The Best Meal – EVER

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I know I keep promising to discuss the Farmers’ Market/Fall Market in Brighton. The weather just has NOT cooperated. I’m still hopeful, though.

 

In the interim, I started thinking about all the wonderful fruit and vegetables that are available at all the farmers’ markets in the area. It brought to mind my MOST favorite meal I’ve ever had. While contemplating it, I realized with shock that that meal had to be more 40 years ago. What wonderful establishment could create such a meal that I would remember it all these years later and still salivate? Must it have been a “Michelin” star winner? Absolutely, not.

 

The best meal I ever ate was in my beloved Waynesviile, North Carolina. My family were going to go up Eagles’ Nest Mountain (yes, that Eagles’ Nest Mountain of Boojum fame) to look at property for sale. One of our neighbors had joined in a group who had purchased a very large portion of the land on the mountain and were selling building lots. As Aunt Jean’s momma and daddy lived at the base of the mountain, we just stopped by to say hello on our way up.

 

We should have known that we couldn’t just stop by to say, “Hey!” Mom Hyatt always had to feed her visitors. Mom kept a huge “truck garden.” She said she was starting to cut back the size of her garden due to the fact that she was getting up in age. So, her garden was only about ¾ acre. She grew the best vegetables! So, in we had to come, set down and eat. What bounty!

 

On my plate were corn on the cob, huge slices of still-warm tomato, pole beans, cucumbers and onion (in vinegar), and a huge slab of hot, fresh cornbread with a mound of sweet butter. She tried to pour me some buttermilk, but I hadn’t gotten my taste for that yet, so sweet milk it was. Throughout the whole time, Mom Hyatt kept apologizing for not having any meat. Those were still days where barter was common in the area and the trades hadn’t taken place yet.

 

In the current vernacular…OMG!!!! Every bite tasted like a hug. There was so much love in the growing and in the cooking, that this meal would stick in my heart forever. It’s not that I’d never had any of these items before; it was that I’d never had them all straight from the garden to the table like this before – nor have I since.

 

Do you have a meal or meals that stick out in your memory? I’d love to hear about it – as would all of us, I’m sure. Please share your story with us in the “Reply” section. This blog is so much more fun when others get involved.

 

Up Next: I’m Still Hoping for “Fall Markets”

 

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