The Best Cook in the World

by Rick Bragg

  It required no sides, just a bowl and a spoon. The old man, though, liked to eat it with a savory side or two, like stewed cabbage, which was mildly sweet and a fine complement to this simple porridge, and apples fried in butter and cinnamon, which, he said, was like having dessert but not having to wait on it.

  To Ava, the porridge sounded like a terrible notion, like the meals the evil kings fed to their prisoners in the dungeon. They called it gruel.

  “It ain’t like chain-gang food, is it, like mush? ’Cause we had some kin on the chain gang, and they said all they had to eat was mush and white beans and beets and such.”

  He told her to hush, and, no, it wasn’t; she should wait and see—but, mostly, hush.

  “It’s cheap food, shorely, but you need to learn to cook cheap food. Times will always get hard, harder than reg’lar,” he said, as if he could feel the coming Depression in his bones. “But cook it rich,” he said, “and you won’t need as much meat, and you won’t need as much of nothin’ else.” The meaning of that would become especially clear to her, in the worst of times.

  The meal could be made with either cornmeal or flour, but the cornmeal version, he believed, was more savory, more satisfying. The flour recipe was similar in consistency to the broth with dumplings.

  “Never have liked dumplin’s,” he said. “Pasty-tastin’ bastards.”

  Since they had only the liver and gizzard from the one bird, there was not enough to fry, so the old man set them aside to use as bait on his trotlines. They would not do in the stockpot, he said, because they would muddy up the clean taste of the chicken broth, especially the heavy, murky taste in the liver.

  He liked his coffee like tar, and smoked cheap, strong tobacco that would all but knock birds from the sky, and could out-curse any other man she had ever known, but he was not ham-handed as to food. It may be, all in all, he really was just an excellent fish camp cook, akin to all those fine short-order chefs who worked the truck stops. But the old man had a light touch for such an unapologetic ruffian; he even understood the value in a little fresh-picked watercress.

  It seemed, to Ava, to be a puzzling ingredient, not just for a porridge, but for almost anything. The peppery taste seemed to go with nothing. He had gone to the creek to pick it himself, from the cold water, but came back with a bunch so small he could hold it in one hand, more like a bouquet than something a grown man would put in a pot. He boiled it first, then fried it, quickly, in bacon grease. He diced it with a sharp knife, ending up with a handful or less of what looked more like wilted parsley, and set it aside.

  He showed her how to season the water and boil the chicken with a little onion and a dear, store-bought carrot, and how to bone and break the chicken into pieces without burning herself. Then he returned the chicken to the stock, and sprinkled the watercress into the broth. The only real trick was in combining the chicken stock with a mixture of seasoned cornmeal stirred into cool water. It had to be done slowly and carefully, because in this dish the consistency mattered just as much as the seasoning. He cooked it down to a smooth, creamy consistency.

  The key ingredient, he told her, was a quarter-pound of the pure cow’s butter that they had churned themselves, which magnified and complemented the richness of the broth. As the porridge slowly bubbled, pushed to the side of the stove, he washed, chopped, and stewed a head of white cabbage in a daub of bacon grease, frying it a little to get it going, add some flavor, and improve the sweetness a bit, but finishing it more with hot steam than with grease. “It’s a plain food, cabbage is, but not plain-tastin’,” he said. “I’ve cooked it all my life, but I ain’t never seen none th’owed out.”

  The apples were easy, a forgiving dish, and good for the late fall and early winter, especially after the garden had already given up all but a few winter vegetables. He worked fast, cutting and coring, but left the skins on, then fried them in butter, bacon grease, and sugar.

  “Whar’s the damn cinnamon?” he shouted, as he stirred.

  Ava just shrugged, insulted. She knew cinnamon, and had used it in her previous life; cakes and pies were the only dishes she had paid much attention to when she was a child. But it was so odd, too, the old pine-knot asking for a pinch of cinnamon, and she laughed out loud.

