Harold and Kumar and Fried Okra
A few weeks ago, we had an office discussion about places to consistently get good fried okra. It's such a simple food—cut okra, bread it, fry it—but surprisingly hard to make just right. Southerners expect it to be as good as their grandmother's (or, bless her heart, even better). While a great meat-and-three is your best bet for finding the wonderful and lightly cornmeal-breaded okra with bits of almost-burned pod pieces poking out, many only offer it on specific days or even just randomly. So what about chains?
The old Luby's at Harding Mall used to be my go-to place where OK fried okra was always available. It was all-you-can-eat, and I can eat a mess of fried okra. With that gone, I tried the okra at Captain D's. I suggest you don't. When people complain about terrible, from-the-bag, breaded-and-ready-to-fry okra, this is what they mean.
I finally settled on Cracker Barrel, which offers consistently decent fried okra. But who wants to go through the hassle of waiting in their store, trying to find ironic entertainment in their selection of Kountry Krap, just to get a quick fix for an okra jones?
Now you don't have to. White Castle offers fried okra. "White Castle?" you ask. Yes. Well, maybe more specifically White Castle/Church's. It might be the latter that makes it possible, but the important question is whether fast-food fried okra can rise above the subpar standard set by Captain D's.
It can, and it has. Though all were shocked by the source, White Castle passed the taste test of several fried-okra lovers around the office. The real-cornmeal breading was perfectly light and crispy, and the look of it denied its fast-food origin. If it were spread on a plate with some homemade cornbread and black-eyed peas, even your grandmother might be fooled that you made it yourself from her own recipe. Bless her heart.
Comments
I recently asked Carol Babb why her Pie Wagon and so many other meat-and-threes don't have fried okra. She explained that, for one thing, she doesn't use any pre-breaded products. For another, okra can't sit in a steam table--it needs to be fried and eaten immediately.
Thanks for doing the research for us.
Posted 08/15/2008 at 08:44:32 AMCount me among the surprised. That's the best fast-food snack I've encountered since the Chik-fil-A nugget. If you hadn't emptied a gallon drum of salt over yours, Brent, I'd still be eating them.
Posted 08/15/2008 at 09:04:33 AMI have to ask...Brent, where do you keep them? Your fried okra?
Posted 08/15/2008 at 01:14:26 PM