Fried Okra Hash

Deep Run Roots

I have loved fried okra since my first time trying it at my next-door neighbor's house when I was five or six years old. My (northern) mother never made it, so after that I mainly got my fix at restaurants, where it is more often than not sliced and fried, with a pretty thick breading. I know now that was likely made from frozen, pre-breaded okra, which is why it's all pretty similar. And while I still liked it, it was never quite the same as the homemade fried okra I first fell in love with. This recipe, however, is very much like the fried okra I am served when I go to a southern family dinner, and the one that is my usual go-to when I make okra in my own home. The breading is light, crispy, and never coats the whole piece. Bits of green show through, and scraps of fried batter fall off into the oil and onto the paper towels as it drains, where your family can fight over them when the okra is all gone.

If you've never had okra this way, you should try it. And that's all I'm going to say about that.

Captions

[00:00]: [Music]
[00:04]: hello and welcome to cooking the books
[00:06]: with heather today we're going to be
[00:08]: making
[00:09]: yet another okra recipe and yet another
[00:12]: okra recipe out of deep ron roots vivian
[00:14]: howard's cookbook
[00:16]: we are going to be making what's called
[00:19]: fried okra hash now this is probably the
[00:22]: closest
[00:24]: to
[00:26]: the usual homemade fried okra that i do
[00:30]: and that most of the people that i know
[00:32]: do
[00:32]: there will be a few
[00:34]: differences depending on who does it um
[00:37]: but this is a similar this is as close
[00:39]: to what i do as we're going to get
[00:41]: from these cookbooks
[00:43]: um
[00:45]: so
[00:47]: first off i have measured
[00:50]: the oil that she says to use and put it
[00:53]: in my
[00:54]: 12 inch cast iron skillet just like she
[00:57]: says i have some
[00:59]: [Music]
[01:01]: cornmeal looks like she used white i've
[01:03]: got yellow it doesn't really matter
[01:06]: into the cornmeal i'm going to add some
[01:08]: salt
[01:10]: i'm going to put a little bit more than
[01:11]: she says my salt tends to be
[01:14]: a little less on the salty side and
[01:17]: we're gonna add a little bit of
[01:22]: sorry
[01:23]: a little bit of cayenne pepper
[01:31]: and i'm just going to use a fork to mix
[01:33]: these up so that they
[01:37]: it's nicely distributed
[01:41]: i've got my oil heating at medium high
[01:44]: which is what she says to do
[01:47]: this will heat up pretty quickly in this
[01:49]: pan
[01:50]: my okra i have sliced it i took off the
[01:53]: very tips and the tops where it's really
[01:55]: thick i take those off and then she says
[01:57]: to cut them in one
[01:59]: third inch slices
[02:02]: that is not what is in this book the
[02:05]: picture here
[02:06]: those are more like almost an inch
[02:09]: three quarters of an inch maybe
[02:11]: um slices
[02:13]: whatever we did what the book says not
[02:15]: what it shows us
[02:17]: and um i've got it in this colander or
[02:20]: this strainer because
[02:22]: we are going to go rinse this with water
[02:25]: which sounds weird
[02:27]: but we're going to rinse it with water
[02:29]: so that our cornmeal mixture will stick
[02:31]: because we're not going to put this in
[02:32]: any egg wash or any buttermilk
[02:36]: just water so i'm gonna do that and i'm
[02:38]: gonna take this so i don't drip all over
[02:39]: my floor
[02:41]: so now we're just gonna toss our damp
[02:43]: cornmeal mixture
[02:45]: with
[02:46]: our damp okra with the cornmeal mixture
[02:49]: now i did not actually
[02:51]: measure
[02:52]: the okra
[02:54]: but i think it's approximately what she
[02:57]: calls for it's a pound
[03:01]: which is the normal amount that i feed