  “Whar’s the damn cinnamon!” she shouted back, and the old man wondered, not for the first time, if the girl might be truly mad. It was hard to tell, under such a great, great mustache, if he smiled, but he did not murder her, so he might have been amused.

  The finished porridge was the consistency of warm pudding, with tender chicken in every bite; the old man said it was good to thicken it enough so they could use a fork, so as to make it easy to eat beside the cabbage and apples. As they spooned it up, she told the old man and the boy the story of the bears and the blond-haired little girl and the porridge that was too hot, too cold, and just right. We do not know if he enjoyed the story, but he did question it. Why, he wanted to know, did the bears not just eat the little girl, since they had her already hemmed in good?

  When I was a little boy and she told the story to us, she always strayed from the plot and talked of my great-grandfather and his porridge, like he was just another character, like a fourth bear.

  • • •

  Cornmeal Porridge with Chicken and Watercress

  My mother has altered the recipe only in the sense that she has substituted all dark meat for a scrawny, worrisome yard bird. But the soul is the same.

  WHAT YOU WILL NEED

  1 small bunch watercress, finely chopped, or 1 teaspoon finely chopped fresh parsley

  1 tablespoon bacon grease

  7 chicken thighs or big drumsticks

  ½ small onion, or no more than ¼ cup finely diced

  1 carrot, finely chopped

  ½ stalk celery, finely diced

  1 tablespoon salt

  1 teaspoon black pepper

  2 cups cornmeal

  1 stick best-quality butter

  HOW TO COOK IT

  First prepare the watercress. Boil it till tender in unseasoned water, or about 30 minutes over medium heat. Drain, then fry in bacon grease for another few minutes. Remove from the skillet, let cool, and dice it fine, like parsley. When I asked my mother why it had to be cooked twice, she just shrugged. “Because we’ve always done it that way.” This explanation will arise again and again.

  In a large pot—at least 3 quarts—cover the chicken thighs or drumsticks, with the skin on, with water, and add the onion, carrot, and celery, and the dry seasonings. Bring to a roiling boil, then reduce heat to medium. Continue to cook for about 1 hour, or until done.

  Working carefully, lower the heat, then remove the chicken pieces from the water, and set aside to cool, or place in cold water to speed the process. Remove and discard the bones, but keep the skin. Tear the chicken into spoon-sized pieces, being sure to do the same with the skin. Also, do not strain the broth. Leave the vegetable bits in.

  “We’ve done rendered the flavor in the bones and in the skin into the broth, so we’ve saved that already, but those little pieces of skin will be delicious,” my mother said.

  In a bowl, make a mixture of the cornmeal and cool water that is about the consistency of grits, oatmeal, or cream of wheat. It should be thin enough, just barely, to pour. Set aside.

  Return the pulled-apart chicken to the broth, bring to a boil, then reduce heat to medium. Then, carefully, slowly, spoon the cornmeal mixture into the broth. Add the butter at this point, and a pinch of watercress.

  “Cook it till it thickens, which should only take a few minutes,” my mother said.

  When I asked for a more mathematical timetable, she got a little mad at me. “It ain’t like I’ve ever had to time it, hon,” she said, for the thousandth time in my life.

  Sprinkle the top with a little more of the watercress. Some of the old cooks, like the old man, liked to cook the watercress into the dish, but the peppery nature of watercress is more of an acquired taste, so it may be best t
o start small and increase it as desired.

  “In the old days, when we had no meat, we’d just have the porridge, cooked with the watercress, with a little salt pork for seasoning,” she said. “It was good. Chicken is better.”

  Stewed Cabbage

  WHAT YOU WILL NEED

  1 medium or large head white cabbage

  3 slices thick-cut bacon

  ¼ stick best-quality butter

  1 tablespoon salt

  1 teaspoon sugar

  1 cup water

  HOW TO COOK IT

  Only white cabbage will do. Red cabbage, what we call purple cabbage because that’s what it is, will not result in the same sweetness. “Use your purple cabbage for slaw, to eat raw, but don’t cook with it, not for somethin’ like this.”

