Hoppin' John

A bowl of dried black-eyed peas artfully arranged for photographic effect

My Great Barrington neighborhood, "The Hill", (we live on a hill)  is one of the best aspects of life in the Berkshires.  Although it has been my home for almost 50 years, my roots trace to the deep south.  My 98 yr old Aunt Mil still lives in the Burgaw North Carolina house where I originated and remember from my early school days.  My father was born and reared on a farm at the edge of Georgia's  Okefenokee Swamp.  Generations of my direct forbears share North Carolina, Georgia Texas and Tennessee as places of birth, life and death.  A direct Grandfather who was at Valley Forge, his wife and many descendants are buried in the Ebenezer Baptist cemetery in Hendersonville NC.  I migrated to the Berkshires from Eastern New Mexico, my mother's birthplace, just a spit from the Texas Panhandle, where I had lived since my 10th year.

Mrs Cowboy got started in Puerto Rico, (which is way, way south) from a Yankee father and a mother who was born and raised in the Everglades.  Southerness runs deep in this Berkshire household.

Canned Black-eyed peas - can be used in a pinch

The Importance of Hoppin' John

One Important New Year's day tradition common to all those places is Hoppin' John, a simple dish of rice and black-eyed peas.  For us Southerners, New Year's day consumption of Hoppin' John, ensuring good luck for the coming year, is an imperative.

While rice is ubiquitous in our area, black-eyed peas are often more difficult to obtain, especially if one doesn't remember to check one's supply until New Year's eve, which is exactly what happened last Dec 31.  Procrastination is also an honored southern tradition.

A survey of our frijole storage bin revealed plenty of Garbonzo, Black, Pinto, Navy, and Great Northern beans, but alas, none of the most important Black-Eyed variety.  Shopping forays to Price Chopper, Big Y, the Co-op and Guidos rendered no results. Apparently all possible purveyors  had been overrun by hordes of other desperate southern procrastinators.

"The Hill" to the rescue

A few years ago one of our neighbors, Karen Christensen, started a neighborhood Google newsgroup called 'The Hill'.  It is the electronic equivalent of a shared clothes line where neighbors trade reports and tips on everything from tradesmen recommendations to  lost pets to local bear and bobcat sightings.  "The Hill"  has become a great asset to those of us residing on the Hill.   My last hope for avoiding certain 2020 disaster rested in the hope that one of my fellow Hillians had earlier squirreled away some small cache of the magical legume.

A posting resulted in responses from several fellow Hillians.  Elwood and Janice, just a few houses removed from ours, offered to leave a stash on their porch which we could collect upon returning from our New Year's eve revelry in Pittsfield.  Ruth and Hans responded the next morning with an offer, but Elwood's peas were already well into the overnight soak.    Disaster had been averted.  We prepped and consumed our hoppin' John meal on Jan 1, thus our good luck is guaranteed  for 2020 as is that of our wonderful neighbors on the Hill.

Ruth and Hans asked about our recipe for preparing Hoppin' John which I will address in the next post. (I have driveled far too long here as it is)