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{{Short description|American style of cooking}}
{{Other uses|Soul Food (disambiguation){{!}}Soul Food}}
{{Distinguish|Korean regional cuisine#Seoul{{!}}Seoul cuisine}}
[[File:SoulFoodMeal.jpg|thumb|right|A plate of soul food consisting of fried chicken, collard greens, macaroni and cheese, and cornbread]]
{{African American topics sidebar|state=collapsed}}

'''Soul food''' is the [[Cuisine|ethnic cuisine]] of [[African Americans]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://aaregistry.org/story/soul-food-a-brief-history/|title="Soul Food" a brief history|website=African American Registry|language=en|access-date=2020-02-12}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |last=Moskin |first=Julia |date=2018-08-07 |title=Is It Southern Food, or Soul Food? |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/07/dining/is-it-southern-food-or-soul-food.html |access-date=2023-06-08 |issn=0362-4331}}</ref> It originated in the [[American South]] from the cuisines of [[Slavery in the colonial history of the United States|enslaved Africans]] trafficked to the North American colonies through the [[Atlantic slave trade]] during the [[Antebellum period]] and is closely associated (but not to be confused with) the [[Cuisine of the Southern United States|cuisine of the American South]].<ref name="firstwefeast.com">{{Cite web|url=https://firstwefeast.com/eat/2015/08/an-illustrated-history-of-soul-food|title=An Illustrated History of Soul Food|website=First We Feast|accessdate=14 March 2023}}</ref>
The expression "soul food" originated in the mid-1960s when "[[wikt:soul|soul]]" was a common word used to describe [[black American culture|African-American culture]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Ferguson |first1=Sheila |title=Soul Food Classic Cuisine from the Deep South |date=1993 |publisher=Grove Press |pages=57–60 |isbn=9781493013418 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hMd_CgAAQBAJ&q=soul%20}}</ref> Soul food uses cooking techniques and ingredients from [[West African cuisine|West African]], [[Cuisine of the Central African Republic|Central African]], Western European, and [[Indigenous cuisine of the Americas]].<ref name="McKendrick2017">{{cite web |last1=McKendrick |first1=P.J. |title=The Diversity of Soul Food - Global Foodways |url=https://adhc.lib.ua.edu/globalfoodways/the-diversity-of-soul-food/#:~:text=Crops%20that%20are%20indigenous%20to,the%20Americas%20(Hudson%20498) |access-date=30 July 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191206195814/https://adhc.lib.ua.edu/globalfoodways/the-diversity-of-soul-food/#:~:text=Crops%20that%20are%20indigenous%20to,the%20Americas%20(Hudson%20498) |archive-date=6 December 2019 |date=15 December 2017}}</ref> Soul food came from the blending of what African Americans ate in Africa and what was available to them as slaves. The cuisine initially had its share of negativity. Soul food was seen as low-class food, and African Americans in the [[Northern United States|North]] looked down on their (formerly) [[Black Southerners|Black Southern]] counterparts who preferred soul food (see [[Great Migration (African American)|The Great Migration]]).<ref name="Wallach2018">{{cite book |last1=Wallach |first1=Jennifer Jensen |title=Every Nation Has Its Dish: Black Bodies and Black Food in Twentieth-Century America |year=2018 |publisher=UNC Press Books |isbn=978-1-4696-4522-3 |pages=109–111 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bWN5DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA109}}</ref> The concept evolved from describing the food of slaves in the South, to being taken up as a primary source of pride in the African American community even in the North, such as in [[New York City]].<ref>{{cite web|url= https://macaulay.cuny.edu/seminars/henken08/articles/s/o/u/Soul_Food_5133.html|title=Soul Food|website=Macaulay.cuny.edu|access-date=November 6, 2023}}</ref>

Soul food historian [[Adrian Miller]] explains the difference between soul food and [[Cuisine of the Southern United States|Southern food]] is that soul food is intensely seasoned and uses a variety of meats to add flavor to food and adds a variety of spicy and savory sauces. These spicy and savory sauces add robust flavor. This method of preparation was influenced by West African cuisine where West Africans create sauces to add flavor and spice to their food. Also, Black Americans add sugar to make cornbread, while "white southerners say when you put sugar in corn bread, it becomes cake...".<ref name="Duke Sanford">{{cite web |last1=Brownell |first1=Kelly |title=Adrian Miller on the History of Soul Food |url=https://wfpc.sanford.duke.edu/podcasts/adrian-miller-history-soul-food/ |website=World Food Policy Center |publisher=Duke Sanford |access-date=13 June 2024}}</ref> European immigrants seasoned and flavored their food using salt, pepper, smoke, and pickling spices. African Americans add more spices, and hot and sweet sauces to increase the spiciness, or [[Scoville scale|heat]] of their food.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Faries |first1=Dave |title=What is the difference between soul food and Southern cooking? |url=https://www.montereycountynow.com/food_wine/what-is-the-difference-between-soul-food-and-southern-cooking/article_84078f66-7100-11ed-af92-479dad9b529f.html |access-date=16 June 2024 |agency=Monterey County Now |date=2022}}</ref> Bob Jeffries, the author of ''Soul Food Cookbook'', explains the difference between soul food and Southern food: "While all soul food is Southern food, not all Southern food is soul. Soul food cooking is an example of how really good Southern [African-American] cooks cooked with what they had available to them."<ref>{{cite news |last1=Heath |first1=Mary |title=Southern Food Vs. Soul Food: What's The Difference? |url=https://gradynewsource.uga.edu/southern-food-vs-soul-food-whats-difference/ |access-date=16 June 2024 |agency=Grady Newsource |date=2017}}</ref>

Impoverished white and Black people in the South cooked many of the same dishes stemming from Southern cooking traditions, but styles of preparation sometimes varied. Certain techniques popular in soul and other Southern cuisines (i.e., frying meat and using all parts of the animal for consumption) are shared with cultures all over the world.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://home.comcast.net/~osoono/history.htm|title=Fried Dough History|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081012194852/http://home.comcast.net/~osoono/history.htm|archive-date=October 12, 2008|url-status=dead}}</ref>

==Etymology==
[[File:Cooking at stove in old Trepagnier Plantation House, Norco, Louisiana, October 1938.jpg|thumb|right|Cooking at stove in old Trepagnier Plantation House, [[Norco, Louisiana]], October 1938]]
The term ''soul food'' became popular in the 1960s and 1970s in the midst of the [[Black Power movement]].<ref name="Witt1999">{{cite book |last1=Witt |first1=Doris |title=Black Hunger: Food and the Politics of U.S. Identity |date=1999 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-535498-0 |pages=6–7 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VSuArSmUcn8C&pg=PA6}}</ref> One of the earliest written uses of the term is found in ''[[The Autobiography of Malcolm X]]'', which was published in 1965.<ref name=":5">{{Cite book|title=Engaged Surrender: African American Women and Islam|last=Rouse|first=Carolyn Moxley|publisher=University of California Press|year=2004|isbn=978-0-520-23794-0|location=Berkeley and Los Angeles, CA, London, England|pages=106}}</ref> LeRoi Jones (later known as [[Amiri Baraka]]) published an article entitled "Soul Food" and was one of the key proponents for establishing the food as a part of the Black American identity.<ref name="Witt1999a">{{cite book |last1=Witt |first1=Doris |title=Black Hunger: Food and the Politics of U.S. Identity |year=1999 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-535498-0 |pages=80–81 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VSuArSmUcn8C&pg=PA80}}</ref> Those who had participated in the [[Great Migration (African American)|Great Migration]] found within soul food a reminder of the home and family they had left behind after moving to unfamiliar northern cities. Soul food restaurants were Black-owned businesses that served as neighborhood meeting places where people socialized and ate together.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Poe|first1=Tracy N.|title=The Origins of Soul Food in Black Urban Identity: Chicago, 1915-1947|journal=American Studies International|date=1999|volume=XXXVII No. 1|issue=February|pages=4–17}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Muhammad |first1=Karyn |title=How soul food became a staple in the Black community |url=https://asuhornettribune.com/13614/hornet-living/how-soul-food-became-a-staple-in-the-black-community/ |access-date=26 May 2024 |agency=The Hornet Tribune Online |publisher=Alabama State University |date=2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Notable African American chefs |url=https://libguides.sunysccc.edu/c.php?g=67538&p=435912 |website=Begley Library |publisher=Schenectady County Community College |access-date=2 June 2024}}</ref> According to author Laretta Henderson, middle-class African Americans embrace their "blackness" by preparing and eating soul food. Henderson wrote:<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Henderson |first1=Laretta |title='Ebony Jr!' and 'Soul Food': The Construction of Middle-Class African American Identity through the Use of Traditional Southern Foodways |journal=Melus Food in Multi-Ethnic Literatures |date=2007 |volume=32 |issue=4 |pages=81–82 |jstor=30029833 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/30029833 |access-date=17 June 2024}}</ref><blockquote>In its culinary incarnation, "soul food" was associated with a shared history of oppression and inculcated, by some, with cultural pride. Soul food was eaten by the bondsmen. It was also the food former slaves incorporated into their diet after emancipation. Therefore, during the 1960s, middle-class blacks used their reported consumption of soul food to distance themselves from the values of the white middle class, to define themselves ethnically, and to align themselves with lower-class blacks. Irrespective of political affiliation or social class, the definition of "blackness", or "soul", became part of everyday discourse in the black community.</blockquote> This style of cooking is celebrated in the month of June, called National Soul Food month.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Kelly |first1=Leslie |title=Celebrating National Soul Food Month With Celebrity Chef Carla |url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/lesliekelly/2023/06/04/celebrating-national-soul-food-month-with-celebrity-chef-carla-hall/ |website=www.forbes.com |publisher=Forbes Newsletters |access-date=14 June 2024}}</ref>

==History==
===Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade===
[[File:Sea Island red peas.jpg|thumb|[[Sea Island red pea]]s, a variety of ''[[cowpea]]'' in West Africa, were brought to the sea islands of South Carolina by way of the trans-Atlantic slave trade.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Townsend |first1=Bob |title=Recipes that celebrate the culinary history of the African diaspora |url=https://www.ajc.com/lifestyles/food--cooking/recipes-that-celebrate-the-culinary-history-the-african-diaspora/OrJAhRq7JQgpWiL9F2w4kJ/ |access-date=16 June 2024 |agency=The Atlanta Journal-Constitution |date=2019}}</ref>]]
During the period of the [[Atlantic slave trade|trans-Atlantic slave trade]], enslaved people ate African foods aboard [[slave ship]]s. These included rice, [[millet]], okra, black-eyed peas, yams, and [[legume]]s such as [[kidney bean]]s and [[lima bean]]s. These crops were brought to North America and became a staple in [[Cuisine of the Southern United States|Southern cuisine]].<ref name="African Crops and Slave Cuisine">{{cite web |last1=Holloway |first1=Joseph |title=African Crops and Slave Cuisine |url=http://slaverebellion.info/index.php?page=crops-slave-cuisines |website=Slave Rebellion Info |publisher=Slave Rebellion Website |access-date=31 May 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Diet and Nutrition |url=https://dh.scu.edu/exhibits/exhibits/show/health---medicine-aboard-trans/diet---nutrition |website=Santa Clara University Digital Exhibits |publisher=Santa Clara University |access-date=21 June 2024}}</ref> One enslaved African aboard a slave ship recalled later that all they ate were yams on the voyage from Africa to [[Gadsden's Wharf|Charleston, South Carolina]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Davis |first1=Donald |title=Southern United States: An Environmental History |date=2006 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |isbn=9781851097852 |page=130 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oajOEAAAQBAJ&dq=guinea+fowl+american+south&pg=PA130}}</ref> Slave ships were provisioned with African vegetables, fruits, and animals to feed the enslaved people bound in chains below the ships' decks. These items were later planted and used in the New World for food and as [[cash crop]]s. The introduction of African plants to the Americas that shaped American cuisine was part of what is called the [[Columbian exchange]].<ref>{{cite web |last1=Horgan |first1=John |title=Columbian Exchange |url=https://www.worldhistory.org/Columbian_Exchange/ |website=www.worldhistory.org |publisher=World History Encyclopedia |access-date=6 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=J. Wallach |first1=Jennifer |title=Getting What We Need Ourselves:How Food Has Shaped African American Life |date=2019 |publisher=Rowman & Littlefield Publishers |isbn=9781538125250 |pages=13-15 |url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/Getting_What_We_Need_Ourselves/_WmRDwAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1}}</ref> Researchers from Mercer University Libraries explain: "The foods selected to bring to America were brought over for specific reasons. 'They all remain palatable long after harvesting and were thus ideal for use on the slow voyage from Africa. Secondly, they are all the edible parts of plants that thrive in the American South, and therefore they flourished once they had been planted hopefully by the slave in the garden space allotted to him on his owner's plantation'".<ref>{{cite report |first1=Sydney |last1=Addison |first2=Kailey |last2=Bryan |first3=Taylor |last3=Carter |first4=J.T. |last4=Del Tufo |first5=Aissatou |last5=Diallo |first6=Alyson |last6=Kinzey |title=African Americans and Southern Food |url=https://ursa.mercer.edu/bitstream/handle/10898/1521/Race%20Project.pdf;sequence=5 |website=Mercer University |access-date=6 June 2024 |hdl=10898/1521}}</ref>

