The Chicken and Noodles Are Served
Photos by Donna Campbell
They don’t advertise. They don’t have to. No road signs direct folks to the St. John’s Grange Homemade Chicken Noodle Supper in the Mount Pleasant community near Concord, NC. Everybody around here already knows it’s always the Saturday before Thanksgiving when the scratch-made egg noodles–rolled and cut and stowed away in two-pound bags in June by teams of local citizens–are finally brought back to the Grange kitchen to be cooked. (To read or revisit Food Pilgrim’s entry about the noodle making, click here.)
On Wednesday before the supper, volunteers acquired and distributed 30 chickens, split in half, to team members who cooked up the broth at home and shredded the chicken separately into bite-sized pieces. “Some folks pressure cook the birds and others boil them,” explains Meredith Harrison who is washing dishes in the Grange kitchen as the supper is being prepared. “But we don’t season the stew at all until the broth is boiling. Then the noodles are dropped in—one bag per pot.” The already-cooked and weighed chicken portions are added last.
The cooking crew is out back of the building now under a tent, stirring giant pots of stew over four propane grills. Noodle veterans John Swaringen and John Harrison have it down to a science. They explain that the chickens they procured this year from Chick-a-Ray Poultry in nearby Albemarle are old hens. They must be old hens. “Why?” I ask.
“Because they make the richest broth,” Meredith explains.
A line is forming at the front door and it’s not even 4 o’clock. Sharon Ritchie, one of the noodle makers we met on our first visit, is handling the money. She expects the big rush a bit later, once the Christmas parade in Concord disperses, and folks come streaming in for supper. To dine-in, the freewill donation suggested is $12 per person. Take out quarts of stew are $12. The proceeds go to various community groups. They are also serving hot dogs for two dollars and slices of homemade cake and pie for a dollar. Two kinds of tea—sweet and slightly sweet—are complimentary.
Sharon, who has already had her bowl of stew, is quick to tell us proudly that St. John’s has just been named a Distinguished Grange for 2024. One of only two in North Carolina. “It’s our ninth year in a row to win,” Sharon says. She went on stage in Raleigh to receive the award from the National Grange President a week ago. The National Grange organization, whose slogan is “elevating rural America,” has been around since 1867.
We order six quarts of stew to go, and before we can turn around, Avery, one of the handsome 12-year-old twins we met at the noodle making, has brought us a box full and will carry it to the car for us. He also quickly does the math for Sharon so I can write a check.
Raymond and Sadora Hayes come in the door. They are early patrons who have driven three hours from Sampson County down East to sample the stew they’ve heard about for years. Raymond is on the State Grange Board. “We are Grangers,” he says. Later, at the table and after receiving a big hug from a Mt. Pleasant friend, Sadora declares the stew delicious. Set out on each dining table is a bowl of Mt. Olive pickles and a sleeve of saltines.
Once the stew is stowed in the car, Donna and I decide to sample the hot dogs. We’ll have our stew later. Angie Hahn, who is serving the dogs, explains that the chili comes from Cruse, a meat packing plant near the Rowan County line. They also offer a topping of a slaw. It’s reddish, meaning there was ketchup involved in the recipe made famous by Lexington Barbecue, also just up the road.
The chili is the best I’ve had in a long time—granular with a hint of sweet and good heat—so good we decide to drive by the plant for a picture on the way home. “They have a little store and it serves as a butcher shop for the area,” Angie explains. Cabarrus County is, after all, a place where cattle, sheep, goats, and chickens are raised on family farms. And Katie Dulaney, the local Ag Education teacher whom we met last time, is here with her mom and dad, Jane and Keith Cauthen. Katie is helping the kids keep the take-out orders straight.
Jane Stancil is minding the cake table. “We got a couple of pies even though we asked people to make pound cakes,” she says, smiling at a gorgeous, uncut pecan pie and another fruit pie with a woven crust. There’s also red velvet cake and a range of glazes and flavors on the pound cakes. Jane points out that they have a couple of Sun Drop pound cakes. “If you don’t have Sun Drop, you are not up to speed,” she says. (Sun Drop is a soft drink once bottled in Concord and promoted by NASCAR driver Dale Earnhardt.) We buy a piece. Jane also gives us a free slice of another pound cake she says “fell and had a sad streak.” That’s cake maker talk for what turned out to be an extra moist and perfectly satisfying slice.
If it seems that Food Pilgrim has gone nostalgic this year in our choices of stories, it’s true. That bowl of chicken noodles, which we served up the minute we got back to Carrboro, was the very essence of comfort food, and much needed this month. The noodles were soft, not gummy, the chicken perfectly seasoned, and the broth an elixir to cure most any ailment. The six quarts will be shared broadly with friends.
Oh, and the morning after, we got word that all but 15 quarts of noodles had been sold by 7:30 at the end of the supper. The leftovers would go to Sunday School for purchase by those who missed the feast.
What a great story of community, and pride in what’s made close to home! Thanks so much for the warm read.
In Stokes County (just north of Winston-Salem), church and school groups make Moravian chicken pies and brunswick stew for sale around this time of year. I no longer live there, and I miss that good food!