Grits ain’t groceries. 3 out of 10 Southerners haven’t tried them

As recently as last Christmas, Brittany Schock of Shelby, Ohio had never tasted a grit.

She sized up the servings of shrimp-and-grits on a grazing table assembled for her office holiday party and knew right away that she’d rather stick to dips and cheeses. After all, she wasn’t sure what grits were made of, but they sounded more like a road crew supply than something she’d buy at the supermarket.

Based on the name, “I was trying to imagine gravel in my mouth,” says the 32-year-old solutions journalist, who prefers the blunt comforts of coffee and cats.

Her employer’s caterer had taken a big swing that night. Research by Datassential suggests nearly half of Schock’s colleagues have led similarly grits-free lives, with 46 percent of Midwestern consumers reporting they’ve never tried them. Shockingly, 32 percent of Southerners said the same.

At least I was shocked when I heard the stats. Mike Kostyo of Datassential doesn’t think there’s anything surprising about the nation’s grits abstention.

“With them being on relatively few menus — 4.8 percent in the Midwest, 12.4 percent in the South — I guess it’s fairly easy to miss out on trying them,” he wrote in an e-mail providing the latest numbers. “Though it’s at 1,401 out of 4,165 foods in our database, so a lot more people have had grits than many other foods.”

Other subject matter experts were equally blasé. “That’s pretty much what I expect after my experience, sure, yeah,” Robert Stehling, the longtime owner of shrimp-and-grits powerhouse Hominy Grill in Charleston, said when I tried to scandalize him with the findings.

Apparently, grits are another victim of capitalism, with working-class eaters turned off by the bland instant sludge promoted as compatible with their schedules, and one-percenters showing more interest in cream, cured ham, and caviar than the stoneground corn to which they’re sometimes applied.

Still, for people who can’t quite square the surging cross-country popularity of sweet tea, biscuits, and bourbon with grits’ sad status (aka me), there are signs that the situation could change, one tourist at a time. Just ask Brittany Schock’s mom.

Becky Schock is crazy about Charleston. “I think she would live there if my dad would let her,” Brittany Schock said, remembering her mother’s first glowing review of the city following a business trip there. She was charmed by the downtown streets, the beaches, and the grits.

Back in Ohio, “she went on and on about the grits, and how she craved them,” Schock said.

A half century ago, Quaker Oats executives fantasized about that very scenario.

In 1967, the same year in which the Chicago-based company applied for a patent to produce instant grits, Quaker Oats rented out space in an Upper East Side hotel to throw a grits luncheon for skeptical Northerners. At that point, grits were barely sold outside of the South, with the Carolinas alone accounting for 40 percent of global grits consumption.

Keen to expand the market, Quaker arranged for hostesses in hoop skirts to usher guests into a room where strolling waiters proffered deep-fried grit balls stuffed with gruyere. The main course was a sculpted ring of grits encircling sauced seafood.

“It is a missionary effort not unlike, perhaps, teaching a Southern cook to turn off the heat when the greens are done,” Mississippi-born Craig Claiborne grumped in his New York Times column.

Claiborne a few years later tried his hand at evangelizing, publishing a selection of “very chic” grits recipes featuring chicken livers and wine, but his initial instinct was correct. In the 1970s, despite Americans paying attention to the grits on Jimmy Carter’s breakfast table and parroting the “Kiss my grits” catchphrase from Alice, grits remained a regional novelty.

Even in the South, though, grits were losing ground.

“My great-grandmaw lived in deep Kentucky,” Brittany Schock said when racking her memories for previous grits exposure. “If I was going to have grits, that would have been the time, but I had Golden O’s at her house.”

Although there’s no way of knowing why there was cold cereal in Schock’s bowl, it’s perhaps relevant that Quaker received its patent for “admixing corn grits, water, polysaccharide gum, and critical amounts of an emulsifier.” Grits loyalists took an immediate dislike to the quick-cook product, and it failed to win over many new fans.

A Quaker Oats representative didn’t respond to a message seeking comment. But as Florence, South Carolina heirloom grits maker Will Altman sees it, the industrial versions of other starches come closer to approximating their inspiration’s texture and flavor. Boil-in-bag rice, for example, hasn’t destroyed rice’s reputation.

(Stehling disputes this assessment: “Look at instant mashed potatoes,” he said. “Nobody is going to tell you how great they are, unless they have a weird attachment.”)

Altman Farm & Mill grits take 35 minutes to cook, or 25 minutes if you soak them first. Not every home cook has that kind of time, but the traditional prep fits right into restaurant operations. In fact, chef Frank Kline has made grits the cornerstone of his Charleston restaurant, The Grit Counter, which he hopes to one day franchise.

Kline uses Adluh grits from Allen Bros. Milling Co. in Columbia, South Carolina for his bowls garnished with a customer’s pick of more than two dozen toppings, including collard greens, butterbeans, fried green tomatoes, and red eye gravy.

When Kline approaches a table, he’ll often hear some variation of: “These grits are great. We were scared but got them anyway. What are they?”

“Corn,” Kline reveals.

“Oh, wow,” customers respond. “That makes sense.”

Brittany Schock is so fond of corn that she makes a casserole with creamed corn, Jiffy corn muffin mix, and sweet corn niblets, yet she never connected the plant to grits before her mother invited her on a Charleston trip. Before leaving, Schock did an online search for the dish she knew she’d have to eat.

“I am a grownup,” she told herself. “I can try new things.”

With her courage thus summoned, Schock ordered pimento cheese grits with lobster at The Boathouse at Breach Inlet. She worried the grits would be goopy. She feared they’d have no taste at all.

Instead, she said, “I was like, ‘I get it now. This is awesome.’”

Grits at Fleet Landing Restaurant were “again, a positive experience,” but this time around, Becky Schock was glum. It was the heavy cream and bacon fat in the Lowcountry Grits that got her down.

“You know,” she said. “The grits I like from here are just the original grits.”

Obviously, the twosome wasn’t about to leave town without Becky Schock having her dream grits again. They asked their server to pack up a portion, which she delivered in a coffee cup with plastic wrap stretched across the top. The next day, the Schocks warmed up their side in a microwave.

Of all the grits they’d sampled, Brittany Schock said, “Those were my favorite. They were so buttery, and just went against every assumption I had. Everyone says if you’ve had Cream of Wheat, you’ve had grits, but I just don’t think that’s true.”

Since coming home to Ohio, Schock has picked up her mother’s habit of proselytizing. “Oh my God, grits,” she tells friends. “You don’t even know.”

Soon, they might. She’s planning to order grits from Fleet Landing for Christmas.

This story first appeared in The Food Section, a Charleston-based newsletter covering food and drink across the American South. To learn more about the James Beard Award-winning publication, visit thefoodsection.substack.com.