The [[Guineafowl|guinea fowl]] is a bird indigenous to Africa imported to the Americas by way of the slave trade; the bird was brought by the Spanish to the Caribbean, and introduced to the South of what is now the United States in the early 16th century. Guinea fowl became a source of meat for enslaved Black Americans and eventually part of the subsistence culture of the whole region.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Davis |first1=Donald |title=Southern United States: An Environmental History |date=2006 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |isbn=9781851097852 |page=130 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oajOEAAAQBAJ&dq=guinea+fowl+american+south&pg=PA130}}</ref> On American plantations, enslaved people consumed the eggs of the guinea fowl, as well as cooking the meat with rice like their West-Central African forebears. Enslaved Africans in the South continued to prepare their traditional dishes of guinea fowl and plant foods native to West and Central Africa. They adapted European and Native American foods and cooking methods to create new recipes that were passed down orally in [[The Black Family in Slavery and Freedom|Black families]] and later published in African-American cookbooks by the end of the [[American Civil War]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Carney |first1=Judith |title=Seeds of Memory: Botanical Legacies of the African Diaspora |journal=African Ethnobotany in the Americas |date=2013 |pages=15, 20 |url=https://www.geog.psu.edu/sites/www.geog.psu.edu/files/event/miller-lecture-coffee-hour-out-africa-food-legacies-atlantic-slavery-americas/carneychapter2africanethnobotanyintheamericas.pdf |access-date=6 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Twitty |first1=Michael |title=Foodways of the Transatlantic Slave Trade |url=https://www.masterclass.com/classes/michael-twitty-teaches-tracing-your-roots-through-food/chapters/foodways-of-the-transatlantic-slave-trade |website=www.masterclass.com |publisher=Master Class |access-date=6 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Twitty |first1=Michael |title=How rice shaped the American South |url=https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20210307-how-rice-shaped-the-american-south |website=www.bbc.com |publisher=BBC |access-date=6 June 2024}}</ref>

===Slavery===
[[File:A Black Cook in the 1930s.jpg|thumb|left|An African American woman in the kitchen in the 1930s]]
Soul food recipes have pre-slavery influences, as [[West African cuisine|West African]] and [[European cuisine|European foodways]] were adapted to the environment of the region.<ref name="firstwefeast.com" /><ref>{{cite web |last1=Wilke |first1=Carolyn |title=The Resistance and Ingenuity of the Cooks Who Lived in Slavery |url=https://www.sapiens.org/archaeology/enslaved-people-foodways/ |website=www.sapiens.org |date=26 August 2021 |access-date=26 May 2024}}</ref> Soul food originated in the home cooking of the rural [[Southern United States]] or the "[[Deep South]]" during the time of slavery, using locally gathered or raised foods and other inexpensive ingredients.<ref>{{cite web |title=Soul Food in Dekalb A Tasty History |url=https://dekalbhistory.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/soul-food-booklet-updated-2-3-22.pdf |website=Dekalb History Center |access-date=14 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Twitty |first1=Michael |title=The Unbearable Taste: Early African American Foodways |url=https://commonplace.online/article/unbearable-taste-early-african-american-foodways/ |website=Common Place: The Journal of Early American Life |publisher=Common Place |access-date=25 May 2024}}</ref> Rabbits, squirrels, and deer were often hunted for meat. Fish, frogs, crawfish, turtles, shellfish, and crab were often collected from fresh waters, salt waters, and marshes.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Soul food {{!}} Description, History, & Ingredients {{!}} Britannica |url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/soul-food-cuisine |access-date=2023-07-30 |website=www.britannica.com |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Food |url=https://www.mountvernon.org/george-washington/slavery/food/ |website=George Washington Mount Vernon |access-date=26 May 2024}}</ref> Soul food cookery began when Black American/ [[African American]] enslaved people learned to make do with what they were given to eat by their enslavers: leftovers and the undesirable parts of animals such as ham hocks, hog jowls and pigs' feet, ears, skin, and intestines, which white plantation owners did not eat.<ref>[https://www.ncceh.ca/sites/default/files/USA.pdf Soul Food - Oxtails], ''Nccah.ca'', PDF</ref><ref name="VOA Arts and Culture">{{cite web |title=How Enslaved Africans Influenced American Diet |url=https://learningenglish.voanews.com/a/how-enslaved-africans-influenced-american-diet/4816356.html |website=www.learningenglish.voanews.com |date=15 March 2019 |publisher=VOA Arts and Culture |access-date=24 May 2024}}</ref> Soul food was created by enslaved African Americans, who created meals out of minimal ingredients.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Holloway |first1=Joseph |title=Africanisms in American Culture |date=2005 |publisher=Indiana University Press |isbn=9780253217493 |pages=48–49 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TmzTyI5rfDMC&q=food}}</ref> Slaves combined their knowledge of West-Central African cooking methods with techniques borrowed from Native Americans and Europeans, thus creating soul food.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Miles |first1=Angie |title=Soul food is closely tied to Black cultural identity |url=https://www.vpm.org/2023-03-24/soul-food-is-closely-tied-to-black-cultural-identity |website=www.vpm.org |date=24 March 2023 |publisher=VPM National Public Radio (PBS) |access-date=13 June 2024}}</ref><ref name="Duke Sanford"/>

[[File:Numididae Numida meleagris 1.jpg|thumb|Enslaved people in the American South cooked the African [[Guineafowl|guinea fowl]] and paired it with rice, a combination common in the foodways of Sub-Saharan Africa.]]

Pork and corn were two staple items in the Southern United States for both slave owners and slaves. Many of the foods integral to the cuisine originated in the limited foodstuffs that poor southern subsistence farmers had at hand. This in turn was reflected in the rations given to enslaved people by their enslavers. Enslaved people were typically given a [[peck]] of [[cornmeal]] and 3–4 pounds of pork per week, and those rations formed the basis of African American soul food.<ref name=":6">{{cite book|last1=Covey|first1=Herbert |title=What the Slaves Ate: Recollections of African American Foods and Foodways from the Slave Narratives|pages=105–110}}</ref> Most enslaved people needed to consume a high-calorie diet to replenish the calories spent working long days in the fields or performing other physically arduous tasks.<ref name=":3" /> The slave owners would have smoked ham and corn pudding while the enslaved were left with the [[offal]].<ref>{{Cite web |last=Demas |first=Antonia |date=2022-02-01 |title=Celebrating Black History Month |url=https://foodstudies.org/celebrating-black-history-month/ |access-date=2023-07-30 |website=The Food Studies Institute}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Braly |first1=Anne |title=Soul food: From the trauma of slavery came beautiful cuisine |url=https://tennesseelookout.com/2020/06/19/soul-food-from-the-trauma-of-slavery-came-beautiful-cuisine/ |access-date=24 May 2024 |publisher=Tennessee Lookout |date=2020}}</ref> The leftovers and scraps from meals cooked for the "big houses" (plantation houses) were called ''"[[juba dance|juba]]"'' by the enslaved. They were put in troughs on Sundays for the slaves to eat. The term "juba" occurs in numerous African languages, and folk knowledge records that early on it had the meaning of "little bits" of food.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Edwards |first1=Gus, etl. |title=Black Theatre Ritual Performance in the African Diaspora |date=2002 |publisher=Temple University Press |isbn=9781439901151 |page=335 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5xpIgr7f070C&dq=juba+left+over+soul+food&pg=PA335}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Nolen |first1=Claude |title=African American Southerners in Slavery, Civil War and Reconstruction |date=2005 |publisher=McFarland, Incorporated, Publishers |isbn=9780786424511 |page=15 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MHgByLO2o-UC&dq=pot+liquor+slave+health&pg=PA15}}</ref>

[[Archaeology|Archaeological]] and historical research concerning [[Slave quarters in the United States|slave cabins]] in the Southern United States indicates that enslaved African Americans used bowls more often than flatware and plates, suggesting that they primarily made stews and "gumbo" for meals, using local ingredients gathered in nature, vegetables grown in their gardens, and leftover animal scraps rejected by their enslavers. This process allowed enslaved people to create new dishes, for which they developed a variety of ways to season and add spice using hot sauces they prepared. The research shows that white plantation families more often used plates and flatware, indicating that they ate meals consisting of individual cuts of meats and vegetables that were not blended into one dish like the stews made by enslaved people. Enslaved people living on plantations located along the Atlantic coast developed a diversity of foodways enabled by their access to seafood.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Baumann |first1=Timothy |title=The Web of Cultural Identity: A Case Study of African-American Identity and "Soul Food" |journal=Tennessee Archaeology |date=2009 |volume=4 |number=1–2 |page=72 |url=https://www.tn.gov/content/dam/tn/environment/archaeology/documents/tennesseearchaeologyjournal/arch-journal_volume-4-issues-1-and-2.pdf |access-date=24 May 2024}}</ref>

[[File:FISHERMEN FIND BASS, FLOUNDER, SHAD AND ROCK FISH IN CHESAPEAKE BAY - NARA - 548499.jpg|thumb|Black fishermen find bass, flounder, shad and rockfish in the [[Chesapeake Bay]]|left]]

During slavery times, [[Gullah|Gullah people]] in the [[South Carolina Lowcountry|lowcountry]] of South Carolina and Georgia practiced a fishing culture that came from [[West Africa]] and made canoes similar in appearance to the ones in [[Sub-Saharan Africa]]. Gullah people passed down their fishing traditions and prepared meals of fish using local ingredients from the region, developing fish dishes that are still a part of Gullah culture. Author Amy Lynne Young's research at the [[Mary Plantation House|Mabry Plantation]] in Louisiana showed the differences in foodways between enslaved people living inland versus those living along the Atlantic coast. Families in coastal areas had access to a variety of meats from land and sea animals, especially those who lived on the coastlines and barrier [[Sea Islands|sea islands]]. Inland slaves' choices of meats were limited, consisting of game such as rabbit and squirrel, farm chickens, pigs, and leftover animal scraps. Vegetables were locally gathered or grown in their gardens. Young suggests enslaved people living along the coast consequently had a more diverse diet than inland slaves. This demonstrates regional styles of cooking soul food based on local ingredients.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Baumann|first1=Timothy |title=The Web of Cultural Identity: A Case Study of African-American Identity and "Soul Food" |journal=Tennessee Archaeology |date=2009 |volume=4 |page=72 |url=https://d1wqtxts1xzle7.cloudfront.net/33575768/Baumann_and_Groover__Tennessee_Archaeology_2009_4%281_2%29.pdf?1398675332=&response-content-disposition=inline%3B+filename%3DColleague_Mentor_and_Friend_Essays_in_Ho.pdf&Expires=1716560899&Signature=bveFFEuIsKuXYWTcZs3ccD-K1MSPtgGK7YCfJqGX1l4ptA~6~LBCNgYTX2~yYud8hIP7bWNNEF-LABWVDOp2slWyNQBrYE7bGaPIOspkGmxNkFPTbgi68wadn9e52UbbXoTiZR5o~WAy-pYzJ9MLy7AK6MQ~Mmbz9OVcAeDRt86~0MiHSmY5HjfmmIy67rremDhb00d4zKZscNxFLBYbVRYX5Rz8EXw6Tw7Cm9cSmnjB3YQ622vDox1AmAMxutO9qjBEXrfzpNpo5hVhywwn2cOTsTtLiPlPmIqsWIDsA6jsQYEdvti429nV0ZDY7-OdDJp-BK41PRyHLolSrSRCGQ__&Key-Pair-Id=APKAJLOHF5GGSLRBV4ZA#page=68 |access-date=24 May 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Opala |first1=Joseph |title=The Gullah: Rice, Slavery, and the Sierra Leone-American Connection |url=https://glc.yale.edu/gullah-rice-slavery-and-sierra-leone-american-connection |website=Yale Macmillan Center |date=10 March 2015 |publisher=Yale University |access-date=24 May 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=The History of Successful Black Fishermen Dates Back Centuries |url=https://www.pushblack.us/news/history-successful-black-fishermen-dates-back-centuries |website=www.pushblack.us |access-date=24 May 2024}}</ref>
[[File:FMIB 35001 Knocking Out, or making the preliminary cleaning of the shells.jpeg|thumb|A young African American at the [[Chesapeake Bay]] cleaning crab shells]]
[[Frederick Douglass]] explained in his autobiography that because enslaved people living on the Eastern shore of Maryland near the [[Choptank River]] received the bare minimum in food from their enslavers, they fished for food to supplement their diet, catching turtles, fish, and eels. Douglass wrote: "The men and women slaves received, as their monthly allowance of food, eight pounds of pork, or its equivalent in fish, and one bushel of corn meal". Another way they supplemented their diet was by growing vegetable gardens; they grew corn, potatoes, peas, beans, herbs, and melons. They did not have fat or cooking oil to cook their food.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Douglass |first1=Frederick |title=Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. Written by Himself |date=1845 |publisher=THE ANTI-SLAVERY OFFICE |page=10 |url=https://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/douglass/douglass.html}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=The Food Sources of Enslaved Afro-Marylanders |url=https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=199283 |website=www.hmdb.org |publisher=Historical Marker Database |access-date=13 June 2024}}</ref> Slaveholders in [[Dorchester County, Maryland]] rarely fed their slaves. To supplement their poor diets, enslaved people in Dorchester fished for food in the Choptank River and hunted game on land. The animals they caught for food included rabbit, turtle, duck, goose, turkey, pigeon, woodpecker, possum, raccoon, skunk, deer, and [[muskrat]]. They cooked vegetables such as okra, corn, leafy greens, and sweet potatoes that they grew in their gardens. From these various food sources enslaved people created their meals.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Gattuso |first1=Raina |title=A Historical Dig Sheds Light on the Food of the Underground Railroad |url=https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/what-did-people-eat-on-underground-railroad |website=www.atlasobscura.com |date=14 October 2020 |publisher=Atlas Obscura |access-date=23 June 2024}}</ref>

