Grits Update

This is an update to my 08/03 post "Sheer Grit and Determination," in which I lamented how hard it was to find grits at Boston-area groceries and joked that maybe if people had more grits in their diets they would have more grit to their personalities. I'm not the only one of this opinion. Check out this bill to make grits the South Carolina state food.

I didn't think the "Bob's Red Mill" grits I'd bought at a local health-food store were quite right, but they were all I could find, so I made some and posted the photographs to illustrate my entry.

Today I found some Quaker grits, which are white and made from hominy. These are more what I was expecting to find, though I don't think there's anything wrong with Bob's grits. Hominy is corn that's soaked in lye until the hulls come off.

Wikipedia says that yellow grits, like Bob's, are from unhulled corn, while white grits are from hulled corn. I think soaking in lye is the only way to remove the hulls.

But you also have to consider the corn color. Grits can be made from white or yellow corn. I suspect that yellow corn is white once the hulls are removed, which is what Wikipedia is talking about. So white grits could be either from yellow corn, hulls removed, or from white corn. Yellow grits would be from yellow corn before the hulls have been removed. Here are some nice photos of white and yellow grits.

Bob's grits are probably from yellow corn with the hulls left on. The Quaker grits are probably from corn that has been soaked in lye to make hominy, then dried and milled. Could be either white or yellow corn, originally. I'm just not sure...