Slaw Abiding Citizens: A Quest for the West Virginia Hot Dog →

We arrived at the small country store at dusk, giddy for our first hot dog. The hand-painted sign outside Buddy B’s in Sissonville, West Virginia, advertised fresh produce, pinto beans and cornbread, and “Best In Town Hot Dogs.” Inside, bulk seeds, bags of peanuts, and jars of penny candy lined the red gingham–papered walls, and a cash register and food counter stood on either side of the door. We gawked like tourists at the hot dog clock and hand-painted hot dog sign, outlined by the triple-underlined text, try our hot dogs they are go-o-o-o-d. As the cashier-cook prepared our dogs, we surreptitiously took pictures.

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Ramp Fingerprints: Field Notes from the Helvetia Ramp Supper →

The last Friday in April, I drove along the Buckhannon River through the village of Helvetia, West Virginia to the coat of arms-adorned community hall in the center of town. Though I’ve been visiting the Swiss-German community for five years now— first as a tourist, then as a journalist, and now as a folklorist— this was my first time here in the spring. Having previously contended with whiteout blizzards just to make it to the 59-resident town perched in a high mountain valley, I was struck by how lush and alive everything seemed. Spring ephemerals dotted the roadsides, locals were out walking and doing yard work, and the distinctively pungent smell of ramps wafted out from the kitchen of the hall.

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Pop Culture: Southern Soda Vinegars →

Travis Milton greets me at the door of his Richmond, Virginia, house, bearded and burly in a plaid shirt, horn-rimmed glasses, and a “Virginia is for lovers” ball cap. Peeking out from his rolled-up shirt sleeve is a tattoo of his great-grandfather’s farm logo surrounded by vegetables. He offers me whiskey before I’m through the door, and I spy his collection of Star Wars and Ghostbusters action figures in the next room. As we cross the hall, he reverently points out his grandmother’s last written recipe hanging in a small wooden frame among family photos and album covers—Rick James, Hank Williams, and Thin Lizzy.

In the living room, he’s piled at least a dozen notebooks of varying sizes on the coffee table, their open pages revealing scrawled handwriting and sketches of kitchen layouts. I’ve heard about these notebooks before. When I first met Travis at Comfort, where he was executive chef, he told me that he keeps 19 journals in various locations—restaurant kitchen, home kitchen, glove compartment, and nightstand. When ideas strike, he records them before they flit away.

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Something Good from Helvetia →

Helvetia, West Virginia, is not a town you can just happen upon. About 30 miles south of Buckhannon and 40 miles southwest of Elkins (you know where those are, right?), the journey to Helvetia is a long and winding mountainous route up County Route 46. Even when you get there, it would be easy to blow right through town, were it not for the Swiss Alpine–style buildings peppered along the roadside.

The village was settled in 1869 by Swiss immigrants, many of them craftsmen, who had immigrated to Brooklyn, New York, during the Civil War. In Brooklyn, they formed a society of Swiss and German speakers called the Gruetli Verein, and together sought a place where they could live freely and practice their respective art forms. One of their members had done some surveying in West Virginia and spoke of the large tracts of land, beautiful mountains, and plentiful forests of game. The group eventually found cheap land for sale in the area and decided to establish a village, calling it Helvetia, the Latin name for Switzerland.

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Women at Work: Wrapping up “Give Me Some Sugar” →

For the past 3 months, I’ve been talking with women pastry chefs from across the South for the Southern Foodways Alliance’s series “Give Me Some Sugar.” One of the questions I asked each chef was how being a woman has informed—or hasn’t informed—her work. I asked this, fully understanding that the question has its problems (as described by this Eater piece that was published when I was working on the series), as it marks women as an “other” in the professional culinary world, where women chefs are no longer a rarity.

But I still wanted to ask the question. I knew some might feel indifferent, but also thought that particularly in the world of baking, a realm that at least in the home sphere is still commonly associated with women, that it might elicit some interesting responses. And though a few did laugh at the question, it evoked some powerful stories in others.

