Chitter skimming sorghum syrup Burnette Farm Haywood County NC
I grew up on Sand Mountain. Born in 1884, I was a pretty good size chunk of a boy when I went out on my own at age seventeen atter my mother died. Before that I was a runt, pore [sic], and skinny. Yeah, but I growed up tolibly [sic] well.
Before she died, my mother plowed, cut logs—I’ve seen her pull a cross cut saw for fifty cents a day. And she could shoot a gun bettern’n I could. She brought down many a squirrel.
We grew sorghum cane back then; we tried to raise what you could eat. Everybody had a little patch of sorghum. We ate sorghum and biscuits and we ate sorghum and corn bread many a time. Back then it was hard for us to get biscuits. Wasn’t many farmers that eat biscuits.
— Will Samples, Smyrna, Georgia, Age 106 when interviewed by the author in 1990 – Smokehouse Ham, Spoon Bread & Scuppernong Wine written by Joseph E. Dabney
A friend gave us some sorghum syrup he made last fall. I have thoroughly enjoyed it. His family has raised sorghum for many years in Madison County NC.
When I was growing up Pap and Granny just called it syrup. Every fall Pap would get a case of honey and a case of syrup for us to enjoy with Granny’s biscuits. He and I were partial to the syrup and everyone else liked the honey best.
Roy Pipes told me when he was a boy most all restaurants in our area had sorghum syrup sitting on the tables along with salt and pepper.
I’m glad Dabney was able to interview Mr. Samples. In this area folks say Smyrna like Smyrnie. Pap and Granny both always changed the ending to ie and they did the same with the state making it Georgie.
Last night’s video: Washing Machine’s Little Brain Gets Matt’s Blood Pressure Up and We Got the First Bed Retrofitted!
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We also enjoyed this growing up. The r was left out so it was pronounced
sogh-um, and sometimes mashed butter into it till it was thick. I am from Sand Mountain also, a plateau running from Alabama into Georgia but not sure if it is the same as referred to.
Your comment about adding “ie” to places brought back a memory of my Maw-Maw, Della Smith from Bluefield, W Va. Whenever she referred to Appalachia she called it Appalachie. She said a few other names that way too. The plural of our last name Aust was the same. She would say “the Austies are fixin to come by”
Never came across any Sorghum but, I always remembered my Mother always had Molasses handy. I have to say that Pure Hickory Syrup is so very delicious on Sausage, bacon and fat back along with eggs and biscuits. Where I’m from in Pennsylvania I came across many types of pure kinds of Syrups up in Elk County Pennsylvania. This is about close to almost 200 miles from where I live on Pennsylvania. We don’t go there too much because of the distance and us being in our late 60’s really puts our backs outta wack. I do though go to their website if I want to purchase more of their many syrups. MM So DELICIOUS!!
I have never heard of sorghum.i live in a Midwest. Is sorghum sweet like sugar?
God bless Granny and everybody in the family.HH
I don’t think I have ever had sorghum syrup. I’ve had and used molasses, but not sorghum syrup.
Sorghum is a favorite in our family. If we were serious about getting some passed down the table we called it by its full name: Sorghum Molasses as in “Mind you pass me that sorghum molasses.” The name “syrup”, pronounced “serp”, was what we called that fancy maple stuff from up yonder north.
Thanks for sharing the sweet story of Mr. Samples. My grandparents were sharecroppers and grew sugar cane to make molasses. It was a wonderful treat for a big family living in poverty in Mississippi. My mother remembers eating it with biscuits and the sweet taste. Thanks for the reminder of simple pleasures in life.
I learned to love sorghum while eating at my grandparents home. My grandmother made the best biscuits that I’ve ever eaten. Some sorghum and homemade butter on one of her biscuits was a delightful treat. For many years now, I’ve bought sorghum from a family in Muddy Pond Tennessee. That and local sourwood honey are staples at my house.
