A lot of the recipes I've seen call for cream. I have no idea if it's authentic or a celebrity chef take on things.

Funny how a dish that was known only to a tiny portion of the SC coast has become so ubiquitous. I guess one of these days I should try it.

Bored and looking through some old post I ran across this one. I love shrimp and grits. This is my mother's recipe and it is fabulous. For the shrimp I season raw shrimp with a cajun type seasoning (Emeril's Essence, lots of recipes on the web) and sautee in a little oil. I had forgotten how good this is and may have to make it for dinner tonight!

CHEESY GRITS

1 Cup Quick Grits
3 Cups Water
8 Tablespoons Butter
3 Cloves Garlic, minced
2 Eggs, lightly beaten
Milk to make 1 cup
1 Cup Shredded Cheddar Cheese
Sate and freshly ground Pepper to taste

Cook the Grits in the Water according to package instructions. When the Grits are still hot, add the Butter and Garlic, stir to melt the Butter. In a measuring cup, lightly beat the Eggs, add enough milk to bring it up to one cup. Stir to combine, and stir into the Grits Mixture. Stir in the Cheese.

Pour into a casserole or baking dish and bake in a preheated 350 degree oven and bake 30 Â 60 minutes. Mixture will puff up as it bakes. When top is golden and no longer loose, they are done.

Growing up in the Pacific and the NW, I have never tried grits before. I am curious but not brave enough to dive it. What do I expect when it comes to taste and texture?

Al

I have used this recipe for years. It's creamy and delish! I guess you could just add shrimp to the basic recipe once cooked and let it sit for about 7 minutes on Medium/Low.

I served thisrecipe to Jessica's clan when they came to visit minus the shrimp and I think they loved it.

Yield: Makes 6 to 8 servings

Ingredients
6 cups low-sodium chicken broth or water
2 cups milk
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground white pepper
2 cups uncooked quick-cooking grits
1 2/3 cups shredded smoked Gouda cheese
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
Preparation
Bring first 4 ingredients to a boil in a medium saucepan; gradually whisk in grits. Cover, reduce heat, and simmer, stirring occasionally, 5 minutes or until thickened. Add cheese and butter, stirring until melted.

Bob Gadsby, Great Falls, Montana, Southern Living, JULY 2004

I had grits for breakfast this morning and they were the best!
Only because I had some leftover whipping cream from Christmas!
I never use a recipe but usually 3 parts water to one parts grits and plenty of salt. Only stone ground yellow grits, ever.
Bring grits, salt and water to a boil , cover and cook for awhile. The grits will thicken up. They should be the consistency of pancake batter. They do thicken as they cool, btw.

When close to serving add some knobs of butter or as today pour in some cream. The cream makes the best grits.
Cook a little longer.
You should be in the kitchen watching the grits, occasionally whisking, adding a tablespoon more grits, a little more water, etc. to get the perfect balance the whole time, maybe 20 minutes.
The shrimp and cheese are "extras" and if you get the grits part right, are easy additions.

Al, I'm a northern gal & had my first grits in Charleston just a few years ago. My impression was that of cornmeal mush with garlic/cheese. Because my taste buds are conditioned to expecting a bit of sweet either from maple syrup on fried cornmeal mush or a tablespoon of brown sugar on regular mush...I hated the grits. They seemed just somehow *wrong* to my senses. There was nothing inherently bad about the grits. Like I said, the savory notion of cornmeal mush just didn't register well.

I'd try them again now knowing more what to expect.

/tricia

I'd say they are a coarser, grittier polenta.
It's a base, you can do a thousand things with it, including slicing and frying.
Stone ground grits, even here in grit country, are not at most grocery stores but established produce stands carry them.
My last batch is Timms Mill.
Most meat and threes serve the white, non-stone ground, grits.

Thanks for the additions! It does look like the milk/cream has something to do with it. And I like the idea of the gouda, riverrat, since the ones I had didn't taste like the cheddar or processed jar kind.

Tricia, that's interesting since I always thought the reason people didn't like grits was because most people don't realize they need a lot of salt to taste like anything. It's cream of wheat that I do the sugar sweet thing, plus some salt/butter.

Al, cream of wheat is very, very smooth in texture and grits are more substantial. Texture-wise, it's sort of like the difference between eating a piece of white bread and a piece of cornbread (true cornbread made without flour). And, personally, I've never eaten them with sugar or syrup, only salt and butter, and the fancier version with cheese and garlic. If you've ever had southern spoonbread, there's a little likeness.

The first time trying, I would go with Skeip or Riverrat's recipes rather than plain.

Sorry about the grammar - I swear I'm getting worse and worse!!

I had a huge giggle last year when we had breakfast with Canadians and their friends. Grits was on the buffet. Of course, I took a portion, as did a couple of the friends. They tasted, made faces and let them set. I ate mine. Not the best, but good!

Al, It's basically like polenta, only with white corn.

Tricia, I can't imagine putting anything sweet on grits, but you are not the first northerner I've heard say that. Slat, pepper, and butter...maybe a little shredded country ham, that's my idea of good. I save the sweet additions for my oatmeal and cream of wheat. :)

I made a shrimp and grits casserole for brunch, during Christmas. Was a big hit.

Cooked the grits with chicken broth. Sauteed scallions and garlic in butter, added that to the grits, with the shrimp, can medium rotel tomatoes, cheese, then baked and topped with crisp bacon before serving.

