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Wednesday, March 19, 2025

The Breakfast that Got Us Through the Great Depression | Fried Cornmeal Mush

VIDEO HERE  (15:07 minutes)

*****

This was a regular breakfast when I was a kid and stayed with my grandparents while my dad was overseas. Us youngsters would eat it with syrup or jelly while my Grandpa had his with 2 or 3 fried eggs on top.
Once my dad got back though, I never got a chance to eat it. According to him, "I've worked too damned hard to have to eat this shit anymore."

29 comments:

  1. Done right corn meal mush is pretty damn good...

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  2. Cornmeal Mush and Scrapple were favorites growing up.

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    1. Bigus, Pon Haus and eggs mighty fine eaten. I was up in a Holler and they were making Pon Haus. Big black kettle over and open fire and a wooden paddle to stir. I asked, what kind of meat are you puttin in it. The ol boy looked at me and said, Enny thin what the dogs don't drag off. God I miss those people.

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    2. Still eating it here in Ohio either I purchase it in several stores in the area or make my own. I like it with fried eggs the grand-kids like it with syrup. Scrapple is good too never knew was something exotic.

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  3. My maternal grandparents were Italian and getting 'polenta' was a treat. Leftover and cut in slabs, fried with butter or the fat from Italian sausages and offered up with grated cheese, the sausages and over easy eggs right from the hen house. Of course that was special not every day.

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  4. If anyone's really curious about it and hasn't had it, Bob Evans' Restaurants used it have (according to Grok, today some of them do and some don't). I tried it many years ago and I didn't think it was bad at all (doused with lots of syrup) but I can see how it'd be different if that's the only thing you had to eat over and over again.
    Tom from East Tennessee

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    1. Kind of like grits. Put salt on them, they're salty. Put sugar on, they're sweet. Put noting on and it tastes like it.

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    2. Bob Evans french fries it. Properly done, it's pan fried in butter until golden brown. And then topped with 100% pure maple syrup, not that gooey thickened corn syrup crap we usually see.

      I make corn meal mush from scratch about once a year, usually at Christmas. Corn meal, a little salt and water, cooled overnight in the fridge. Slice, dredge in flour, and fry in butter until yummy brown.

      Best breakfast ever.

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  5. When I was a youngster we had cornbread as a breakfast food. I would cut a piece and chop it up to small pieces. I would then pour syrup on it till it was the right consistency and add my sausage patty to it. My Mississippi in-laws thought I was nuts. Still weird eating cornbread with just butter on it.

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  6. It’s hard to mess up good cornbread. Easy too but you gotta have a little patience.

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  7. During the civil war (aka the war of Northern Aggression) the Rebels called that "sloush".

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  8. Never had it, looks good though..When times were tight as a kid we would often have some leftover rice from the fridge, we always had leftover rice, in a class of milk along with eggs, we had chickens.. Fried, scrambled or overeasy eggs and the rice milk was actually pretty good and filling
    JD

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  9. Bet you they'd be good with honey on top.

    I saw a Kent video the other day where he made Apple Fritters. Boy, did they look tasty!

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    1. Yes it was. There was no shortage of raw honey in Bud's house.
      I'll have to look for the Kent video. Thanks.

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    2. I wish you could get the honey we buy here from a local beekeeper. It comes in seasonal varieties and the latest variation is Orange. Oh, Man, is it delicious! Sweet as candy.
      Simple pleasures are the best.

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    3. I don't think so. "Sloush" was cornmeal and bacon grease, according to the late Shelby Foote.

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    4. You replied to the wrong comment, partner.

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  10. My favorite breakfast. My great grandmother used to make it for me. Used to be able to get it at Bob Evans, but they took it off the menu. :-(

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  11. We had a little bit of milk with either oatmeal or Red River cereal (you know the stuff with so much fibre, even the tapeworms couldn't hang on.)

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    1. Omg. Grew up with red river. Loved that stuff!

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  12. "I've worked too damned hard to have to eat this shit anymore."
    My dad said the same thing about chicken necks, but he loved fried bologna sandwiches.
    Go figure.

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  13. Mama made those for us when I was growing up. Everybody around where I'm from (Atlanta) called 'em corn fritters. Made 'em from grits, too.

    Shell

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  14. Cornmeal mush, liver mush, scrapple, goetta...it's all good.

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  15. All you guys are bringing back memories of my early years. At 6:00 a.m.,I will go to the kitchen and cook up a few servings of corn meal mush. I haven’t had it in years.

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  16. My great grandfather lived with us for a while in the 60's and he ate his with molasses on it. Truly an old hard-ass, I liked him a lot. He was a finish carpenter and had his shop in the old carriage house under the front porch of my grandmother's mansion that he converted into an old folks home for her. Long story short, everyone got too old and in-firmed to keep things up and the bank won in the end. Eod1sg Ret

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  17. Got me reminiscing, my Mississippi mom would make what she called corn meal mush with crumbled pork sausage in it. My Pennsylvania dad called it scrapple.Whatever they called it I loved it. Mom would cut slices off the loafs and fry it up in butter, a little salt and pepper maybe a fried egg on the side yummm! Now I’m thinking about moms fried chicken.

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  18. My mom was a wonderful baker....bread, cakes, pies, etc. But she was raised thinking cornbread was something only southerners ate, and that they all made it from box mixes. You guys have just destroyed my childhood memories this morning.

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  19. My grandfather (he was born in 1899) made mush for me for breakfast when I was a kid. It was good with maple syrup.

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  20. True fact: cornmeal is made from grinding popcorn, not regular corn.

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