Grits have no middle ground with diners. Folks either really, really love them, or they really, really don’t.
Grits lovers will tell the grits-averse that they just haven’t had them cooked properly.
When Mickey Samuels first sampled this Southern staple, he was decidedly underwhelmed. Samuels is the chef for Lucile’s, the Cajun/Creole restaurant that started in Boulder and has eased into Denver, Longmont and Fort Collins. He has been with Lucile’s for 23 years. Grits were on the menu when he arrived.
“I love them now,” he says. “I’m originally from Connecticut, but I went to college in North Carolina, where everybody eats them. At first I thought ‘Ick’ because the first time I had them they were watery and tasteless. But when they’re done right, they’re delicious.”
And they are done several ways at Lucile’s, on South Logan Street near East Alameda Avenue: from Eggs New Orleans (fried eggplant slices with creole sauce, poached eggs and hollandaise) to Eggs Sardou (creamed spinach, gulf shrimp, poached eggs and hollandaise) or the Cajun breakfast (pork-laced red beans, poached eggs with hollandaise and andouille – spicy Louisiana sausage).
All are served with a baseball-sized biscuit, and a choice of potatoes or creamy grits. Or both.
“Although recipes have changed over the years, I still use the old-fashioned, slow-cook grits we get from Quaker (Oats Co.),” he continues. “What I like about them is the texture. We cook them for a long time, which brings out the starch and flavor.”
Denver is gradually coming around to grits, as evidenced in their presence on unlikely menus.
But they are absent from ones on which you would expect them appear. For example, grits aren’t on the menu at Gumbo’s, NoNo’s or Pappadeaux Seafood Kitchen – restaurants that lay claim to Cajun and Creole-influenced food. Dirty rice, a masterful Southern blend of chicken giblets, onions, celery, green onions and cayenne, yes. Plain grits, cheese grits, buttered grits, no.
Oddly enough, the Dallas-based Black-Eyed Pea chain of restaurants doesn’t serve them either. Don’t look for them at Ellyngton’s at the Brown Palace either, although server Jerome Stewart wishes they were.
“I’m from Pennsylvania, but I was raised on grits,” he says. “And I miss them. Really and truly I do.”
But he doesn’t have to. He could mosey over to the City Park Le Peep eatery, where manager Carlos Landeros has seen interest in grits grow over the years.
“We started serving them a few months ago after we got so many requests for them,” he says.
Stewart might also try the Denny’s restaurant on Federal Boulevard near Invesco Field, where it’s possible to start the day with An All-American Slam breakfast of scrambled eggs with cheddar cheese, bacon strips, sausage links, grits or hash browns.
Manager Doug Rockefeller is not a grits fan, but he’s noticed that they are popular among customers and he believes in giving folks what they want.
“I’ve been with the company for five years, and they’ve been an option on the menu for as long as I’ve been here,” he says. “Maybe one in 10 (diners) will substitute grits for hash browns.”
As is the case with many foods, grits were here before any of us. American Indians first combined maize and greens. This inspired union has remained unbreakable over centuries.
Before the Civil War, Southern cooks favored greens of European provenance – Swiss chard, spinach and kale. After the war people took what they could find. Ultimately collards, brought to the low country by African slaves, became the defining half of this dish.
Shrimp and grits are so entrenched in the food culture of the South that author Nathalie Dupree and colleague Marion Sullivan have written about the delicious duo.
“Nathalie Dupree’s Shrimp and Grits Cookbook” (Wyrick, 21.95) pairs grits with dozens of partners in addition to the crustacean of the title.
Recipes feature grits and cheese, tomatoes, collard greens, corn, prosciutto, mussels, bacon, goat cheese, spinach and saffron. There’s even a peach and grits cobbler.
In a nod to the Indians who introduced early settlers to coarse-ground corn, there is a recipe for Indian-
Style Chicken, Shrimp and Grits stew. The real showstopper for okra lovers will be the recipe for okra, shrimp and grits in garlic-butter sauce.
“The interesting thing about grits is that they’re different everywhere you go,” Dupree says in a conversation from her Charleston, S.C. home. “It’s a standard breakfast meal throughout the Carolinas, of course, but you still think, ‘What am I going to get if I order shrimp and grits?’ There’s no consensus.
“It’s been a lot of fun researching the book because it gave us some really wonderful recipes, and we got to test and taste practically all of them. You won’t believe the peach and grits cobbler.”
Dupree and Sullivan had a hard time selling the book, Dupree says.
“All of New York turned its collective nose up at it, but we finally found a printer out of Utah willing to take a chance on it,” Dupree says, referring to Gibbs Smith, Publisher. “I’m sure they did it with fear and trembling, but we’re now in a second printing – the first was 10,000 – and already the publicist is worried that we won’t have enough for me to sign when we go on tour.”
The book is the kind of thing that will be evergreen in the low country.
While grits may not have achieved the acceptance of hash browns, home fries, oatmeal or granola, the humble mix of ground corn, boiled and laced with butter, is working its way up a different kind of food chain.
The Delectable Egg at 16th and Market streets in Lower Downtown boasts a raft of eggy options, but hasn’t listed grits on its menu yet. There is a possibility that they might appear when the menu is revamped.
“We have more people asking for them during the week than on weekends,” says assistant manager Pilar Valdez. “I know there are a lot of regulars who like them. I don’t know if it’s because there are a lot of oil relocations with offices in LoDo or what, but grits are requested all the time.”
Meanwhile, Dupree is back to wrestling with the grammatical correctness of grits.
“There is no such thing as one grit, there is only the plural,” she says. “There are actually people wed to the issue. Is it ‘grits is’ or ‘grits are’? I say ‘grits are good.”‘
Staff writer Ellen Sweets can be reached at 303-954-1284 or esweets@denverpost.com.
What are grits, anyway?
Grits, also known as “hominy grits,” are coarsely ground corn. Introduced to colonists in the 1600s, they were hand-ground by American Indians. They come in a choice of coarse-, medium- or fine-ground grain, although finely ground cornmeal is what polenta is made from, and that’s another story altogether. Grits are so iconic that a website, grits.com, bills itself as “a celebration of Southern cooking.”
How to get them:
You can order organic stone-ground grits from Anson Mills, 1922-C Gervais St., Columbia, SC 29201, 803-467-4122; ansonmills.com
Where to eat them:
Lucile’s Creole Cafe (Denver)
275 S. Logan St., 303-282-6258.
7 a.m.-2 p.m. Monday-Friday, 8 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturday-Sunday. Also in Boulder, Fort Collins, Longmont and Steamboat Springs. luciles.com
Le Peep, 1875 York St., 303-399-7320
Denny’s, various locations
Waffle House, various locations
-Ellen Sweets
Eat ’em in N’awlins
Anyone heading to the Big Easy between now and the end of September can tuck into COOLinary New Orleans, the city’s second annual restaurant celebration of dining in what has been called America’s most delicious city. It will not be difficult to find grits on menus there.
Through September, some of the Crescent City’s most notable restaurants will offer three-course lunch and dinner specials throughout the Big Easy, including Arnaud’s, Emeril’s, Galatoire’s, Brennan’s, Court of Two Sisters, Jacque-Imo’s and Palace Café.
In celebration of New Orleans’continued efforts at recovery from Katrina, these restaurants are serving special three-course menus for $20.06 at lunch and $30.06 for dinner.
For more information about the event, and a complete listing of participating restaurants, go coolinaryneworleans.com.
– Ellen Sweets