Researchers at [[St. Mary's County, Maryland|St. Mary's County]] Library located in Maryland documented an African American muskrat recipe. "Skin and disjoint the animal. Soak it in salted or vinegar water for 2 hours. Put the pieces in a pan of water, and parboil until slightly tender, but not real done. Dust in a mixture of seasoned flour, salted and peppered to taste, and fry in hot fat until golden brown." Black Americans in St. Mary's County created recipes during slavery that were passed down orally in their families.<ref>{{cite web |title=300 Years of Black Cooking in St. Mary's County, Maryland |url=https://www.stmalib.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/300YearsofBlackCooking.pdf |website=www.stmalib.org |publisher=St. Mary's County Library |access-date=23 June 2024}}</ref> To add heat and flavor to seafood dishes, enslaved and free Africans in [[Baltimore]] and the [[Chesapeake Bay|Chesapeake region]] of Maryland grew [[fish pepper]]s in their gardens.<ref>{{cite web |title=Fish Peppers |url=https://www.chesapeakebaymagazine.com/fish-peppers/ |website=www.chesapeakebaymagazine.com |date=28 July 2020 |publisher=Chesapeake Bay Magazine |access-date=21 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Larson |first1=Zeb |title=The US pepper that was nearly lost |url=https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20240216-the-us-pepper-that-was-nearly-lost |access-date=21 June 2024 |agency=BBC News |date=2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Intern |first1=Waxter |title=Maryland Food History: The Fish Pepper |url=https://preservationmaryland.org/maryland-food-history-the-fish-pepper/ |website=Preservation Maryland |date=28 July 2017 |access-date=21 June 2024}}</ref> After national emancipation many African Americans got into the seafood industry. By 1864 almost half of all [[Waterman (occupation)#Watermen in the United states|watermen]] in Maryland were former slaves. They became skilled in netting shrimp, gathering oysters, and fishing.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Willhoite |first1=Kenneth |title=The Soul Food Museum Story Celebrating 400 Years of Culinary Arts Hospitality and Agriculture |date=2018 |publisher=Arthur House |isbn=9781546225140 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7vpqDwAAQBAJ&q=maryland}}</ref> During the American Civil War, some enslaved people in Maryland ate clabber milk, fish, and cornbread.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Covey |first1=Herbert |last2=Eisnach |first2=Dwight |title=What the Slaves Ate Recollections of African American Foods and Foodways from the Slave Narratives |date=2009 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |isbn=9798216164265 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cq72EAAAQBAJ&q=maryland}}</ref> After the war, Maryland became known for its crabbing industry, and Maryland deep-fried crab cakes became a part of soul food cuisine.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Bower |first1=Anne |title=African American Foodways Explorations of History and Culture |date=2009 |publisher=University of Illinois Press |isbn=9780252076305 |page=162 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gF8NCxGHyMMC&q=maryland}}</ref>

[[File:Slave food garden - slave cabin at pioneer farm - Mount Vernon.jpg|thumb|A slave food garden at [[Mount Vernon]] - To supplement their diet, enslaved people grew their own food to make stews.]]

Enslaved fishermen in [[History of slavery in Virginia|Virginia]] caught fish to feed their families and the [[The Slave Community|slave community]]. ''The Encyclopedia of Virginia'' explains the history of free and enslaved Black fishermen: "Enslaved workers also received fish considered undesirable by whites, such as [[garfish]], whose red flesh Niemcewicz explained 'is little esteemed, serving only as food for negroes', and black catfish, which held less appeal for whites than white catfish, which was 'considered excellent.' Enslaved workers also fished in their time off to supplement their rations."<ref>{{cite web |title=Enslaved Fishermen and Mariners in Virginia |url=https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/enslaved-fisherman-and-mariners-in-virginia/ |website=www.encyclopediavirginia.org |publisher=Encyclopedia Virginia, Virginia Humanities |access-date=24 May 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Schafer |first1=Leanna |title=South Yard Dwellings: Food and Cooking |url=https://www.montpelier.org/south-yard-dwellings-food-cooking/ |website=www.montpelier.org |date=4 February 2021 |publisher=James Madison Montpelier |access-date=25 May 2024}}</ref> At [[George Washington]]'s residential plantation in Virginia, [[Mount Vernon]], enslaved cooks there prepared corn meal pancakes, "hoe cakes", individual cuts of meat, and seasoned cooked vegetables for the Washington family, while the enslaved people primarily ate corn meal and salted fish.<ref>{{cite web |title=A Day in the Life of an Enslaved Cook in 1799 |url=https://www.mountvernon.org/george-washington/slavery/a-day-in-the-life-of-an-enslaved-cook/ |website=www.mountvernon.org |publisher=George Washington Mount Vernon |access-date=30 May 2024}}</ref>

The diet of slaves in Virginia generally included meat from farm animals, vegetables, blackberries, walnuts, and seafood. Historical research at the Burroughs plantation in [[Franklin County, Virginia]] by the [[National Park Service]] showed that enslaved people there had a diet of cornbread, pork, chicken, sweet potatoes, and boiled corn for breakfast. Along the coast, enslaved people ate [[oyster]]s and seafood. [[Booker T. Washington]] was born enslaved in Franklin County, Virginia in 1856 and wrote an autobiography titled, ''The Story of My Life and Work and Up from Slavery'', that explained the diet he grew up with as an enslaved child. Washington's mother was an enslaved plantation cook who prepared meals for the white families.<ref>{{cite web |title=Mid-19th Century Plant Uses |url=https://www.nps.gov/bowa/learn/historyculture/upload/the-final-plant-uses-site-bulletin.pdf |website=www.nps.gov/bowa |publisher=The National Park Service |access-date=24 May 2024}}</ref>

[[File:ASC Leiden - Coutinho Collection - C 26 - Life in Sara, Guinea-Bissau - Girls cooking - 1974.tiff|thumb|Cooking techniques in [[West African cuisine|West Africa]] continued in North America with enslaved Africans and their descendants.|left]]

Booker T. Washington's mother cooked over an open fireplace or in skillets and pots. Washington, his mother, and siblings ate out of pots and skillets while white families ate from plates and flatware using forks and spoons. His mother prepared one-pot meals for her family using local meats, vegetables, nuts, and berries, combining all the ingredients in a pot to make a stew. This way of cooking is still done in West Africa and continued in the Southern United States with enslaved families.<ref>{{cite web |title=A 19th Century Slave Diet |url=https://www.nps.gov/bowa/learn/historyculture/upload/the-final-slave-diet-site-bulletin.pdf |website=www.nps.gov/bowa |publisher=The National Park Service |access-date=24 May 2024}}</ref> Enslaved people at the Burroughs plantation had a variety of vegetables with which to make stews; they were: "Asparagus, beets, beans, black-eyed peas, carrots, cabbage, cucumbers, garden peas, Irish potatoes, kale, lettuce, lima beans, muskmelons, okra, onions, peppers, radishes, tomatoes, turnips, and watermelons would be planted, ripened, and harvested from spring through fall".<ref>{{cite web |title=Mid-19th Century Plant Uses |url=https://www.nps.gov/bowa/learn/historyculture/upload/the-final-plant-uses-site-bulletin.pdf |website=www.nps.gov/bowa |publisher=The National Park Service |access-date=24 May 2024}}</ref>

According to Chambers's research, [[Igbo Americans|Igbo]] Africans influenced the foodways of Black Americans in Virginia. During the slave trade, about 30,000 Igbo people were imported from [[Igboland]] to Virginia. [[Igbo people]] in West Africa ate yams, okra, poultry, goats, and fished for their food. Okra, yams, black-eyed peas, and other African foods were brought to Virginia and enslaved Igbo people cooked these foods and prepared stews as one-pot meals. Enslaved people fished for food in the [[Chesapeake Bay]] and prepared seafood meals. In Virginia's nearby creeks and rivers, slaves caught catfish, crayfish, perch, herring, and turtles for food.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Chambers |first1=Douglass |title=Murder at Montpelier: Igbo Africans in Virginia |date=2005 |publisher=University Press of Mississippi |isbn=9781617034374 |pages=164–168 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PrPxWLSrp78C&q=crayfish}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Enslaved Igbo and the Foundation of Afro-Virginia Slave Culture and Society |url=https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=12372 |website=www.h-net.org | date=October 2006 |publisher=Humanities and Social Science |access-date=14 June 2024}}</ref> White plantation owners in Virginia rarely provided food to feed their slaves. To supplement their diets, enslaved people relied on Igbo methods such as hunting, fishing, and foraging for food and prepared meals that were influenced by Igbo culture. Chambers wrote: "Slave owners stinted the slaves, throwing the people back onto their own resourcefulness for sustenance. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, masters provided slaves with only the barest necessities. Weekly or monthly rations consisted of salt fish and/ or pork, corn or cornmeal, and salt and perhaps molasses. The largest plantation holders usually doled out salted herring as well as smoked pork and corn, which the slaves pounded and mixed with beans and boiled into hominy".<ref>{{cite book |last1=Chambers |first1=Douglass |title=Murder at Montpelier: Igbo Africans in Virginia |date=2005 |publisher=University Press of Mississippi |isbn=9781578067060 |page=166 |url=https://archive.org/details/murderatmontpeli0000cham/page/166/mode/2up?q=slave+owners}}</ref>

[[File:Baked macaroni and cheese close-up.jpg|thumb|Macaroni and cheese, a European dish that became a staple in Southern cuisine, was popularized in the United States by enslaved cook [[James Hemings]], [[Thomas Jefferson]]'s personal chef.]]

A few enslaved chefs had some degree of autonomy because of their cooking skills, such as [[Hercules Posey]] and [[James Hemings]]. Hercules Posey was the enslaved cook for [[George Washington]] at [[Mount Vernon]] in Virginia. Posey's dishes were so popular among elite white families that he had quasi-freedom to leave the house on his own and earn money selling leftovers. According to historians, the dishes Posey made were influenced by West African, European, and Native American foodways. He created dishes of veal, roast beef, and duck, along with puddings and jellies prepared in a way not unlike that of other chefs, but creating his own sauces and flavors. Posey was never given his freedom, and eventually escaped from slavery.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Jackson |first1=Frank |title=Our Sustenance: From Scraps to Soul Food, a Positive Institution |url=https://www.mappmagazine.com/articles/our-sustenance |website=www.mappmagazine.com |date=15 November 2023 |publisher=Mapp Magazine |access-date=24 May 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=The Culinary Legacy of Soul Food: Shaping American Cuisine |url=https://cocosouthla.org/the-culinary-legacy-of-soul-food-shaping-american-cuisine/#:~:text=During%20slavery%2C%20enslaved%20cooks%20ingeniously,into%20flavorful%20and%20hearty%20dishes. |website=Community Coalition | date=21 February 2024 |access-date=24 May 2024}}</ref> James Hemings (brother of [[Sally Hemings]]) was born enslaved in colonial Virginia and was the head [[chef]] for [[Thomas Jefferson]]. Hemings combined African, French, and Native American food traditions. While enslaved, Hemings traveled to [[Paris|Paris, France]] with Jefferson, where he trained under French chefs and learned how to make macaroni pie (today called [[macaroni and cheese]]). Hemings introduced and popularized macaroni and cheese in the United States; it later became a common side item in soul food dishes in Black communities.<ref>{{cite web |title=The Life of James Hemings |url=https://www.monticello.org/jameshemings/ |website=www.monticello.org |publisher=The Jefferson Monticello |access-date=24 May 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Yursik |first1=Patrice |title=Did An Enslaved Chef Bring Macaroni And Cheese To America? The Truth Behind Everyone's Favorite Side Dish |url=https://www.essence.com/entertainment/prime-video-culture-rated-once-upon-a-time-in-94/ |website=www.essence.com |date=2 May 2024 |publisher=Essence Magazine |access-date=24 May 2024}}</ref>

[[File:Afternoon Cooking (47139232).jpeg|thumb|Enslaved women cooking|left]]

[[Sesame]] is an African crop that was brought to South Carolina in 1730 during the slave trade. Thomas Jefferson noted how enslaved people prepared stews, baked breads, boiled their greens with sesame seeds, and made sesame pudding. Slaves ate sesame raw, toasted, and boiled. It was used as an ingredient for baked breads in colonial America and is still used in the present day.<ref name="African Crops and Slave Cuisine"/>

Some slaves grew herbs in their gardens to add flavor to their food.<ref>{{cite web |last1=White |first1=Brenda |title=Black History, Soul Food's Origin |url=https://www.dvidshub.net/news/464891/black-history-soul-foods-origin-ltc-brenda-d-white-ms-rd-ldn |website=www.dvidshub.net |publisher=Defense Visual Information Distribution Service / U.S. Department of Defense |access-date=30 May 2024}}</ref> Other cooking techniques were boiling and simmering food in an earthenware or iron pot known as colonoware.<ref>{{cite web |title=All the slaves ate together: African American foodways and the Colonial Era |url=https://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/fireandfreedom/education/highereducationdetail0100.html |website=www.nlm.nih.gov |publisher=National Library of Medicine |access-date=30 May 2024}}</ref> Salt was used to preserve meats for weeks until consumption.<ref>{{cite web |title=All The Slaves Ate Together: African American Foodways in the Colonial Era |url=https://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/fireandfreedom/education/highereducationdetail0200.html |website=www.nlm.nih.gov |publisher=National Library of Medicine |access-date=30 May 2024}}</ref> To sweeten their food and beverages, slaves used [[molasses]]. They also made blackstrap molasses, a very dark molasses with robust flavor, by cooking the juice of [[Sugarcane|sugar cane]] low and slow. Other sweet sauces created and used by slaves were sorghum syrup, similar to molasses, made by cooking the juice of the [[sorghum|sorghum plant]]. Sorghum seeds came from West Africa by way of the [[Atlantic slave trade|trans-Atlantic slave trade]] and were grown by enslaved people on plantations in the New World and used to make sweet sauces.<ref>{{cite web |title=Origins of Soul Food |url=https://libguides.sunysccc.edu/soulfood |website=Suny Schenectady County Community College |publisher=Begley Library |access-date=3 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Lamback |first1=Briona |title=How Molasses and Sorghum Fueled the Slave Trade |url=https://www.pushblack.us/news/how-molasses-and-sorghum-fueled-slave-trade |website=www.pushblack.us |publisher=PushBlack |access-date=3 June 2024}}</ref>

According to research by scholars at [[Mercer University]], white plantation families initially refused to eat African foods prepared by their slaves, although in many plantation kitchens enslaved African women were the primary cooks. These women passed down cultural knowledge of cooking techniques to the children. Older slave women were preferred as cooks by white plantation families because they were seen as nonthreatening, knowledgeable, and skilled in cooking. Time spent in the kitchen was time that enslaved mothers could spend bonding with their children and teaching them about life, culture, and foodways. In African societies and during slavery, women were the primary cooks. The role of enslaved Black women in the kitchen and as mothers led to racist stereotypes portraying them as [[Mammy stereotype|Mammy]]s.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Addison |first1=Sydney |title=African Americans and Southern Food |url=https://ursa.mercer.edu/bitstream/handle/10898/1521/Race%20Project.pdf;sequence=5 |website=Mercer University Libraries Institutional Repository |publisher=Mercer University |access-date=26 May 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Covey |first1=Herbert |last2=Eisnach |first2=Dwight |title=What the Slaves Ate: Recollections of African American Foods and Foodways from the Slave Narratives |date=2009 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |isbn=9798216164265 |page=55 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cq72EAAAQBAJ&q=What+the+slaves+are+recollections+of+african+american+foods+and+foodways}}</ref>

[[File:An ash cooking place.jpg|thumb|Using ashes to cook is a traditional method of cooking in Africa that continued in the slave communities in the American South.]]

