I honor of Black History Month can we discuss "Black Food"

I put that in "" because I didn't know how best to describe it.

Okay today at work is our Black History Month pot luck luncheon-one of the great perks about working where I do (I am in a vast minority being both white and male)the costumes and songs and readings are like one big HUGE church service really something to behold.

Anyway I was asked what dish I had brought. Anything from a "Funeral meal" would have sufficed but I forgot about it.

First off-GREENS
I am sorry but no matter how they are made they still tasted like lawn clippings to me. I don't care if they are #10 Greens or not.

"Fish"
This is an inside joke with my co-worker and myself.

What are you having for lunch today?
Fish.
:eyes:

Really what kind of "FISH"? You don't say you are having "cow" for lunch do you?

I have just come to find out that there is a "butter fish" that two people were only able to describe to me as a "small fish" that's it. I looked it up and there is a "butter fish" but usually such specifics are not necessary when "fish" is the topic.

Last

I might need some help with this one

"port salad" or "pork salad" apparently is a plant/weed that is cooked in some way. The two people I asked about this didn't agree on what it was actually called but I understand that it is like a "Dandelion salad".

:shrug:

which is made from very young pokeweed shoots. The mature plant is poisonous. I've never tried it.

...these are parentheses () and these are quotation marks ""

I love greens, collard greens, turnip greens... YUM!

What?

"evilgrin"

:hi:

Mustard greens with some vinegar happen to be my favorite.

Link: http://www.answers.com/poke%20salad


Ed: Never mind, the link won't work.

:D

There's a soul food place out by the Port of Houston that serves the BEST buffet lunch: cornbread, all kindsa greens, pork, beef, catfish, beans, EVERYTHING. Perfectly salted, greased, and just plain GOOD. :9

Dayum, I want to go there for lunch now....

A good peach cobbler will bring me running.

:9

mmmmmmm

I'm fairly new to Houston and it sounds like a place I'd like to try.

I'd appreciate that.

Never eaten it but I have heard the Elvis P. song 'Polk Salad Annie'. :dunce:

pork
port
poke
polk

http://www.recipesource.com/fgv/salads/01/rec0134.html


edit: a *poke* salad is also called a nooner in some regions. :evilgrin:

I don't suppose licorice counts does it. I had grits once, but I think that is more 'Southern' than 'Black.' What do I know - I'm north of the 49th.

are basically the same thing, it's just that southern people don't like it when you call their cooking "soulfood", that's where the southern designation comes in. i made the mistake of calling my gramma's curly kale soulfood one time, and boy did i get corrected.

now when you see something like: "sage & thyme rubbed barbecue veal tenderloin, texas style" that's not southern, it's yuppie.

i had grits once too, they taste like tile glue to me.

First, get you some salt pork. Cut you up that salt pork into some slices. Throw that salt pork into a pot and render it out.

Warsh them greens smartly, to get them gritty things out of them. Then, take a handful of them and cut off them stems. Then take the leaves and roll them up into a cylinder. Then, starting at one end, start slicing them greens and then, when you are done, chop them into littler pieces, a bit. Them leaves are big and you don't want "greens spaghetti". Do it till all them leaves are chopped up. Make sure the fatback grease is hot. Throw some red pepper into the hot grease and let it cook a moment. Make sure the fans are on. Whooee, that hot pepper smoke can be mighty irritatin'. Throw the chopped greens into the hot grease and slather them around for a moment. Add a bit of water. Slam a lid on that pot and reduce the heat. Cook until them greens are cooked.

Serve with Corn Bread and lots of pot liquor. Sop the pot liquor up with the corn bread. Eat the soppy corn bread.

You will start farting about an hour or two afterwards. So what? ;-)

still

I compared it to Conch which people go on and on about but no matter what you do to it-it itself is still tasteless and chewy.

Which greens were you eating and how prepared?

I rarely if ever cook my greens in meat, though I grew up eating them that way. They are basically tasteless

I prefer a mix of mustard greens with its sweet-hot bite, with the slightly tamer but tangy taste of turnip greens, sauteed in soy sauce, garlic, ginger and a bit of sesame oil and liquid smoke

Collards and kale to me taste blander and they are best sauteed or used like Swiss chard in soups

(but I guess you'd say these taste like seasoned grass clippings)....

Means you're getting enough fiber in your diet.

away from the dinner table....


Greens greens the more you eat,
Greens Greens the more you fart!
The more you fart, the better you feel,
So eat those greens at every meal!

Any Creole dish, for instance, rightly counts as "Black food", though I suppose it wouldn't seem to be what most people mean when they talk about "Soul Food".