You can find similar recipe by googling SHRIMP AND GRITS CASSEROLE

Grits...hmmm, most of my immediate family luv 'em, but those that don't, well DON'T! Around here it's almost a love 'em or hate 'em thing. My brother-in-law will only eat them if I make them, don't ask, difficult eater that one is!

So, I've tried many a different combinations of milks and milk/water ratios. IMHO, the longer you cook them and let them absorb liquid, the creamier the grits. If you happen to like the 'grittier' texture, then don't cook them as long (which is to say, the longer you cook them, the more liquid that is needed). I'm sure Alton Brown could tell you how much each grit molecule could hold in liquid, but, frankly, I don't know. It's kind of like making pie crusts or biscuits, you just figure out what you like and what works and go with that.

Lately I have been using evaporated milk and a little water and the kids love it. I have also used powdered milk and have learned that adding more than the water/powder ratio gives a very 'milky' taste to the grits.

I think that grits are like potatoes that can be prepared so many different ways that if you try them once and don't like them, you must try, try again!

Oh, and butter and salt is all that goes on them here...well, hubby will add bacon or sausage if it's around, kids though, butter and salt only.

Thank you all for the enlightenment. So the texture is what I expected but the taste is completely different than what I thought it was. I too, thought sweet was eaten with grits. I guess I associated grits with cornmeal therefore assumed it prepared in similar fashion.

Beachlily, I haven't seen any Canadians eating grits but I certainly can imagine the faces! LOL

I know people who eat grits with sugar, more like cream of wheat. In my family (I'm a 2nd generation northerners with both sets of grandparents from the south), everyone likes butter & salt and perhaps a little pepper. I'm the only one who eats and makes cheese grits. I use a ratio of milk/water similar to riverrats whenever I do cheese grits, and that works well. I find that too much milk adds a sweet taste, which I don't like.

"I guess I associated grits with cornmeal therefore assumed it prepared in similar fashion."

Exactly, Al. That's spot on what I thought also. I've always had cornmeal mush in its various forms as a breakfast food. In the north, cornmeal mush is just another breakfast cereal like cream of wheat or oatmeal.

Same thing with polenta. Don't much like that either & for the same reason. Just odd to my taste buds.

/tricia

I hope no one took my comment the wrong way. I didn't mean "OMG, how could you do that to grits!", only that I have as hard a time reconcoiling grits + sweet in my mind as Tricia probably does grits + savory. :)

Actually, I guess I do get it because I'm used to cornbread being savory, white corn, and fried, so the baked, yellow, sweet kind has never appealed to me. If I'm served cornbread in a restaurant, I usually save it for dessert.

I wouldn't serve grits sweet, but I often put syrup on my grits.

Beanthere, just out of curiosity, do you crumble up cornbread in a glass of milk and eat it with a spoon? To me that's the ultimate in comfort food. I've even made a pan of cornbread just to have the excuse to get some of that. It even beats out mac and cheese. But it would never work with sweet cornbread...

Crumble up a warm piece of cornbread in a tall glass of butter milk sprinkled with pepper.

I'm a hoe cake lover!

Grew up eating my grits AND rice with butter and sugar.

Don't anymore. Prefer redeye gravy on my grits. Or plain with salt and pepper.

I love cheese gritS with cajun shrimp SOOOOOOOOOO DELICIOUS!!!!!!!

I've been pondering and reading, and it seems like the science behind risotto may apply here. From what I gather, it's something like the low heat and constant stirring contribute to the starchy layer of the rice melting off into the liquid. I'm linking to a chowhound thread-- search on page for "risotto". I am also curious whether adding some kind of supplementary starch would contribute to the creaminess. Wikipedia says yellow grits are the whole kernel whereas white grits have the hull removed, so if you're trying to recreate those grits you had, I'd look for white grits.

Here is a link that might be useful: Grits thread

Yellow grits taste like corn and corn bread unlike white grits.

We always ate white grits growing up and that's all I ever saw in restaurants ( and most still use white grits) but once as an adult I had yellow stone ground grits I never went back.

Here's another take on cornmeal, grits and hominy grits.

Cornmeal = ground corn.

Grits = corn ground a little courser than cornmeal and cooked like cornmeal mush.

Hominy grits = ground hominy cooked like cornmeal mush. Confusingly, hominy grits are often (usually?) referred to simply "grits".

If that isn't confusing enough, there is also corn flour, masa harina (hominy ground fine as flour), fresh masa, polenta, etc. There is much debate (not just here) over the meaning of the names and the correct or tastiest way to prepare each of these. I have my own strong preferences and am still experimenting and learning. Feel free to correct me. Can we at least agree that it's all corn?

Jim

Ages ago I watched a SC friend make grits and I would have sworn he made them with half milk- half water, so that's the way I've always made mine. This same SC friend and his wife stayed with us a few years ago and said I made the best grits ever! and I said that he'd been the one who taught me. It turns out he'd never ever made grits with any milk -- so I don't know where I got the combination from.

Cooks Illustrated has a new soft cover cookbook/magazine out called The Best of America's Test Kitchen. It has a recipe in there for Grits and Shrimp that I would like to try.

PS: i checked their website and the recipe isn't on there.

Dirtgirl, I didn't, but it was one of my dad's favortie things. He preferred buttermilk, and if he had sliced green onions for it, he was a happy man.

Beanthere, my mother does both the buttermilk or milk. I'll have to tell her about the green onions. She is one who loves to put a big slice of vidalia on a homegrown tomato sandwich. (Which is treason IMO!! Nothing should take away from that tomato!)

Still haven't gotten to the milk with the grits yet. Pulled them out, but they're still sitting there waiting.