[[Slave Narrative Collection|Slave narratives]] revealed continued African methods of cooking, heating, and seasoning food. Enslaved people roasted and heated their foods using ashes from fire pits, a traditional cooking method in Africa. This method was passed down orally in Black families in the Antebellum South, and slave narratives explained how slaves cooked food this way. The word "ash" was appended to the name of some of the food thus prepared, as in "ash cake" and "ash roasted potatoes". Enslaved people placed food directly on hot ashes or coals to roast or bake their foods. Pots and pans were also placed on top of hot ashes and coals to cook food. Some slaves heated or cooked their foods by putting them on leaves placed on top of the hot ashes. A former slave, Betty Curlett from Arkansas, told of roasting her potatoes on hot ashes: "They cooked a washpot full of peas for a meal or two and roasted potatoes around the pot in the ashes."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Covey |first1=Herbert |last2=Eisnach |first2=Dwight |title=What the Slaves Ate: Recollections of African American Foods and Foodways from the Slave Narratives |year=2009 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |isbn=9798216164265 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-k7EEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA59 |page=59}}</ref>

Some slaves did not receive enough food from their enslavers as some [[Slave health on plantations in the United States|slaves starved]] and consequently were malnourished. House slaves and field slaves had different diets. House slaves ate the leftovers they prepared for white plantation families such as individual cuts from meats like chicken, turkey, or fish, along with pies and seasoned vegetables. Slaves working in the field ate leftover animal scraps, [[offal]], and whatever food they could find in their environment. Some field slaves rarely ate regular hearty meals. Historian [[John W. Blassingame|John Blassingame's]] book published in 1972, ''[[The Slave Community|The Slave Community: Plantation Life in the Antebellum South]]'', was researched from a collection of [[Slave Narrative Collection|slave narratives]]. According to Blassingame's research, some enslaved people received the bare minimum in food and had to supplement their diets by hunting, fishing, and foraging for food.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Blassingame |first1=John |title=The Slave Community: Plantation Life in the Antebellum South |date=1972 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=9780195025637 |pages=39, 155–158 |url=https://archive.org/details/slavecommunitypl0000blas/mode/2up?q=food}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Brown |first1=Shayla |title=Slavery, Soul Food and the Power of Black Women |url=https://www.northjersey.com/in-depth/life/2020/12/02/slavery-soul-food-black-women/5980490002/ |access-date=3 June 2024 |agency=North Jersey News |date=2020}}</ref>

Research from the [[National Park Service]] and professor George Estabrook explained that enslaved people supplemented their diets "By boiling black-eyed peas, turnip greens, and pork fat in a single kettle and serving the mixture with grits made from home-ground corn, slaves cooked up meals that satisfied their dietary requirements, as well as their appetites." The black-eyed peas were a source of protein and the greens provided fiber and vitamins C and A.<ref>{{cite web |title=Early diet of soul food proven to be "remarkably nutritious. |url=https://www.nps.gov/ethnography/aah/aaheritage/lowCountry_pop4.htm |website=African American NPS Ethnography Program |publisher=National Park Service |access-date=16 June 2024}}</ref> Boiling greens in a kettle produced a vitamin-packed beverage called [[pot liquor]] that was consumed by the enslaved during the Antebellum era to maintain their health. White plantation owners ate the greens prepared by their slaves and left the green liquid (broth) for the slaves to drink not realizing the nutrients was in the broth. Pot liquor (also called potlikker) has Vitamins A, Vitamin C, Vitamin K, and iron. The enslaved and their descendants created healing remedies using pot liquors.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Edge |first1=John |title=The Potlikker Papers: A Food History of the Modern South |url=https://egrove.olemiss.edu/libarts_book/9/#:~:text=During%20the%20antebellum%20era%2C%20slave,poor%2C%20both%20black%20and%20white. |journal=Liberal Arts Faculty Books |date=January 2017 |publisher=The University of Mississippi |access-date=17 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Torrence |first1=Jackie |title=The Importance of Pot Liquor |date=1994 |publisher=August House |isbn=9780874833386 |pages=9-10, 49-50 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=H0mbhpckTO4C&q=slaves%20pot%20liquor}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Wright |first1=Tanya |title=Soul Food Reconsidered |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1990/10/07/magazine/soul-food-reconsidered.html |access-date=17 June 2024 |agency=The New York Times |date=1990}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Corbin |first1=Melissa |title=Potlikker Is A Simple Soul Food Dish With A Deep History |url=https://www.tastingtable.com/1093323/potlikker-is-a-simple-soul-food-dish-with-a-deep-history/ |website=www.tastingtable.com |date=9 November 2022 |publisher=Tasting Table |access-date=17 June 2024}}</ref> Slave gardens were important in the slave community, it supplemented slaves nutrient-deprived diet because their slaveholders did not provide enough food to feed them.<ref>{{cite web |title=Slave Gardens |url=https://www.encyclopedia.com/humanities/applied-and-social-sciences-magazines/slave-gardens |website=www.encyclopedia.com |publisher=Encyclopedia.com |access-date=16 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=How Enslaved Africans Influenced American Diet |url=https://learningenglish.voanews.com/a/how-enslaved-africans-influenced-american-diet/4816356.html |website=VOA News Arts and Culture |date=15 March 2019 |publisher=VOA News |access-date=16 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Kelley |first1=Susan |title=Seeds of survival: Botanic Gardens honors the Black experience |url=https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2022/08/seeds-survival-botanic-gardens-honors-black-experience-0 |website=Cornell Chronicle |publisher=Cornell University |access-date=23 June 2024}}</ref>

[[File:Chitlins.jpg|thumb|left|Chitlins]]

[[Chitterlings]] (also known as chitlin's) are cleaned pig intestines; they are cooked in a pot and seasoned. This food has been associated with enslaved Black people in the American South; however, eating animal innards (intestines) is practiced in other cultures such as Asia, Europe, and West Africa. The [[Hausa people]] in West Africa eat chicken intestines. Enslaved Africans in the American South continued their traditions of cooking, seasoning, and eating animal innards. Enslaved people added extremely hot peppers for additional flavor and spice to their chitlins. Cooking chitlins was time consuming; field slaves slow cooked their pig intestines while they were working in the field. The parts of the pig that white plantation owners did not eat they gave to the enslaved which they used to season food and prepared one-pot meals, soups, and chitlin dishes.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Bower |first1=Anne |title=African American Foodways Explorations of History and Culture |date=2009 |publisher=University of Illinois Press |isbn=9780252076305 |page=51 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gF8NCxGHyMMC&q=chitlin%20recipe%20of%20slaves}}</ref> Chitterlings are considered a delicacy in other cultures.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Lowery |first1=Sharelle |title=Chitlin's From Slave Food to Delicacy The Black American Kitchen |url=https://baystatebanner.com/2014/01/08/chitlins-from-slave-food-to-delicacy-the-black-american-kitchen/ |access-date=9 June 2024 |agency=The Bay State Banner |date=2014}}</ref> Due to the time it takes to clean pig intestines, chitterlings were preserved for special occasions and holidays. Some cooks season chitterlings with onions, celery, garlic, salt and pepper, and butter.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Stewart |first1=Vernetta |title=In Defense of Chitterlings |url=https://ediblenortheastflorida.ediblecommunities.com/food-thought/chitterlings-soul-food-chitlins |website=Edible Northeast Florida |access-date=9 June 2024}}</ref>

===Foodways on the Underground Railroad===
[[File:Oyster shuckers at Apalachicola, Fla. This work is carried on by many young boys during the busy seasons. This is a... - NARA - 523162.jpg|thumb|Black men worked in the oyster industries to support their families. A few were able to start their own oyster business creating soul food meals from oysters.<ref>{{cite web |title=Black Foodways and Cuisine |url=https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/stories/black-foodways-and-cuisine |website=National Museum of African American History and Culture |publisher=Smithsonian Institution |access-date=30 June 2024}}</ref>]]
[[Fugitive slaves in the United States|Freedom seekers]] (runaway slaves) foraged, fished, and hunted for food on their journey to freedom on the [[Underground Railroad]]. With these ingredients, they prepared one-pot meals (stews), a West African cooking method. Enslaved and free Black people left food outside their front doors to provide nourishment to the freedom seekers. The meals created on the Underground Railroad became a part of the foodways of Black Americans called soul food. For example, [[Thomas Downing (restaurateur)|Thomas Downing]] was born enslaved in 1791 on [[Chincoteague, Virginia|Chincoteague Island]], on the Eastern Shore of Virginia. He learned how to harvest [[clam]]s, [[oyster]]s, and [[terrapin]] from the [[Chincoteague Bay]], a lagoon of the Atlantic Ocean between Chincoteague and Assateague islands, and prepared meals from this seafood. Downing left Virginia during the [[War of 1812]] and traveled to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, a city that had Black Americans working in the culinary industry. There, he settled in the free Black community and found work catching oysters. Gaining his freedom in 1819, Downing, his wife, and sons moved to New York City, where the [[Hudson River]] provided work for New York's African American men working on the water harvesting oysters. By 1825 he had opened an oyster cellar, "Downing's Oyster House", on Broadway Street, in the city's business district. There he served raw, fried, and stewed oysters, oyster pie, fish with oyster sauce, and poached turkey stuffed with oysters. In the basement of his restaurant, Downing and his eldest son George hid people who were escaping slavery and seeking freedom. Downing became known as the "Oyster King of New York".<ref>{{cite web |title=Thomas George Downing (1791–1866) |url=https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/thomas-george-downing-1791-1866/ |website=Virginia Humanities |publisher=Encyclopedia of Virginia |access-date=20 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title=Soul Food Got Its Start From Freedom Seekers Surviving Off The Land |url=https://www.cbsnews.com/pittsburgh/news/soul-food-freedom-seekers-surviving-off-the-land/ |access-date=20 June 2024 |agency=CBS News |date=2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Downing's Oyster House |url=https://maap.columbia.edu/place/1.html |website=Mapping the African American Past |publisher=Columbia University |access-date=20 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Filippenko |first1=Alexandra |title=Original soul food wrapped in rich history |url=https://www.museeum.com/original-soul-food-wrapped-in-rich-history/ |website=www.museeum.com |date=26 June 2017 |publisher=Museeum |access-date=20 June 2024}}</ref>

===Slave recipes===
[[File:Homelard.jpg|thumb|Enslaved people fried their foods in lard, which is rendered pork fat.]]
In the 1930s, the [[Works Progress Administration]] paid American writers to gather stories from the last generations of African Americans born into slavery that are called [[Slave Narrative Collection|slave narratives]]. Alongside the narratives are collections of recipes for sauces, desserts, and cooked meat and seafood dishes made by formerly enslaved African Americans. These records have been studied by [[John W. Blassingame|John Blassingame]], [[Michael W. Twitty|Michael Twitty]], [[Jessica B. Harris]], and other historians as they reveal the food culture and diets of enslaved people. The narratives show how enslaved people created new dishes that influenced Southern cuisine in the United States.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Covey |first1=Herbert |last2=Eisnach |first2=Dwight |title=What the Slaves Ate: Recollections of African American Foods and Foodways from the Slave Narratives |date=2009 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |isbn=9798216164265 |pages=39–42, 89 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cq72EAAAQBAJ&q=What+the+slaves+are+recollections+of+african+american+foods+and+foodways}}</ref> The foods enslaved people prepared in the kitchens for white plantation families influenced the diets and cooking methods of European Americans.<ref>{{cite web |title=Seeds of Survival and Celebration: Plants of the Black Experience |url=https://cornellbotanicgardens.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/panels.pdf |website=Cornell Botanical Gardens |access-date=16 June 2024}}</ref>

