Recipe(tried): How To Fix "A Mess Of Greens" Granny Church Style

Hello Friends;
Thank you all for those nice messages that you keep on sending to me. I've been entertainin here these past couple of weeks and jus aint got the time to sit down here and do much. Goodness, I'm as nervous as a long tailed cat in a room full of rockin chairs right now, haven't had younguns around in so long I forgot what they was all about! They all took off in a gang for the beach for two days and I now gotta little bit of peace. Now, I know this might be a recipe that most outside the south wont care much for, but by southerners, it is revered as the "Staff Of Life". It's greens! Greens are those leafy things like kale, collards, turnip tops, and if you live in the south, polk. Polk is a wild thing that grows and is most delicious when cooked up right. To prepare a proper "mess" of greens, it's best to mix em together, but thats not an always kind of rule, but to mix turnip, kale, collard, and if you have any, cresses (called "Creasy Greens" in these parts), then it makes it all the more interestin. Law, I could go on and on about the right and wrong ways with greens. Umm, just give a southerner something to fret over and it goes full blown hysteria! But, dont ya'll fret, just use whats available and you'll get the idea of what it taste like.

Now, this is not an exacting recipe, it's kinda like makin biscuits, everyone has their own way of doin it, but, not to worry on this one, just follow the basics, and the rest will be just fine.

Below is Granny Church's way of doin it, and of course, after that, comes a story to go with it'all.


Granny Church's Fried Greens
****************************

4 Pounds Of Greens (Kale, Collards, Turnip, alone or mixed)
This seems like alot, but they cook on down to nothin, this
will end up makin around servings for four or five folks.

Salt & Sugar Two Tablspns of each.

Fatback (about 1/4 pound)Also known as Salt Pork

Bacon Fat (Fry about 1/2 pound bacon, reserve fat, and crumble the
bacon up) Save this till the end.

Ok, now you wash all those greens twice, or maybe even three times if they
look dirty. Get all that sand and dirt out of them. Trim any big stalks
from the greens, cut the stems out of them collards, they have big old
stems that are tuff. You break off any stems from the turnip and kale
greens.
Now, you get the biggest pot you got and you lay those leaves flat in the
pot and pack'em in their tight, then cover the whole mess with water, then
add the salt and sugar. Slice up the fatback into little strips and put
that on top of the whole affair, then cook, just turn on the stove and let
them cook and cook and cook. The house will get a funny smell of cabbage
at first, but it goes away after awhile. They need to cook for ages, like
two to three hours. Dont worry, you cant hardly overcook them. When they
are down to nothing, then turn the stove off and drain the water off and
you can even let them sit in a collander and drain out real good. You'll
be amazed at what you have left, they cook down to nothin. Let them cool,
and press out any excess moisture from them. Remove the fatback also.

Now, let them cool on down to room temperature, or even better, let them
rest in the refridgerator overnight. Then, take them out and slice up the
greens into large chunks of say 2 to 4 inch pieces. Get out the cast iron
fryin pan and put your bacon grease in there and the bacon crumbles, and
get it good and hot, and then just add in the greens and start a little,
how do those French people call it "Saute"? You keep this up till every
thing is piping hot, then it's ready to serve. We always took a little
drizzle of apple cider vinegar and put ontop for a little zing to it all.
And if you want to be true to the dish, you serve it up with cornbread, and
pinto beans that have been cooked with smoked hamhocks, and a big ole plate
of fresh garden tomatoes sliced up with a little salt, pepper, and sugar.

Now, I remember one day when I was a kid I was at Granny Churchs and a whole gang of us cousins were there to boot. She had the most wonderful little garden outside the back of her kitchen and we loved to go out and help her tend to everything. I can see her now in her summer duster dress, as she called it, and it was just a lightweight mid-calf cotton frock with some little print on it and she would have that straw hat on her head with the plastic flowers stuck on the side of it. She'd survey the garden, and fuss, "Oh Law, Japanese Beetles are in here again, Youngguns, dont step on my squash darlins, Vernon, get your cotton pickin hands off those dahlia buds, theyz just bought to open, dont force them honey, God's not ready for 'em yet. Law Mercy, that dog from next doors done trampeled through my cucumbers." All behind us in that little patch of garden, and that space of time flowed that most beautiful Greenbrier River, and those mountains just loomed over us, and we, at the time, were oblivious to their watching us.

Now, just before we went down to the garden to work, Granny Church had put a mess of greens on the stove. Only... their was a new invention to her and she had learned to use it to quicken up things. It was called "A Pressure Cooker".
Law, she said she could work miracles with that (For her, it was a microwave).
Our grandaddy, Tom Church, was a little bity guy who just kind of hummed around the house and their was never any contest as to who ruled the roost! Granny Church had henpecked Tom Church centuries ago, and Granny ruled, and that was that! Now we all called Grandpa "POP", he was known all over Hinton, West Virginia as Pop Church. Pop spent most of his days on the front porch on the glider, and taken us youngguns to the "Tastee Freeze" for ice cream and rides on the little merry-go-round that cost a dime. He loved us all, and sang us songs about his kitty cat that he'd make up. The cats name was "Marmalade", and that was appropriate, it was a calico type cat!

Now just before we all went down to the garden to work I remember Granny Church saying to Pop, "Tom Church, I'm cookin a mess of greens, now dont you go opening no pots till I get back now ya'hear!" "Ok Lottie Doll", as he called her, I'm just going out with Marmalade for a spell. Well, while we were all in that garden workin away we heard this big BOOOOOFOOOOM! Granny Church jerked her head up in a split second and said "LAW MERCY! WHAT HAS POP CHURCH GOTTEN INTO NOW"!!! The whole gang of us cousins raced across the garden on the heels of Granny Church, and up the back steps we went. We all ran into the back porch door all at the same second, and spilled right into the kitchen. MY, what we saw!
There stood Pop, and greens were just everywhere you could imagine. Pop had opened up the pressure cooker full of greens. The lid was over in the family room and everything from the stove to the bedrooms was just covered in greens. Pop had greens all over him, the ceiling, the frigidair, the floor the whole of EVERYTHING was just covered in greens! Pop just looked at the collection of us all and all he said was "Lottie Doll, I've disobeyed orders."

Lucky for Pop, he had a bit of scalding on his head but, nothing near the scalding that I am sure was to come from Granny! Now Granny Church was a very religious woman, but on that day me and my gang of cousins saw her in a state that would have scared the Devil himself! We all found ourselves raceing down for shelter in the basement. Much later on in the evenin, Granny came down, and with that denture clicking smile she always had, she said, ya'll come on up for supper, I just fixed up a batch of greens. We got to the stop of the stairs and all was right with the world again, everything was cleaned and as it should be. Pop Church was on the front porch with Marmalade, and we just had our supper and crawled onto the porch with Pop, and he sang us some of his songs that he had written, and we all giggled and laughed on into the night, always so full of love and of forgivness.

Peace To You All! Sweet Dreams, and may all of lifes problems be solved this
way.


Your Friend,
David In Virginia