Soul Food
- Darius Stuckey
- Feb 10, 2023
- 2 min read
Food is a way to connect and express feelings. It plays a huge role in defining historical and cultural backgrounds. For African Americans soul food is one way to describe our culture. Passed through many generations, the term became a major use for black pride in the mid 1960’s and originated in the rural south of the United States. It was a way for enslaved Africans to pass down traditions to their descendants when they were brought to the U.S.
Louisiana is the state best known for soul food, though the cooking happens all over the U.S. now. It all typically happens at home or during family gatherings. You’ll notice all types of recipes including fried or smothered chicken, macaroni and cheese, collard greens, baked beans, cornbread, candied yams, and many other foods. Not only do we cook foods but we like to add in desserts too. A lot of popular ones cooked are banana pudding, sweet potato pie, peach cobbler, red velvet cake, apple pie, strawberry rhubarb cake, banana bread, along with others. The beverages are pretty much open to anything but at a black family function you’ll mainly find sweet tea, water, and some ice buckets with cans of soda.
There is not a set recipe for all the different kinds of foods. Many black people find ways to make it into their own to pass down their family generations while also keeping it traditional to their ancestors. Many cooks also change some things to the recipe for maintaining a good blood pressure, keeping the fat low, and other health factors. Some will do light salt, less canola and vegetable oils, and more lean cuts of meat. Some cooks also manage to find a way to equivalate vegetarian meals to soul food. While others like to spice it up and add more to the traditions, spicy vinegar based pepper salt is still the most used condiment.
Soul food is still rapidly growing all around. You can find many restaurants with soul food in major areas with high or average black populations. The food was also brought to Central Ohio. Some popular restaurants called Madison Soul Food Kitchen, La Glory’s Soul Food Cafe, Str8 Out the Kitchen, Lawshea’s, etc. Below are some of the websites that you should definitely try out to see what Soul Food is all about!
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