[03:03]: my family of four let's just say that
[03:07]: that cornmeal sort of gets on everything
[03:11]: but you're not going to have a thick
[03:13]: coating on on this okra like you
[03:16]: did on most of the other recipes that
[03:18]: i've made this is going to be a much
[03:20]: lighter
[03:22]: batter
[03:24]: than
[03:24]: the other ones
[03:27]: now
[03:29]: if you think your oil is ready she says
[03:31]: to put in
[03:32]: she doesn't give you a temperature or
[03:34]: anything but she says to put in a piece
[03:35]: of okra
[03:37]: and if it immediately starts to sizzle
[03:40]: it's ready
[03:42]: and i think we're ready
[03:44]: and now we're just going to put all of
[03:45]: this in here
[03:46]: [Music]
[03:52]: and we're supposed to spread it out you
[03:54]: know as
[03:56]: as
[03:57]: as close to like one
[03:60]: layer as we can
[04:09]: try not to get any of the super dry
[04:12]: extra um cornmeal in
[04:16]: here that's on the bottom
[04:23]: there we go
[04:27]: now
[04:28]: the goal here
[04:31]: is to spread this out a little bit if it
[04:33]: needs to if you can to get it as close
[04:36]: to one layer as possible
[04:39]: and
[04:41]: now um
[04:43]: [Music]
[04:45]: they're all supposed to be touching the
[04:47]: oil so
[04:49]: we're gonna do the best we can
[04:54]: it's all pretty good pretty close
[04:59]: but now we're supposed to
[05:01]: just leave this be for three to four
[05:03]: minutes so i'm just gonna go wash my
[05:04]: hand and uh
[05:07]: leave it be
[05:08]: all right we're at four minutes so now i
[05:10]: can touch it
[05:12]: and so she says to toss it around
[05:15]: with a spatula
[05:18]: and cook for three to four
[05:20]: more minutes
[05:32]: i'm gonna
[05:34]: let this side cook a little bit and
[05:36]: maybe toss around a little bit more i
[05:38]: don't know if she means to toss it
[05:39]: around
[05:41]: continually at this point but i'm gonna
[05:44]: let
[05:46]: the other some other sides cook
[05:49]: but it's only gonna take three or four
[05:51]: more minutes so
[05:54]: the goal is not for these all to be
[05:56]: evenly
[05:60]: the goal is not for these all to be
[06:02]: evenly
[06:03]: brown
[06:04]: she says that some of them will be sort
[06:06]: of honey brown some of them will be a
[06:08]: chestnut color and some of them will be
[06:10]: blonde so
[06:12]: don't worry if you can't get them all
[06:15]: you know the the nice brown you know
[06:17]: golden brown and delicious
[06:19]: it'll still be delicious but that is
[06:21]: that is not the goal here
[06:27]: the hard part for me is not messing with
[06:30]: it and let me letting it
[06:33]: sit that's one of the hardest parts of
[06:35]: cooking i think
[06:37]: is leaving it be
[06:40]: all right i'm going to call this done
[06:42]: it's um
[06:44]: you know some parts are really brown
[06:45]: some parts are not really brown and um
[06:50]: i think it's ready it's been like four
[06:53]: minutes since we stirred it the first
[06:55]: time i tried not to stir it too much but
[06:57]: now we're going to
[06:58]: take it with a slotted spoon and put it
[07:00]: on
[07:02]: a paper towel lined plate to drain and
[07:05]: and the only other thing we have to do
[07:08]: is after we get all of this out
[07:11]: we're going to hit it with a little bit
[07:12]: more salt now she
[07:16]: has measurements for this
[07:18]: but i am not going to use them
[07:22]: i'm just going to salt it with you know
[07:25]: my fingers like i usually do
[07:27]: using my judgment um
[07:29]: once you learn how to
[07:32]: salt
[07:34]: your food uh with kosher salt um by you
[07:37]: know the pinch or or that kind of thing
[07:40]: you get pretty good at it and you
[07:43]: i mean i think
[07:44]: i think that's the best way honestly
[07:46]: it's the easiest way to me and then i