Research from slave narratives showed enslaved people cooked sweet potatoes by roasting or frying them in [[lard]]. Sweet potatoes were mashed and sweetened with [[molasses]]. A traditional soul food dessert in Black families for Thanksgiving and Christmas is sweet potato pie.<ref>{{cite web |title=Seeds of Survival and Celebration: Plants of the Black Experience |url=https://cornellbotanicgardens.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/panels.pdf |website=Cornell Botanical Gardens |access-date=16 June 2024}}</ref> Enslaved people also consumed [[pot liquor]], the liquid left behind after boiling greens. George Key, who was born enslaved in Arkansas, said: "We had stew made out of pork and potatoes, and sometimes greens and pot liquor, and we had ash cake mostly, but biscuits about once a month."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Yetman |first1=Norman |title=Voices from Slavery 100 Authentic Slave Narratives |date=2012 |publisher=Dover Publications |isbn=9780486131016 |page=202 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dLfCAgAAQBAJ&q=pot%20liquor}}</ref> Making pot liquor continued after emancipation. Jackie Torrence, an African American storyteller, remembers her grandmother making pot liquor from mustard greens, collard greens, pinto beans, peas, and white potatoes as gravy. Pot liquor was also used as a healing remedy to treat earache and ingrown toenails.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Torrence |first1=Jackie |title=The Importance of Pot Liquor |date=1994 |publisher=August House |isbn=9780874833386 |pages=49–50 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=H0mbhpckTO4C&q=pot%20liquor}}</ref>
[[File:Dried spicy red peppers (4888546786).jpg|thumb|Slaves used red peppers and vinegar with other ingredients and made a homemade barbecue sauce.]]
A former slave named Wesley Jones from South Carolina gave a recipe to make a vinegar-based [[barbecue sauce]] using black and red peppers and [[vinegar]]. Wesley said slaves barbecued meats often, smoking and basting their meats with this homemade barbecue sauce; they would stay up all night slow cooking the meat. Other slave narratives described barbecuing as a preferred method of cooking because it added flavor and spice to food. Slaves barbecued their foods for special occasions and on their days off. Henry Bland,a former slave who lived in Georgia, said slaves had July 4 (Independence Day) off from work, allowing them to barbecue food, play ball games, wrestle, and play music.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Covey |first1=Herbert |last2=Eisnach |first2=Dwight |title=What the Slaves Ate: Recollections of African American Foods and Foodways from the Slave Narratives |date=2009 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |isbn=9798216164265 |pages=89–90, 199–200 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cq72EAAAQBAJ&q=What+the+slaves+are+recollections+of+african+american+foods+and+foodways}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Twitty |first1=Michael |title=Barbecue is an American Tradition – of Enslaved Africans and Native Americans |url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/04/barbecue-american-tradition-enslaved-africans-native-americans |access-date=4 June 2024 |agency=The Guardian |date=2015}}</ref>

A former slave named Callie Elder from Georgia said her grandfather cooked catfish with lard, salt, and pepper, and rolled the catfish in [[cornmeal]] before baking. Former slave Clara Davis from Alabama cooked catfish using tomatoes and potatoes or prepared baked catfish with a tomato gravy and sweet potatoes. Slaves in the South fried catfish in [[lard]] or other fats. Enslaved people made use of fruits like apples and peaches that had been introduced to North America by European colonists. Some fruits, such as apples, were battered and deep fried in oil, fruit fritters were also fried, and peaches were stewed. Former slaves Mose King from Arkansas and Rose Williams from Texas described eating [[goat]]. Mary Minus Biddie was a former slave from Florida and said enslaved people cooked goat in a smokehouse. David Goodman Gullins was a former slave from Georgia and said they prepared barbecued goat. Goat is a traditional meat in West Africa and was commonly cooked and eaten in the American south by slaves.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Covey |first1=Herbert |last2=Eisnach |first2=Dwight |title=What the Slaves Ate Recollections of African American Foods and Foodways from the Slave Narratives |date=2009 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |isbn=9798216164265 |pages=104–105, 129, 171–172, 174 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cq72EAAAQBAJ&q=What+the+slaves+are+recollections+of+african+american+foods+and+foodways}}</ref>
[[File:A Southern Barbecue.jpg|thumb|Black Americans preparing a southern barbecue]]
Enslaved people also barbecued [[squirrel]]s. One recipe for barbecued squirrels that might have been similar to the way slaves cooked them was given in an 1879 cookbook: "Put them in the oven and let them cook until done. Lay them on a dish and set near the fire. Take out the bacon, sprinkle one spoonful of flour in the gravy and let it brown. Then pour in one teacup of water, one tablespoon of butter and some tomato or walnut catsup. Let it cool, and then pour it over the squirrel." Barbecuing and preparing barbecue sauce and hot sauce were done to season lower grades of meats.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Covey |first1=Herbert |last2=Eisnach |first2=Dwight |title=What the Slaves Ate: Recollections of African American Foods and Foodways from the Slave Narratives |date=2009 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |isbn=9780313374982 |pages=89, 125 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-k7EEAAAQBAJ&q=barbecue&pg=PA59}}</ref> Enslaved people living near rivers and the Atlantic Ocean caught [[crab]] and made stews with the crab meat in a pot with okra, sometimes adding a sauce. Cooking seafood with okra is a traditional cooking method from West Africa that slaves continued on Southern plantations.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Covey |first1=Herbert |last2=Eisnach |first2=Dwight |title=What the Slaves Ate: Recollections of African American Foods and Foodways from the Slave Narratives |date=2009 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |isbn=9780313374982 |page=42 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-k7EEAAAQBAJ&q=crabs&pg=PA59}}</ref> Some of these recipes made by former slaves were published in African-American cookbooks. The earliest such cookbook was self-published in 1866 by [[Malinda Russell]] as a pamphlet titled, ''A Domestic Cookbook: Containing a Careful Selection of Useful Receipts for the Kitchen''.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Watson |first1=Robin |title=1866 African-American cookbook from Michigan woman offers voice from the past |url=https://www.detroitnews.com/story/life/food/2020/02/19/1866-african-american-cookbook-offers-voice-past/4785067002/ |access-date=4 June 2024 |agency=The Detroit News |date=2020}}</ref> A cookbook published in 1900 in the city of [[Charleston, South Carolina]] had recipes used by formerly enslaved Gullah people. [[Sesame|Benne seeds]] from ''sesame'', a plant native to West Africa, were eaten raw with sugar or milk. Enslaved people also made cakes, wafers, and brittles from them for white plantation families whom they called "[[buckra]]"<ref>{{cite journal |last1=West |first1=Kai |title=Buckra: Whiteness and Porgy and Bess |journal=Journal of the American Musicological Society |date=2022 |volume=75 |issue=2 |pages=319–377 |doi=10.1525/jams.2022.75.2.319 |url=https://online.ucpress.edu/jams/article/75/2/319/185498/Buckra-Whiteness-and-Porgy-and-Bess |access-date=10 June 2024}}</ref> (a [[Gullah language|Gullah word]] for white people).<ref>{{cite book |title=Confections delicacies sweets from the Old Slave Mart |date=1900 |publisher=Old Slave Mart |page=5 |url=https://digital.tcl.sc.edu/digital/collection/sccookbook/id/4}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=History of Benne in the Lowcountry |url=https://www.charlestonspecialtyfoods.com/pages/history-of-the-benne-seed-and-the-benne-wafer-in-the-lowcountry |website=www.charlestonspecialtyfoods.com |publisher=Charleston Specialty Foods |access-date=10 June 2024}}</ref>

===Barbecue traditions===
[[File:Barbecueing meat at a Masonic picnic- Kissimmee, Florida (4876969466).jpg|thumb|People gather to barbecue meat at a Masonic picnic in Kissimmee, Florida in 1886]]
Enslaved Africans in the American south contributed their own influence to the [[Barbecue in the United States|American barbecue]] tradition. The first people to barbecue food in North America were [[Native Americans in the United States|Indigenous people/Native Americans]]. West and Central Africans had their own method of barbecuing food that they brought to the Americas and the West Indies. The [[Hausa people]] in West Africa had a term for barbecue, ''babbake''. This term is used "...to describe a complex of words referring to grilling, toasting, building a large fire, singeing hair or feathers and cooking food over a long period of time over an extravagant fire".<ref>{{cite news |last1=Twitty |first1=Michael |title=Barbecue is an American Tradition – of Enslaved Africans and Native Americans |url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/04/barbecue-american-tradition-enslaved-africans-native-americans |access-date=4 June 2024 |agency=The Guardian |date=2015}}</ref> The blending of Native American and African styles of barbecuing meat contributed to the creation of the current barbecuing culture in the US.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Rao |first1=Vidya |title=Barbecue: The Black and Indigenous roots of an American tradition |url=https://www.today.com/food/barbecue-black-indigenous-roots-american-tradition-t222467 |access-date=30 June 2024 |agency=USA Today |date=2021}}</ref> During slavery times, white plantation owners left the labor-intensive work of preparing and barbecuing food to their slaves.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Regelski |first1=Regelski |title=The Soul of Food Slavery's Influence on Southern Cuisine |url=https://ushistoryscene.com/article/slavery-southern-cuisine/ |website=U.S. History Scene |access-date=30 June 2024}}</ref> Food historian [[Adrian Miller]] explains the history of Black people and barbecue during slavery: "Blackness and barbecue were wedded in the public imagination because old-school barbecue was so labour intensive. Someone had to clear the area where the barbecue was held, chop and burn the wood for cooking, dig the pit, butcher, process, cook and season the animals, serve the food, entertain the guests and clean up afterward. Given the racial dynamics of the antebellum South, enslaved African Americans were forced to do that work. The media, in turn, took note that a barbecue, as a social event, was a black experience from beginning to end."<ref>{{cite news |last1=Miller |first1=Adrian |title=How the long history of black barbecue was erased |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and-drink/media-barbecue-black-america-history-b1903832.html#comments-area |access-date=30 June 2024 |agency=Independent |date=2021}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Miller |first1=Adrian |title=Black Smoke African Americans and the United States of Barbecue |date=2021 |publisher=University of North Carolina Press |isbn=9781469662817 |pages=22-25, 39-49, 50-57 |url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/Black_Smoke/Lc_9DwAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=Black+Smoke:+African+Americans+and+the+United+States+of+Barbecue&printsec=frontcover}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Béchard |first1=Deni |title=The Bard of Barbecue |url=https://stanfordmag.org/contents/the-bard-of-barbecue |website=Stanford Magazine |publisher=Stanford University |access-date=30 June 2024}}</ref> On [[Independence Day (United States)|Fourth of July]] celebrations, the enslaved prepared barbecued food for white politicians and their enslavers.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Twitty |first1=Michael |title=Barbecue is an American Tradition – of Enslaved Africans and Native Americans |url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/04/barbecue-american-tradition-enslaved-africans-native-americans |access-date=4 June 2024 |agency=The Guardian |date=2015}}</ref>

Enslaved people brought their own influences on the creation of [[barbecue sauce]].<ref>{{cite web |last1=Dehart |first1=Rob |title=Tasting the History of Barbecue |url=https://tnmuseum.org/Stories/posts/tasting-the-history-of-barbecue |website=Tennessee State Museum |access-date=30 June 2024}}</ref> Hot and sweet sauces are used in West and Central African cuisine to add flavor, heat, and moisture to food.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Regelski |first1=Regelski |title=The Soul of Food Slavery's Influence on Southern Cuisine |url=https://ushistoryscene.com/article/slavery-southern-cuisine/ |website=U.S. History Scene |access-date=30 June 2024}}</ref> In 1748, Peter Kalm, a Swedish-Finnish botanist, noted enslaved Africans in Philadelphia cultivated [[Guinea pepper|guinea peppers]] and the pods were pounded and "mixed with salt preserved in a bottle" to make sauces poured over fish and meats.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Houck |first1=Brenna |title=Regional Barbecue Sauce Styles, Explained |url=https://www.eater.com/2016/6/18/11966056/barbecue-sauce-styles |website=Eater |access-date=30 June 2024}}</ref> Frederick Douglass Opie, writing in his book ''Hog and Hominy'', describes the origins of soul food in Africa: "African women cooked most meats over an open pit and ate them with a sauce similar to what we now call a barbecue sauce, made from lime or lemon juice and hot peppers."<ref>{{cite news |last1=Vaughn |first1=Daniel |title=How Southern Barbecue Got to Texas |url=https://www.texasmonthly.com/bbq/how-southern-barbecue-got-to-texas/ |access-date=30 June 2024 |agency=Texas Monthly |date=2015}}</ref> "Slaves made up a large percentage of the Texas population by 1860. During this time they brought with them the idea of cooking over an open fire and dousing meats with a sauce, that sounds an awful lot like the barbecue sauce we know today."<ref>{{cite news |last1=Donahue |first1=Emily |title=The Historic Connection Between Slave Recipes and Today’s Barbecue |url=https://www.texasstandard.org/stories/how-old-slave-recipes-became-todays-texas-bbq/#:~:text=Slaves%20made%20up%20a%20large,barbecue%20sauce%20we%20have%20today. |access-date=30 June 2024 |agency=Texas Standard |date=2015}}</ref> After the American Civil War, a Black pitmaster named Arthur Watts, brought his family's barbecue sauce recipe and barbecuing methods to [[Kewanee, Illinois]] and became a well-known pitmaster.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Alexander |first1=Steve |title=A family legacy of barbecue sauce emerges from the darkness of slavery |url=https://wgnradio.com/the-business-of-food-with-steve-alexander/a-family-legacy-of-barbecue-sauce-emerges-from-the-darkness-of-slavery/ |access-date=30 June 2024 |agency=WGN Radio 720 |date=2022}}</ref> In [[African-American neighborhood|African-American communities]], barbecuing food became a preferred method of cooking during [[Emancipation Day]] celebrations.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Twitty |first1=Michael |title=Barbecue is an American Tradition – of Enslaved Africans and Native Americans |url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/04/barbecue-american-tradition-enslaved-africans-native-americans |access-date=4 June 2024 |agency=The Guardian |date=2015}}</ref>

