Behind the Scenes Minis: Tracy’s Frustration

Tracy shares issues she has with overly reductive internet videos that misrepresent the story of nixtamalization. She and Holly also discuss the various ways they like to eat corn.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Stuff you missed in History Class A production
of iHeartRadio, Hello and Happy Friday. I'm Tracy V. Wilson
and I'm Holly Frye. We talked about pelagra. We sure did,
I said in the episodes, I was not expecting or

(00:23):
planning for two did not know about all the stuff
that was involved in Italy. Of course, as we said
that there is is, and has been pelagora in parts
of the world besides the southern US and Italy, but
it became particular problem in those places and still today
places where especially people are living mostly on corn, a

(00:48):
lot of times corn that has been through well meaning
ways donated from the international community to places where there
is famine or unrest or war or whatever. Going to
talk about Tracy's frustration in this episode, and the frustration
is overly reductive Internet videos, Okay, because I watched several

(01:12):
videos about nichemalization, and several of them had this sort
of narrative of this is how the indigenous peoples of
the America's really all across the Americas. Some nuances to
how different nations and peoples did things, but like some

(01:33):
kind of treatment of the corn with alkaline water, or
ash or something that was making the nias and more bioavailable,
and then it would be like, but the colonizers thought
that was stupid and they didn't want to do it,
and that's why there was pelagra. And that's not really accurate, right,

(01:55):
because foods like hominy and masa masa arena, all things
that are made with with masa like those became foods
that the colonists were also eating, how many in particular
the poorest people were eating, and that continued to be
the case for centuries after colonization started. Like we said

(02:16):
in the episode, it is like there seems to be
a correlation between milling technologies, particularly the big determinator that
was patented in like nineteen oh two. There seems to
be a correlation between that and polagorates because now there
was a way to give corn a really long shelf
life that didn't involve nicheimalizing it that was more labor intensive. So, like,

(02:41):
the problem was not that colonizers were being picky about
indigenous food ways. The problem was capitalism exploiting people right
and trying to give the poorest people the cheapest, lowest
quality food possible as they're staple but I watched so

(03:02):
many videos that had that as the narrative that I
started to second guess myself. I was like, I really
thought that people were for sure eating harmony, and poor
people for sure eating harmony. I can't speak to Meso
America and South America, but like all over North America
at least, like, what's going on with this? And I
started looking through old recipe books to be like, am

(03:28):
I just am I misunderstanding something fundamental? And so now
I'm going to read to you from a nineteen twenty
four USDA Farmer's bulletin, okay, prepared in the Bureau of
Home Economics, a bureau that we have a whole episode on.
This is on from a Farmer's bulletin called Corn and

(03:52):
Its Uses for Food. And this is a section called
lie harmony, or called corn. This is easily made at
home from any variety or of white or yellow dent
or flint corn. The kinds with fairly large kernels are
easier to hull than those with small kernels, and only
clean sound ears should be used. The hulls and germs

(04:15):
are loosened by steeping the corn in a lye solution,
rubbing off the hulls than washing out the lye and
finally boiling the corn. Sometimes the kernels are boiled with
the lye, but cold soaking is also effacious and gives
what many consider a more delicate flavor. The Division of
Serial Investigations of the Bureau of Plant Industry recommends the

(04:37):
following method. Dissolve five ounces of lye sodium hydroxide or
caustic soda in six quarts of cold water, Stir in
five quarts of corn, and let it stand fifteen hours.
Wash thoroughly to remove the lye and the hulls. Rubbing
the hominy in a cloth bag helps to take off
the hulls. When the washing is finished, the hull and

(04:59):
black tips should be off and the kernel should look clean.
The slight discoloration which the lye causes may be removed
by soaking the hominy overnight in water to which a
little salt has been added. Cover with water to which
five tablespoons of salt have been added, and boil in
a covered kettle for three to four hours or until
thoroughly cooked, making sure that the hominy remains covered with water.

(05:24):
Changing the water once or twice during the cooking will
lessen the taste of the lye. Five quarts of corn
will make from fifteen to twenty quarts of lye hominy.
This was just one part of this bulletin that had
numerous recipes for things that you can make with hominy.
And the Bureau of Home Economics did not advocate for

(05:46):
foods that they thought were weird or quote ethnic. We
talked about that in our episode on them. So after
really just sort of like questioning, I was like, but
hominy though, no, real, Like, people really were eating a
lot of hominy and it really was not people's personal
food preferences that led to corn meal being the only

(06:09):
thing that was sold in the company store. Right, So anyway,
I got, really, I gotta be in my bonnet about that,
Like I get the wanting to make that the narrative.
I totally understand that, and there are a lot of
Indigenous foods that are totally overlooked or foods that are

(06:30):
Indigenous developments that people who are not Indigenous have no
idea that's where it came from. All that's valid, But
I was like, this is not people were still eating homedy.
Though they're still eating homedy today. I could go to
the store and I can buy homedy off the shelf.
You know what I wondered through this whole thing, what
how are people not passing out all the time? Like,

