Straight From Some Black Food Folks

Though not all of our drops in MATM will focus on Black-centric topics, I happened to have projects in the works that aligned with Black History Month and decided to lean into that when planning. In an effort to be sure to include voices beyond my own, today’s drop features some Black food creators who inspire me and who I always learn from.

A note about why I structured this drop this way: This week’s podcast-like recording, complete with video and captions, was designed to be an easy lift for the participants. They could log in, chat, and log off with minimal prep or interference with their lives. That was intentional as I know all too well how overwhelming it can be to be a Black creator in advance of and during Black History Month. It’s a time when it can feel like everyone wants something from you and always somehow they don’t want to pay you. This leads me to my next note: I paid these creators for their time for this recording as well.

Beyond hearing from them, I’ve included a host of resources here to learn more about Black foodways in the context of the United States, including some resources from one of own pieces on how we define “Black food”. Take from those what you will, but I hope you find something that’s useful for you.

I’ll be back next week with a more personal drop about preparing for our family trip to Iraq.

Best,

Anela

Video Description: Anela, Mila, KJ, and Meiko on a Zoom-like recording discussing issues they face as Black content creators, perceptions of Black foodways, and more.

4 Color Books, a publishing imprint helmed by award-winning chef, author, and publisher Bryant Terry, recently released Black Food: Stories, Art, and Recipes from Across the African Diaspora. Part cookbook, part essay collection, Black Food combines contributions from chefs, writers, and creatives to explore the culinary history of the African diaspora. The result is a gorgeous and moving project, at once expansive and personal. "Black Food," Terry writes in the introduction, "is a communal shrine to the shared culinary histories of the African diaspora.”

The approach taken by Black Food reflects an expanding definition of Blackness, particularly in the United States, which I'll focus on here. In her acclaimed book High on the Hog: A Culinary Journey from Africa to America, which has been adapted for a show on Netflix, culinary historian and one of Time Magazine's 2021 Most Influential People of the Year, Dr. Jessica B. Harris writes, "the designation ‘black American’ no longer means up from the South. It can also encompass folks from the Caribbean, Central and South America, and the African continent itself.” A growing awareness of how African diaspora communities in the United States, the Americas, and beyond, share historical ties underpins this definition of Blackness.

In the realm of food, a similar expansion of our conception of Black food, or food of the African diaspora, has long been underway. In the United States, the term "Black food" historically led people to immediately think of Soul Food - of the celebratory, nostalgic, and survival foods of Black Southerners introduced to the United States more broadly through the Great Migration. Soul Food became a widely used term for Black Southern foodways during the Civil Rights Era as the Black pride movement and a growing assertion of Black culture as a point of pride coalesced around food.

Almost as soon as Soul Food became a widely used moniker, Black peoples in the United States sought to challenge, expand, and redefine conceptions of Black foodways. Activists and Civil Rights leaders sought to underscore health-conscious, vegetarian, and vegan diets and interpretations of Soul Food to reject stereotypes of "unhealthy" Black dietary practices and promote food sovereignty in a society where Black communities were (and still are) subject to food apartheid. In the decades since, food writers, chefs, and historians have also expanded our collective consciousness surrounding Black food, emphasizing through their work that Black peoples in the United States have historically worked in every aspect of the food system from agricultural production to fine dining. These perspectives challenge us to consider that the culinary practices of Black peoples in the US also reflect that diversity of experience.

I've also seen an expanded definition of Black food circulate on social media. As our discourse about Black food begins to change, so do the conversations and projects about Black food in the digital space. When asked for their definitions, my digital community responded with an emphasis on the diversity, history, and deeply personal nature of Black foodways. There remains no single definition of "Black food." The term can encompass foods of the African diaspora and take on a global character. Depending on our distinct positionality it can also take on a very localized or national view tied to the United States.

But, no matter how you define it, "Black food" so often takes on an intimate and historical nature, a reflection of its importance to Black peoples and the centrality of food to identity for so many communities. To learn more about Black food, check out the below