As I sit on my back porch in the early morning hazy sunlight as it filters through the white Crepe Myrtle trees next to me, I look out at the overgrown, overrun, and wild grasses and dried vegetable leavings that was once our lush green garden. This “produce producing patch” gave us a plethora of fresh vegetables for the past two months and the proof of this is sitting on my canning shelves in our laundry room – tomatoes, corn, squash, eggplant, cucumbers, and an assortment of different peppers.
My husband, the ever-loving farm boy, has fussed over and watered these garden vegetables as the weather changed from day to day. He makes the statement every year, “I’m not going to plant a garden next year, it’s just too labor intensive.” But then here comes May of the next year and he gets that “itch” to get the seeds and plants into the black dirt of our garden spot. And, giving him the credit, he deserves, he is a good farmer even as good as he is a cattle rancher and retail grocer.
This innate quality was deep-seated into him at an early age as his granddaddy and his parents always raised nearly all that they consumed as times were hard back then and he was from the country area, and everybody raised all their food including the meats they ate.
I remember the first time he carried me to meet his family, many years ago, there were chickens running around all over the yard, a pig pen was a way down from the house and there was a milk cow in the barn. I was a city girl and we bought most of our food supplies except for the beef and pork that my daddy bought and had slaughtered for the winters, and milk was delivered to our front door every other day.
As I pondered my early life, I can remember the times I was at my grandmother’s house when it was ‘hog-killing’ time. I was always excited and for the life of me, I can’t remember why. I never saw the actual hog execution as the men always took care of that before I was roused from my fluffy feather bed. I can remember it was cold during those preparations. I remember that they never not used anything as ALL the pig was prepared for consumption. The head, feet, ears, and tail were even made into a sandwich meat – souse meat. I can’t remember but I surely hope I didn’t eat a slice of that! And then we have to talk about the “innards” of this pork producing animal- the chitterlings. Now I know I never tried this delicacy as I know I would remember that scrap.
One set of my grandchildren has a small pig – Crisp-P- and I think he may live to be a ripe old age and die of a natural death as they will never be able to make him into souse.
Fresh Vegetable Goulash- 4 pieces of bacon cut into small pieces and fried, leave in the pan with all grease and add 1 cup of cut up okra until browned. Add 1 cup of cut up onion, ¼ cup of green peppers, and 2 garlic cloves minced. Cook on low until tender and then add 1 cup of whole kernel corn and 1 quart of home canned tomatoes, (or store bought), salt and pepper. Bring to a boil and cook on low for about 30 minutes.
