When Texas was my home, we ate Black Eyed Peas without question each and every New Years Day. It was a tradition that I insisted we continue after moving to Indiana. My yankee wife asked me a few years back, “Honey, why do you eat Black Eyed Peas?” Having a hard time with the answer, I said, “I eat Hopin John with a few extra ingredients. I think Black Eyed Peas are pretty disgusting, but it is what we have always done in my family.”
Now, I have actually heard people who tell me they love those little beans. Yeah, they are still gross. But how did this become a tradition in my family and most other southern families? It turns out that this tradition started in the 1864-1865 timeframe.
You see, there was this little thing done to the southerners called “total warfare”. The ultimate idea was to destroy their will to fight. As common practice, federal troops took anything they could carry or needed for the campaign. Anything left was destroyed, including fields, farms, farm equipment, reserves, railroads, homes, and darn near anything else that could be found. It was a traumatic time filled with terror affecting mostly women and children.
The only thing left were silage filled with black eyed peas and some hidden stores of salt pork. Since the federal army had either taken or slaughtered all the animals, Sherman did not feel it was necessary to burn the beans. The beans were used as animal feed.
Having nothing else to eat, the southern people started eating the beans. Those who were fortunate enough to have hidden stores of salt pork added cubes to the beans. From that day forward, the peas were said to represent good fortune. Regardless of how the survivors felt about the peas, they certainly kept the people from starving.
Some still cook the black eyed peas with a silver coin in the pot as a symbol of good fortune!
Over time, other dishes were added to compliment the beans. Hopin John is a medley that contains a variety of beans, pork, rice, onions, jalepenos and other ingredients. Other dishes served with the peas are symbolic and represent good fortune, health, wealth, and prosperity in the coming year.
Greens represent wealth and paper money. Any greens will do, but in the South the most popular are collards, mustard greens, turnip greens, and cabbage.
Cornbread – a regular staple among Southerners in the absence of wheat – symbolizes gold and is very good for soaking up the juice from the greens on the plate.
Pork symbolizes bountiful prosperity, and then progressing into the year ahead. Ham and hog jowls are typical with the New Year meal, though sometimes bacon will be used, too. Pigs root forward, so it’s the symbolic moving forward for the New Year.
Tomatoes are often eaten with this meal as well. They represent health and wealth.
So reflect on those stories when you sit down at your family table and enjoy this humble, uniquely Southern meal every New Year’s Day. Be thankful for what this year did give you in spite of the bad, and hope and pray for better days that are coming ahead for you. This was what your Southern Kinfolk did and reflected upon every year
I have Black eyed peas every New year and sometimes during the year II like them. My past Brother in-law said they taste like dirt.
Very interesting read. Thanks
I think your BIL is 100% correct.
That is what makes them even more special. I would’ve probably done a little hunting if by chance the yankees had left anything. One thing I am trying to figure out is where did the rice come from? Lousiana produces a lot of rice, so it might have something to do with that?