Tipper–With my pronounced penchant for little side stories, I’ve got to add a bit about skimmin’s from sorghum syrup making. Those skimmin’s attract yellowjackets like sourwood bloom draw honeybees, and when a bunch of skimmin’s were set aside in some kind of container, the green, gooey mess would soon feature a bunch of drowned or drunk yellowjackets. I say drunk because skimmin’s turn to a substantial alcohol content in fairly rapid order. Often at old-time community molasses makings there would be a sot or two on site to “help” but mostly to sample the skimmin’s. Sometimes they would, in time, be about as bad off as the yellowjackets that had drunk their fill before drowning.
That’s a bit out of the mainstream but I wonder how many readers were aware of this “sidelight” of making molasses (well, sorghum syrup if you want to get technical, but the use of molasses was almost universal in my boyhood experiences (and beyond).
I have never tasted sorghum syrup before. I do keep molasses for recipes, but I read that sorghum syrup tastes even better. We raise honeybees, so we eat lots of honey. We only keep two hives, but it is plenty to use for hot biscuits, homemade bread, cooking , baking, oatmeal and sharing with our family. I rarely buy sugar anymore. We, also, really like maple syrup. We don’t live too far from the site of the annual WV maple syrup festival. It is held in March in Pickens, WV, where there is the perfect colder climate for tapping maple trees and making syrup.
Got a Mason jar of molasses on our table right now
She sure was a tough one. Had to be. as a child we had all kinds of syrup that momma made. I’m not sure if that was the same or not.
My Grandma Johnson always had a mason jar of sorghum, when I was a child. I don’t remember tasting it, just remember thinking it was special because she loved it so. Thank you for bringing that memory back to me. ❤️
I always had sorghum at my Grandmother’s house. Ate it on her homemade biscuits with home churned butter. I have the Daisey churn and the cedar churn. I can still see my Grandaddy on the porch with the cedar churn. My kids never had a taste for sorghum. I guess it was a little strong for them. But I still love it.
I love the change to Georgie (smiling big.) I also love the way my mom and her mom always said Louisville, as in they are from Louisville KY. They say Luv’l (like love-ull.) I notice you use the same “ull” on Gainesville, I love it!!!
I do remember stripping cane. The green fodder would slice the inside of a hand, and stinging paxsadles (catipillars) would raise a row of burning pain when gripped by mistake. All this was part of it, and on a cold winter morning, we knew we had earned that butter and syrup sopped up with a hot biscuit.
my go to surp was Farmers Favorite. Great with Biscuits and butter!
In the summer of 1978, I turned14. I helped my grandparents plow the field, plant, tend, and harvest a three acre patch of sorghum. It was their last batch. After cutting it down in stages (much involved with that amount), we took it about twenty-five miles to a man who had a press and an outdoor cooking pan set-up where he cooked it out for a portion of the finished product. It was hot and hard work, but we got it done. Four years later my grandmother was about to go into the hospital and undergo open heart surgery (that wasn’t as common as today). This was 1982 and I was a senior in high school. She took me back to the pantry and told me she had something she wanted to give me. I followed her in and she handed me the last two buckets of that batch of syrup. It had not turned to “sugar” and was as good as when it was first made. She knew I loved it and wanted me to have that I suppose in case things did not go as planned with her surgery. I had eaten and loved sorghum since I was a small boy (I don’t remember not eating it). I ate it almost every morning if we had it. I would start by putting a dab of butter on a plate and pouring as much syrup as I intended to eat on top of it. Then, I would “cut” or mash the butter into the syrup with my fork and stir. When the mixture reached the desired consistency, I’d take a freshly buttered biscuit and sop the mix until the plate was clean. Many times at after supper I would repeat the same process but use cornbread for sopping. Nowadays, I buy my sorghum from some Mennonites close by and I still eat it with both cornbread and biscuits.
The Good Lord provides. Sorghum syrup was a very important staple that helped sustain early pioneer families from this country’s infancy through the Great Depression. It was loaded with a myriad of vitamins and minerals (not to mention the caloric value) that people in rural areas often lacked.
I may have to make a skillet of biscuits this morning and eat a little RIGHT NOW. LOL
We grew sugar cane, Daddy made molasses each fall. We also ate with hot cornbread, butter, and molasses. As well as biscuits and butter.