===Emancipation===
[[File:"Emancipation Day in South Carolina" - the Color-Sergeant of the 1st South Carolina (Colored) addressing the regiment, after having been presented with the Stars and Stripes, at Smith's LCCN99614128.jpg|thumb|Emancipation Day celebration in Beaufort]]
On January 1, 1863, Gullah people in the [[Sea Islands|sea islands]] of South Carolina celebrated their freedom on New Year's Day at [[Camp Saxton Site|Camp Saxton]] in Beaufort with food and barbecues. Black people in the barrier islands of South Carolina became free early during the [[American Civil War]] after the [[Battle of Port Royal]] on November 7, 1861, when many of the plantation owners and white residents fled the area after the arrival of the Union Navy and Army. As a result, over 10,000 African Americans became free on that day.<ref>{{cite web |title=Beaufort's Reconstruction Era National Historical Park |url=https://southcarolinalowcountry.com/beauforts-reconstruction-era-national-historical-park/ |website=South Carolina Lowcountry Resorts and Lands |date=23 May 2022 |access-date=1 June 2024}}</ref> However, their freedom was not official in government writing until the passage of the [[Emancipation Proclamation]] on New Year's Day in 1863. Thousands of newly freed people celebrated their freedom with food, song, and dance.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Brack |first1=Andy |title=Emancipation Day celebrations |url=https://www.statehousereport.com/2019/12/27/history-emancipation-day-celebrations-2/ |website=www.statehousereport.com |publisher=State House Report |access-date=1 June 2024}}</ref> [[Charlotte Forten Grimké|Charlotte Forten]], the first black teacher at the [[Penn Center (Saint Helena Island, South Carolina)|Penn School]] on [[Saint Helena Island (South Carolina)|St. Helena Island]] in Beaufort, attended the Emancipation Day celebration at Camp Saxton and recorded in her journal they ate roasted oxen and barbecue.<ref>{{cite web |title=This First Day of January |url=https://clements.umich.edu/exhibit/proclaiming-emancipation/this-first-day-of-january/ |website=William L. Clements Library |publisher=University of Michigan |access-date=1 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Forten |first1=Charlotte |title=The Journals of Charlotte Forten Grimké |date=1988 |publisher=Oxford University Press |page=431 |isbn=978-0-19-505238-1 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3uHylBU24jMC&q=oxen}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Moss |first1=Robert |title=BBQ Evolution |url=https://charlestoncitypaper.com/2010/09/01/bbq-evolution/ |access-date=1 June 2024 |agency=Charleston City Paper |date=2010}}</ref> [[Susie King Taylor]], a Geechee woman born enslaved in [[Liberty County, Georgia]], wrote in her memoir that she had also attended the Emancipation Day celebration at Camp Saxton: "It was a glorious day for us all, and we enjoyed every minute of it, and as a fitting close and crowning event of this occasion we had a grand barbecue".<ref>{{cite book |last1=King Taylor |first1=Susie |title=Reminiscences of My Life in Camp with the 33d United States Colored Troops Late 1st S. C. Volunteers |date=1902 |publisher=Harvard University |page=18 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=v3-cyYKvZr8C&q=barbecue}}</ref> Other Emancipation Day celebrations were celebrated with a barbecue feast, a tradition that originated in the [[The Slave Community|slave community]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Covey |first1=Herbert |last2=Eisnach |first2=Dwight |title=What the Slaves Ate Recollections of African American Foods and Foodways from the Slave Narratives |date=2009 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |isbn=9798216164265 |pages=89–90, 199–200 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cq72EAAAQBAJ&q=What+the+slaves+are+recollections+of+african+american+foods+and+foodways}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Twitty |first1=Michael |title=Barbecue is an American tradition – of enslaved Africans and Native Americans |url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/04/barbecue-american-tradition-enslaved-africans-native-americans |access-date=4 June 2024 |agency=The Guardian |date=2015}}</ref>

[[File:2017 Juneteenth Celebration on the Square20170617 0009 (35406892355).jpg|thumb|A 2017 Juneteenth Celebration showing soul food vendors|left]]
After the [[American Civil War]], 4 million African Americans were freed from slavery. They celebrated their newly won freedom with barbecues and [[Emancipation Day#United States|Emancipation Day]] celebrations and prepared soul food meals. Two months after the Civil War ended in April 1865, slaveholders in Galveston, Texas refused to tell their slaves the Civil War had ended and they were free. On June 19, 1865, United States Brigadier [[Gordon Granger|General Gordon Granger]] and his troops arrived in Galveston and issued [[General Order No. 3|General order No. 3]]. This order enforced the Emancipation Proclamation which declared enslaved people in Texas were now free.<ref>{{cite web |title=Featured Document Display: The Emancipation Proclamation and Juneteenth |url=https://museum.archives.gov/featured-document-display-emancipation-proclamation-and-juneteenth |website=National Archives Museum |publisher=National Archives and Records Administration |access-date=20 June 2024}}</ref> To celebrate their freedom, African Americans in Galveston, and other Black communities in the United States, gathered at public parks and prepared red foods that represent the color of freedom. These celebrations are called [[Juneteenth]], which became a national holiday under the Biden Administration in the year 2021.<ref>{{cite web |title=Juneteenth: A Celebration of Freedom |url=https://www.nps.gov/articles/juneteenth-origins.htm |website=www.nps.gov |publisher=The National Park Service |access-date=1 June 2024}}</ref>
[[File:Picayune Creole Cookbook (cropped).jpg|thumb|Picayune Creole Cookbook]]
According to food historian [[Michael W. Twitty|Michael Twitty]], the reason African Americans eat red food on Juneteenth is that it reminds them of the blood of their ancestors that was shed during slavery, and the cultural colors of the [[Yoruba people|Yoruba]] and [[Kongo people|Bakongo people]], who were enslaved in the Southern United States and brought to North America under the slave trade. Among the Yoruba and Bakongo people, the color red represents power, sacrifice, and transformation.<ref>{{cite web |title=The Meaning and History of Juneteenth Foods |url=https://www.pbs.org/articles/the-meaning-and-history-of-juneteenth-foods |website=www.pbs.org |publisher=Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) |access-date=1 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Juneteenth |url=https://nmaahc.si.edu/juneteenth |website=National Museum of African American History and Culture |publisher=Smithsonian Institution |access-date=1 June 2024}}</ref> The red foods eaten at Juneteenth are, watermelon, red lemonade, and [[red velvet cake]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Tastes of Resilience |url=https://nmaahc.si.edu/juneteenth#Tastes |website=National Museum of African American History and Culture |publisher=Smithsonian Institution |access-date=1 June 2024}}</ref> In addition to red foods, BBQ, fried foods, and other cooked meals are prepared to celebrate the day of freedom.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Ayele Djossa |first1=Christina |title=The Story Behind Red-Hued Juneteenth Food and Drink |url=https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/what-is-juneteenth |website=www.atlasobscura.com |date=19 June 2018 |publisher=The Atlanta Obscure |access-date=1 June 2024}}</ref>

After [[Emancipation Proclamation|emancipation]], many Black Americans in the South became [[Sharecropping|sharecroppers]] and cooked what was available in their region. This created regional styles of cooking with similar dishes passed down orally in [[The Black Family in Slavery and Freedom|Black families]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Wallach |title=Dethroning the Deceitful Pork Chop: Rethinking African American Foodways from Slavery to Obama |date=2015 |publisher=University of Arkansas Press |isbn=9781610755689 |pages=200–210, 211–220 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rWuJCgAAQBAJ&q=sharecropping}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Ferguson |first1=Sheila |title=Soul Food: Classic Cuisine from the Deep South |date=1993 |publisher=Grove Press |isbn=9780802132833 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-RoZrySwkxIC&q=sharecropper}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=2023 Black History Month: Family Traditions: Feeding the Spirit and Soul |url=https://dcps.libguides.com/c.php?g=1175843&p=8592802 |website=www.dcps.libguides.com |publisher=District of Columbia Public Schools |access-date=20 May 2024}}</ref> Due to slave laws, it was illegal in many states for slaves to learn to read or write. Soul food [[recipe]]s and cooking techniques were passed down orally until after emancipation.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Opie |first=F.D. |title=Hog and Hominy: Soul Food from Africa to America |publisher=Columbia University Press |year=2008 |isbn=9780231146395 |pages=35}}</ref>

The first soul food [[cookbook]] is attributed to [[Abby Fisher]], entitled ''[[What Mrs. Fisher Knows About Old Southern Cooking]]'' and published in 1881. ''Good Things to Eat'' was published in 1911; the author, Rufus Estes, was a former slave who worked for the [[Pullman Company|Pullman]] [[railway]] car service. Many other cookbooks were written by Black Americans during that time, but as they were not widely distributed, most are now lost.<ref>{{cite news|url= https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/food/1995/11/29/rediscovering-the-first-black-cookbook/c8dc66e9-a512-487f-807d-4bfb1bdd848d/|title=Rediscovering the First Black Cookbook|newspaper=[[The Washington Post]] |url-access=subscription}}</ref>

===Mid-20th century to present day===
[[File:Chitterling, fish and sugar cane on street in Negro Section,... (3110576314).jpg|thumb|left|Black-owned night-clubs during the Jim Crow era were called the Chitlin' Circuit—they were safe places for Black people to eat.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Jeffries |first1=Fran |title=Chitlin' Circuit: Black performers' soulful showcase during segregation |url=https://www.ajc.com/news/national/chitlin-circuit-black-performers-soulful-showcase-during-segregation/srbp9fswLEa3tsiOe5Z54M/ |access-date=9 June 2024 |agency=The Atlanta-Journal Constitution |date=2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Martin |first1=Roland |last2=Ostberg |first2=Rene |title=Chitlin Circuit |url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/chitlin-circuit |website=www.britannica.com |publisher=Encyclopedia Britannica |access-date=9 June 2024}}</ref>]]
The introduction of soul food to cities such as [[Washington, D.C.]], [[Baltimore]], and [[Harlem]] came during the [[Great Migration (African American)|Great Migration]] as African Americans moved to the North looking for work. [[Sylvia Woods]] was born in [[Hemingway, South Carolina]] in 1926. When Woods was a teenager she moved to Harlem and worked in a [[Brooklyn]] factory. In 1954, Woods changed jobs and started working at Johnson's Luncheonette located in central Harlem. Seven years later, Woods and her husband purchased the luncheonette and opened it as a soul food restaurant in 1962, calling it [[Sylvia's Restaurant of Harlem|Sylvia's Restaurant]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Sylvia's Restaurant - A Harlem Institution Since 1962 |url=https://www.harlemamerica.com/harlemlove/sylvias-restaurant-a-harlem-institution-since-1962/ |website=www.harlemamerica.com |date=15 September 2020 |publisher=Harlem America |access-date=13 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Jones |first1=James |title=Sylvia Woods (1926-2012) |url=https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/woods-sylvia-1926-2012/ |website=www.blackpast.org |publisher=Black Past |access-date=13 June 2024}}</ref>

Food historian [[Adrian Miller]] studied soul food's development in Maryland and in Northern American states. Soul food in Maryland's Black communities added local flavors from seafood from the [[Chesapeake Bay]]. People in Maryland fried chicken in shallow fat in a frying pan, covering it with a lid, thus frying and steaming the chicken, which was served with waffles.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Miller |first1=Adrian |title=Soul Food: The Surprising Story of an American Cuisine, One Plate at a Time |date=2013 |publisher=University of North Carolina Press |isbn=9781469607634 |page=53 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Od8VAAAAQBAJ&q=Maryland}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Braga |first1=Brunno |title=Culinary Gems: 7 Must Try Black-Owned Restaurants in Baltimore |url=https://travelnoire.com/black-owned-restaurants-in-baltimore |access-date=9 June 2024 |agency=Travel Noire |date=2023}}</ref> [[Chicken and waffles]] became a common soul food item to eat in Black communities in Maryland and in [[Harlem|Harlem, New York]]. During the [[blues]] and [[jazz]] era, musicians and singers performed and practiced late into the night and stopped at black-owned restaurants for food where cooks prepared fried chicken and waffles for their customers.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Opie |first1=Frederick |title=Hog and Hominy: Soul Food from Africa to America |date=2008 |publisher=Columbia University Press |isbn=9780231146395 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FMGrAgAAQBAJ&q=chicken%20and%20waffles}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Thomas |first1=Amelia |title=A Harlem soul food fix |url=https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20110701-a-harlem-soul-food-fix |website=www.bbc.com |publisher=BBC |access-date=9 June 2024}}</ref> Nightclubs in Black communities in the United States during the [[Jim Crow laws|Jim Crow era]] were called the [[Chitlin' Circuit]], named after the dish that was usually associated with Black southerners and soul food.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Miller |first1=Adrian |title=Soul Food: The Surprising Story of an American Cuisine, One Plate at a Time |date=2013 |publisher=University of North Carolina Press |isbn=9781469607634 |pages=104–105 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Od8VAAAAQBAJ&q=chitlin%20circuit}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Miller |first1=Adrian |title=Inside the 'Chitlin Circuit', a Jim Crow-Era Safe Space for Black Performers |url=https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/chitlin-circuit |website=www.atlasobscura.com |date=28 June 2022 |publisher=Atlas Abscura |access-date=9 June 2024}}</ref> The Chitlin' Circuit was given its name by entertainers because it included black-owned night clubs that served [[Chitterlings|chitlins (chitterlings)]] and soul food.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Brown |first1=Tanya |title=The Origin (And Hot Stank) Of The 'Chitlin' Circuit' |url=https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2014/02/16/275313723/the-origin-and-hot-stank-of-the-chitlin-circuit |website=www.npr.org |publisher=NPR South Carolina public radio |access-date=16 June 2024}}</ref>

