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Chocolate Fudge

MAKES ABOUT 10 PIECES

3 cups sugar

3 cups milk

2 tablespoons corn syrup

6 ounces semisweet chocolate pieces

3 tablespoons butter

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 cup chopped pecans (optional)

Butter 8 × 8-inch pan.

In large, heavy saucepan, bring sugar, milk, corn syrup, and chocolate to a boil.

Put a drop of mixture in 1 cup of ice-cold water. When the drop forms a soft ball, remove from heat. If ball does not form, continue cooking and repeat until ball forms.

Add butter and vanilla extract to hot mixture. Cool. When saucepan with chocolate mixture has cooled to a lukewarm temperature, beat mixture with spoon until it loses its gloss and becomes thick. If you want nuts, stir in pecans before mixture cools completely. Cool in pan. Cut in desired size squares.

EACH YEAR AFTER THE FIRST FROST, men and women wearing heavy clothes and carrying rifles and sawed-off shotguns stalked around inside the store buying peanut patties and candy bars.

Bailey called them the killing crew because they went around the neighborhood killing all the hogs and cows that had been selected for slaughter.

For the next two weeks, or as long as our icebox could keep the meat, we would be sure that Momma was going to cook some exquisite fresh beef and pork dishes.

She told me that she could cook a whole hog and make people love to eat it. “Everything but its hooves.” She said when it came to hogs, poor people had to learn how to use everything “from the rooter [its snout] to the tooter [its tail].”

The neighborhood women would bring the hog heads and intestines to the store. They would put the heads on tables that had been set up outside between the wells and the iron pots where we washed out clothes. They would carry the intestines far beyond the outdoor toilet and empty them in a hole in the ground, dug for that purpose.

The stench was horrible, but Momma never allowed me to leave the spot and return to the store where there were the aromas of oranges and apples. “You have to know how to do this, Sister. All poor people need to know how to do some of everything, and a poor colored woman even more so. Don’t turn your nose up at anything except evil.”

While I bustled about helping in the stinking miasmic odor, I tried to think of the rich stew that Momma always served with crackling bread. But it was the thought of crackling bread itself that made me forget the smell of raw intestines.

Momma salted and roasted a large pan full of pork skin, which would become so crisp that it crackled. The fat rendered from the meat was stored to be used later for cooking and making soap.

She always gave a few crispy pieces of the skin to her grandbabies and to Uncle Willie, but most of the cracklings were saved for her great beef stew or until she cooked and served a large pot of collard greens. Then she’d bring out a giant pan of corn bread filled with cracklings.

The greens and stew dinner, which was always served with raw onions, pickled beets, and a jar of pepper sauce, was one of my favorite winter meals.

Although two adults and two children would share the food, Momma never reduced the size of the bread she gave us. I preferred Momma’s crackling corn bread over other peoples’ Sunday cake.

Cracklíng Corn Bread

SERVES 8

2 cups white cornmeal

¼ cup sifted all-purpose flour

1 tablespoon sugar

½ teaspoon salt

4 teaspoons baking powder

1 ½ cups plus 2 tablespoons milk

2 large eggs, beaten well

2 tablespoons (¼ stick) butter, melted

½ pound crisp cracklings, * broken into ½-inch pieces

Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease an 8 × 8 × 2-inch pan.

Mix dry ingredients; stir in milk and eggs. Pour in butter, and add cracklings. Pour mixture into pan and bake for 1 hour, or until brown and firm.

* Cracklings are called chicharones in Spanish and can be found in Latino grocery stores.

Momma’s Rich Beef Stew

SERVES 8

3 pounds chuck, cut into bite-size pieces

Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

½ cup all-purpose flour

⅓ cup vegetable