(06:53):
I'm a low blood sugar baby, and if I don't
have a high pro glow, I'm gonna crash really hard. Yeah.
I can't even imagine subsisting exclusively off of corn meal,
corn meal, or even just all like you know, relatively
simple carbohydrates. Yeah, I would not bet a little fat

(07:14):
back in there. That might help a little, but for
a minute, but eventually I'm gonna stop functioning. Yeah, like
without pelagra involved it all right, right, I'm like, no,
the mental illness is because my brain is not getting
any of the things it needs to keep going. Yeah. Yeah,

(07:36):
that's like the scariest to me is like entire diets
with no protein in them. I'm like, what is no brain?
Something else that I definitely didn't understand until researching this

(07:56):
episode is that I was like, Okay, something about corn
was made making people develop plagra. I'm imagining that everybody's
just like chomping down on ears of corn on the cob.
Like I didn't really have a sense that now the
corn was being dried it was being milled into corn
meal or grits or whatever. As I understand it, historically,

(08:19):
prior to colonization, it was a lot more common to
in most of the Americas for the corn to be
niche themalized, so that it would have this longer shelf
life and not so much to like roast up an
ear of corn and eat it right, but you could
pop it popping it too. We do have that whole

(08:40):
episode on popcorn, which I do love popcorn. Before we
started recording, Holly and I started talking about all the
types of corn that we love to eat, yes and don't,
yeah and don't. Yeah. I'm not like the as we
said then, I'm not the biggest fan of just like corn.

(09:01):
Although I'm coming around something is happening to my taste
buds or like now I'm like a roasted corn I'm
okay with. But for the longest time, I just did
not want whole corn. Yeah. I do not want cream
corn by any stretch of the imagination. I can't imagine
a food that grosses me out much more than that. Yeah,

(09:21):
But I love popcorn and I love things made with
ground corn with corn meal. Oh sure, Oh the flavor,
Oh goodness, A good masa. Yeah, I love corn on
the cob. I love corn grits, which again most of
the like the very mainstream North America food companies that
are selling like instant grits. It might have the word

(09:42):
hominy on the label, but that's probably not nastimalized corn
being used. Some of the more specialty producers will specifically
say on on the labeling that it is corn that
has been treated in some way with like an alkaline processing.
But yeah, love corn on the cop love grits, Love

(10:07):
like catfish breaded and corn meal so good. There are
a lot of like Mexican Mesoamerican sort of street food
dishes that involve corn and various cheese like elotes and esquites.
I think that's how there's a pronounce. I did not
look it up before coming in here. I'm sorry, but
I love both of those all and various things that

(10:30):
have corn as an ingredient in there, very into it.
And again, if you're eating a ton of corn that
hasn't been niche tomalized, as long as you're also eating
a variety of other foods, probably fine. Probably fine. Yeah,
I was just gonna say, you know, living in the South,
there are strong opinions about grits. Huh, But there's only

(10:54):
one grit for me, and it is the flying biscuit, creamy,
dreamy gras. Oh so good, Holy Moses. Yeah, if you
were in the South and you are near a flying biscuit, yeah,
and you've never had them. Yeah, get the to flying biscuit,
some streaming grits. They're so good. Yeah. Oh man, I

(11:15):
also like shrimp and grits. Yeah. Moving to Massachusetts meant
less availability of grits. I feel like that's slightly shifted now.
But I remember one time, this was shortly after I

(11:36):
had moved to Massachusetts. We stopped for some reason, like
we were just out and about doing stuff, and for
some reason we stopped at a very large but very
standard chain grocery store in Massachusetts in Brookline, and they
had a whole wall of different varieties of grits in

(11:58):
with the oatmeal and all that, and I was my
mind was absolutely blown because I had not seen grits
in a store in a super long time. And even now,
it's like the place that I usually grocery shop has
at most one kind of instant grit and that's your option. Tracy.

(12:18):
If only you knew someone who still lived in the
South and could ship you grit could ship me grits
as much as I want. Why don't you just send
me your list. We'll get it handled. During the early
COVID time, when many of us were mostly at home,

(12:38):
we were getting things in bulk through mail order from
a place that is sadly no longer in business. And
one time, not one time, like they started having like
these giant boxes of grits, and I was like, give
me the grits all the time, Grits comfort food in
these days of uncertainty. Having returned to days of uncertainty, right,

(13:02):
what I've actually been doing recently is cream of wheat,
which is not it's as good as you remember. Yeah,
that was the ad campaign when we were kids for
cream of wheat. Yeah, yeah, I don't remember this. I'm
telling you. I know all the commercials. Yeah. I was
a child raised by television and I love advertising jingles

