Succotash

Fresh corn kernels (cut from the cob) and fresh or frozen lima beans (or butter beans), sautéed together in butter with salt, pepper, and sometimes diced onion or bell pepper. Optionally: diced salt pork or bacon rendered first, with the vegetables cooked in the rendered fat. The corn should be sweet and barely cooked; the limas should be tender but not mushy. The butter (or pork fat) coats both vegetables with a glossy richness.

Succotash — a dish of corn kernels and lima beans (or other shell beans) cooked together, often with butter and sometimes with salt pork — is one of the oldest continuously prepared dishes in North America. The name derives from the Narragansett *msickquatash* ("boiled corn kernels"). The dish predates European contact and was adopted by colonists who encountered it in the Northeast. Succotash is the simplest expression of the Three Sisters relationship (AM12-02) — corn and beans cooked together, providing complete protein — and it survives in American cooking as a Southern summer side dish made when both corn and lima beans are at their freshest.

1) Fresh corn and fresh limas are the standard — the dish is a summer celebration of the harvest. Frozen limas are the practical substitute; canned corn is not acceptable. 2) Cook briefly — both vegetables need only 5-8 minutes. Overcooking dulls the corn's sweetness and turns the limas mealy. 3) Butter is generous — the dish should glisten.