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Collards
By Melanie Devore
Southerners
always have recognized freaks. According to Flannery O’Connor, in her
1960 essay “Some Aspects of the Grotesque in Southern Fiction,” that’s
exactly why Southern writers particularly possess a penchant for writing
about freaks. However, to recognize a freak, O’Connor fully understood
the need to use the “general conception” of the whole person as the datum
for the grotesque. Possibly the reason Southerners recognize freaks is
rooted in the region’s consumption of collard greens.
The plant
kingdom is full of every kind of freak you can imagine. This is a truth
since plants modify their stems and leafs in such, well, grotesque ways that
it is nearly impossible to have a general conception of what a “normal”
growth form is. And, in the mustard family, the species that provides us
with some of the greatest grotesqueness is Brassica oleraceae. This
species, native to the north Atlantic coast of Europe, has its first record
of domestication in the eastern Mediterranean, possibly after being
introduced by Celtic invasions. Brussels sprouts, broccoli, cauliflower,
kale, kohlrabi, and our beloved collard greens, all are different forms of
Brassica oleraceae produced by extreme modifications of the leaves
and stems. In the case of cabbages, the shoot at the tip of the stem, along
with those along the stem itself, fail to develop and the leaves expand and
encompass the stem. The “heart” of the cabbage consists of the stem tissue
while the waxy, thick leaves, serve as the source of coleslaw. Brussels
sprouts, often referred to as “little cabbages” by younger fanciers of fine
vegetables, are heads formed along the stems of a plant with a
well-developed shoot tip. Broccoli and cauliflower are the youngest,
domesticated versions of Brassica oleraceae. Broccoli crowns are
masses of floral buds. Anyone who has grown broccoli is keenly aware that
the tight clusters of developing flowers will fully bloom if the crop is not
harvested in a timely fashion. In contrast, cauliflower crowns consist of
masses of expanded tips of stems in early “flowering” varieties, while late
“flowering” varieties have a fused combination of stem and floral tissue.
Kohlrabi, a form of the Brassica oleraceae, with a swollen stem and
leaf bases, is the oldest member of this botanical freak show. Pliny, in
about 650 B.C., describes a vegetable that appears to fit the description of
kohlrabi. The general conception of Brassica oleraceae, and the
standard for recognizing all the grotesque ways this species has been
twisted to meet our culinary needs, can be found in kales and collard
greens.
Collards are
wonderfully simple forms of Brassica oleraceae with lower leaves that
sag outward and upper ones that are cup-shaped. The leaves can obtain
lengths of nearly two feet, thus requiring produce sections in Southern
grocery stores to provide costumers with those extra long plastic bags for
their greens. One cultivar of the collard, ‘Morris Heading,’ is named for
the loose heads produced at the tip of the stem. Collards and kales are
usually grown as annuals, and when left untouched for several years, will
produce a thick, long stem with a tuft of terminal leaves. Our friends
across the pond take advantage of this growth form in collards and kales and
use the polished stems of ‘Walking Stick’ kales grown on the Channel Islands
of England as walking sticks. Kales get a little more fancier with their
fringed, thinner leaves. Take a winter stroll through the historic district
of Milledgeville and the campus of Georgia College & State University and
you will be sure to spy the ornamental kale. This purple variety of kale is
a local favorite for container planting. When it came to selecting between
collards and kale for dinner table fare, in the South, collards won hands
down.
You pretty much
can determine which side of the Mason-Dixon Line you reside on by asking
your neighbors what they eat on New Year’s Eve dinner to bring good
fortune. If they simply say “sauerkraut” you know you are in the North. If
you are provided with a more colorful, literal account involving collard
greens (representing future earnings in dollars) and black-eyed peas
(representing future earnings in cents), you know you reside in the South.
Collards define our region and are the perfect crop for our hot summers and
mild winters.