  Wash the whole cabbage carefully, twice. Like the collards, the leaves of a cabbage will harbor grit. Remove any discolored or suspicious outer leaves, but try to save as many of the darker-green outer leaves as you can. There is flavor there, and they will make it look prettier on a plate.

  Quarter it, core it, and cut off the stem. Chop the cabbage into pieces not less than about 2 inches square. This part of the recipe is not meant to be exact. If your cut-up cabbage looks ragged, it will still taste good. Do not shred—this is not the texture you are looking for. Set aside.

  Cut the bacon slices into pieces about 2 inches long. Fry in a large, high-walled skillet until the fat goes clear, but do not cook until crisp.

  While the grease is still hot, add the butter to the bacon and bacon fat, then the chopped-up cabbage, salt, and sugar. Cook over medium heat, stirring, for just a minute or two. It will enhance the flavor if the cabbage fries and there is just a touch of brown on the leaves, no more, before you add any more liquid to the skillet.

  Carefully pour in the water, and—stirring occasionally—continue to cook over medium heat until the cabbage is tender and begins to smell very, very good, about 20 minutes or so. The cabbage should be fork-tender, but do not cook to mush. Some older Southerners like it that way, but it is better if you stop cooking before it goes too soft. If it is still crunchy, it has not cooked quite enough.

  This dish, like creamed onions, may seem a little oily if you are unaccustomed to Southern food. You can reduce the strips of bacon to one, reduce the amount of butter, and substitute a lighter cooking oil. It makes us sad even to put this down on paper.

  Fried Apples

  Fried apples are a staple in the Appalachians, served with everything from roast pig to breakfasts, such as fried sausage and eggs and biscuits, and they go particularly well with porridge and other dishes prepared with cornmeal.

  Some old, old recipes call for cabbage and apples to be fried together, and others add broken pieces of pecans and even walnuts to the fried apples, but as a side to porridge, the dish is best left plain.

  In hard times, when butter, sugar, and cinnamon were scarce, some cooks would simply fry the apple sections in bacon grease, for a less sweet, more savory dish. You can also cube and fry a sweet potato in butter and bacon grease, combine with the apple mixture, and cook for 10 minutes or so, just long enough to let the flavors mix. The old man loved sweet potatoes, and tried to eat one, usually baked, three or four times a week.

  These dishes, too, have changed very, very little over time, and would have been on the table in Birmingham, England, in the row houses outside the BSA motorworks, and in the German factory towns and farms after World War I. He learned the porridge and the cabbage from his momma, and the fried apples in the timber camps, as men and mules set about clear-cutting everything beneath the clouds.

  WHAT YOU WILL NEED

  4 or 5 large apples, any kind

  ¾ cup sugar

  1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

  2 tablespoons bacon grease

  ¼ stick butter

  ¼ cup water

  HOW TO COOK IT

  Wash, peel, and core the apples, and cut into sections. The size of the section is not that important, but thin sections of apple will go limp as they cook. Red Delicious and Granny Smith apples are both fine for this, as are smaller Gala apples. The truth is, just about any apple will do.

  Mix the sugar and cinnamon in a bowl, and then add the apples and mix them in, coating the sections.

  In a large skillet, melt the bacon grease and butter; the stove should be set no hotter than medium heat. Then stir in the apples, sugar, and cinnamon, and sprinkle over them any leftover sugar or cinnamon. Let the apples fry for just a minute or two, then slowly pour in the water and cook, covered, for about 5 minutes. Uncover, stir, and reduce the heat to low. Cook over low another 5 minutes, or until most of the liquid has cooked to syrup and the apples are fork-tender but still have just the tiniest amount of snap to them. What you want, ideally, is a faintly crisp inside, and buttery-soft outside.