(13:25):
to this day. There is a place in I think
this is in Summerville. I don't live there. I don't
live in Summerville anymore, so I don't remember this was
in Summerville or who was like over the line in
Cambridge called the Neighborhood that had a cream of wheat
and we would get it sometimes when a bunch of
friends we were going to go somewhere and we would

(13:46):
stop and get some to go and we would eat
it walking down the sidewalk. And I've started trying to
mock up their cream of wheat in my own house
in breakfast recently. It's got some similarities to grits, but
it's not quite the same thing anyway, delicious, yummy foods.
The only thing I have to make shrimp and grits

(14:07):
for lunch. Thanks Tracy, I'm very excited for you. Shrimp
and grits is one of my all time easily in
the top ten favorite dish. Yes, and I love I
love trying everywhere's version. Yeah, it's the best. We have
grits in the house right now, we don't have any shrimp,

(14:29):
so sadly for me. So yeah, I like to do
grits with a little scallion in the pan. First, fun
let that get brown and even a little crispy. Then
you do your your grit situation. Yeah, and then there's
just scallions spread throughout them making deliciousness. That sounds really good.

(14:53):
It is really good. I love it. I love it.
I do find more shrimp and grits on restaurant menus,
Uh yeah, here always I get so excited when we're
going somewhere that has shrimp and grits. I remember mentioning

(15:16):
in an unrelated conversation, which was actually about Star Wars
when I was at a convention in Salt Lake, that
I any restaurant I go to that has shrimp and
grits on the menu, especially if I'm somewhere I don't go,
I almost order always that's the thing I order. And
I was surprised at how many people in the audience
of that panel were like, I'm sorry, shrimp and what like.

(15:40):
They just thought this sounded like the most gruesome dish
one could put before a human, And I'm like, come
to the shrimp and grits side, it's really quite delicious.

(16:02):
While there was, you know, a Southern pride around these
foods and the roles that things like fat back and
salt pork plating, cooking and all of that, there was
also stigma about some of the foods and Harmony's association
with poor people made like other people who could afford
a richer variety of food like not really want to

(16:23):
deal with that. Yeah, makes total sense that the Department
of Home Economics was like, yes, this is how you
can do this yourself at home, because part of their
whole deal was trying to give people who were facing
hardship tools to have like more nutritious foods at home.

(16:46):
I had its own baggage that we talked about in
those episodes because, like we said, they did not get
behind foods that they thought were weird or Unamerican. But yeah, yeah,
that defensiveness about you know, regional identity and pride probably
cost some people their lives. Yeah. Yeah, Well, and then

(17:08):
it became a situation of the people who had really
criticized that it could be dietarily related, and it became
increasingly evident that yes, this was related to diet continuing
to double down because then it sort of seemed like
they were going to come off as having been backward

(17:29):
and stubborn, So just be more so that's what. Yeah. Yeah,
we've seen it everywhere in our lives, the people who
were wrong and can't admit that they were wrong about something. Right,
So anyway, eat a variety of foods if you are able. Yeah. Yeah,

(17:53):
and you know, if you are able, donate to your
local food bank. Yes, there is a lot of need
right now for food at the food banks. There is.
This is where I will talk about briefly the made
up Star Wars holiday that I do. Okay, Oh, it's
just that every year on Mardi Gras, we have started

(18:16):
going instead to Walt Disney World and we go to
Galaxy's Edge and we celebrate what we call hut Tong's
Day essentially Mardi Gras, but it is in Star Wars
and part of that that I always tell friends because
they're like, can we run around the parks with you?
I'm like, yes, absolutely, We've gotten quite a nice herd together.
But the thing that we always do is like, I'm

(18:37):
not gonna police you, but please, as part of this,
donate to an organization that feeds people. Because the whole
point of like having a very yummy time running around
and playing should be that, like may we all have plenty.
It's my governing thing. So that's just our goofy way
that we do it among our like friend group, which

(18:59):
you know, it spans delightfully each year and makes it
a fun thing out of reminding everyone to take care
of each other by donating to food organizations. But everybody
celebrate Hot Time's Day with me this year in whatever
way you want to. If you're not into Star Wars,
you can just donate to a food org on Mardi
Gras or anytime. I have a food bank, and also

(19:24):
we have a local food rescue organization that goes and
gets the stuff that's going to be thrown out from
the restaurants and grocery stores and they redistribute that and
then also meals on wheels. Yeah, who's federal funding I
think was frozen? I think so, yes, Yeah, And I
don't know what the situation is with that at this point,

(19:46):
and I'm sure it will be different by the time
this episode comes out, because the time we're speaking about
it today to when you hear us speaking about it,
who knows what will have happened. So we've alluded to
the chaos of the times that we're living in. I
really hope that everyone is able to find some moments
of joy and peace, because there's moments of joy and

(20:10):
peace can make the other stuff that we've got to
deal with more deal with able. Yes, and we will
be back with a Saturday classic tomorrow, and something brand
new on Monday. Stuff you Missed in History Class is

(20:32):
a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit
the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to
your favorite shows.