State

A NORTH CAROLIN IAN ТЕШ LONDON .ABOUT HIS FAVORITE TAR HEEL DISH By JOHN McKMGIIT wetM-T iUKVtr OF NORTH CAROLINA Take One Crisp Fall morning A shuddersomc thing has happened in the twenty years I've been away from my native North Carolina. The length of the State, from the misty blue heights of the Great Smokies in the west to the pocosin land of the tidal east, good Tar Heels shake their heads despondently and tell me. “No’th Ca'lina cookin' ain't what it used to be." I’m told, moreover, that the plaint is general throughout the storied Southland. A southern contributor to The Saturday Evening Post not long ago spoke his mind sharply on the deg- dation of an ancient art — and es- ped the tar-and-feathering that bably would have been his lot one two score years past. More rcccnt- y, the food editor of The Atlanta Con¬ stitution, perhaps the South's most influential newspaper, came right out and said that new-fangled ways had upset the candied yam cart: while to¬ day’s diet below the Mason and Dixon line may be more healthful, she ob¬ served, it isn’t Southern, Perhaps an inferiority complex bred of this self-criticism accounts for the fact that the London restaurateur who wrote some months ago asking North Carolina's favourite dish and the recipe therefor, so that he might feature it on his menu, has not yet — so far as I know — received an answer. The London Boniface addressed his letter, quite properly, to the State News Bureau. Desiring advice on the delicate inquiry, the bureau released it to the Press. Controversy rose, and raged for weeks. Every Tar Heel ap¬ peared to have his own idea as to the proudest achievement, past or present, of the State's cuisine. And hardly two of them agreed. Nominations ranged from the hum- Nofe: John Mcknight, widely known AP foreign correspondent, author of "The Papacy,” now with the Stale Department in Italy, wrote the following article for the London magazine “Wine and Food." That publication has generously permitted us to print it here. ble pan-fried “chitterlings" (hog tripe: the word is locally pronounced chit'lings; the dish is especially fa¬ voured of our darker brethren) through angel food (angel cake) to "hushpuppies" (cornmcal pats fried crisp in deep hot fat and eaten with meat or fish, so called supposedly be¬ cause hunters use them to quiet hun¬ gry. keening hounds). Well, if the State News Bureau can’t make up its mind among the prolifer- Pigs barbecuing on Tom Pearsall's Nash County farm. (Photo by llein- mer). ating suggestions. I can. So I'll answer the Londoner's letter. Here goes. Selection of the Old North State's top culinary achievement is indeed, it may be said at the outset, difficult, more difficult than with some other States. The very mention of Maine brings to mind its lobster. Massachusetts is no less famed for succulent clams steamed in seaweed, and for clam chowder in the grand tradition. Penn¬ sylvania is especially proud of its scrapple ( bits of meat with herbs and Indian meal boiled, moulded, sliced and fried) and its lusty pepper-pot soup. In the south, and almost everywhere the barnyard fowl is esteemed, fried chicken Maryland enhances the re¬ nown of the State for which it is named. Scarcely less well known is Vir¬ ginia's nutty, aromatic Smithficld ham. Hoppin' John — peas stewed with ba¬ con and red pepper, and served with rice — is considered by fanciers to be most artfully prepared in South Caro¬ lina, which is also proud of its fat waterfowl gorged on wild rice. Georgia is traditionally the home of Brunswick stew, the thick, savoury hunter's pot¬ tage of chicken, pork, rabbit, squirrel, tomatoes, fresh maize, other vege¬ tables. Florida offers, along with fine citrus fruit, the varied fish of the Gulf stream, of which pompano and yellow- tail arc especially favoured. Louis¬ iana's jambalaya is one of countless gustatory delights in that ancient Frcnch-Spanish State. And so across the continent. . . But it is hard to pick out one deli¬ cacy as truly representative of North Carolina because — “the most North¬ ern of the Southern States, the most Southern of the Northern" — its taste THE STATE. VoL XX; No. 1«. Kntrrrd as second-class mailer. June I. 1933. al the PostoRlcr at Raleigh, North Carolina, under the act of March J. 1859. Published by Sharpe Publishing Co., Inc., Lawyers Bldg., Raleigh, N. С. Copyright. 19SZ, by the Sharpe Publishing Co., Inc.