are great if they're super-fresh. If you can get them from the farmer's markets in early spring or in the fall, they're wonderful. Mmmm, this so makes me want to curl up with a big huge mess of greens and peas!

[TNLocavore]

Gwen - chipotle powder works too but it's got a lot more heat!

Alta - it's funny to grow up in the South but never really experience Southern foods, isn't it? Luckily my husband grew up here in East TN so I can get the scoop from him. Fresh peas are so good. My favorite were some pole beans that a farmer friend let get too big so he gave them to me - shelling them was a pain but they were so creamy and good!

[Kim (Edible/Usable)]

The peas look really amazing. My step mother (in NC) makes them with okra which adds a nice texture and flavor to them. Funnily enough, you never see these type of peas up north.

[TNLocavore]

Okra sounds really interesting although I'm not a big fan of okra cooked in liquids (unless it's gumbo). You're right - I never saw these up north even though some varieties have a short enough maturity time that people could grow them. They must not know what they're missing!

[Cynthia Newman]

You got a really useful blog! I have been here reading it for over an hour now.