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.

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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.

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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.”

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Give Me Some Sugar: Christina Tosi

Who: Christina Tosi
Where: Momofuku Milk Bar (Five locations in New York City)

You may know Christina Tosi for her whimsical, sugary creations like cereal milk (think the dregs of the cereal bowl in drinkable or soft-serve ice cream form), compost cookies, and crack pie—all of which she makes as pastry chef for New York City’s Momofuku Milk Bar. What you may not know is that Tosi is a Southern gal at heart. “I grew up in Virginia and have family in Louisiana, Arkansas, and Ohio. Living, cooking, and eating within the region, with a waste not-want not mentality; celebrating tradition and what’s around you on the breakfast, lunch, or dinner table—that was the spirit of my family’s upbringing.”

Read on via The Southern Foodways Alliance

Give Me Some Sugar: Lisa White →

Who: Lisa White
Where: Domenica, 123 Baronne Street, New Orleans, LA

When Lisa White has a bad day, she makes bread. “It’s so simple—flour, water, salt, and yeast—but it’s magical,” she says. “You don’t know if it’s going to turn out, but when it does, it’s so awesome. It hits people on all levels—you can smell it walking down the street.”

She speaks from experience: Bread is what prompted her to change careers and become a pastry chef. “In March of 2008, I took a personal pilgrimage to France. While walking the isolated trails of the Camino of Santiago de Compostela, I was drawn into the village bakeries by the smell of bread baking. It’s then that I remembered what I had always wanted to do.” Three months later, White had enrolled in culinary school to become a pastry chef.

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Give Me Some Sugar: Stella Parks →

 Who: Stella Parks

Where: Table Three Ten, 310 W. Short Street, Lexington, KY

In a kitchen drawer at Table Three Ten in Lexington, Kentucky, pastry chef Stella Parks keeps a set of plastic measuring spoons that her parents gave her when she was 8. “I dug them up recently at my folks’ house and decided to take them to work. It’s a nice sense of coming full circle.”

But Parks, a Kentucky native, didn’t always know that professional baking would be her path. Though she’d baked since she was little and started working in restaurants as a teenager, she always thought she’d write books. When it came time to pursue a college degree, though, she reconsidered. “I knew I didn’t have a personality suited to teaching, or to journalism, or to whatever other English-major-y jobs I could think of. I knew I liked working in restaurants, working with my hands and on my feet. Then I started researching culinary schools, thinking I could work in food service and write on the side.”

Read on via The Southern Foodways Alliance