Cornbread Nation 4: The Best of Southern Food Writing by Dale Reed | 9780820330891 | Paperback

This new collection in the Southern Foodways Alliance's popular series serves up a fifty-three-course celebration of southern foods, southern cooking, and the people and traditions behind them. Editors Dale Volberg Reed and John Shelton Reed have combed magazines, newspapers, books, and journals to bring us a "best of" gathering that is certain to satisfy everyone from omnivorous chowhounds to the most discerning student of regional foodways.

After an opening celebration of the joys of spring in her natal Virginia by the redoubtable Edna Lewis, the Reeds organize their collection under eight sections exploring Louisiana and the Gulf Coast before and after hurricanes Katrina and Rita, the food and farming of the Carolina Lowcountry, "Sweet Things," southern snacks and fast foods, "Downhome Food," "Downhome Places," and a comparison of southern foods with those of other cultures.

In his "This Isn't the Last Dance," Rick Bragg recounts his experience, many years ago, of a New Orleans jazz funeral and finds hope therein that the unique spirit of New Orleanians will allow them to survive: "I have seen these people dance, laughing, to the edge of a grave. I believe that, now, they will dance back from it." "My passport may be stamped Yankee," writes Jessica B. Harris in her "Living North/Eating South," "but there's no denying that my stomach and culinary soul and those of many others like me are pure Dixie." In her "Tough Enough: The Muscadine Grape," Simone Wilson explains that the lowly southern fruit has double the heart-healthy resveratrol of French grapes, thus offering the hope of a "southern paradox." The title of Candice Dyer's brief history says it all: "Scattered, Smothered, Covered, and Chunked: Fifty Years of the Waffle House." In a photo essay, documentarian Amy Evans shows us the world of oystering along northwest Florida's Apalachicola Bay, and for the first time in the series, recipes are given-for a roux, braised collard greens, doberge cake, and other dishes.

Published in association with the Southern Foodways Alliance at the Center for the Study of Southern Culture at the University of Mississippi. A Friends Fund Publication.

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From the Publisher

"From a fascinating oral history of Paul Prudhomme's contributions to the cuisine of Louisiana to a lovely essay in praise of pork rinds (complete with a list of appropriate wine pairings!), this book offers all the proof I need that Cornbread Nation is by far the best place in the world to live."—Julia Reed, author of Queen of the Turtle Derby and Other Southern Phenomena

"The writers in Cornbread Nation 4 form a patchwork quilt of voices celebrating the rich and varied heritage that is southern cooking."—Scott Peacock, Executive Chef of Watershed Restaurant and recipient of the James Beard Award for Best Chef Southeast

author of Queen of the Turtle Derby and Other Southern Phenomena - Julia Reed

From a fascinating oral history of Paul Prudhomme's contributions to the cuisine of Louisiana to a lovely essay in praise of pork rinds (complete with a list of appropriate wine pairings!), this book offers all the proof I need that Cornbread Nation is by far the best place in the world to live.

Executive Chef of Watershed Restaurant and recipient of the James Beard Award for Best Chef Southeast - Scott Peacock

The writers in Cornbread Nation 4 form a patchwork quilt of voices celebrating the rich and varied heritage that is southern cooking.

Pop Matters

Cornbread Nation 4 is a vivid, heart-felt, often lyrical look at some of the most iconic food of the South-- from the commercial to the home-cooked to the most seasonal of delicacies, gathered in the wild ... You'll wish you could stop by and meet these legends-- along with many of the authors and characters in Cornbread Nation 4-- for yer'self.

Ann On The Daily News Record

Anyone who has ever split a fresh biscuit or held a steaming cup of Brunswick stew during a chilly outdoor event will appreciate 'Cornbread Nation 4' ... It's wonderfully varied church supper of Southern food, Southern cooking, and Southern people ... a compilation that will make even a Yankee's mouth water.
—Theresa Curry

The Athens Banner-Herald

The stories, most of which have no recipes at all, promise to stuff the soul if not the stomach.
—Erin Rossiter

Library Journal

Unlike the two previous collections, the fourth in the series, edited by the coauthors of 1001 Things Everyone Should Know About the South, rejects a binding theme, instead meandering throughout the South in eight structured sections. The selections are solid, and standouts include a haunting photo-essay on the Apalachicola oyster industry by Amy Evans, Rick Bragg's stubbornly worded "This Isn't the Last Dance," Rick Brooks's report on the effort local cooks have taken to recapture recipes that were lost to Katrina, Brett Anderson's fascinating transcript of a conversation on the life and career of Paul Prudhomme, and Audrey Petty's sweet reminiscences of eating chitlins with her mother. Among the 53 selections are many recipes, not found in previous compilations, which greatly enhance the book. For regional cookery and Southern studies collections.
—Rosemarie Lewis

Cornbread Nation 4: The Best of Southern Food Writing

Paperback

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