I grew up in the South, where meals that Northerners might find strange were just normal for us. My grandmother’s kitchen always had one burner going. On it, she’d cook up a skillet of biscuits, later covering them in thick sausage gravy—a kind of rich gravy that’s hard for Northerners to imagine. For us, her cooking felt almost sacred, the way homemade meals can.
Southern food, like biscuits, collard greens that cook for hours, and a glass of sweet tea, carries its own kind of tradition. It brings to mind family picnics and holiday dinners, moments that feel like home. In the South, home cooking is its own kind of ritual.
Here are 10 Southern comfort foods that leave Northerners scratching their heads, but that we wouldn’t trade for anything.
Featured Image Credit: ROMAN ODINTSOV /Pexels.com.
Chicken and Waffles
Crisp, fried chicken with fluffy, airy waffles, slicked with maple syrup and coated in butter – it’s hard to find a Southern soul food restaurant and not see it on the menu. Whenever we have out-of-towners, they always seem puzzled about what kicks together crispy fried chicken with morning waffles, especially when we add eggs and bacon.
Biscuits and Gravy
In the South, a plate of Southern-style biscuits needs to have some sausage gravy to go with it. I’ve been a bit of a missionary when it comes to southern-style biscuits and sausage gravy. I show it to people up North and say: ‘Look at this! What do you not understand? Nothing wrong with this. Have you ever thought about having something like this for breakfast?’
You put a big pile of those sausage gravy on the middle portion, over them biscuits, soak it up, cup it up with your hand, and put it all in your mouth. It’s such a wonderful thing. Anybody in the world knows this should be a breakfast staple!
Like our content? Be sure to follow us.
Grits
You can have grits as an accompaniment with breakfast food, or dressed up with shrimp for dinner. Northerners, used to creamier cereals or hot oatmeal might find grits a bit too bland and grainy. But Southerners love to dress up grits with cheese, butter, or even bacon. You know exactly what you’re going to get with grits.
Fried Green Tomatoes
Made with firm green tomatoes rolled in cornmeal and fried until crispy, it is a good Southern appetizer that’s light but tasty. To a Northerner, green tomatoes this way might seem like a strange food to eat, but down South, this is an appetizer at its finest.
Collard Greens
Low and slow-cooked with ham hocks or bacon, collards are a Southern-style side dish that reeks of smoky comfort — a flavor too strong or mushy for most Northerners, but loved by Southerners for how satisfyingly they taste at home.
Chicken-Fried Steak
This is a steak – typically round or flank steak – that is breaded and fried and usually served with a creamy white gravy on top. So the idea of coating steak as though you were making fried chicken seems too much, and does actually sound more like a messy disaster. But to us down South, it’s juicy and gentle in the middle, with a satisfying crisp outer crust, and this combination is a comfort food mainstay.
Pimento Cheese
Nicknamed the ‘caviar of the South’, pimento cheese is a creamy shredded cheddar, mayonnaise, and pimento pepper blend spread on crackers or bread. For Northerners, it is an odd cheese spread; for Southerners, the punchy pungency is a favorite condiment.
Boiled Peanuts
In the South, you buy raw peanuts that have been boiled in salted water until they’re soft and salty — a standard Southern snack. Other people around the country think the texture is strange and find the taste an acquired one, but in the South, you take them with you on road trips. You prefer them warm.
Hoppin’ John
Hoppin’ John, a Southern New Year’s dish of black-eyed peas and rice (often with bacon or ham), probably won’t have much appeal to Northerners – a weird congealed legume and grain product? Good luck! But Southerners understand it to be their lucky comfort food.
Sweet Tea
This super-sweet iced tea, found everywhere in the South, is often called the region’s “house wine.” When someone from the North moves South, they usually get handed a glass on their first day at work. They’ll take a sip, blink, and say, “Whoa! This tea is really sweet!” Southerners just laugh and say, “Grab some water!” because, down here, sweet tea is as normal as water.
Disclaimer: This list is solely the author’s opinion based on research and publicly available information.
Like our content? Be sure to follow us.
