Miller - Soul food: the surprising story of an American cuisine, one plate at a time

What comes to mind when you hear the words soul food? Does your mouth water as you visualize the images of familiar food items taking shape? Do you recall the aromas, sounds, and tastes of a Sunday dinnerall the culinary artifacts of a grandmothers love? Or maybe you picture a celebrity chef or television personality who is an unabashed soul food evangelist? Do you see the facade and neon lights of the last soul food in a restaurant you patronized, or perhaps the cozy interior of someones home? Or does your mind turn to thoughts of death as if a heart attack, cancer, diabetes, or some other chronic disease could be served to you on a plate? If your mind went completely blank or you had to grope for answers, dont feel too badits symptomatic of the current state of this particular cuisine. In our food-obsessed times, soul foodthe food most associated with one of Americas most conspicuous racial groupsremains unknown to some, unfamiliar to many, and unappreciated by most.

It never occurred to me that soul food needed a biographer until I stumbled across John Egertons 1993 book Southern Food: At Home, on the Road, in History. In that book, Egerton penned the Those words instantly piqued my curiosity and inspired me to take a closer look at African American cuisine.

This is the story of soul food. Down through history, African American cuisine has gone by several names since enslaved West Africans arrived in British North America: slave food, the masters leftovers, southern food, country cooking, home cooking, down home cooking, Negro food, and soul food. Those are the more polite names that have been used. Of them, southern food and soul food are the labels most used, but they also tend to confuse. This book explores where southern food ends and soul food begins, and why soul food became the most recognized aspect of African American cooking. My hope is that by sharing the intriguing story of how soul food developed, people of all stripes will be more apt to try this cuisine. Soul foods not in immediate danger of becoming extinct, but it certainly faces the prospect of being needlessly obscure. That can change if stereotypes of and negative associations with soul food become perishable items instead of something processed for a long shelf life.

Chasing down the soul food story required me to break cornbread in many placessometimes literally, but mostly metaphorically. I consumed the culinary history works of Jessica Harris, Judith Carney, Fred Opie, Howard Paige, and Diane Spivey. I read and cooked out of too many cookbooks to remember. I drew upon my own memories and mined the memories of others. The most gratifying research was done at the tablein homes where traditional cooking is still practiced and at soul food restaurants whose numbers are thinning.

For the past decade, Ive peppered a lot of peopleimmediate family, countless relatives, the congregation at Campbell Chapel A.M.E. Church (my home church), friends, dates, Facebook friends, Twitter followers, and strangerswith random questions about what they ate during their childhood and what soul food means to them now. Soul food would never have tugged at my curiosity if my parents, Hyman and Johnetta Miller, had not fed me soul food while I was growing up in a suburb south of Denver, but far removed from the South. I dedicate this book to them. All of the above has been a blessing beyond measure. My jar of bacon grease (on the back of the stove) truly runneth over!

I thank the following folks who gave me shelter as I traveled around the United States assessing the state of soul food: Eric Ames, Brett Anderson and Nathalie Jordi, Rachna and Rajeev Balakrishna, Gary Blackmon, Hieu Dang, Joel and Freddi Felt, Martha Foose, Shailu Halbe and Manju Kulkarni, my Aunt Joyce Halsey, Martha Hopkins, Nelson Hsu, Kimberly Kho, Judy and James Justice, Al and Fran Lanier, Mary Beth Lasseter, my loving twin, April Miller-Cook, my cousin Antoinette Miller, Prakash Mehta and Shefali Shah, Terry and Carolyn Murphy, Paul and Joy Martin, Linda Paulson, and Tammy Svoboda and Sandra Wray-McAfee. I truly appreciate Rhonda Andrew, Jim Auchmutey, Sheri Castle, Angela Cooley, Ajay Dandavati, Grace and Damian Dobosz, Charla Draper, Karen Edwards, John Egerton, John T. Edge, Lolis Elie, Fatima Ford, James Foy, Jessica Harris, James Keown and Joette Bailey Keown, Jan Longone, the late David Walker Lupton for graciously sharing his astounding historical bibliography of African American cookbooks, Toni Tipton Martin, LaRuth McAfee, Nancie McDermott, my brothers Hyman Miller Jr. and Kenny Lloyd, Gloria Montgomery and family, Michelle Oakes, Sandy Oliver, Fred Opie, Cathleen Price, Susan Puckett, Katie Rawson, Leni Sorensen, Ellen Sweets, Carol Titley, Bob Underwood, Ari Weinzweig, the staff at the Denver Public Library, and countless others for their willingness to entertain my random questions or impromptu dinner invitations, for their wise on-the-spot counsel, helpful suggestions, support, and not-so-random acts of kindness when I needed them.