25 Things Appalachian Grandmothers Saved That Americans Throw Away

Somebody is pouring bacon grease down the drain right now. Coffee grounds go in the trash, eggshells follow, and nobody thinks twice. Up in these mountains, a coffee can sat on the back of every stove, lid never fitting right, catching strained grease that fried eggs and potatoes all winter, blackened cast iron, greased hinges, softened chapped hands with a little beeswax. Eggshells dried on the windowsill, then went crushed into every tomato hole because of blossom end rot. Coffee grounds fed the blueberries, and wood ash got scratched in a cup at a time, never piled, because too much sweetens the ground until nothing grows. A freezer bag of bread heels turned into dressing, bread pudding, croutons, and the panade that held 2 lbs of ground beef together for a meatloaf that fed more people than the beef could. A bag of onion tops, carrot peels, and a Sunday chicken carcass simmered into broth, and a beef shank that cost 50 cents made soup 3 days running. Orange and lemon peels covered in white vinegar became a counter spray that cut grease a $12 bottle from the store would not touch. Onion skins dyed eggs amber for nothing. Newspapers lined the cellar stairs two and three thick under the potatoes, each apple rolled shut in newsprint so no two touched. A pint jar that never held peaches took skimmed fat and lye water trickled through hardwood ash and came out as soap. Behind the flour sack, wrapped in flannel and oiled with a rag, a knob of tallow the size of a walnut came down every late October for stove hinges, boot leather, an axe handle, and a kid's knuckles. And past that, a tin of seed envelopes labeled in pencil, half planted and half kept, the reason a family squash older than the house is still in the ground and beans from one saved vine are growing in the next county.