Read on via The Southern Foodways Alliance

Give Me Some Sugar: Tandra Watkins →

Who: Tandra Watkins
Where: Ashley’s at the Capital Hotel, 111 West Markham St., Little Rock, AR

When Tandra Watkins described a childhood berry-picking memory, I felt like she was describing one of my own. “I grew up in the country and remember picking blackberries on the side of the dirt road we lived on. We brought them home and turned them into pies, and even had enough leftover to make jam. It was a simple, nice life—I don’t live that way anymore, and I don’t think many people do. But my parents were very involved with food and family.”

Though I grew up in a small city—the dirt road where we picked berries was on a friends’ farm that we visited frequently, this is one of my favorite food memories and serves as a basis for my approach to food, much like it does for Watkins. It’s one centered in whole foods, tradition, and creativity.

Read on via The Southern Foodways Alliance

Give Me Some Sugar: Dolester Miles

Who: Dolester Miles
Where: Highlands Bar and Grill; Bottega, Birmingham, Alabama

One of my favorite themes to explore in my research and writing is the idea of women’s domestic creativity, acknowledging the home as a place of empowerment for creative pursuits. In the days when fewer women held “public work,” the home provided a non-commercial space for practice and experimentation, where women could hone a variety of skills—from cooking to quilting—and share them in a supportive environment. Domestic creativity is alive and well today, too: It could mean making a pie with the ingredients in your pantry, holding a community dinner out of your kitchen to raise money for a cause, or hosting a creative writing group in your living room.

Pastry chef Dolester Miles remembers her mother as a beacon of domestic creativity in their family’s Bessemer, Alabama, home. “She used to make us pecan pies, lemon meringue pies, and peach cobblers, with fresh homemade ice cream and fresh fruit from local farmers,” recalls Miles.

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Give Me Some Sugar: Carla Cabrera-Tomasko →

Who: Carla Cabrera-Tomasko
Where: Bacchanalia, 1198 Howell Mill Road, Atlanta, GA

“The Global South” is a popular concept in cultural studies these days. Simply put, it’s a way to compare cultural, political, historical, and socioeconomic trends among the world’s many “Souths”—places like Southeast Asia, Latin America, the Caribbean, and sub-Saharan Africa. Here at home, examining the Global South also means looking at international influences on American Southern culture—as well as the American South’s cultural influence on other parts of the world. In 2010, the Global South was the theme of the Southern Foodways Alliance’s annual symposium, and featured talks on topics ranging from the Cuban influence on Floridian cuisine, to Croatian and Vietnamese shrimpers in Mississippi, to the African origins of rice production in the Lowcountry of South Carolina and Georgia.

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Give Me Some Sugar: Sonya Jones →

Who: Sonya Jones
Where: Sweet Auburn Bread Co., 234 Auburn Ave NE, Atlanta, GA

When asked to name her favorite dessert, Sonya Jones, pastry chef and owner of Sweet Auburn Bread Co. in Atlanta, has a hard time. “That’s like choosing between your children!” she says, laughing. But slowly it emerges that—though she loves her buttermilk–lemon chess pies, sweet potato–molasses muffins, and pecan brownies—she does have a clear preference. “Growing up, there was always cake in the cupboard, and it was usually pound cake. I remember the old women on our street who would make it. I love seeing pound cake come out of the oven.”

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Give Me Some Sugar: Lauren Mitterer →

Who: Lauren Mitterer
Where: WildFlour Pastry, 73 Spring Street, Charleston, SC

When pastry chef Lauren Mitterer opened Charleston’s WildFlour Pastry in 2009, she set out to make a big impact with a small shop. She offered handmade baked goods for every occasion, from Sunday-morning sticky buns to fancy wedding cakes. “My vision for WildFlour was to create a place that people could come to, be part of the community, and really connect with one another through baking.”

Read on via The Southern Foodways Alliance