Virginia

Yes Soul Food is apt as well. Should I change the subject line while I have the chance.

For the next Black food potluck, bring some really good, unexpected Black food. Everyone will be surprised and impressed!

I don't cook so well

yuck!!

I like them. They taste like licorice.

Black gumdrops are even better.

Wish I could find some sugarfree ones...

:9

I guess that's why I don't like black jelly beans!
:silly:

Especially with hot sauce. Actually I love all foods, I'm about the least picky person you will ever meet.

A black gentelman I used to work with loved Bratworst and Sauerkraut. He brought it for lunch at least once a week. :shrug:

Speaking as a white person, I love poke salad, mmm.. and Greens can be flavored with vineagar, that's how I eat them anyway. Sounds like a great lunch.

or not even have tried to name it.

Sorry that is just how I think of it. I tend to think that "Soul Food" is served in NYC or Chicago ---that's just me.

which IS much better than KFC.

By far better than either one IMHO

got actual chicken feathers on my chicken there once.

I do miss Church's chicken though.

chicken biscuit, french fries, dirty rice, sweet tea...
:9

Hey, when Oprah was in her "all she can eat" stage, she had a batch of this chicken flown to Chicago.

and ignorant? You're describing regional AMERICAN food - what's the big yuck yuck?

I read it as U.P. being just a regular white boy tryin' to broaden himself.

and regional food can be weird but the remarks about 'costumes' and such surrounding Black history month just don't read like self-deprecating humor.

Thanks, Ricardo.

I tried to word that delicately but I know some of what was meant was not going to come through no matter what I did.

I in no way mean it to be derogatory or demeaning-that is so against my nature that it is unimagineable. I meant it more as a celebration and a learning of things formerly unknown to me, aside from the "fish" thing which has been a running joke between me and my co-workers (almost all African American).

Didn't we have a discussion a while back about how whites now feel hardship or something like that?

Anyway, I read your post a few times fully expecting to be amused, actually. And, I even took into account that maybe you were aiming for something you didn't quite manage to pull off. However, I've been hearing a low murmer of resentment against celebrating differences, acknowledging history and 'special rights' lately and the awkward costume reference just didn't go down well. I sometimes wonder if as many Democrats as Republicans have scorn for anyone honoring anything other than the generic 'America' they believe exists.

How is it you're such a fish out of water at work, though? Did you move from another region? Formerly live in an all-white neighborhood? In our previous conversation - if that was you! - you said you worked around gays as well.

don't be so touchy.

With hot sauce no less. :P

then it was either a shitty batch or poorly prepared

It's too bad the OP thinks that what he calls "black food" is gross and the people who eat it are too ignorant to even know what they put in it ("fish" or "cow").

So from someone who grew up on it, here is a primer on soul food (our preferred term).

Feelingarfunkelly is probably closest to understanding soul food when he wrote that it is basically southern food. The cousines of white people and black people of the south have much more in common than differences. There are, however, some distinct differences, at least historically. Also, there are influences on southern food that are distinctly of African origin, so we can speak of white southerners eating African American food.

Southern food has several characteristics, compared to the food of other regions. Most obviously, southern food is heavily based on pork. This is not just a preference but was deeply ingrained in the southern economy. Unlike the mid west or northeast, the south devoted a huge proportion of its land to non-edible crops -- cotton, tobacco, sugar cane -- and imported a lot of basic food staples from the mid west -- especially dried corn and wheat. These were grown in the south, but not enough to feed the population of people and animals. The south was a food-poor society, and in general, both black and white farmers were poorer than in other regions. Discrimination, underfunding of education and other legacies of southern racism further impoverished both black and white poor farmers. People made dishes from what was available.

One of the thriftiest animals for converting food waste, and crop residue into food was the pig. Poor southern sharecroppers, black and white, rarely ate beef or other red meats. Southerners also used every part of the pig "except its squeel" as the old saying went -- fat for rendering, bristle for brushes, even ears and tails were eaten. Southern breads used pork fat, rather than butter, like the breads of other regions. Because of the abundant lard, southerners tended to fry more foods -- not just chicken, but fried fish, and fried breads (hoe cakes, fried corn bread, etc). Because of the lack of refrigeration, pork was converted to preserved smoked ham, hamhocks and bacon, which in turn was not just sliced and fried, but added to greens and other dishes.

One short excellent description of a dinner prepared by a poor white sharecropping family is in Let Us Now Praise Famous Men: Three Tenant Families by James Agee and Evans Walker. It is quite sad -- fried ham and a gravy made from the left over grease and with molasses added. This was sopped up with cornbread. Commentators in the late 19th and early 20th century often noted that southern cooking was very unhealthy. Southern turn of the century cousine of the majority of southerners would be almost unrecognizeable to fans of the Food Network's southern chefs -- a fairly unwavering diet of grits, cornbread, ham, bacon and rarely vegetables, often wild.

