From the Southern Table

Food, Fun, and Love with Paul and Angela Knipple

Recipes 

Squrings: Fried squash rings

Paul Knipple , ,

Nothing is more Southern than our penchant for taking something wholesome and nutritious and frying the heck out of it.

We bought some gorgeous delicata squash from Dodson Farm at the farmers market. We used some of them in place of potatoes in a beef stew (using Neola Farms beef of course). With so many good vegetables coming from the market though, our squash had been languishing.

After our wonderful late-afternoon brunch (lupper?) at Hunt Phelan, we didn’t need a big dinner. When we did start to get hungry again, I hit on the idea of slicing our squash, dredging the slices in cornmeal, then frying them.

It seemed like a reasonable plan until I moved the mandolin aside to get the slices. I hadn’t reckoned on the seeds.

For a small squash, the delicata has some serious seeds. We’re talking pumpkin here. As much as I love roasted pumpkin seeds, fried squash seeds didn’t sound appetizing. So I found myself poking out seeds from individual slices of squash, leaving squash rings.

We love onion rings. We love fried zucchini. Surely this couldn’t be too bad. And it wasn’t. The delicata squash fried up much sweeter than we expected. It was a nice contrast with nutty browned corn meal and a good dose of salt. And thus were born squrings.

I guess if I am going to promote this ramble to a recipe, I should give some hints as to what we did. Slice your squash. If you have big seeds, poke them out. If not, don’t. Dredge in a mixture of one egg and about a half cup of buttermilk. Then dredge in cornmeal and salt. Fry your slices (in Crisco in a cast iron skillet of course) until they are golden brown. Drain them on a paper towel. Sprinkle a bit more salt while they are hot. Wait until they are a bit cooler before eating them. We don’t want anybody getting hurt on squrings.

Share this:

2 thoughts on “Squrings: Fried squash rings”

  • mjhughes76
    June 22, 2007 at 10:11 am
    Permalink

    Out of the three natural beef purveyors, would you say that Neola Farms is your favorite? I took home some of their shortribs to braise in red wine, stock and garlic. They were magnificent! I have yet to try the other two but I’m very curious.

  • Papa Squirrel
    June 25, 2007 at 9:27 am
    Permalink

    With a presence at both local farmers markets and a stocked freezer downtown, Neola is the most convenient. The meat is spectacular of course, but I also like being able to buy the cuts of beef that I want at the time. We are talking about splitting a half steer with my in-laws though. I’ll let folks know about that.

    I haven’t had a chance to try M4-D Ranch beef since they only sell in quarters and halves. If someone would like to sell me a small portion of their next purchase, I would love to hear from you.

    Who is your third? There are the folks who come in from Sale Creek. I didn’t get any of their beef. Their selection was limited.

    We are interested in West Wind Farms. They were there on 6/16 and I think they will be back on 7/7. They have organic beef, pork, and chicken. We got a chicken and a dozen eggs from them. She has a few beef items that Neola doesn’t. Teh Boy loves beef tongue. Check them out at http://www.grassorganic.com.

    Also, send us an email. We should talk about upcoming activities.

Comments are closed.