Oh man, I'm another abhorrent Yankee who loves grits. (my mother can't even say the word without shuddering).
With tomato or olive oil, schmalz, or lard and good salt they are fabulous. Truffle oil, too. Sundried tomato and nutritional yeast makes an awesome fancy vegan grits. but I sure like just butter too.
I am literally making grits for dinner today instead of polenta to go with
chicken cacciatore (usually I would make polenta, but I found grits with the right texture recently and I just couldn't wait!)