A love letter to collards

An exersize in memory

My great grandma Clara Banks Hardison Eldridge (right) and her sister Dorcas Banks Brinson (left in red). Clara farmed and raised her children, she was also a skilled sewist. Her sister Dorcas was a member of the N.C. Basket Weavers Association. I was lucky enough to make a basket or two with her as a child.

Dear collards, 

I’ve gone this whole time not knowing that you are in fact, a summer star. Yes, among the bursting tomatoes, wafting basil, and delicate sweet corn, your praises are also worth singing! Collards are a quintessential childhood memory, one I will always associate with my great grandmother’s house. My great grandma Clara lived down the road a ways from my grandma ‘Nette (short for Annette) in the tiny town of Arapahoe, on the coast of NC. Hers was a small and sunny house, surrounded by a ring of lumbering pecan trees–for the life of me I cannot ever remember going through the front door, we always walked through the back, entering through her sun porch. The sun porch was where the kids hung out; sitting on her exercise bike, watching TBS amongst her washer and dryer, and most importantly to my mind’s eye, her collection of sun catchers. There were many peppered among the windows, prisms casting rainbows every which way, the raindrops of color shifting throughout the day. 

Her house always smelled of cooked collards. I’m talking that gassy collard smell people love to refer to with a turned up nose. She would diligently wash the leaves because collards are notorious for being sandy and there is nothing worse than biting down on grit after you’ve gone through the trouble of stewing collards for hours. She would then toss them in a pot with water and a ham hock and leave the rest up to time. They would be finished off with dumplings made from flour, water and lard, probably crisco if I had to guess by the time I was around. Not only did her house always smell of collards; if I close my eyes, I can see a glass bowl imprinted with flowers, filled with collards and dumplings on cherry red countertops made of formica, sealed with dewey saran wrap. Deeper into the house, past the kitchen into her living room I can hear As the World Turns on her second T.V. set, and this is where you’d usually find her. She would be sitting in her chair, doing crossword puzzles. Although, according to my mom she was also a prolific knitter but I have no memory of that. She was somewhat somber, with snowy white hair and an iconic front tooth gap. She attended church weekly at Bethany Christian Church until it was physically too much for her. Other things I remember when I call upon myself to think about the time I spent with her:

-Dark green, shag carpet from the 70s

-Peach ice cream, which was always in the freezer when we stayed with her

-One of those white, iridescent Christmas trees

-Smucker’s jelly jars with cartoon characters, repurposed as kids cups for me, my siblings and cousins

-Playing with a tan and black horse that, if I had to guess, were made in the 1950s. She had one of those closets with toys on the occasion one of her grandchildren, and eventually great grandchildren were visiting or staying the night

-Matching red pillowcases made of satin she made me and my sister when we were pre-teens

I spent most of my summers staying with her daughter, my grandma ‘Nette aforementioned, and we would occasionally get dropped off with grandma Clara, a handful of times spending the night with her. Major holidays were inevitably celebrated at her house–her four children and their children, along with THEIR children, packing into her small house, filling it with side dishes to accompany her cheese biscuits and collards. Based on my memory she died around age 87, although I cannot remember specifically of what.  I do know she had diabetes and colon cancer at one point, although I cannot remember if that was before or after she inevitably lived in a nursing home. I was in my mid 20s when she passed, living away from home, I missed her funeral although I cannot recall what the excuse must have been. It is one of my biggest regrets, nagging at me from time to time although according to my mom and sister her funeral was anything but sentimental or celebratory due to the falling out that happened among her children, as so often happens when a parent dies.

There are two additional reasons I suddenly, out of what always feels like nowhere, become sad when recalling her. I inherited some of her Christmas ornaments I managed to keep intact yet unused through at least five moves, some across state lines, only to lose them in my second to last one. I mistakenly left them at Goodwill with other things I was getting rid of in the effort to pare down. I cried for three days after realizing this, feeling especially bitter because I had never actually gotten a Christmas tree to see the ornaments in their glory once more. When my mom asked if we wanted anything from her house after her death I asked for any of the sun catchers or jelly jam jars, both of which had already been discarded by other family members. Inevitably, I was left without any one thing to manifest my memories of her. 

Until, two summers ago when my mom passed onto me two unfinished quilts and a stash of fabrics she had managed to take on. I cherish these items all the same, but after accidentally giving away her Christmas ornaments, out of necessity, out of some protective neurological pathway that exists within me, I realized my memories of her and her house are the only relics I need. I have learned to sew and knit, and now I can make clothes and quilts for my loved ones and friends, as she did, so expertly. I can eat collards, the touchstone that transports me back to summers and holidays in Arapahoe. Sometimes my child asks for stories from when me and her Aunt Aubrey were little before she goes to sleep, this exercise allowing me to flush out little details in the recesses of my mind, in a way implanting her great great Grandma Clara into her memory in the same way me making her a doll does, or making cheese biscuits on New Years Day does. 

My addition to her flower garden quilt, very slow going, I love looking at her hand-sewn stitches underside.

So with that, I provide you this recipe paying homage to summer’s unsung hero, the young collard greens in your CSA. Truly, kale is so one-note compared to massaged, marinated collards as a base for a salad. They have heft, they are spicy and addicting in this bright dressing made of apple cider vinegar, minced garlic and chopped sun dried tomatoes. It’s punchy in its acidity, enhanced with ample garlic (I used five cloves ! ). Usually one to two nights a week we have pantry salad in the summer—using whatever we have on deck with a dark green, carb, legume and protein, either tinned fish or tofu. Last night I combined roasted sweet potato, salted slices of tomato, adding orange bell pepper, castelvetrano olives (my favorite olive, so buttery and meaty), canned chickpeas and smoked trout. I ate the leftovers for breakfast—fondly thinking of my grandma Clara, digging up whatever I could remember about her, knowing she celebrated collards year round.