[[File:The Busy Bee Café.jpg|thumb|[[The Busy Bee Café]] is a soul food restaurant frequented by civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.]]
During the [[civil rights movement]], soul food restaurants were places where civil rights leaders and activists met to discuss and strategize civil rights protests and ideas for implementing social and political change.<ref>{{cite book |last1=J. Wallach |first1=Jennifer |title=Every Nation Has It's Dish: Black Bodies and Black Food in Twentieth-Century America |publisher=University of North Carolina Press |isbn=9781469645223 |pages=145-155 |url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/Every_Nation_Has_Its_Dish/bWN5DwAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1}}</ref> As the [[Atlanta History Center]] explained: "Throughout the civil rights movement in Atlanta, soul food restaurants were hubs of change where civil rights leaders could convene, converse, and strategize, and in times of terror and violence, these places were retreats where leaders could plan their next tactical moves, giving many of these spots a legacy beyond good cooking". Soul food restaurants in [[Atlanta|Atlanta, Georgia]] served as the primary meeting places for numerous civil rights leaders and supporters of the movement. Many politicians and civil rights leaders gathered to discuss plans about the movement at [[Paschal's|Paschal's Restaurant]] on West Hunter Street. In the 1950s and 1960s, civil rights icons such as [[Andrew Young]], [[John Lewis]], [[Martin Luther King Jr.]], [[Julian Bond]], [[Adam Clayton Powell Jr.]], and [[Jesse Jackson]] frequented the restaurant, staying late into the night talking about civil rights strategies and politics. Several soul food restaurants were located on West Hunter Street because [[Jim Crow laws]] restricted where African Americans were allowed to operate their businesses.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Singh |first1=Rachel |title=The Restaurants that Fueled the Civil Rights Movement |url=https://www.atlantahistorycenter.com/blog/the-restaurants-that-fueled-the-civil-rights-movement/#:~:text=Throughout%20the%20civil%20rights%20movement,these%20spots%20a%20legacy%20beyond |website=Atlanta History Center |date=10 January 2022 |access-date=26 May 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Goldmon |first1=Camille |title=Paschal's Restaurant |url=https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/arts-culture/paschals-restaurant/ |website=Georgia Encyclopedia |publisher=Emory University |access-date=26 May 2024}}</ref>
[[File:Ben's Chili Bowl - facade.jpg|thumb|Ben's Chili Bowl is a black-owned restaurant in Washington, D.C.|left]]
In 1963, a few days before the [[March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom]] in Washington D.C., where Martin Luther King Jr. gave his ''[[I Have a Dream|I Have a Dream Speech]]'' on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, King ate at a soul food restaurant called the Florida Avenue Grill. During the years of the civil rights movement, other civil rights leaders and activists met at the restaurant, planning and strategizing for the movement. Before King was assassinated on April 4, 1968, at the [[National Civil Rights Museum|Lorraine Motel]] in Memphis, Tennessee, he ate at the Four Way restaurant and had fried catfish and lemon icebox pie. Throughout his civil rights career, King frequented several soul food restaurants where he ate and met with other local and national civil rights leaders.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Miller |first1=Adriane |title=Black Restaurants that Fed the Civil Rights Movement |url=https://www.southernliving.com/culture/black-restaurants-civil-rights-movement |website=www.southernliving.com |publisher=Southern Living |access-date=31 May 2024}}</ref> After King's assassination, riots broke out in [[1968 Washington, D.C., riots|Washington D.C.]], and the leader of the [[Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee]] (SNCC), [[Stokely Carmichael]], asked the owner of [[Ben's Chili Bowl]] restaurant to remain open to provide food for police officers, student activists, and firefighters as they worked together to stop the riot. Authors Hoekstra and Khan explained in their book, ''The People's Place: Soul Food Restaurants and Reminiscences from the Civil Rights Era to Today'', that soul food restaurants served as places to bring communities and families together in times of trouble during the Jim Crow era and helped in the fight against segregation laws by allowing white and Black people to eat together.<ref>{{cite web |title=The People's Place: Soul Food Restaurants and Reminiscences from the Civil Rights Era to Today |url=https://ppld.overdrive.com/media/2397348 |website=Pikes Peak Library District |access-date=2 June 2024}}</ref>
[[File:Staff of Sylvia's, a legendary soul-food restaurant in Harlem, New York LCCN2011632427.tif|thumb|Staff of Sylvia's, a legendary soul food restaurant in [[Harlem|Harlem, New York]]]]
In [[Montgomery, Alabama]], civil rights protestors convened and organized for the movement at soul food restaurants because they provided a safe haven and a place to eat and relax. Martha's Place and Chris' Hotdogs were visited by protestors. During this period of activism, Jereline and Larry James Bethune, the owners of the restaurant Brenda's BBQ, also in Montgomery, taught African Americans how to register to vote and how to read a ballot when Jim Crow laws and [[literacy test]]s prevented Black people from voting. Civil rights activists frequented the restaurant for moral and financial support. The owners also helped to print out fliers for the movement and allowed protestors to have secret meetings in the back of the restaurant.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Greene |first1=Lydia |title=Soul Food Was at the Heart of the Civil Rights Movement in Montgomery |url=https://www.wideopencountry.com/soul-food-montgomery/ |website=www.wideopencountry.com |date=15 November 2021 |publisher=Wide Open Country |access-date=26 May 2024}}</ref>

Atlanta's oldest black-owned restaurant, the Evelyn Jones Cafe, was founded in 1936 by Evelyn Jones and her sister. In the mid-1940s, Evelyn and her husband, Luther Frazier, enlarged the restaurant and renamed it Frazier's Cafe Society. It is located at 880 Martin Luther King Jr. Drive (then known as West Hunter Street). The Jones family challenged Jim Crow laws when they allowed whites and blacks to eat together. It was the first interracial restaurant on West Hunter Street. The cafe also served as a location for civil rights leaders to meet. The foods the restaurant served were Virginia baked ham, pork chop dinner, jumbo shrimp, roast beef, and other classic Southern dishes.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Camerino |first1=Taria |title=A Seat at the Table with Evelyn J. Frazier |url=https://discoveratlanta.com/dining/culinary-scene/a-seat-at-the-table-with-evelyn-j-frazier/ |website=Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau |access-date=26 May 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Cintron |first1=Daniela |title=Atlanta's Culinary Evolution: Unveiling Michelin Guide's Love for the City |url=https://discoveratlanta.com/stories/eat/atlantas-culinary-evolution-unveiling-michelin-guides-love-for-the-city/ |website=Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau |date=9 November 2023 |access-date=26 May 2024}}</ref> Club from Nowhere was a black-owned soul food restaurant that opened in 1955 in Montgomery, Alabama, operated by civil rights activist [[Georgia Gilmore]]. Gilmore's fried chicken, macaroni and cheese, stuffed pork chops, stuffed peppers, and coleslaw were popular among her black and white customers. These were dishes she learned how to make from the women in her family. Gilmore's restaurant provided food for civil rights leaders during the [[Montgomery bus boycott]], and her soul food was a favorite among Martin Luther King Jr.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Blalock |first1=Bob |title=African-Americans have shaped Alabama’s and America’s cuisine |url=https://alabamanewscenter.com/2019/02/06/african-americans-shaped-alabamas-americas-cuisine/ |access-date=6 July 2024 |agency=Alabama News Center |date=2019}}</ref> Several soul food restaurants served black and white people before the passage of the [[Civil Rights Act of 1964]], which made segregated facilities illegal.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Ruane |first1=Laura |title=Black-owned restaurants nourished the activist soul |url=https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/02/18/black-history-month-restaurants/5591989/ |access-date=3 June 2024 |agency=USA Today |date=2014}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Draughn |first1=Janay |title=(Southern) Black Women's Presence in Invisibility: Miss Georgia Gilmore & The Club from Nowhere |url=https://www.mdcinc.org/2022/08/23/southern-black-womens-presence-in-invisibility-miss-georgia-gilmore-the-club-from-nowhere/ |website=www.mdcinc.org |publisher=MDC |access-date=3 June 2024}}</ref>

During the [[Jim Crow laws|Jim Crow era]] in the 20th century, it was not safe for Black Americans to travel on the road as they faced possible violence from white supremacists. Black people needed to know what places were safe to stop for food, gas, and motels. In 1936, an African American postal worker from Harlem, New York, named [[Victor Hugo Green]] created ''[[The Negro Motorist Green Book|The Green Book]]'' for Black people to travel safely in the Southern United States, where Jim Crow laws were widespread. Several soul food restaurants were listed in the book because they were safe havens for African Americans to eat. One restaurant listed in the Green Book was Swett's, which opened in 1954.<ref>{{cite web |title=The Green Book Sites Were A Welcome Relief From The Ominous Presence of Jim Crow |url=https://negromotoristgreenbook.si.edu/virtual-exhibit/south/ |website=The Negro Motorist Green Book |publisher=Smithsonian Institution |access-date=2 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=The Importance of "The Green Book: Guide to Freedom" |url=https://www.uwci.org/blog/the-importance-of-the-green-book-guide-to-freedom#:~:text=The%20annual%20guidebook%20was%20first,serve%20them%20along%20the%20road. |website=United Way of Central Indiana |access-date=2 June 2024}}</ref>
[[File:Ulmann, African-American Church.jpg|thumb|African-Americans in church during a church service. Black churches served soul food meals to feed the [[African-American neighborhood|African-American community]].|left]]
The [[Black church|Black Church]] (African-American churches) played a key role in Black communities as they provided food and a place of worship. Researchers from [[Public broadcasting|PBS]] explained: "Religion played a key role in the proliferation of soul food, as well as the diversification of the cuisine. Black churches, crucial during slavery and in the Civil Rights movement, were also crucial as gathering places, where Black communities could eat and rejoice over plates of chicken and dumplings, black-eyed peas and rice, red drinks, and the classic Black American church dish, fried catfish and spaghetti".<ref>{{cite web |last1=Stewart |first1=Kayla |title=The Spirit of Soul Food: More Than Just Shrimp and Grits |url=https://www.pbssocal.org/shows/the-migrant-kitchen/the-spirit-of-soul-food-more-than-just-shrimp-and-grits |website=Public Broadcasting SoCal |date=15 February 2022 |publisher=PBS SoCal |access-date=3 June 2024}}</ref> Chris Carter is an African American pastor and professor of history who published a book about the Black Church and soul food in 2021 titled, ''The Spirit of Soul Food: Race, Faith, and Food Justice''. According to Carter, soul food in the African-American community is food that fights injustices centered around the lack of access to food, as some Black Americans live in poverty and Black churches on Sundays and during the week prepare meals to feed their community.<ref>{{cite web |title=The Spirit of Soul Food: Race, Faith, and Food Justice |url=https://memphisseminary.edu/2022/02/08/the-spirit-of-soul-food-race-faith-and-food-justice-with-rev-dr-christopher-carter/ |website=Memphis Theological Seminary |date=8 February 2022 |access-date=3 June 2024}}</ref>

Since the mid-20th century, many cookbooks highlighting soul food and African-American foodways have been compiled and published. One notable soul food chef is celebrated traditional Southern chef and author [[Edna Lewis]],<ref name=":0">{{Cite book|title=The cooking gene : a journey through African American culinary history in the Old South|last=Twitty |first= Michael |author-link= Michael W. Twitty |isbn=9780062379290|edition= First|location=New York, NY|oclc=971130586|year= 2017}}</ref> who released a series of books between 1972 and 2003, including ''A Taste of Country Cooking'' in which she weaves stories of her childhood in [[Freetown, Virginia]] into her recipes for "real Southern food".<ref>{{Cite web |title=Biography: Edna Lewis |url=https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/edna-lewis |access-date=2022-07-12 |website=Biography: Edna Lewis |language=en}}</ref>