[07:48]: don't have to measure it so often i did
[07:49]: measure
[07:50]: what went in
[07:52]: to the batter
[07:55]: but that is
[07:56]: that is it and you'll see it absorbed
[07:58]: most of the oil out of this but
[08:01]: a lot of that will go into this um
[08:04]: this paper towel so
[08:06]: i'm gonna hit it with a little salt
[08:14]: about two pinches i think
[08:16]: and
[08:17]: that is it
[08:18]: stay tuned and we'll let you know what
[08:20]: we think
[08:21]: on this episode of cooking the books
[08:22]: with heather you watched me make fried
[08:24]: okra hash out of
[08:26]: vivian howard's deep run roots cookbook
[08:29]: i think this might be the last ochre
[08:31]: recipe we make for this year at least
[08:34]: there's not that many in here that we
[08:35]: haven't made and i don't think i have
[08:37]: any in other books that we haven't made
[08:38]: so
[08:39]: i think it's a little fitting that this
[08:41]: is probably the closest to what i do
[08:44]: when i make a fried okra at home
[08:48]: generally
[08:49]: um
[08:50]: i find it
[08:51]: less
[08:53]: messy
[08:54]: than um most recipes uh and when i do it
[08:58]: at home instead of putting my cornmeal
[09:01]: in
[09:01]: on a plate or in a bowl and then and
[09:04]: mixing the okra around in that i just
[09:07]: put it in a zip top bag
[09:09]: dump the ochre in and shake it up and
[09:11]: then
[09:12]: take it out from there and fry it always
[09:15]: fry it all at once
[09:17]: never use a
[09:20]: a not a dredge but like a dip like egg
[09:24]: or um buttermilk which a lot of recipes
[09:26]: that we've made here for okra
[09:28]: do use i think that makes it just more
[09:31]: messy
[09:32]: um
[09:34]: but i do love it for the larger pieces
[09:37]: of ochre that we fried like when we
[09:39]: fried it whole or just split lengthwise
[09:42]: so
[09:44]: yeah so for me
[09:47]: what i do is generally this method some
[09:49]: people use and this is a really common
[09:52]: sort of um
[09:53]: southern way to
[09:55]: cook okra i think that's this is how i
[09:58]: had it most in in in homes
[10:01]: when you know grandma or mom made it
[10:06]: it doesn't usually have a thick coating
[10:09]: some people use flour some people use
[10:11]: cornmeal i usually use a mix of both
[10:15]: so either way
[10:17]: works fine
[10:19]: and uh i think it's a really nice
[10:21]: lighter coating method and i prefer the
[10:24]: lighter coating on my pieces of fried
[10:26]: okra um
[10:28]: so yeah
[10:30]: wasn't very spicy so that's good um
[10:33]: there is a little bit of cayenne in it
[10:35]: but it was perfectly fine for the whole
[10:37]: family um just gives it a little bit of
[10:41]: flavor um different than
[10:43]: most
[10:44]: i'm pretty sure most people don't put
[10:46]: kai in it but maybe not i don't know i
[10:49]: just know the few people that i've
[10:50]: interacted with and eaten at their homes
[10:53]: um
[10:54]: don't seem to be spicy fried okra
[10:57]: not that this was spicy anyway um so
[11:00]: yeah it doesn't need
[11:02]: lots of
[11:03]: special equipment um i did use i'm
[11:06]: pretty sure my um
[11:08]: cast iron skillet you can fry it in
[11:10]: anything it's nice to get it all done at
[11:13]: once um
[11:15]: yeah and you just kind of let it sit
[11:17]: there
[11:18]: and turn it a few times so it doesn't
[11:19]: even take a whole lot of effort so
[11:22]: if you want to make fried okra sliced
[11:25]: this is the method i prefer out of all
[11:28]: of the ones that we've made
[11:30]: actually i think only one of them has
[11:32]: been sliced besides this one anyway
[11:35]: so
[11:36]: if you enjoyed watching me make this
[11:37]: please give me a thumbs up hit the
[11:39]: subscribe button and come back and watch
[11:41]: me make something else next week
[11:43]: [Music]