Cornbread Nation 2

Description

Southern barbecue and barbecue traditions are the primary focus of Cornbread Nation 2, our second collection of the best of Southern food writing. "Barbecue is the closest thing we have in the United States to Europe's wines or cheeses; drive a hundred miles and the barbecue changes," writes John Shelton Reed. Indeed, no other dish is served a dozen different ways just between Memphis and Birmingham.

In tribute to what Vince Staten calls "the slowest of the slow foods," contributors discuss the politics, sociology, and virtual religion of barbecue in the South, where communities are defined by what wood they burn, what sauce they make, and what they serve with barbecue. Jim Auchmutey links barbecue to the success of certain Southern politicians; Marcie Cohen Ferris looks at kosher brisket; and Robb Walsh investigates why black cooks have been omitted from the accepted histories of Texas barbecue, despite their seminal role in its development.

Beyond the barbecue pit, John Martin Taylor sings the virtues of boiled peanuts, Calvin Trillin savors Cajun boudin, and Eddie Dean revisits his days driving an ice cream truck deep in the Appalachian Mountains. From barbecue to scuppernongs to popsicles, the forty-three newspaper columns, magazine pieces, poems, and essays collected here confirm that a bounty of good writing exists when it comes to good eating, Southern style.

Sujets

• Cooking

Informations

• Publié par: The University of North Carolina Press
• Date de parution: 27 janvier 2010
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9798890878823
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 3 Mo

Extrait

CORN BrEaD NATION2

Cornbread Nation John T. Edge, General Editor

The United States of Barbecue Edited by Lolis Eric Elie

Published in association with the

                     ,

Center for the Study of Southern Culture,

University of Mississippi,

by the

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Chapel Hill and London

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© 2004 Southern Foodways Alliance, Center for the Study of Southern Culture, University of Mississippi All rights reserved Manufactured in the United States of America Set in Minion, Goshen, and Rosewood types by Eric M. Brooks Title page and part title illustrations © Paula McCardle The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources.

This volume ofCornbread Nationwas underwritten, in part, by a gift from the Atticus Trust.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Cornbread nation 2: the United States of Barbecue / edited by Lolis Eric Elie. p. cm. “Published in association with the Southern Foodways Alliance, Center for the Study of Southern Culture, University of Mississippi.” Includes bibliographical references. 0-8078-5556-1 (pbk.: alk. paper) 1. Barbecue cookery—United States. 2. Food habits—Southern States. I. Elie, Lolis Eric. II. Southern Foodways Alliance. 840.367 2005 641.5'784—dc22 2004013682

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Introduction,1 Lolis Eric Elie

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The Land of Barbacoa,11 Bárbara Renaud González Barbecue Service,14 James Applewhite Caribbean Connection,16 Jessica B. Harris George Washington and Barbecue,19 Mary V. Thompson An Ode to the Pig: Assorted Thoughts on the World’s Most Controversial Food,23 Bethany Ewald Bultman The Georgia Barbecue,30 Maude Andrews

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Dixie’s Most Disputed Dish,37 Rufus Jarmon Texas Barbecue in Black and White,48 Robb Walsh

The Rhetoric of Barbecue: A Southern Rite and Ritual,61 Stephen Smith Politics and Pork,69 Jim Auchmutey Barbecue Sociology: The Meat of the Matter,78 John Shelton Reed In Xanadu Did Barbecue,88 Ripley Golovin Hathaway We Didn’t Know from Fatback: A Southern Jewish Perspective on Barbecue,97 Marcie Cohen Ferris By the Light of the Moon: The Hash Pot Runneth Over,104 Saddler Taylor The Ribs Hit the Fan,108 Max Brantley

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Cheer Up Mama,113 Peter Kaminsky When Pigs Fly West,121 Lolis Eric Elie Whole Hog,130 Jeff Daniel Marion Kicking Butt,135 Matt McMillen

Real Barbecue Revisited,138 Vince Staten To the Unconverted,141 Jake Adam York

  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . In the Kitchen,145 Linda Parsons Marion Willodene,146 Juliana Gray Creole Contretemps,151 Brett Anderson The Viking Invasion,160 Molly O’Neill Never Give a Child an Artichoke,171 Jenine Holmes The Power of Memory and Presence,172 Randy Fertel The Hamburger King,181 William Price Fox End of the Lines?,186 Pableaux Johnson Catfish People,199 Earl Sherman Braggs

  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . And the Band Played On: Taylor Grocery, Mississippi,203 Sarah Thomas Open House,205 John T. Edge

Learning and Loafing at Tennessee’s Oldest Business,211 Fred W. Sauceman

  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Roadside Table,219 Michael McFee What Abby Fisher Knows,220 Sara Roahen Ice Cream Dreams,223 Eddie Dean For the Love of Mullet,233 Diane Roberts Boiled Peanuts,239 John Martin Taylor The Fruits of Memory,246 Amy E. Weldon Missing Links: In Praise of the Cajun Foodstuff That Doesn’t Get Around,250 Calvin Trillin Women Who Eat Dirt,257 Susan Allport Rich and Famous,270 Julia Reed Love, Death, and Macaroni,273 Pat Conroy

Contributors,277 Acknowledgments,281

Illustrations appear after pages120and216.

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Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .             

I was born happily in New Orleans. I was only dragged into the South thirty- some years later unwittingly and uneasily by the Southern Foodways Alliance. The difficulty was not a matter of geography. One of the advantages of liv- ing in New Orleans is that you can hop in a car or on a plane and in a matter of hours, you’ve traveled from the northern Caribbean to the southern United States, from sugarcane to cotton, from crawfish to catfish. Indeed, I had vis- ited the South many times and even spent three years of my youth exiled in that region’s capital, Atlanta. No, the difficulty was a matter of identity, or more precisely, a matter of navigating the long list of identities available in America to find that one that best correlated with my own personal set of idiosyncrasies. I suppose in those pre-Southern days, I was something of a Creole. Neither of my parents would embrace the term, but that was no impediment to my appropriation of the birthright. The Africans and Europeans whose cultures combined to form Creole identity were often less than wild about their café au lait progeny. Thus the Creole credo has always been that the great, grand whole is infinitely superior to the sum of the little parental parts. So whenever there was a North-South debate about culture, sports, or politics, I lofted above the fray, confident that New Orleans was superior in all matters that mattered—food, music, architecture, and, of course, attitude. I was a New Or- leans nationalist, utterly convinced that my city-state and certain other choice morsels of southern Louisiana territory should be considered in their own separate sphere. I believed that certain self-evident truths needed to be re- examined, namely this notion that the American Purchase of the Louisiana Territory was such a great deal. (While the Americans have profited hand- somely from the transaction, try as I might, I have failed to see any advantage in it for my people.) In 1998 I was invited to speak at the second annual Southern Foodways Alliance symposium. The topic of that year’s event was Creolization, and I

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