Road Trip Recipe: Anne's Transcendental Cheese and Garlic Grits
Sunday, July 29, 2012 at 9:23PM Mrs. G. 
This is Anne of Newnan, Georgia. She has sky blue eyes and a great laugh.
Everything Anne cooked was a real treat, but her cheese and garlic grits were life changing. Grits are hard to come by in Seattle and Mrs. G's family just generally finds them suspect, so digging into a big bowl at Anne's was first-rate. So first-rate that Mrs. G. snuck back into Anne's kitchen at 3:30am and snagged another bowl of grits to take back to her room. They were just as good cold.
Cheese & Garlic Grits
1 cup old-fashioned grits (NOT quick or instant)
5 cups water
1 tsp salt
8 oz grated sharp cheddar
½ cup milk
2 well-beaten eggs
½ stick butter
1 clove minced garlic (if using pre-minced, use about 2 well-rounded tsp.)
Preheat oven to 350° and butter a 2 quart casserole dish.
Combine water and salt in large saucepan and bring water to a rolling boil. Stir in grits and cook until thickened (about 10 minutes) stirring constantly.
In a medium bowl, combine beaten eggs, milk, and garlic. [Stir in about a cup of the hot grits mixture to temper the eggs so you don’t get noticeable bits of egg in your grits.] Stir the egg mixture back into saucepan of hot grits.
Add the grated cheese and butter and cook over low heat, stirring, until melted and combined. Pour into greased 2 qt. casserole dish and bake, uncovered, about 1 hour.
When cool, stick your face in dish and inhale.
Road Trip Recipe
Reader Comments (11)
Sounds divine! I make something very similar with polenta, which I imagine is easier to find in Seattle? I saute an onion before adding the water and polenta, then spread it in a casserole and put some parmesan on top instead of the cheddar and then bake it for about 15 min.
My kids refuse to eat grits, despite spending 5+ years in Texas and 4 years in Virginia. I confess to preferring my grits with plenty of butter, salt and pepper, but this recipe might just convince me to give cheese grits another try.
Chalk me up as another west-coaster who misses grits. I will be checking them out. Annie, are there good mail order sources of grits for us exiles?
There was a heavenly choir in my head the first time I had really well-prepared grits. Shrimp and grits in Charleston, South Carolina did it for me. It had just enough cheese and a dash of BBQ sauce to bring out the buttery goodness of the grits. I went from a hater to a lover of this southern staple.
This receipe looks fabulous and I can't wait to try it. Thanks for sharing.
Yeah, baby! Oh, hell yeah! I love grits and putting cheese with then is a bowl of goodness. Those of you who don't like grits, try this and toss on some shrimp....
lol back in the 1980s, I dated a guy named Michael...he was from NC. Southern as southern could be. I knew he liked grits so I made cheese grits one day. He laughed (kindly) and said them greeeeeetis is tooooo fanceeefull fer me! Even told his mom about it and they laughed at this northern girl making cheese grits. LMAO! I TOLD them it was good!
I've always been of the non-grit eating party. But anything with garlic and sharp cheddar has GOT to be good! I'll be testing this out on the family. How would you do the shrimp with this?
I've never tried grits. Go figure. But this recipe sounds good, seeing as it has cheese and garlic in it. I wonder what the chances are of finding grits in the supermarkets up here. :)
I was at table with Anne, Mrs. G. and Elizabeth for this glorious feast and will attest to the fact that these were absolutely delicious (as was the rest of the meal). Give them a try - I really think you'll like them!
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that I think you could use quick grits in this, which I've been able to find most everywhere I've lived, including Portland. I have a similar recipe from a family friend that I've had for years and I can't check it because I'm not at home but I'm pretty sure she used quick grits. I don't think you'd need to cook the quick grits for quite as long in the beginning.
Like Karen (formerly kcinnova) I like my grits with butter, salt and pepper. They are a comfort food for me and the first thing I turn to when I am getting a cold or feeling under the weather. I grew up with grits but my husband and kids never liked them. But I don't remember ever not having grits in my cupboard.
These sound amazing ... I may have to make them soon. Thanks for the recipe.
For all you grits seekers ... I used Quaker Old-Fashioned White Hominy Enriched Grits. Their website has a product locator here:
http://www.quakeroats.com/products/product-locator.aspx
looks like Target might be a good source - I've never used quick grits in this recipe so I can't attest to that, but the texture would probably be a bit different. There are other more "gourmet" grits (I think that's an oxymoron) available. These are particularly good, but quite pricy:
http://www.zingermans.com/Product.aspx?ProductID=P-GRI
I love grits every which way and would be happy to send some along to any Derf who is unable to obtain them locally ...