“The kiss of the sun for pardon, the song of the birds for mirth, one is nearer God’s heart in a garden than anywhere else on earth.” – Dorothy Frances Gurney
I have a picture of me years ago with out garden, but of course, I couldn’t find it. Instead, I found this one of Mom that I took back when I was a kid. Mom worked hard in the garden. We helped. Then she canned or froze the vegetables. We helped. And we learned. When I got married, I helped her in her garden and shared the produce or sass. Later we moved to our farm and had a garden of our own. Then my kids helped with the planting and picking and getting the sass ready to can or freeze. Now my son shares our garden here and his kids help.
My characters in my Appalachian books always have a sass patch for vegetables. The same as it was for us when my kids were younger, they need those vegetables or sass to keep good food on the table for their families. In A Chance for Kallie Mae, Kallie is picking beans and tomatoes and worrying about a drought has her sass patch drying up.
But why is it called a sass patch?
My research told me Appalachian people called vegetables sass and where those vegetable grew were sass patches. I use it in my stories because I like having mountain lingo in the stories. Not long ago, a reader asked me why vegetables are called sass. After writing five books set in the Appalachian region with various characters picking beans and tomatoes, I decided I should try to find out.
So, here goes with some of what I found out there on the great worldwide net.
Sass – a colloquial pronunciation of sauce. Sass (n.) as a colloquial variant of sauce (n.) is attested by 1775.
Oh, and why, would sauce mean “vegetables?”
The word sauce comes from the French sauce, kin to the Spanish (and Portuguese and Italian) salsa, all of which descend from Latin salsa, which is the feminine form of salsus “salted”. Salad, also, is descended from the Latin sal “salt”, which makes it an etymological sibling of sauce.
Here’s another explanation of the term “garden sauce” found in Betty Crocker’s Picture Cook Book, published in 1956
In the early days of our own country, vegetables were “garden sauce” or just “sass” to go with meat. Beets and carrots sometimes were referred to as “long sauce”, while onions and potatoes were “short sauce.” A vendor who sold vegetables from door to door was a “sauce man.”
While the word sauce had Latin roots, garden sauce is an American term which has several different spellings and pronunciations. You might find it as garden sars, and garden sarse, but the Appalachian old-timers liked sass. My characters and I do too. Sass. Sass patch.
“Gardens are not made by singing ‘Oh, how beautiful,’ and sitting in the shade.” – Rudyard Kipling
Have you ever picked sass for your dinner table or taken a hoe to the weeds in your sass patch?
Comments 14
I love my sass patch and frequently hoe in mine. Blessings & thanks for sharing.
Author
My son and I have been working hard to try to keep the weeds out of our sass patch this year, Lucy. Last year because of all the rain that kept us out of the garden and my son having some work trips, the weeds were awful. And our garden didn’t produce very well. It was either too hot, too weedy, too dry or too wet all year. This year the garden is looking better so far.
Yes ma’am I sure have! we have Green beans, tomatoes, potatoes, bell peppers ,carrots ,sweet potatoes ,green onions, beets and watermelon and cucumbers Have a Happy 4th of July
Author
I have grown all those things in my gardens over the years. I haven’t tried potatoes for a number of years because the potato bugs got so bad that I had to spray the bare ground just for the plants to grow. I never had much luck with carrots though. I did like having sweet potatoes, but before we fenced in the garden, the deer decided those vines were planted especially for them. Sounds as if you can have a feast out of your sass patch, Sarah.
I REMEMBER EXPERIMENTING WITH A FRENCH GARDEN.
YOU COULD DIG TO A DEPTH OF 12 INCHES, USE VERY ENRICHED
SOIL AND GET A HIGH YIELD FROM A SMALL AREA. IT WORKED! I BROUGHT IN FRESH VEGGIES FOR DINNER OF EVERY KIND. GROWING YOUR OWN IS SPECIAL FOR ME. IT CREATES A FEELING OF HOME THAT ONLY A SASS PATCH CAN GIVE. THANK YOU, ANN, FOR SUCH A RICH AND FUN HISTORY.
Author
There is something special about growing your own food or at least some of it, Mary Clare. A lot of people do container gardens or raised beds these days to do as you say and grow more in a small area. We haven’t had to do that since we have plenty of ground for a garden. Glad you enjoyed your sass patch even if it was much different from Kallie Mae’s.
I have to admit I wondered why Kallie called her garden a sass patch.
My dad always had a garden in our backyard of corn, beans, tomatoes, peppers. I helped some but really didn’t learn as much about gardening until my husband dug a vegetable garden in our yard. Each place we’ve lived we’ve at least had tomatoes and peppers growing but that last couple years we haven’t. This year would have been extra hard with the drought we’re experiencing. I can relate to Kallie looking at her sass patch and worrying about the bean plants drying up.
I’m thoroughly enjoying reading A Chance for Kallie Mae and anticipating how things will work out for each of the characters.
Author
I’m glad you are enjoying following along Kallie Mae’s story trail, Janet. It had to be especially hard for people like Kallie who depended on their sass patches for necessary food. They didn’t have the same options we have these days to head to the grocery store. They depended on what they could grow or gather for their food.
I’ve never heard it as a sass patch! I don’t have a garden. I have a black thumb, to be honest. My flowers have to be able to fend for themselves, and do well without much help from me, or they won’t last. I will water them until they’re established, but then they’re on their own. It’s so HOT now, our “feels like” temps have been triple digits for the last several weeks, and we’re supposed to be even hotter next week. We’re also supposed to be getting more rain, so I’ll just hope that the rain revives my plants!!
Author
I don’t have as good a touch with flowers as my sister who has a beautiful flower garden, Trudy. I try but sometimes my flowers don’t flourish. I have been watering things though because it’s hot and in the triple digit feels like temperature here too. Supposed to get back to more normal hot temperatures in the 80s next week. Hope you stay cool and that your plants get that needed drink of rain.
Now I’m wondering why vegetables were considered sauce. I just don’t get it. Also, is sass pronounced like sauce or like sass as in “Don’t sass me!” I’ve assumed the latter but now I’m not sure.
Author
I’m hearing it as sass as in don’t sass me, Lee. But the sauce is from thinking about the sauce that can make meal better. The vegetables were that extra that back in the day was that extra. Not sure I understand it enough either, but somehow words can take on different meanings for different people in different eras.
I have that saying on an embroidered sampler. Many moons ago when I had a house with a septic tank we had a barbecue in the backyard and tomato seeds fell and I had the best tomato plants ever!!! Unfortunately Uncle arthritis has caught up to me and I no longer can do vegetables. And with my landlord as Uncle Sam we’re not supposed to grow vegetables everything I have in my garden is pots. I mostly grow sunflowers and miniature roses.
Author
I’m not sure which saying you have on an embroidered sampler, but either quote could be a good one for a gardener, Marjorie. Sounds as if you had some good gardening years and still have a way of making your place beautiful with flowers. I have tried to grow miniature roses, but I don’t always have a green thumb for flowers.