The first basic difference historically between white and black southern cooking was that soul food originally derived from cheaper and less desireable products as a result of the poverty and lack of choice of slaves. Chitlins (the intestine of the pig) for example was more associated with slaves and freemen after the civil war than with white southerners. Other cuts that developed into soul food included hog jowls, pig feet, and pig tail.

The last and maybe most important contribution of African Americans to souther cooking and the development of soul food is African influences. Okra and yams (sweet potatos) actually were brought from Africa and are mainstays of soul food. Cooking vegetables with hot peppers, meat and oil, also is a universal practice across West Africa and if you know soul food, you would be shocked to see how similar the preparation of collard greens is to West African casava leaf dishes.

By the early 20th century, southern living standards began to improve. Moreover, soul food was radically transformed when black people moved north and had more variety and higher incomes. Also important, black women worked as cooks in southern hotels and for northern and southern upper class families, introducing more variety, better ingredients and more healthful cooking methods.

Today soul food has a lot of variety, and is difficult to generalize about too much. It is a lot more like French cooking than other American cooking, being based on long cooked stocks, sauces and roues, and long braising for very tender meats. There is still a lot of fried food, although almost all meats rather than breads as in the past, and each family's fried chicken recipe is considered a secret treasure. It is still common to cook all kinds of greens, not just collards, with preserved meat and some source of hot pepper, although smoked turkey is replacing ham for health conscious families. In the northeast, the influx of Geechies, West Indians and Puerto Ricans into the black community has probably helped in the replacement of rice for cornbread and other corn based starches. Also in the northeast, salt water fish that are well suited to frying (porgy, whiting) have replaced fresh water fish that are good for frying (butter fish, cat fish).

-

Here in Houston, "soul food" & basic Southern food are quite similar. "Who learned what from from whom" is an interesting question--but the African-Americans were creating their cuisine when my ancestors were vainly looking for non-blighted potatos back in the old country. Generally soul food seems spicier but, here in Texas, even the "white" food is less bland than elsewhere in the country.

Barbecue is a variant--African-American roots with sausages brought from Centrel Europe to the Hill Country & cabrito from farther South.

Let's not forget Creole food, brought West from Louisiana. It mixes African, European & Native American influence & uses lots of seafood from the Gulf.

And the evolution continues--I had barbecued salmon on a bed of spicy greens for lunch.

Our OP is a good guy. Wish we could take him out to eat!

All that you described, I grew up on. In black cast iron skillets we could smell the aroma of fried corn bread with our black-eyed peas and catfish. To this day, my mother can not and will not prepare collards without adding some kind of meat. I do not eat pork (actually I don't like to eat meat at all) but we compromised on smoked turkey. The peach/blueberry cobblers were always my favorite.

The BBQ was always fun to make. The way my elders prepared it was open style, out doors, in a barrel (or drum) that was cut open. Coal, wood and just about everything you could find that would light a fire was used. Oh, mercy! The Saturday church dinners. To this very day, you can go in to any black community USA and buy a church dinner for about 7.00 that will feed a family of 4 (try it, you'll like it ;-)

This is an excellent summary of soul food. From slavery to modern day.

Great job!

Undergroundrailroad


Have Mercy!

(that's not a typo) and you call it "Soul Food." Foods associated with African Americans and the Black population in America are some of the purist form of American cuisine.

It is unfortunate that much of it is also quite unhealthy and no doubt contributes to the high rates of cancers and heart disease within that community.

Can't beat it for thrifty and satisfying comfort food, though.

This is the kind of meal that may be short on fresh fruit but LONG on taste!!! How I envy you to be part of a group like this!

Man, I'm thinking back to stuff I used to get to eat--like buttermilk fried chicken, cream gravy, fried Okra, and biscuits so light you had to eat three or four to be sure you'd had them! I'm thinking black eyed peas, greens with bacon, and potatoes and onions fried in bacon grease... Oh, and don't forget the Bread dressing, fried mush, and the dirty rice and several other things that would probably make my cholesterol count go off the charts.

Gawd, I really hate this middle age bullshit.

Enjoy your experiences, and you may want to check into the Sylvia's brand of "soul food" that they sell in some of the markets. It isn't home made, but it ain't bad, either, if you doctor it up a bit...


Laura

but you've got to cook them in some kind of pork fat. It's a pig fat thang honey...lots 'o salt and pork fat. Cook 'em slow, cook 'em low. Too good for anglo words.