Virginia-Style Brunswick Stew (2023)

When I arrive in the south-central Virginia city of Alberta (population around 300) on a brilliant blue winter day to unravel the mysteries of Brunswick stew around 8:30am. m., I find four guys weighing about 85 gallons. Iron stand Dutch oven, steam rising from its chicken and water contents, the first stage of braising.

"What time did you start?" I ask.

Team leader George Daniel, a mustachioed, white-haired 73-year-old auctioneer in faded zip-up dungarees, takes the opportunity to guide me through the long and complicated process. "It started yesterday," he says.

"Yesterday?" I ask confused.

"Billy, cut potatoes and onions."

That would be Billy Waller, 76, a retiree from the Virginia Department of Transportation. Waller, a stocky man in a red cap, blue shirt and jeans, uses a long-handled shovel to stir 160 pounds of boneless, skinless chicken thighs into 18 gallons of well water, turning the liquid at the bottom into a milk pot. "We cut a bit," he says dryly.

Daniel and Waller is sort of a stew made by Lennon and McCartney of Virginia Brunswick. The two have been cooking together for so many years that they have lost count. Do you agree that I can say "more than 20". His team, the Red Oak Stew Crew, won first place in the Brunswick Stew competition at the annual A Taste of Brunswick festival in October, so many times they lost count.

Their victories earned them repeat trips to the state capital, Richmond, to cook the concoction on the fourth Wednesday in January, also known as Brunswick Stew Day. The Virginia General Assembly approved the designation in 2002. It followed a 1988 resolution that proclaimed Brunswick County "The Original Home of Brunswick Stew," a rebuke to the city of Brunswick, Georgia, whose legislature also issued a proclamation , in which it was stated that the stew was made there.

Georgians point to a plate on a 25-gallon stew at St. Simon's, outside the town of Brunswick, that was used in 1898 to support their claim. Virginians say the stew was created in 1828 by Jimmy Matthews, a slave who simmered squirrels, breadcrumbs, onions, butter and spices for the hunt for his master, Creed Haskins. In Southern Food, John Egerton suggests that Native Americans likely prepared the stew before either state was a colony.

Be that as it may, the squirrel has long been replaced by chicken and, especially in Georgia, by other types of meat, especially pork. He supposed additional vegetables, usually tomatoes, small beans, and corn, and Georgians usually added peas. Some stew masters even cook it over a wood fire to give it a smoky flavor. However, most of them use more manageable propane flames. Smoked meat is sometimes added, and the spice level, while occasionally fiery, is usually hot.

I first tried Brunswick Stew in Atlanta in 1988 and have since tried various versions in the South. But there are so many variations that the more I researched the stew, the less I understood. So I went to Brunswick County to take a closer look.

The differences somehow do not obscure the basic identity of the stew, which is thick in texture and brown in color. It is usually done as part of a community event, like Daniel and Waller are doing on this special day in Alberta to cook to raise funds for a Church mission trip to Nicaragua.

Waller takes turns with two younger men: Michael Grimm, 29, Daniel's son-in-law, and Scott Brandt, 47, a five-year-old crewman who says he's still an apprentice. The four of them started cooking at 7:45 am.

At around 9:30 a.m., Daniel uses an old metal strainer to scoop 100 kilos of sliced ​​onions out of a huge fridge and into the pan. He does the same with 100 pounds of potatoes, cut into fillets and dunked in water that is browned by the spices. I ask Daniel about the smells in the colder water. "That," he says with a slight smile, "I can't tell you." A stew master must have the secrets of it.

Huge clouds of steam rise from the pot, engulfing Waller, who, after being hexed by the others, has retaken his helm. The process of preparing the stew is not only long but also tedious. I know because I ask to stir the pot. Daniel agrees. The others comment that it is a great honor to be admitted. I swing the bat vigorously, trying to find a rhythm that doesn't strain my shoulder muscles, and keep my hands away from the sizzling rim of the pot as I go about my primary task: keeping the stew from burning. The bottom. After a while, Waller takes over. He has found a problem. "Cuddled up together," he says. His tone suggests simple observation, not judgment (I think).

Ingredients are added at intervals. Several giant cans of white beans around 10:15 a.m. m., giant cans of grated tomatoes at 10:35 a.m. m., large cans of two kinds of corn, cream and pins, sometime after noon. On the last few legs, Daniel pours copious amounts of salt, black pepper, and cayenne pepper into the pan. From time to time, team members pour the stew into small plastic foam cups to test for flavor. More salt is added. More pepper. More cayenne pepper.

Waller places the bat in the middle of the pot and doesn't budge. “The stew is ready when the oar is raised,” says Daniel.

It is rumored that there is a notch in the bottom of the jumbo pot to accommodate the paddle. Daniel is holding back on this. He understands that part of the appeal of Brunswick stew is the mystique of it.

When the stew is finally ready, I taste it in a foam cup. It is coral red in color and has a velvety texture, thick with chicken tenders sprinkled with beans, corn kernels, and undissolved potato chunks. The slow, long, lazy bubble of tomato, chicken and vegetables produced a mild flavor, the cayenne pepper a mild bite.

All morning the townspeople stopped by to ask when the stew would be ready. They smelled it all over the block. Daniel and Waller cook community stews twice, sometimes three times a month. Ever since news of this stew broke weeks ago (by old-fashioned word of mouth; no social media here), locals and even residents of Richmond an hour away have been ordering several pints. For days every gram of the 85 gallons was talked about. In fact, he is oversold. Daniel calls to see who can reduce the order.

Around 1:30 p.m., people go to their barracks. This one takes six, the other 10, another 22, at $7 a liter. I didn't know the etiquette for ordering ahead. I'm afraid I won't make it.

Daniel has already thought about it. Pour the stew from the pot into a plastic container. “Do you know what he saw today?” he says.

"¿Sim?"

He smiles.

"You haven't seen everything yet," he says.

He hands me a bottle and I head back to the big city because I think I know more than I probably do.

Shahin will be participating in the Free Range Chat this afternoon:live.washingtonpost.comSiga Shahin on Twitter:@jimshain.