I grew up in town with store-bought molasses. We loved to mash butter up in it to put on biscuits.
The names ending in “a” being prounounced “ee” goes way back to the song Hang Down Your Head, Tom Dooley.
A man from North Carolina, his last name was actually spelled Dula!
My son’s mother in law’s great-grandfather was Thomas Hardin Dula. His father was Thomas Pinkney Dula. Both were from Wilkes County, North Carolina where the infamous Tom Dooley (Dula) murdered Laura Foster in 1866 and was hanged in Statesville, Iredell County for it. So far I haven’t found a connection between Tom Dooley and my daughter in law’s Dulas. But, just because I haven’t found it doesn’t mean it isn’t there!
I love sorghum molasses, especially on a biscuit! My West Virginia relatives and in-laws have always pronounced -a on the end of a word like -ie / -y. Pretty sure that’s a mountain thing.
papaw and the Casadas and many others, no doubt, will recognize Alarka, that Swain County community, as Alarkey.
We drop the A and call it Larky! My wife and I lived in a little garage apartment up on Larky for a while when we were first married. It was on Deep Gap Road on the right just before you get to Mount Vernon Freewill Baptist Church. The garage itself was dug into the hillside and the three room apartment was above it.
My brother gets Burnett Farms molasses for me each fall. I believe that this year’s was the best ever, can’t beat a hot buttered biscuit and molasses!
Folks here add a “ s” to end of words like Walmarts, Kmarts
Just curious is the Burnette Farm Chitter is working sorghum located in Burnette Cove? …. I was born and raised in Dutch Cove, Haywood county about 5 miles outside of Canton, Burnette Cove branches off Dutch cove Road.
Also we had a saying “Let the rough end drag” … do you know if that phrase is used anywhere else?
James-that is the place 🙂 Matt said he’d heard that saying a lot.
Love my Seabolt’s surp!!
My people lived in the Ozarks and they used that -ie ending for several words that ended in A. Like sodie pop, tobackie (tobacco) and okrie for okra. Great-aunt Anna was always referred to as “Aint Annie”.
Matt is such a ‘handy dandy’ doer…another good reason to listen and watch. I do love his raised beds, now to find some tin. As far as the syrup goes, soghum, it is one of the best along with fresh homegrown cain.
Prayers for Granny and you guys.
I grew up on Sand Mt too. Still live here. In high school our FFA program had a sorghum cane field that we made syrup from to sell to raise money. We would have to go strip the cane in the fall during class. Always a dirty sweaty job especially if you were in the early morning classes and dew was still on the cane.
What an interesting life this man had. on his own at 17. And his mom, what a woman!
This posting has me thinking of some happy moments…I saw sorghum being made into syrup a couple times when I was very young, the last time when I was five, maybe six years old, all in the 1950’s. Some neighbors and my grandfather would cut their little patches of sorghum cane, and work together to make some syrup.
When I was two or three years, this is the first time I remember the cane being squeezed so the juice ran out and was collected. I mostly remember I got in trouble for walking up to my grandmother and calling her big fat granny. My mom gave me a little spanking then and there (maybe not a happy moment when that happened).
I remember bottles and jars of sorghum, sassafras, honey, regular molasses, jam, salt, pepper, sugar, and a butter bell on a large tabletop lazy susan–everything you could need for coffee, tea, biscuits or cornbread–everyday food. I loved them all.
My family has always loved sorghum syrup or molasses. Each year during the fall, Daddy would try to find someone that had made some homemade syrup and buy some. Right now I have a mason jar of it on my table along with another jar of sourwood honey. Hot homemade buttered biscuits along with this syrup or honey make for some mighty fine eating. A true southerner will “work up” some butter in his molasses. For the ones above the Mason Dixon line, Karol syrup and the like is NOT sorghum syrup or molasses.
Anyone remember Jerry Cower telling about growing up poor and eating out of wooden plates. He said when eating biscuits and sopping up sorghum syrup with them the plates would scoot off the table and across the floor. He said they finally nailed the plates to the table and by the end of winter they had sopped the heads off of the nails.