Virginia Willis - Secrets of the Southern Table: A Food Lovers Tour of the Global South

F rom the rolling hills and hollows in Appalachia to the flat salt marshes of South Carolina to an urban farm in metro-Atlanta, the South has a strong tradition of good food and generous hospitality. The region is well known for fried chicken, grits, and biscuits (and there are irresistible recipes for those inside this book), but there are some Southern foodways that many may find surprising: There have been Chinese Americans living in the Mississippi Delta since the 1800s; at one time more Italians lived in New Orleans than New York City; and an Atlanta suburb is known as the Seoul of the South. The South is rich in cultural diversity and the food of the modern global South reflects this.

Here, with her signature charm and wit, chef and award-winning cookbook author Virginia Willis shares a one-of-a-kind collection of classic and new recipes: Pimento Cheese Tomato-Herb Pie, Chicken and Butterbean Paella, West African Chicken Stew, Greek Okra and Tomatoes, Mississippi-Style Char Siu Pork Tenderloin, Brown Butter and Thyme Whole-Grain Cornbread, Catfish Tacos with Avocado Crema, and much more. Along the way, she introduces you to the Southern farmers, purveyors, chefs, and small-business owners who are growing and making this extraordinary food.

Stunning documentary photography by renowned Southern photographer Angie Mosier transports you across the South and the seasons to Floridas gulf coast, the Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia, and the farms and fields of Louisiana, Georgia, Mississippi, the Carolinas, Texas, and Tennessee. Together, these stories and the recipes that accompany them celebrate the delicious diversity and ever-evolving heritage of Southern cooking.

Copyright 2018 by Virginia Willis

Photography 2018 by Angie Mosier

All rights reserved.

For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book, write to or to Permissions, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 3 Park Avenue, 19th Floor, New York, New York 10016.

hmhco.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Willis, Virginia, 1966 author. | Mosier, Angie, photographer.

Title: Secrets of the southern table a food lovers tour of the global South / Virginia Willis ; photography by Angie Mosier ; foreword by Sean Brock.

Description: Boston : Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2018. | Includes index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2017059031 (print) | LCCN 2017051914 (ebook) | ISBN

9780544931831 (ebook) | ISBN 9780544932548 (paper over board)

Subjects: LCSH: Cooking, AmericanSouthern style. | CookingSouthern

States. | LCGFT: Cookbooks. Classification: LCC TX715.2.S68 (print) | LCC TX715.2.S68 W5564 2018 (ebook) | DDC 641.5975dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017059031

Book design by Rachel Newborn

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In hope of a nation where, in the words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., people will be judged not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.

I n 2011, I sat trembling with fear on a panel in Tokyo with some of the worlds best chefs. We were all there to experience Japan and create a meal inspired by our experiences at the weeks end. As I stood in front of the sea of Japanese journalists during a press conference, one reporter asked me why I had been chosen to participate since Southern food was merely ketchup on smoked meats and fried chicken. Her question was an earnest one and I sensed no condescension in her voice. KFC and the Colonel are often synonymous with Southern food, both outside the United States and within it as well. Regardless of her intention, it felt like I had been punched in the heart. There is a misconception around the world that Southern food is a singular cuisine. In my opinion, its one of the globes most misunderstood cuisines. In reality, the South makes up nearly 40 percent of the U.S. population and covers nearly 1 million square miles. If you were to break off the South from the rest of the United States and cut and paste it next to Europe, you would see in relation its size. Then think about how many cuisines make up Europe. People dont use the term European cuisine, for instance. Europe is known for its multitude of distinct and delicious cuisines. I believe the American South isnt far behind.

Virginia and I both grew up uniquely Southern. We both got our start knee-high to a grasshopper in the kitchen, schooled in the art of biscuit-making by our grandmothers. We also both experienced vastly different cuisines and cultures within the South: Virginia moved from Georgia to the Bayou as a young girl, and I moved from the Appalachian Mountains to the Low Country as a teen. Experiencing micro-regions and micro-cuisines from an early age led to an understanding of the role and value of immigrants in the culinary and cultural diversity of the South. The food that I smelled and tasted in Charleston on my first trip was worlds apart from my grans table in Appalachia. I was dumbfounded and not much has changed since thenI hope to spend my life experiencing these kinds of discoveries.

Those who sought a new life in the American South brought with them the agricultural practices, flavors, seeds and seasonings, ingredients, and the soul of their homelands. Each region in the South is home to a distinct mix of immigrants, and therefore cultural influences. If you break down each micro-region like we do at Husk, youll quickly realize that there are micro-cuisines within micro-cuisines. Despite its short history, the South had one of the first recognizable cuisines in America, and it changed as the country changedspurred by pivotal events like the abolition of slavery and the great depression. Fast forward to 2018, and its fascinating to take the same look at the micro-regions and who is living where now. The settlers gave way to the thriving Vietnamese community in Houston and the Kurdish influence in Nashville, while the Creole of Louisiana and the Gullah Geechee traditions in Charleston continue to shine. As immigrants began to combine their flavors with the ingredients of their newfound home, a new multicultural South was born.

I often ask myself what the future of Southern food is. The answer to that question begins in these pages. Virginia examines the individual relationships in each region, and then steps back to showcase the cultural and culinary diversity of the South as a whole. The future of the South is as multicultural as anywhere in the country. Secrets of the Southern Table examines the possibilities of a fully realized welcome table where everyone adds some wisdom to the skillet. Food unites us and sparks the dialogues that need to happen, even the difficult ones. The future of Southern foodways is exhilarating, intriguing, and insanely delicious. A hot wedge of cornbread with kimchi sounds good to me. I cant wait for you to dig in to this book and start exploring.