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Stuffed Okras, Virginia
Trim off both ends of thirty-six fresh okras. Heat one and a half tablespoons melted butter in a saucepan, add two ounces raw Virginia ham cut in small square pieces, nicely brown for five minutes, then add the okras. Season with a half teaspoon salt and three saltspoons pepper, pour in two gills tomato sauce, mix well, cover pan, let boil for five minutes on range, then set in oven for forty-five minutes. Remove, dress okras in a vegetable dish, sprinkle a little parsley over and serve.
A braise rather than a stuffed dish despite the title — the okra pods are trimmed whole and stewed with ham in tomato sauce. Two points of translation matter: the volumes, and the fact that the oven temperature is never given.
- Gills and saltspoonsA gill is half a cup, so two gills of tomato sauce is one cup. A saltspoon is a quarter teaspoon, making three saltspoons of pepper about 3/4 teaspoon — assertive but not a misprint.
- The unnamed ovenNo temperature or oven term is given anywhere in the recipe. A moderate oven, around 350F, is a reasonable modern reading: the pan is covered and already boiling when it goes in, so this is a slow braise, not a roast.
- Nothing is stuffedThe title does not match the method; nothing is hollowed or filled. Trim the ends only, keep the pods whole, and do not slit them — cut okra releases far more mucilage into the sauce.
- Raw Virginia ham"Raw" here means uncooked dry-cured country ham, not fresh pork. Two ounces of prosciutto or a genuine salt-cured country ham is the right substitute; supermarket wet-cured "Virginia ham" is already cooked and will add water rather than salt and depth.
- Salt with cautionThe half teaspoon of salt was written for a ham of unknown saltiness. Brown the ham first, taste the fat, then salt at the end.
- Forty-five minutesFar longer than the few minutes modern recipes give sauteed okra, and this braise will produce very soft pods, which appears to be what the recipe intends; if you want them to hold shape, check at twenty minutes.
- Quantity and yieldThirty-six small pods is roughly 1 to 1 1/2 lb; the recipe gives no yield, but that is enough for four to six as a side. Choose pods under four inches; large ones turn woody and fibrous no matter how long they cook.
Okra came to the American South through the Atlantic slave trade from West Africa, where the plant and several of its names — including okra, generally traced to Igbo okuru — originate. By the nineteenth century it was fixed in Virginia and Carolina kitchens, often paired with tomato and cured pork, the combination that appears here. The International Cook Book was compiled by Alexander Filippini, long a chef at Delmonico's in New York. The recipe's reliance on Virginia ham as a seasoning meat rather than a main ingredient is the most Southern thing about it: a couple of ounces of salt-cured pork standing in for stock, salt and fat all at once.