When I write, I write almost excluisvely about the South.
Perhaps it's because I've lived in the region for thirty-three years.
Perhaps it's because there are so many characters in the South, a writer can never run out of material.
Perhaps it's simply because I love the South.
The manuscript I'm shopping around is titled Sweet Divinty, and yet it occurred to me not so long ago that there may be some sad souls out there who have never tasted the pure fantasticness that is Southern divinity candy.
As a child, I used to buy divinity twice a year at the Prater's Mill Country Fair, a fantastic gathering of artists, craftsmen, cloggers, fiddlers, tractor and engine buffs, Civil War re-enactors, farmers, cooks, and bakers. I would dream of my culinary journey each year as the air turned crisp in the fall and again when the flowers began to burst forth in the spring. Each year I followed the same eating routine: lunch at the Methodist church bbq shelter where I would eat fresh bbq chicken with sweet baked beans and a soft roll, a snack of Mississippi Mud Cake from aisle three, a cup of homemade vanilla ice cream while I watched the Dixie Rainbow Cloggers, and a ziploc baggie of divinity from the angels at the Shiloh Baptist Church to keep me company on the drive home.
There were so many other treats, but a girl has to stop before she gets outrageously, roaringly sick.
That perfect divinity was the highlight of the fair, one I anticipated each year, and one that never let me down. Growing up, I always heard how difficult it was to make divinity, how the weather had to be just right, and the stand mixer had to be plugged in and ready for action. My own wonderfully southern grandmother only made divinity one time that I can remember. As for me, I tried making divinity for the first time just this year. I pulled out a recipe from my Nana's old timey cookbook, bought myself a candy thermometer, and gave it a go.
The ingredients are simple: egg whites, sugar, corn syrup, vanilla, and optional pecans (not optional, if you ask me). And yet making this treat sent from heaven above (thus, the name), was a challenge, to say the least. My students will tell you that I'm a fast-paced person, an addicted multi-tasker. And yet there I was, holding a candy thermometer in the syrup, crouched at eye-level as I watched the little red line climb higher and higher until the moment it hit the "hard ball" stage when, as I was told, I immediately whisked the pot off of the stove and poured the contents into the running stand mixer. There was a moment of triumph--I hadn't messed this up yet--and then I felt my life draining away as I slo-o-o-o-o-owly poured the syrup into beaten (and still methodically rotating) egg whites. I had looked at the recipe, which read "pour slowly into egg whites (5 minutes)" and wondered what that "5 minutes" meant. Ha--it meant that it would take me five minutes of holding a heavy metal mixing bowl in order to pour the syrup without burning the egg whites. FIVE MINUTES of watching syrup run in the tiniest of streams into a rotating bowl. Not so bad, you say? Go into your pantry, grab the pancake syrup, and pour it steadily into a bowl for five minutes. Then get back to me.
My first batch turned into glop the minute I proudly plopped it onto a baking sheet. But after a couple more frustrating attempts to make it "stand up", as well as ten minutes on the Internet seeking hints, I plopped down a spoonful of candy and--miracle of miracles--it stood up!
As I pressed a pecan into the top of a piece and popped it into my mouth, so many memories came back. Memories of the country fair, memories of making sand art with the little old man whose booth was always busy, memories of touring the old cotton gin and being amazed watching the waterfall power the old mill, memories of the sweetness of childhood. I love the South, and I love that I was raised here. It's so much a part of who I am.
But I think I'll leave the divinity making to the ladies at Shiloh Baptist Church.
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