 |
 |
M: I’ve made no secret of my affinity for fresh summer corn served pretty much any way you can make it. Now you can add this sweet corn gravy from Roan Mountain, Tennessee to the list. Little more than corn, milk and flour, this cooks down into the sweet, silky gravy your biscuits have been missing. The submitter of this Roan Mountain dish reports her mother would serve this for breakfast lunch and dinner. I would adjust that to say I’d serve this *with* breakfast, lunch and dinner. It’s pretty sweet (and I even left the sugar out of the recipe), so I found it played out nicely alongside crisp bacon, salty country ham or savory fried chicken. For the record, the day I made this, I did, in fact, eat it with breakfast lunch and dinner. You know, for science. Ah, the trials I endure.
The second time I made this, I added a little spicy pork sausage (about 1/3 Lb). For those looking to this as a meatless alternative to sawmill gravy, that is obviously not the way to go, but the heat and salt of the sausage was an excellent counterpoint to this silky sweet recipe. Do they have sawmills in Roan Mountain?
K: I also opted to stack this up against a strong background flavor, and slathered it over a lovely, crispy, blackened fish. If I were home, it would no doubt have been catfish, but up here it seemed appropriate to pair with fresh-caught cod, so that’s what we did. Verdict? FANTASTIC.
Then I found myself sneaking spoonfuls straight from the gravy dish, so the next day I thinned it a bit with a little milk, jacked up the salt and black pepper, and just ate it as soup for lunch with wee oyster crackers. I can’t recommend that highly enough. Hot sauce wouldn’t have been amiss here either, if only I’d thought of it.
Recipe: Roan Mountain Corn Gravy
Summary: This irresistible sweet corn gravy goes with just about anything, but really shines when paired with something salty or with a little bite in need of taming. From The Southern Foodways Alliance Community Cookbook
Ingredients
- Kernels of 4 Ears of Corn
- 1/2 c Water
- 2 T Sugar (M: I skipped this and it was plenty sweet without. K: Yes. Me too.)
- 1/2 tsp Salt
- 1/4 tsp Black Pepper
- 2 T Butter
- 3 c Whole Milk
- 1/4 c Flour
- 1/2 c Cold Water
Instructions
- Combine corn, 1/2 c water, salt, sugar, pepper and butter in a heavy saucepan.
- Cook at medium heat until corn is tender (about 5 minutes).
- Add milk and bring to boil.
- Slurry flour and cold water together in a small bowl.
- Gradually add slurry to saucepan, stirring constantly.
- Continue to cook and stir until gravy thickens (about 10 minutes).
- Serve hot.
Creamed Corn « The Communal Skillet
December 20, 2011 at 1:35 pm
[...] looking for something more conventionally creamy (read: dairy), check out the also excellent corn gravy found in the Community Cookbook. I can’t argue with either [...]