Jackson Jambalaya

Until the fourth of July comes again, well maybe it's only 51 weeks now but there is no real reason to panic over what we will eat for the next Independence Day celebration meal. As for me, here is the one I fixed for 7/4/2024. Worked pretty well so I might just do a redo for 7/4/2025.

The family moved to Clinton in 1961, so it has been 63 years since my dad, mom, and their four kids (three siblings and me) lived on Fair Court Street in west Jackson. If you Google map Fair Court, you will find it is what, back in those days, folks called a dead-end street. Now days, in Madison, they are called Cul-de-sacs, but I have no illusions about our ten-house street. Back then most of the fathers had fought in WWII, managed to come home alive and were too busy making kids to worry about dead end streets or whatever a realtor might call them. (I guess we had realtors back then). Our Street fed off of Hillsdale circle, which ran off of Clinton. Blvd, just west of what in those days was Jackson Country Club, before they moved it to Old Canton Road in the late 1950s, to get away from working folks.

Four streets ran off Hillsdale, Google says East Crest paralleled Clinton Blvd and ran from east to west Hillcrest. The other streets were all dead ends, Fair Court, Club Court, and Gay Court. We knew every kid in the neighborhood and liked all of them. If we wanted to get from one part of the neighborhood to another, we cut through folks' yards and if a fence was in the way, we climbed it. I guess times were different back then. In my memory, all of the dad's worked and pretty much everyone shopped at Shainberg's, except for my aunt and a few other uppity folks who bought high class stuff at McRae's, Kennington's, and the Emporium.

The fourth of July was a big deal in our neighborhood, since East Hillsdale ran along the western edge of Jackson Country Club, or as it is called now, "The Country Club of Jackson". Back then, JCC hosted a big fireworks show just after dark every year. It seemed like everyone in Jackson showed up to park on both sides of Hillsdale, all of the other streets in the neighborhood and as far up and down Clinton. Blvd as they could to watch the big display originating from a cart path running along the first fairway. In my memory, all of the streets, including Fair Court were packed and a good time was had by everyone who came. As official "Hillsdale Kids", we ran wild all night long, fueled by chilled rattlesnake watermelon, grilled burgers, hot dogs, and my favorite meal, which was BBQed chicken thighs, cooked by my dad, potato salad and English peas, cooked by Mom.

This year, we watched the Clinton Fireworks display. It was OK, plenty big enough for me, and even though it was as hot as Mississippi in July, not a bad end to a day of thoughts of blessing about our dysfunctional nation that is still the best one in the world.

So, what did I cook? If nothing else, at least I know the joys of tradition. It was the fourth, and I cooked BBQed chicken thighs, potato salad, and English peas. One last story and then I will do the recipe. 

There are a small number of men I admire. I guess you need to be special to make my list of the best. Among the men I admire are my hero (my dad) and my wife's father. Neither of these two men ever backed away from a hard day's work, and always made certain their family came first. My FIL was as good as any man I ever knew, and he made potato salad exactly the way my mom made it, and the way I do. There was one difference. I never saw him make a batch that began with less than ten pounds of potatoes. Mu memory is that he would happily eat 2-3 pounds of it himself. The man absolutely loved the stuff and to him, the best way to assure enough was made so that he had as much as he wanted was to make it himself. In addition to my dad, we lost a second good one when he passed, five days after we buried my dad.

Here is how I made our fourth of July meal, and how I will do it next year, if I am still able to drive a potato peeler when the fourth next rolls around.

BBQed Chicken Thighs, Potato Salad and English Peas

Ingredients:

10 bone in chicken thighs - for us, it made 1 meal on the fourth and 4 leftover meals
ZeroBear Polybear's World Famous BBQ Rub
Lawry's Garlic Salt
Your brand of BBQ Sauce, or your Aunt Cleo's recipe

English Peas

I like frozen green peas. There are no canned green peas in our house
Water, salt to taste, Vegetable oil or butter, and sugar to taste

Directions:




Prep celery and sweet pickles. I stopped adding onion to my potato salad 10-15 years back. If you add it to your potato salad, I will eat it with no complaints. I just like mine better without. My stomach does, too. When I can find, them, I use sweet pickles that are sugar free. They taste great and have fewer calories. I like Gerkens pickles because I think they are crispier. May or may not be correct there, but it is also why Mom used them. I like my dice just a little larger for potato salad. About medium dice.