Milton Tire Service and Grill
by David Cecelski My favorite thing about Milton Tire Service and Grill in Milton, in CaswellCounty, is the stories. I stopped there today on my way back from taking my sister and nephew to Danville. A combination grill and automotive tire shop, it’s on Broad Street (US 62), just south of the Dan River and theVirginia line. The grill is a […]
Hoe Cakes
by David Cecelski The only place I know that serves anything called a “hoe cake” anymore is in a convenience store in Person County. Located on US 501 south of Roxboro, the convenience store is called King Bee #4 and the hoe cake makers call their little business Granny B’s Biscuits and Hoe Cakes, after the […]
Jeff & Lisa’s Brick House Grill
by David Cecelski My son and sometimes my daughter and I have taken to shooting sporting clays down by the Deep River, in Lee County. By the time we put up our shotguns, we’re usually pretty hungry. It’s a lovely rural area and we like to explore the abandoned brickyards, the remnants of the old lumber mill […]
Stewed Turnips
by David Cecelski I never saw my grandmother make stewed turnips until near the end of her long life. I think she was in her 80s before we ever found a pot of stewed turnips warming on that old stove of hers. But then one day, they were there. Creamy and sweet, stewed turnips are […]
Bear Hunter’s Cornpone with Ramps
2 cups ramp cornmeal ½ tsp. salt 1 – 1 ½ cup milk or buttermilk Heat oven to 425. Mix wet and dry ingredients together. Pour into oiled iron skillet. Bake for 25-35 minutes or until golden brown. I got this recipe last summer when I visited Beverly Whitehead at the Smoky Mountain Native Plants […]
Collard Kraut
by David Cecelski I was on US 111 in southern Duplin County, on my way to a MLK, Jr. Day event at St. Thomas AME Zion Church in Swansboro, when I saw the sign for collard kraut. It was in the front yard of a farmhouse in between the little communities of Lyman and […]
Huitlacoche
by David Cecelski The other day, my daughter and I tried Crazy Taco in Smithfield for the first time. It’s a tiny little take-out stand located at the intersection of South 5th Street and Brogden Road, in an older residential neighborhood that is home to a lot of Mexican and Salvadoran immigrants. My daughter is a vegetarian […]
Black-Eyed Peas and Hog Jowls
by David Cecelski These are photographs from the Littleton Lions Club’s annual New Years Day Black-Eyed Peas and Hog Jowls Dinner. It’s a great public event, with proceeds going to a host of good charities. The club’s volunteers serve a traditional New Years Day dinner of black-eyed peas and hog jowls, collard greens, sweet […]
Craven County corn
by David Cecelski My great-uncle Everett, I’ve been told, was a legendary bootlegger. He made his reputation more than half a century ago, but I occasionally still meet people who knew him back then. Only last summer, my brother and I met an old acquaintance of Everett’s in Sampson County. The fellow was astonished […]
Fried Sweet Potatoes
by David Cecelski My 88-year-old cousin Edsel and I were talking and smoking cigars last night when he pointed to a bushel box of sweet potatoes curing on his back porch. H.B. Taylor, a local farmer, had left them for him that morning. “That’s for a rainy day,” he told me. Edsel had it all […]
Consomé de Borrego
NCFOOD readers, please click here to read about supporting the work of the North Carolina Folklife Institute! by David Cecelski The house specialty at Garibaldi Mexican Restaurant, in Four Oaks, is lamb broth, consomé de borrego. This casual little eatery’s proprietors moved to this little agricultural town in Johnston County from Veracruz, on the Gulf of […]
Keaton’s
by David Cecelski I found Keaton’s on a quiet, dark stretch of Cool Springs Road, betweenStatesville and Mocksville. It’s an old plank building surrounded by woods. Outside, the parking lot was full and cars lined both sides of the road. Founded by a legendary African-American ‘cue man named Burette Walker Keaton, the restaurant has been serving barbecue […]
Pintos and Cornbread
by David Cecelski The sign on the outside of the Cook Shack, on US 901 in Union Grove, in Iredell County, says “Sandwiches. Groceries. Guns. Ammo. Hunting Licenses.” But you walk in the front door on a Saturday morning and it’s a whole lot more: a freewheeling country, old-time, and gospel music […]
Korner Kitchen
by David Cecelski KORNER KITCHEN I was driving through the little Amish community between Hamptonville and Yadkinville, on the Yadkin-Iredell County Line, when I found the Korner Kitchen Restaurant. When I drove by, a very Amish-looking fellow on a tractor was ordering his lunch at the restaurant’s take-out window, something I don’t see every […]
Pig’s Feet Supper
by David Cecelski My 88-year-old cousin Edsel had the pig’s feet ready by the time I got to his house tonight. A friend at a local barbecue joint had given them to him and our cousin Bill Dickinson’s wife, Irene, in Core Creek, had cooked them. Like a lot of older people around here, Edsel […]
Home-Canned Tomatoes
by David Cecelski I picked up 10 quarts of Linda Simmons’s canned tomatoes yesterday when I passed through Newport, a little town in Carteret County. A delightful woman who loves baking and canning, Linda makes the finest home-canned tomatoes on God’s green Earth as far as I am concerned. She sells them out of her home […]
Dried Mullet Roe
by David Cecelski My mother and I found a pair of big jumping mullet at the fish market last week and they turned out to be heavy with lovely golden roe. Striped, or “jumping,” mullet roe is a delicacy here on the North Carolina coast, especially between Cedar Island and Stump Sound. This time of […]
Oakwood BBQ
by David Cecelski On my way to my niece’s wedding last week, I had to zig-zag through the back roads of Onslow County to avoid all the washed-out bridges and flooded roads left by tropical storm Nicole. More than once, I had to turn around and try another way to get to the wedding. Half the time, I […]
Homeland Creamery
by David Cecelski This morning I happened on Homeland Creamery in the little rural community of Julian, in the southern part of Guilford County. I was on my way to see my son run in a cross country meet outside of Greensboro and had taken the old Greensboro-Chapel Hill Highway and US 62 so I could stay […]
Flour Burgers
by David Cecelski Yesterday I stopped for a flour burger at a little restaurant on NC 41 in Chinquapin. Flour burgers are a local delicacy in the little country places there in southern Duplin County. They’re made out of roughly equal parts of hamburger, flour, and onion, served on white bread, and, in my case, eaten with mustard […]
Pickled Corn on the Cob
by David Cecelski I found this jar of pickled corn on the cob at the Clay’s Corner country store on Old Highway 64 in Clay County. The store’s proprietor told me that he grew the sweet corn himself. To pickle the corn, he simply put the ears of corn in the jar, filled the jar with water […]
Loaves and Fishes
by David Cecelski At dusk I love walking through the old family campgrounds aroundLinville Falls, in Avery County. The campers come from all of the country, though I think mainly from Tennessee, South Carolina,Georgia, and here in North Carolina. This time of year they make their own community, sweet and fleeting. Tonight crowds of children raced through our campground, giddily happy. […]
Brightleaf Flea Market
by David Cecelski On my way to the farm early this morning, I found a wondrous array of street foods, backyard cookery, and fresh produce at the Brightleaf Flea Market in Smithfield. Located in and around an old tobacco warehouse on US 301—once famous as “Tobacco Road”—the flea market attracts hundreds of vendors, most (but hardly […]
Big T’s on a Saturday Night
by David Cecelski One of the loveliest places you can be on a late summer Saturday night is Big T’s in Hope Mills, a town a little south and west of Fayetteville. I was down there tonight to watch my son compete in a cross country meet and I thought the scene around Big T’s was […]