Rev. Erudite Redneck, B.S., B.S., M.A., M.Div.

By The Erudite Redneck

I just love fried chicken.

Keep the nuggets, keep the boneless-skinless-calorieless breasts. Give me good old-fashioned yardbird, cut up, skin on, floured, salted and peppered and fried in a heavy skillet.

Biscuits or cornbread on the side, please. Sliced dill pickles, cucumbers soaked in vinegar or green tomato relish is a must. Mashed taters. Corn, on the cob if available, from a can if not. And green beans, seasoned with bacon grease. Oh, and chicken gravy, which is the same light brown color as sausage gravy if done right.

Some of my fondest memories as a young’un involve Mama in the kitchen. And bein’ underfoot when she was fryin’ chicken was especially fun. I mean, the whole operation is fascinating to a kid.

One, that was an entire carcass, or two, on the table – until she cut it up. Then, she’d wash each piece under the faucet in the sink. In a brown paper sack, she’d put flour and salt and pepper. I think that’s all. She’d put some of the pieces in the sack and shake it around.

Then, into a quarter-inch or so of Crisco already hot in a big skillet, she’d gently place the pieces, making a layer of simmering wonder that, after two or three dangerous, grease-popping flips, would eventually be a big pile of good eatin’ on the table.

It would take awhile – and that’s the secret of home-fried chicken, which cannot be replicated in a fast-food place, roadside chicken shack or even a fancy eatin’ joint: Frying chicken right – with the insides all moist and the outsides perfectly crispy and lightly browned – takes time. Waitin’ for it is part of what makes it special.

And I just love watermelon.

Keep the mango, keep the kiwi, keep the starfruit. Give me good old-fashioned watermelon, iced down, preferably in a metal tub under a shade tree, with lots of friends and kin around. A dash of salt, please.

Sittin’ on a stump, or a tailgate, or a bale of hay, juice drippin’ from your chin, your arms and elbows – that is the way God intended watermelon to be consumed. Spiked is OK _ vodka or something else with no taste – but not necessary at all.

Some of my favorite memories, as a young’un, a high school kid, and a college kid, involve watermelon. We grew them, and strawberries and other treats, on the farm I was raised on. Sold ’em out front from a stand on the highway – complete with a self-service cigar box with change that operated on the honor system. I have fleeting memories of bein’ covered with melon juice and Mama givin’ me the rough washrag wash that only mamas can give:

Plop the boy down on the kitchen counter, or the table, or the back of a truck, or somewhere easy to get to, and go over every inch of every uncovered part of the body – which is quite a bit for a country boy runnin’ around in a summer shirt and short pants.

In high school, my very first payin’ job was for a farmer who grew watermelons down in the bottoms for sale wholesale, not on the side of the road. It was serious business to him. He hired me as a hoer. Monotonous work, hoein’ watermelon plants, but not hard at all. One, they grow best in sand, so hoeing them means just raking the hoe across the sand on either side of a plant. And the plants grow a couple of feet apart in wide rows. Easiest hoein’ I can think of, actually. You have to really be goofing off to accidentally whack a melon plant, which I did, from time to time, when I got to watchin’ Tammy, the farmer’s lovely daughter, and Pam, his lovely niece, who were my age (16) and well worth watchin’ in their loose-fittin’ comfortable summer hoein’ clothes.

In college, my first year, some more experienced hands introduced me to the spiked variety of watermelon. Pretty fun, but I’d just as soon drink beer. Watermelon is too good as it is to mess it up with alcohol – and that’s about the only thing I can say that about.

END