We learned enough about Savannah ahead of time through this board to make our one day trip a great success! Thanks to everyone!

What we found on our own, was a cooking demonstration/dinner with Chef Joe Randall. What a delightful evening! Ihad read about his classes in Southern Living and visited his website (www.cefjoerandall.com) and found a perfect evening for my husband and I to attend. The class was full (20 students) on a Wed evening. His menu was great southern cookin'. This yankee had never experienced Smothered Shrimp on Grits, Fried green tomatoes with homemade buttermilk dressing and we loved the crab cakes and peach cobbler. The students were all friendly and with a little wine purchased separately, it was one of the highlights of our trip.
I highly recomend this!

Smothered shrimp on grits?

Do you mean shrimp& grits? What was smothered about them?

Go Travel........."Smothered" is a cooking term that denotes a type of cooking. In this case, it's a gravy sort of thing. We also have smothered chicken, smothered steak. Good stuff!!

I haven't had a chance to take in Chef Randall's classes, but his reputations is really growing.

GoT..was it Louis Osteen that made that dish so popular first time around? I think it had cheese as well. Have you ever eaten at his place?

By the way...I didn't have a time to read your links on McClellanville when you first posted them but will do that. The deals we have passed up by being unable to commit to an area!! (Marshfront lot in Windmill Harbor, HH for 100,000 8 years ago was the last one!

We eat at Louis Osteen's place in Pawley's Island whenever we are down there and I've been eating shrimp and grits all my life and have never heard of smothered.

I know that smothered means gravy. It just sounds so yuk on already rich food.

OO, I'm trying to do the same thing with McClellanville. I could kick myself in the behind for passing up so many good real estate deals.

Let me know if you find any in Texas

I agree...smothered anything sounds yuck. I don't do smothered!

I'll post something on your McCleanville thread about the real estate deal (sounds too good to be true though) we read about here.

Never had shrimp and grits with gravy--not a good thing that.
Somehow I also think I would like something a bit more challenging for a chef's demo.
Cook grits with cream, add cheese, garnish with (preferably grilled) shrimp and bacon. Done.

Thank you Gretchen for confirming that I'm not losing my mind.

Us Yankees don't eat grits--the only way I ever had it was in a casserole with tons of garlic cheese and butter...so this was unique!

Here's the official:
"Sea Island Smothered Shrimp on Creamy Stone-Ground Grits"
Grits with butter and cream
and
Smothered Shrimp contains bacon, flour and vidalia onion as your gravy.

It was served as an appetizer so it was a small serving with about 4 shrimp.

This was not a fancy kitchen demo as much as it was a taste of the south and entertainment. But he sure did have a nice kitchen to do something fancy!

There is no better (or other for me) way to eat grits than with butter, salt, cheese, and heavy cream.

The sauce the shrimp are in are what you are referring to. Shrimp and grits aren't shrimp in or thrown over top of grits. There are in a sauce or gravy.

I don't understand. When I make shrimp and grits I am folding cooked shrimp into the creamy cheese grits. What are you doing? A sauce? Not for me.

There is a shrimp dish that uses a shrimp gravy. It is served over plain grits (don't fancy up those grits) or rice. The shrimp are dredged with corn meal and a little flour, fried slightly and set aside while a thick pan gravy is made from water or broth made from simmering the shrimp shells..and a flour roux. Then the shrimp are placed back in the gravy for a few minutes to finish cooking. This dish was known in the Low Country of South Carolina and Georgia as Monkey Stew. (don't ask me why. It's an old traditional name) It's another way of stretching a few shrimp to feed a lot of people. It's one of our families favorites.

Gretchen, I make my shrimp & grits very similiar to aileen's recipe, with a roux.

Nneve seen it that way.