  * * *

  • • •

  “Your little one will like this,” the old man told her. “You may have to beat ’em some to get ’em to eat the cabbage. But they’ll like them apples. You heat them apples up at breakfast, and put on a butter biscuit, they’ll eat a pan of biscuit.”

  The girl was so flabbergasted by this soliloquy, by this long-winded recitation, she almost didn’t hear the most important part.

  “Your little one…”

  The old man had known almost before she did.

  The first boy came in ’26. Ava named him James, and they called him Jim, for short.

  The second, William, came a year later, in ’27.

  The first girl, Edna, followed in ’29, and another, Emma Mae, a year later.

  As she became more proficient, and as the hard times he had warned about seemed to be upon them, the old man went to work in the trees again, cutting timber, sawing lumber. But in the evenings, he always helped with the supper, and rose early the next morning to begin the biscuits and coffee. It seemed that, as he grew older, he grew gentler in their house, in their company. He began to call her “daughter,” and though he would never be loquacious, he did admit to a fondness for her, in time.

  * * *

  • • •

  He emptied the contents of his own memory into his teaching, showing her not just how to get by, to keep his boy and the children from going hungry, but the foundation of life itself in this bare-knuckle place. The preachers could worry about their souls, he said. There was no point in rushing into it.

  They would need, in the years ahead, every inch of the landscape around them. He taught her how to find food deep in the woods, in the creeping vines and wild fruit trees and even in the weeds. He showed her what was good to eat, and what would at least keep them alive when there was nothing else, and what would kill them if she made a mistake. It became part of her.

  “My momma loved that old man. I know that. She said it, many times,” my mother said. “I don’t truly know if she ever told him that. You know, they was a lot alike, them two,” like they were blood kin themselves. It was that invisible, unwritten book of recipes that bound them, at least as tight as blood, which had rarely seemed to mean that much to the old man anyway. But even that had seemed to change, pot by pot.

  He taught her biscuits, and stewed okra, and catfish, fried and in a spicy stew, and fried green tomatoes, squash, and baked backbone and black-eyed peas. He sacrificed many, many a mysterious chicken, and the boy would walk in the door, day after day after day, to glorious smells.

  A romantic would say it was how the old man made amends for leaving his family, but, then, we do like to grind the rough edges off the dead down here, if you give us time. Still, some of his kin say he never left his people a thing except a few welts and bruises, and a legacy of violence. But they never said that in front of her, at least not more than once.

  No amount of polishing would make him a saint, or even less a sinner, in some things. As the hard times did descend, and worsen, no one wanted a good roofer, or carpenter, or well digger, and the demand for timber bottomed out. Then, because this i
s just the way luck will do you, disease ran through their small flock of chickens, and they died one by one. They lived off their garden, and watched their one hog closely, with trepidation. Ava had never been poor, and it was raw and ugly to her.

  One day, the old man told Ava and his son he believed he would saunter down to the neighbors and have a little chat if he was to catch ’em outside. They found this especially odd, since the old man did not chat, and would rather eat dirt than make small talk; it all tasted the same in his mouth. He rarely even returned a wave with little more than an almost imperceptible nod, fearing it would be seen as an invitation of some kind, to continue the worrisome interaction.

  Later, they saw him coming up the road at a distance, but at an odd gait, and as he got closer it became clear that he was carrying something. It was a chicken-wire cage, crammed with sad, scraggly chickens.

  Once in the yard, the old man laid down his burden, turned the chickens loose to spread through the handful that had followed behind him, then turned out one pocket to sprinkle the last handful of crushed corn across the yard. Being chickens, they probably thought they had merely traveled in a circle and were home again. Ava feared the worst, but the old man told her he had swapped for them, fair and honest. She spent most of the next day waiting for someone to come into the yard to reclaim their property, but day passed into night, and no one came. Only then did she notice the old man was not wearing his great wool coat, and her heart broke the slightest bit.