Where the Red Fern Grows
SKILLET CORNBREAD with HONEY BUTTER
When I was thirteen I used to babysit for a family with two young kids and an ancient golden retriever named Sammy. Whenever I babysat, I had to complete a long and messily handwritten checklist of tasks to keep poor, ravaged Sammy alive. She was forever having accidents on the carpet and staring at me with exhausted, sorry eyes. Often I was so overwhelmed by the pill crushing and ointment spreading that I would forget to bathe or feed the kids, or I would lose track of time sautéing ground beef for Sammy’s dinner and end up putting the kids to bed an hour late.
One night, I put Sammy’s dinner down and took the kids downstairs to go to sleep. When I came back upstairs, Sammy was lying next to her untouched dinner, eyes rolled back, foam spilling from her mouth. Terrified and hysterical, I called the parents and they rushed home immediately. They scooped up her tired body and whisked her off to the animal hospital in their blue Volvo station wagon, and I said a little prayer that rather than getting more pills and shots, Sammy would finally be allowed to be at peace.
The relief that I felt for Sammy when she did in fact pass that night immediately disappeared when I saw how devastated the mom was. She was inconsolable when she returned home, and I felt immense guilt on the walk back to my house, a tiny part of me wondering if my small prayer had somehow caused this giant sadness.
At home I went straight up to my room and immediately dissolved into the kind of self-indulgent crying fit that only a thirteen-year-old can muster. A half hour later I pulled myself out of bed and went digging for my well-loved copy of Where the Red Fern Grows. All of the dog drama had reminded me of the story and I thought that maybe the book, which I had loved so much as a kid, and which tells the story of a boy who loses his beloved dog, would comfort me.
I had read it for the first time in second grade after choosing it from one of those Scholastic book fair packets they used to pass out once a year in elementary school. Was there anything more exciting than those colorful, book-filled, whisper-thin packets? I was always a sucker for any books that looked slightly spooky or adventure-packed, and I remember distinctly the third grade book fair in which I picked up Maniac Magee, Wait Till Helen Comes, and Where the Red Fern Grows based on their promising-looking covers. It was the first book ever to bring me to tears—I remember crying dramatically into my dog Henry’s fur upon completing the last lines.
The book put me at ease enough to realize that I was absolutely starving, not only from the hour of full-body sobbing I had just done, but also from all of Wilson Rawls’s delicious food descriptions. The farm-freshness of everything in Billy’s meals was dazzling to me, both as a kid and as a teenager. Books like these had me searching my backyard for edible berry bushes, mushrooms, and roots before sitting down at night to a meal of Weaver chicken nuggets and canned fruit cocktail (no complaints, Mom, it was delicious).
One food that appears repeatedly throughout the book is cornbread—Billy stuffs it in his rucksack to go camping, he sells stale chunks of it as bait to the fishermen, he makes salt pork sandwiches between its crumbly layers, and he eats it with jarred peaches, fried potatoes, fresh huckleberry cobbler, or honey and butter. Inspired by the book and desperately wanting to clear my conscience of the guilt I felt over Sammy’s death, I decided I would make a batch of cornbread for Sammy’s family. Baking the cornbread succeeded in comforting me where the book hadn’t, and by the time I was done cracking eggs and measuring milk I felt almost back to normal.
The next morning, I walked the cornbread over to the family’s house. I was expecting that maybe in the light of day, having had the night to mourn Sammy and reflect on her long and happy life, Sammy’s mom would feel better, but I’ll never forget how exhausted and deeply, unreachably sad she still looked when she opened the door and saw me standing there with a tray full of cornbread squares. I felt very young and very silly when she patted my head distractedly before closing the door.
What I know now, having lost both of my childhood dogs, is that the grief of losing a beloved pet—especially one that has been in the family for many years—is as much about recognizing the passing of time and the closing of chapters as it is about mourning companionship.
I learned this firsthand when Henry died, right before I left for college. Henry was a miniature dachshund and my constant companion from the time I was seven until I was eighteen. He was a tiny, anxious thing who followed at my heels and slept on the pillow beside my face every night.
Henry loved to eat crayons so much that he even learned how to remove the paper wrappers in order to consume just the wax. At first we blamed my little sister for all the missing crayons, but then Henry started to poop the most beautiful, colorful jewels all over the yard. They were speckled with neon pinks and greens, oranges and purples—just gorgeous poops. They were so beautiful it took everything I had to convince my best friend that they weren’t candy and she couldn’t eat them. My sisters and I would walk around the yard, pointing to the little piles and matching them to their crayon names: “Burnt Sienna!” “Carnation Pink!” “Screamin’ Green!” “Wild Watermelon!” A week before I left for college Henry died. He was never sick, he never seized or foamed or got tumors—he just came in from playing in the yard one day, curled up on the rug, and passed. He looked very small and very peaceful.
WHERE THE RED FERN GROWS
Skillet Cornbread with Honey Butter
As an East Coaster I wasn’t always familiar with the less-sweet Southern iteration of cornbread, but it is lovely, especially paired with this sweet honey butter. If you don’t have a cast-iron skillet it is worth investing in one, if only to make a cornbread with edges this sweetly crisp.
Serves 8
4 tablespoons (½ stick) unsalted butter, plus extra for the skillet
¼ cup vegetable shortening
1¼ cups fine yellow cornmeal
¾ cup all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons sugar
½ teaspoon baking soda
1 cup buttermilk
⅓ cup whole milk
2 large eggs, beaten
1 or 2 pieces of bacon, ham, or salt pork (optional)
Honey Butter
¼ cup honey
5⅓ tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
Kosher salt
Preheat the oven to 375°F.
Melt the butter and shortening in a seasoned cast-iron skillet over medium-high heat. Pour the melted butter and shortening into a dish and rub the remaining grease around in the skillet with a paper towel, making sure to coat the sides. Put the skillet in the oven while you prepare the rest of the ingredients.
Sift together the cornmeal, flour, sugar, baking powder, and baking soda in a large bowl. Add the buttermilk, milk, beaten eggs, and melted butter-shortening mixture. Mix until incorporated, being careful not to overmix; it’s okay if the batter is a little bit lumpy.
Remove the skillet from the oven. If you have some bacon, ham, or salt pork, fry it up in the skillet until crispy and remove, leaving the grease in the pan. If not, add a little bit more butter and spread it around the hot pan. Pour the batter into the skillet and bake until a tester inserted into the center comes out clean, about 20 minutes.
While the cornbread is in the oven, make the honey butter. Whip the honey into the softened butter until emulsified. Season with salt to taste. Allow it to set up in the fridge for 5 to 10 minutes before spreading on the hot cornbread.