By Mick Vann
Collards grow like a weed in these parts in the fall, through the winter, and well into the spring; when it gets hot they typically bolt and go to seed, making the leaves bitter.
They descended from wild cabbages that once grew in Europe. They are a continuous crop, meaning that you can harvest the outer leaves while the center continues to grow.
Collards can be seeded, or planted as starts. Some nurseries around town will have several varieties of starts at the moment, including the standard “Vates” (crumpled dark green leaves, winter hardy, the local standard variety), and an improved variety, “Georgia Southern”(bigger, thick blue-green leaves, non-bitter, heat tolerant, frost hardy).
Collards prefer full to half sun, rich fertile soil high in nitrogen, regular water, good drainage, and organic mulch. Plant them 1-foot apart, and expect them to yield for 6 months or so if they are regularly harvested; increase the mulch when it warms in the spring to insulate the roots and deter blooming. If you get any insect pests, expect small beetles or caterpillars.
A pot of collard greens is always referred to in the South as a “mess of greens”, and the vitamin-rich, bacon-seasoned savory broth in the bottom of the pot is called potlikker.
Traditionally the white plantation owners of the South consumed the cooked and drained collard greens while the slave cooks, who understood the high nutrient value of potlikker, saved the broth to supplement their family’s diets.
Nothing is better for soaking up the potlikker than a hot piece of crusty cornbread that’s been split down the middle and slathered with sweet butter.
The Potlikker and Cornpone Debate in February and March of 1931 pitted Julian Harris, an editor at the Atlanta Constitution, against Huey “The Kingfish” Long, the backwoods populist governor and soon to be U.S. senator-elect from Louisiana.
The traditionalist Harris contended that Southerners must crumble cornpone into potlikker, criticizing Long as an unrefined rube, who contended that the cornpone should instead be dunked.
What started as a lighthearted fluff piece in the local paper turned into a 23-day long news event that captivated the South (and much of the rest of the nation, once it spread on the wires), and ended up dealing with all sorts of cultural affairs, including race relations, gender, social class, elitism and regional chauvinism.
For what it’s worth, we prefer eating our potlikker-soaked chunk of buttered cornbread with a spoon, so as not to lose any of that precious elixir.
Mick Vann is a horticultural expert, chef and cookbook author.
Read Mick’s blog at:gustidude.blogspot.com
If you have a question for Mick or Chris, send it via email to iathyme@yahoo.com. Or mail a postcard to It’s About Thyme: 11726 Manchaca Road, Austin, TX 78748 www.itsaboutthyme.com
