From the New world Part 2

At first glance this amorphous white side-dish looks like mashed potatoes- or grits. But this is white hominy with sour cream and mild green chiles, and it was sauteed in a skillet.The recipe is based on James Beard's Hominy Casserole from his "The New James Beard".

My late father, on his first visit to Nashville, was astounded to find civilization here. ("Where did all this money come from?", he asked me.) He would have heard of hominy and put it in the same category as Dogpatch, Faulkner's Snopes clan, and hookworms. I too assumed hominy was hardscrabble food for the Southern rural poor. Yet looking through my cookery books I learned that it is a New world food,eaten throughout the Americas. Maria de Carbia and Helen Corbitt have recipes for "Chili and Hominy" and "Hominy with olives" in their "Mexico Through My Kitchen Window". Maria Baez Kijac in "The South American Table" writes that the Brazilians combine hominy with shredded coconut and coconut milk to make a pudding. And Diana Kennedy (The Cuisines of Mexico) gives us a daunting pork and hominy soup requiring three day's preparation and a hog's head. I think pork must have an affinity with hominy. The next time I can afford it I am going to make a Serrano ham and hominy casserole!

This recipe is simple.


Two 15 ounce cans of white hominy, drained and rinsed.

4 ounces of sour cream

One 4 oz can of mild green dice chiles, drained.

4 tablespoons of butter

Salt and Pepper to taste


Melt the butter in the skillet. Add the hominy, the chiles, and the sour cream and mix with the melted butter.Sprinkle with salt and pepper to taste. Heat through and serve as a side to Fried chicken or catfish or any other iconic Southern entree. This is that easy. And to think that hominy comes from corn kernels treated with lye. Edna Lewis, in her "Taste of Country Cooking" describes how the people in her hometown of Freetown, Virginia made their hominy. I was just reading her story when I noticed that my 2 dollar paperback copy of her book is signed. Something McKay Books must not have noticed!

And as for this upcoming weekend- I am off and I am going to make Hominy and coconut pudding.