June 3 2008
Hi y'all!
No, not really. I haven't perfected my drawl enoug to use that as a greeting.
Welcome to my blog.
My name is Amy Piazza and I am a tranplant to the deep south from the uber-civilized, and former murder capitol of the world, Washington DC area. Typically you see the opposite - I know. There's likely something wrong with me.
I live near Charleston, SC which isn't completely uncivilized at all. However - I live in the "red-headed step child" of the Charleston suburbs...Summerville. I think this whole area used to be some sort of TB ward or something. I don't know - I'm not a history buff.
I've been in the 'ville for almost 2 years now and have recently given up my fight against the southern way of life. At this point I'm going to try and embrace it. "Try" implies minimal commitment, right?
I thought this would be a good time to start my embrace of this new culture. We just hosted our first pig pickin' over the Memorial Day weekend. There are some pictures below.
It was quite an ordeal...the pig (yes - we did the whole pig) had to be on the grill by 6 AM and took almost a full 12 hours to cook. Then there was this whole thing with bits and parts like the head called a Puddin' Pot. I'll never think of pudding the same way.
I was in charge of the sauce. Traditional Charleston pig pickin's usually have a mustard based sauce. Regular yellow mustard gives me wicked nasty heartburn so I opted to make 4 sauces. I made a mustard sauce per the protocol and then I made a red vinegar based sauce, a hot ketchup and vinegar sauce, and a white sauce made from mayonnaise. I assume everyone was happy with them.
We had the neighbors contribute the sides and my husband lovingly coordinated 6 different kinds of mac 'n cheese, 20 pounds of steamed white rice, and brownies with no nuts. Fortunately we had 130 pounds of pig to go around.
We had about 82 people. I only knew about a third of them by name. If I met some new ones, I most likely don't remember their names because I was drinking this WONDERFUL new adult beverage called FireFly Sweet Tea Vodka. HOLY CRAP this shit is dangerous! Mix it with some water and lemonade and the next thing you know you're on top of a folding table trying to demonstrate your mad skills with all of the signature Karate Kid moves. Not that I did that.
I'd call it a success - by the end of the evening we were pillaging the neighborhood for scrap lumber to burn in our Target firepit at about 3000 degrees, we had a self proclaimed fire-goddess and some sort of new-age chanting circle that only those individuals with a vagina were allowed to participate in. I don't think I was around for that part - but I heard it was quite humorous.
I think we'll do it again next year. Thanks to Coleman and Elaina for being both instigators and planners.
