We were in Vermont recently for a visit to the factory where they make Ben and Jerry’s ice cream — it’s among the most popular tourist destinations in New England — and decided to stop for dinner at a restaurant a few miles away in Waterbury. When we opened the menu, we were surprised — ok, jaw-dropping astonished — to discover the presence of grits in the listings!

Now, you have to bear in mind Waterbury VT is just a little over an hour driving time away from Canada. Nine hours north of the Mason-Dixon line. Eleven hours south of the Arctic Circle (you do have to fly). And almost 16 hours north of Columbia, SC, where Anson Mills produces authentic stone-ground grits.
Which brings up the question: what the heck was on that menu in Waterbury?
And the answer is: grits from Anson Mills. “That’s where we’ve always gotten our grits,” said a young woman behind the hostess desk at the Prohibition Pig restaurant, which also specializes in North Carolina pulled pork barbecue and varieties of another southern favorite, mac and cheese.

Is this a wonderful world or what?

We’ve missed grits since moving to New Hampshire from South Carolina and Georgia not long ago. We’ve ordered from Anson for our own use from time to time, to be sure. But finding restaurants that serve them has been difficult. And we’ve been reassuring some New Englanders that the use of “grits” is both singular and plural, as acknowledged by the authority of no less than The New York Times.

The word “grit,” however, can be a piece of sand or stone, a country bumpkin, a grinding of teeth, a statement of character or several other things. And “True Grit” was a movie. But they have nothing to do with corn and are not something you smear with butter or salt and pepper and whisk down your grateful gullet.

As native-born Southerners who took grits for granted along with okra, humidity and bourbon, we knew there would be some cultural challenges living in New England: snow, dirt roads, lobster, baked beans, snow, the E-Z Pass, no Civil war battlefields, maple syrup, snow and ice. And did I mention it gets pretty cold, too?
Anyhow, for many southerners, eating grits is one of those things you just did, like going to church, turning on the air conditioner or watching college football. And most committed grits eaters want only the long-cooked, stone-ground grits. Around New Hampshire, though, we’ve encountered people who assume the instant things like cream of wheat are the equivalent of grits. We have not laughed at those people — and it’s been hard sometimes — but we have pitied them.

The history of grits, I reminded anyone I could get to listen, goes back to the first discoveries of our country, in the late 16th century when Sir Walter Raleigh arrived in Virginia, and when the Mayflower Pilgrims landed at Plymouth a few years later. The Europeans found the Native Americans making several foods from corn, among them a boiled corn which became hominy grits.

The rest is history, albeit rather tangled, except that the Pilgrims apparently failed to get hooked on grits while the tasty dish spread like slavery in the South. Fortunately, the South eventually figured out that slavery was very bad, even though it took a war to finally convince everyone, and grits were very good. I can only assume now that New Englanders are envious that their ancestors never got the grits part right.
South Carolina recognized what a good thing it had in 1976 when legislators passed a bill that named grits as the official state food and declared that “given enough of it, the inhabitants of planet Earth would have nothing to fight about. A man full of grits is a man of peace.” South Carolina may have shed slavery, but it has not been able to do much about hyperbole.

These days, of course, you can find shrimp and grits — a creation of distinctly southern origins — on menus even in some New England restaurants. Sadly, the establishments serving it don’t always have the right sort of grits. And occasionally they give the dish a uniquely New England flavor that seems about as misplaced and welcome as an ice storm in Key West.

In a magazine aimed at New Englanders recently, we came across a recipe for grits and homemade sausages — something we’d be prepared to indulge — but then found the author added this: “Let’s put those sausages with a traditional southern dish, made my way! With good ol’ cheddar cheese and apples, not to mention maple syrup, this is a great way to taste your first grits.”

Yep, you read that correctly. Maple syrup in the grits.

I’m afraid we may have more cultural challenges facing us than I had ever imagined.