Boiling with Bacon

History

"Boiling with Bacon" is less a recipe than a method, and Martha McCulloch-Williams presents it that way in "Dishes & Beverages of the Old South" (1913). A pound of streaky bacon, cut square if possible, is scraped and washed clean and put on in plenty of water with a young onion, a little thyme and parsley, brought to a quick boil, checked with cold water, skimmed clean, then left simmering two to three hours. Greens — "mustard, turnip, or dandelion or field salad" — go in and cook until very tender, are skimmed out and drained, and laid in a hot dish with the square of bacon on top.

She is emphatic about what surrounds it: "You should have plenty of Cayenne vinegar, very hot and sharp, hot corn bread, and cider or beer, to go along with it." She also notes that string beans, "known to the south country as snaps, never come fully to their own, unless thus cooked with bacon." That is the Southern greens-and-pork method recorded as a working practice rather than a novelty.

The historical record does not document a specific earlier origin for this preparation.

McCulloch-Williams was a white writer born near Clarksville, Tennessee, who grew up on a plantation before the Civil War. The book's dedication is "to our Mammys," and much of the cooking it records is the work of enslaved and formerly enslaved Black women it does not name.

Ingredients

• 1 pound streaky bacon
• 1 young onion
• thyme
• parsley
• greens
• water

Instructions

1. Get a pound of streaky bacon, cut square if possible, scrape and wash clean.
2. Put on in plenty of water, with a young onion, a little thyme and parsley.
3. Bring to a quick boil, throw in cold water, skim the pot clean, then let stand simmering for two to three hours.
4. Add to it either greens — mustard, turnip, or dandelion or field salad — well washed and picked, and let cook till very tender.
5. Then skim out, drain in a colander, lay in a hot dish with the square of bacon on top.
6. Serve two thin slices of the bacon with each helping of greens. You should have plenty of Cayenne vinegar, very hot and sharp, hot corn bread, and cider or beer, to go along with it.
7. String beans, known to the south country as snaps, never come fully to their own unless thus cooked with bacon. Even pork does not answer, though that is far and away better than boiling and buttering or flooding with milk sauces.
8. It is the same with cabbage. Wash well, halve or quarter, boil until very tender, drain and serve.
9. Better cook as many as the pot will hold and the bacon season, since fried cabbage — chopped fine, and tossed in bacon fat with a seasoning of pepper, salt and vinegar — helps out wonderfully for either breakfast, luncheon or supper.
10. Never throw away proper pot-liquor — it is a good and cheap substitute for soup on cold days. Heat it, and drop into it crisp bread-crusts; if they are corn bread crusts made very brown, all the better.