Fries and Gravy
Fries and gravy never seemed to me like a natural or particularly tempting combination, and I can honestly say that in my whole life I managed never to have experienced the whole fries and gravy “thing”. Until recently that is.
When we started on Grace’s cookbook project, people started popping out of the woodwork with their fond memories of Grace, the diner and their favourite dishes. Grace’s fries and gravy was mentioned over and over and was the subject of one particularly vivid message from a former Brock Road School student (the school was next door to Grace’s). Apparently, the kids from the school regularly sneaked over during the day to grab an order of fries and gravy, which would be reluctantly shared with the kids who were on lookout duty at the edge of school property. The student went on to describe how in his subsequent life he tried fries and gravy at many different places, but none matched Grace’s. He concluded with the hope that we would be supplying the gravy recipe in the cookbook. (You will find the whole story in the “Memories” chapter of the book.)
Well, we hadn’t really planned to include her gravy recipe in the book, Grace’s gravy was very simple and basic, but given the back story we figured we kind of had to re-think that decision. So Deb gave me the recipe, I made the gravy. It seemed fine, but as I’ve never been much of a gravy fan, I still wasn’t really “getting” it. I figured what I really needed to do was get some nice hot crispy fries and cover them with gravy. Off I went to the local diner for an order of fries, still piping hot when I got them home. Poured Grace’s hot beefy gravy over the fries and had a taste…
OMG!! I get it! Fries and gravy! I can’t believe I’ve gone my whole life depriving myself of this gourmet treat! (But you’ll still never get me to try snails, no matter how much gravy you pour over them!)
