For sure, you either like it or you don't. For many Northerners, Southern cuisine is almost a cultural shock. You can't spend a day in Atlanta without running into grits, country ham and red-eye gravy, warm peach cobbler and pecan pie. The latter desserts set well with most northerners because they are fairly familiar, but most southern food is cooked and seasoned differently. Northern hams and Southern hams are worlds apart in just about everything except genetics.
Southern hams are hard-cured, salty and brimming with flavor.
They must be cooked properly to be good. Red-eye gravy is made from the ham's pan drippings with a shot or two of black coffee. Potatoes in the South are more apt to be sweet potatoes rather than the white spuds, and the second most important starch of choice for breakfast is grits. Grits are dried, ground hominy and similiar in texture to corn meal. You will find plain grits accompanying country ham and sage-flavored sausage patties.