A Southern Tradition

Happy New Year to you all. Today, I'm not going to talk about writing but of traditions...southern style. I wasn't a very old bride when I learned here in the south New Year's Day had it's own menu...Ham (hog jowls), black-eyed peas with small diced onions, rice, some kind of greens and of course, corn bread.

Since I garden, I put aside multiple pounds of black-eyed peas both in my freezer and dried as a staple. My husband loves my recipe for Hoppin' John. Now the tradition goes something like this...you eat one black-eye pea for every day of the coming year for luck. I never actually counted how many peas would make up the year's worth of luck until today. Usually, I lazily just cooked up a couple pounds of dried peas.

Yeah, I had too much time on my hands between the laundry, cleaning, clipping coupons, and my sermon for church. But most of all I was curious. Anybody have a guess how many cups of black-eyed peas you'd have to eat for 365 days of good luck?? Well, I'll tell you. FOUR cups of peas! (Uncooked) Add the water, seasoning and time the amount almost doubles!

Now, even though I love black-eyed peas the idea of eating that much at one sitting is just way too much. I'm also allergic to pork so it's a turkey ham versus the pig thing. Now, I know what I have done wrong all these years...I haven't eaten enough black-eyed peas on New Year's Day. Well, I didn't eat enough this year again so I'll have to break out my lucky rabbit's foot, horseshoe, and a few other things to carry my luck through the year.

That thought brought me to another realization...the rabbit's foot wasn't lucky for the rabbit. Uh, oh...now I'm going to have to research just where this tradition got started.

Anyhow, happy New Year to all of you.

Keep writing and loving the Lord.