Collards
tolerate heat better than kales and survive our warm summer months. But,
collards also can tolerate freezing temperatures making them an ideal
traditional, winter crop. If you want sweeter collards, those icy evenings
will result in a less pungent flavor in your greens. Collards are so simple
to grow and will yield harvestable greens just about a month after being
planted. Historians have consistently commended collards for enabling the
South to survive the aftermath of the Civil War and endure the Great
Depression. But, collards, in the eyes of some people, became associated
with those occupying the lower rungs of the social ladder. This viewpoint
was exactly that of one Mrs. Ruby Hill in O’Connor’s “A Stroke of Good
Fortune.”
When we first
meet Ruby Hill, she literarily has the one food item she disdains the most
stuck to her face: a big ole gritty, collard leaf. Mrs. Hill takes pride in
the fact that she, and her husband Bill Hill, live as the so-called
sophisticated folks and maintain their social standing by not consuming
collards. The only reason she is wrestling the sack of low life leaves up
the stairs to her apartment is because her brother Rufus, returning from
Europe, desires the dishes he dreamed of during his tour of duty. The
reader gets the impression that Ruby thinks anyone spending time in Europe
would come back like “somebody from somewhere.” After all, we are talking
about Europe, and anything European has to be sophisticated. The thought
that Rufus, after spending several years of avoiding artillery, skirting
shrapnel, and eating rations, simply wants a dish that reflects the comfort
and security of his home never crosses Ruby’s mind. And, to Rufus, collards
were that special comfort food.
No doubt Ruby
prepared Rufus’ special culinary request in the traditional Southern style.
Typically the collard greens are washed, slid into a gargantuan pot with
water and pork, and boiled until tender. The greens are then removed from
the green colored juice, chopped, and commonly doused with a bit of vinegar
and salt. Now, if Rufus is a real collard connoisseur, he probably
requested that Ruby keep the juice, or “pot likker,” to be smothered over
cornbread or, in some cases, used as a dessert. Between the pot likker and
the greens, Rufus would have consumed a healthy dosage of Vitamin A, as well
as substantial amounts of Vitamin C, calcium, and iron. The nutritional
attributes of collard greens just may be one of the keys to this Southern
delicacy’s salvation.
Dark leafy
greens are in vogue these days with the health conscious crowd. In the
court of public opinion, particularly outside of the South, healthy is the
last adjective one expects to be used in a sentence with Southern cuisine.
Watch one episode of ‘Paula’s Down Home Cooking” on the Food Network and
you will see the loveable host and her darling sons pouring pints of heavy
cream and pounds of butter into decadent, heart- clogging dishes. Travel
to Atlanta and you will find noveau Southern cuisine dished out to Yankee
refugees treating out of town guests to health conscious “Southern
cooking.” Collards are creeping into the vegan and vegetarian arsenal of
recipes, but good, solid, true Southern food will no doubt always have an
audience with the crowds who go to barbecue, buffet, “meat and three,” and
soul food restaurants.
Edward Davis and
John Morgan (both of Emory & Henry College) have dedicated a substantial
portion of their research to collards and their cultural geography. In the
Southeastern Geographer (2005, 45: 67-82), they present a detailed
study of the cultural geography, economics, history, and use of collards in
North Carolina. The traditional source of collards was the home garden.
However, even rural people became less connected to the land and bought most
of their food from grocery stores. Ronald McDonald is also doing more of
the cooking these days, and fast food has become a source of several meals a
week. Even though you can buy fresh and frozen collards readily in the
supermarket, Big Macs and KFC have shaped a generation of taste buds.
Still, there is hope for the home garden and the collard green.
Newscasters
swarmed on the White House lawn in early spring 2009 to cover a rather,
folksy event. The First Lady, along with her two daughters, invited
Washington school children to join in the planting of the first garden. It
seems the new leadership was reflecting a trend occurring across the
country. Community gardens are making a comeback and Flannery O’Connor’s
very own Milledgeville is in on the action. This year Milledgeville
established not only a community garden, but also a Tuesday farmer’s
market. When it comes to raising fresh winter vegetables, one of the best
options in the South would be collard greens.
Like the South
itself, collards will rise again to their rightful place on the dinner
table. No longer will our beloved greens take a back seat to the
grotesqueness of broccoli, Brussels sprouts, and cabbage. In the South we
do recognize freaks, but that doesn’t necessarily mean we want them for
dinner, or as dinner guests.
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