Another early and influential soul food cookbook is [[Vertamae Grosvenor]]'s ''[[Vibration Cooking|Vibration Cooking, or the Travel Notes of a Geechee Girl]]'', originally published in 1970, focused on [[South Carolina]] [[Lowcountry]]/[[Geechee]]/[[Gullah]] cooking. Its focus on spontaneity in the kitchen—cooking by "vibration" rather than precisely measuring ingredients, as well as "[[Improvise|making do]]" with ingredients on hand—captured the essence of traditional African-American cooking techniques. The simple, healthful, basic ingredients of lowcountry cuisine, like [[shrimp]], [[oyster]]s, [[crab]], fresh produce, rice, and [[sweet potato]]es, made it a bestseller.<ref>{{cite book|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=KX4u6rXRgiUC&q=Another+early+and+influential+soul+food+cookbook+is+Vertamae+Grosvenor%27s+Vibration+Cooking,+or+the+Travel+Notes+of+a+Geechee+Girl,+originally+published+in+1970,+focused+on+South+Carolina+Lowcountry/Geechee/Gullah+cooking.|title= Vibration Cooking: or, The Travel Notes of a Geechee Girl|isbn= 978-0-8203-3959-7|last1= Smart-Grosvenor|first1= Vertamae|date= 15 April 2011|publisher= University of Georgia Press}}</ref>
[[File:The Historical Cookbook of the American Negro.JPG|thumb|The Historical Cookbook of the American Negro]]
Usher boards and Women's Day committees of various religious congregations large and small, and even public service and social welfare organizations such as the [[National Council of Negro Women]] (NCNW) have produced cookbooks to fund their operations and charitable enterprises.<ref name="Witt1999b">{{cite book |last1=Witt |first1=Doris |title=Black Hunger: Food and the Politics of U.S. Identity |year=1999 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-535498-0 |page=219 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VSuArSmUcn8C&pg=PA219}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=C. Eves |first1=Rosalyn |title=A Recipe for Remembrance: Memory and Identity in African-American Women's Cookbooks |journal=Rhetoric Review |date=2005 |volume=24 |issue=3 |pages=280-297 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/20176662?searchText=soul+food&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3Dsoul%2Bfood%26so%3Drel&ab_segments=0%2Fbasic_search_gsv2%2Fcontrol&refreqid=fastly-default%3A23cc969e229a5fc7d8b8a2b21104cb49&seq=1 |access-date=1 July 2024}}</ref> The NCNW produced its first cookbook, ''The Historical Cookbook of the American Negro'', in 1958, and revived the practice in 1993, producing a popular series of cookbooks featuring recipes by famous Black Americans, among them: ''The Black Family Reunion Cookbook'' (1991), ''Celebrating Our Mothers' Kitchens: Treasured Memories and Tested Recipes'' (1994), and ''Mother Africa's Table: A Chronicle of Celebration'' (1998). The NCNW also recently reissued ''The Historical Cookbook''.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Perry |first1=Michiel |title=National Council of Negro Women: Cookbooks to add to your coffee table |url=https://www.blacksouthernbelle.com/national-council-of-negro-women-cookbooks-to-add-to-your-coffee-table/ |website=www.blacksouthernbelle.com |date=9 March 2024 |publisher=Black Southern Belle |access-date=1 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=African American Cookbooks |url=https://exhibitions.library.vanderbilt.edu/cookbooks/section/african-american-cookbooks/ |website=Vanderbilt Library and Exhibition |publisher=Vanderbilt University |access-date=1 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=The Historical Cookbook of the American Negro |url=https://exhibitions.library.vanderbilt.edu/cookbooks/item/the-historical-cookbook-of-the-american-negro/ |website=Vanderbilt Library and Exhibition |publisher=Vanderbilt University}}</ref>

The Special Collections at the [[University of Alabama]] has the largest collection of over 450 African-American cookbooks. Kate Matheney, a librarian at the University of Alabama, studied the history of African-American cookbooks and found that several Black cookbooks were authored by white women. As they were the primary cooks in [[Plantation complexes in the Southern United States|plantation houses]], enslaved Africans in Alabama influenced the foodways of whites there. During the [[Jim Crow laws|Jim Crow]] era, African American women worked in the homes of white families as domestics and prepared their meals. Some white women authored Black cookbooks using stereotypical images of black women as [[Mammy stereotype|Mammies]] on the cover of cookbooks to better market the recipes they learned from black cooks to audiences. African Americans authored their cookbooks using non-stereotypical images and added recipes they learned from their family.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Blalock |first1=Bob |title=African-Americans have shaped Alabama’s and America’s cuisine |url=https://alabamanewscenter.com/2019/02/06/african-americans-shaped-alabamas-americas-cuisine/ |access-date=6 July 2024 |agency=Alabama News Center |date=2019}}</ref>

In 2011, culinary historian [[Jessica B. Harris]] published a book titled, ''[[High on the Hog (book)|High on the Hog]]'' that explains the origins and development of African-American dishes and their roots in [[Sub-Saharan Africa]]. Enslaved and free African Americans incorporated indigenous foods from North America such as plants, fruits, and animals but [[Africanisms#food|Africanized]] the foods by preparing and flavoring their dishes similarly to West and Central Africans.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Harris |first1=Jessica |title=High on the Hog: A Culinary Journey from Africa to America |date=2011 |publisher=Bloomsbury |isbn=9781596913950 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SaszAQAAQBAJ}}</ref> Harris' book later became a docuseries in 2021 on [[Netflix]] called ''[[High on the Hog: How African American Cuisine Transformed America]]''.<ref>{{cite web |title=High on the Hog: How African American Cuisine Transformed America |url=https://www.docnyc.net/high-on-the-hog/ |website=www.docnyc.net |publisher=DOCNYC |access-date=2 June 2024}}</ref>

In 2018, African American author and culinary historian [[Michael W. Twitty|Michael Twitty]] published ''[[The Cooking Gene|The Cooking Gene: A Journey Through African American Culinary History in the Old South]]'' that explains the history, development, and evolution of soul food in Black communities in the Southern United States.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Twitty |first1=Michael |title=The Cooking Gene: A Journey Through African American Culinary History in the Old South |date=2018 |publisher=Harper Collins |isbn=9780062876577 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=K15PDwAAQBAJ}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Terry |first1=Ruth |title=How Black Culinary Historians Are Rewriting the History of American Food |url=https://www.yesmagazine.org/social-justice/2020/02/26/food-african-american-history |website=www.yesmagazine.org |publisher=Yes Magazine |access-date=16 June 2024}}</ref>

Gullah Geechee [[chef]], [[Emily Meggett]], was born on [[Edisto Island|Edisto Island, South Carolina]] in 1922. Meggett learned how to farm and cook from her family and published a book about Gullah cuisine in 2022 titled, ''Gullah Geechee Home Cooking: Recipes from the Matriarch of Edisto Island''.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Meggett |first1=Emily |title=Gullah Geechee Home Cooking: Recipes from the Matriarch of Edisto Island |date=2022 |publisher=ABRAMS |isbn=9781647006907 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=v-o7EAAAQBAJ&q=Gullah+Geechee+Home+Cooking:+Recipes+from+the+Matriarch+of+Edisto+Island+in+2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Tsioulcas |first1=Anastasia |title=For Gullah Geechee chef Emily Meggett, cooking was about heart |url=https://www.npr.org/2022/08/15/1116289080/for-this-89-year-old-gullah-geechee-chef-cooking-is-about-heart |website=South Carolina Public Radio |publisher=NPR |access-date=4 June 2024}}</ref>

In 2024, Lakisha Harris became the first Black woman in the United States to present a presentation on soul food at the [[American Culinary Federation]] (ACF) National Convention titled, ''Culinary Freedom of the Soul''.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Key |first1=Marcus |title=Muskegon woman to be first Black woman in U.S. to present soul food at national chef's convention |url=https://www.wzzm13.com/article/news/community/muskegon-woman-first-to-present-soul-food-at-national-convention/69-04e9dc94-b5b8-4b41-806a-5a48cd5f3b7d |access-date=26 May 2024 |agency=13abc on your side |date=2024}}</ref>

Gullah Geechee [[chef]] [[Benjamin Dennis IV]], born in [[Charleston, South Carolina]], continues to educate the public about Gullah and African-American cuisine's origins in [[West African cuisine]] and its influence on American foodways.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Barna |first1=Stephanie |title=Chef BJ Dennis delves into his people's Gullah Geechee past to inspire his future |url=https://charlestoncitypaper.com/2012/10/10/chef-bj-dennis-delves-into-his-peoples-gullah-geechee-past-to-inspire-his-future/ |access-date=4 June 2024 |agency=Charleston City Paper |date=2012}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Sullivan |first1=Marian |title=We're All Ears |url=https://charlestonmag.com/features/we_re_all_ears |website=Charleston City Magazine |date=17 May 2016 |access-date=4 June 2024}}</ref>

African American chef [[Carla Hall]], author of the cookbook ''Carla Hall's Soul Food: Everyday and Celebration'', is a television personality and the culinary ambassador to the [[National Museum of African American History and Culture]] Sweet Home Cafe in Washington, D.C. Hall has [[Yoruba people|Yoruba]] ancestors from Nigeria, West Africa, and [[Bubi people|Bubi]] ancestors from [[Equatorial Guinea]] in Central Africa. She studies the history of soul food and found connections of African-American foodways in West-Central Africa and continues to educate the public about African-American food heritage.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Rickman |first1=Catherine |title=How Carla's Hall Yoruba Roots inspired her Soul Food Journey |url=https://www.tastingtable.com/1270490/carla-hall-yoruba-roots-inspired-soul-food-journey/#:~:text=The%20television%20personality%20and%20cookbook%20author%2C%20known%20as,Nigeria%20and%20her%20Bubi%20ancestors%20from%20Equatorial%20Guinea. |website=Tasting Table |access-date=6 July 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Koman |first1=Tess |last2=Arnold |first2=Allison |title=Everything You Need To Know About Carla Hall, The Former Co-Host Of 'The Chew' |url=https://www.delish.com/food-news/g21097928/who-is-carla-hall/ |website=www.delish.com |publisher=Delish |access-date=6 July 2024}}</ref>

== African influence ==
[[File:Ham hock and black-eyed peas (cropped).jpg|thumb|[[Ham hock]] and [[black-eyed pea]]s]]
Scholars have found substantial African influence in soul food recipes, especially from the [[West Africa|West]] and [[Central Africa|Central]] regions of [[Africa]]. This influence can be seen in the [[Pungency|heat level]] of many soul food dishes, as well as many ingredients used to prepare them.<ref name=":1">{{Cite book|title=The Past Is Not Dead|last=Hall|first=Robert L.|publisher=University Press of Mississippi|year=2012|isbn=9781617033056|editor-last=Chambers|editor-first=Douglas B.|location=Jackson, Mississippi|pages=292, 294, 297, 305|editor-last2=Watson|editor-first2=Kenneth}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Twitty |first1=Michael |title=The Unbearable Taste: Early African American Foodways |url=https://commonplace.online/article/unbearable-taste-early-african-american-foodways/#:~:text=American%20crops%20parallel%20to%20African,early%20African%20America%20were%20born. |website=Common Place Journal of Early American Life |publisher=Common Place |access-date=30 June 2024}}</ref> Peppers used to add spice to food include [[Aframomum melegueta|malagueta pepper]], as well as variants native to the [[Western Hemisphere]] such as [[Cayenne pepper|red (cayenne) peppers]].<ref name=":3">{{Cite book |last1=Whit |first1=William C. |url=https://archive.org/details/africanamericanf0000unse/page/34 |title=African American foodways: explorations of history and culture |last2=Hall |first2=Robert L. |publisher=University of Illinois Press |year=2007 |isbn=9780252031854 |editor-last=Bower |editor-first=Anne L. |pages=[https://archive.org/details/africanamericanf0000unse/page/34 34, 48] |oclc=76961285 |url-access=registration}}</ref> Several foods essential to Southern cuisine and soul food were domesticated or consumed in the [[Savanna|African savannah]] and the tropical regions of [[West Africa|West]] and [[Central Africa]]. These include [[kola nut]]s, [[watermelon]], [[pigeon pea]]s, [[black-eyed pea]]s, [[okra]], [[sorghum]], and [[guinea pepper]].<ref name=":1" /><ref name="VOA Arts and Culture"/><ref>{{cite news |last1=Savannah Morning News |first1=Naftal |title=Black influences have shaped American food for centuries |url=https://www.savannahnow.com/story/lifestyle/2021/02/22/africans-brought-different-seeds-and-plants-americas/4505785001/ |access-date=21 June 2024 |agency=Savannah Morning News |date=2021}}</ref>
[[File:Bucket of raw okra pods.jpg|thumb|Okra is used in soul food dishes|left]]
A species of [[rice]] was domesticated in Africa, so many people brought to the Americas preserved rice cooking techniques. Rice was a [[cash crop]] in the [[South Carolina Lowcountry]], and during the slave trade, Europeans selected coastal inhabitants of West Africa who had knowledge of [[rice cultivation]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Rice in the Lowcountry |url=https://ldhi.library.cofc.edu/exhibits/show/africanpassageslowcountryadapt/sectionii_introduction/rice_lowcountry#:~:text=In%20the%20early%20eighteenth%20century,economy%20into%20the%20nineteenth%20century. |website=Lowcountry Digital History Initiative |publisher=College of Charleston |access-date=1 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|title=Black rice: the African origins of rice cultivation in the Americas|last=Carney|first=Judith Ann|isbn=9780674029217|location=Cambridge, Massachusetts|oclc=657619002|date=2009-06-30}}</ref> Rice is a staple [[side dish]] in the [[Lowcountry]] region and in Louisiana. It is a main ingredient in dishes such as [[jambalaya]] and [[red beans and rice]], popular in [[Acadiana|Southern Louisiana]]. Recipes for rice and beans developed in West Africa were brought to the [[South Carolina Lowcountry]] by enslaved Africans and continue to be prepared by their descendants, the [[Gullah]] people. A Gullah dish of rice, black-eyed peas, onions, and bacon is [[Hoppin' John]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Whit |first1=William |title=Soul Food as Cultural Creation |journal=Journal for the Study of Food and Society |date=1999 |volume=3 |issue=1 |page=40 |doi=10.2752/152897999786690717 |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.2752/152897999786690717 |access-date=20 May 2024}}</ref> Food historian [[Jessica B. Harris]] traces this dish to a [[Senegal]]ese food called ''Chiebou niebe'', made with rice and beef. Enslaved Black Americans in the United States thus created new dishes with origins in West Africa but using North American ingredients.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Jao |first1=Carren |title=A brief look at Black American history told through 10 food traditions |url=https://www.abqjournal.com/clickable/a-brief-look-at-black-american-history-told-through-10-food-traditions/collection_39c010e5-39b6-5ef5-903f-063a04684965.html#10 |website=www.abqjournal.com |publisher=Albuquerque Journal |access-date=3 June 2024}}</ref> A Gullah [[New Year]] tradition is eating Hoppin' John to bring in good luck. Customarily eaten on January 1 throughout the Lowcountry region, it is often paired with [[cornbread]] and collard greens, which are also said to bring prosperity.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Smith Miles |first1=Suzannah |title=Hoppin' John |url=https://charlestonmag.com/features/hoppin_john |website=www.charlestonmag.com |date=22 December 2014 |publisher=Charleston Magazine |access-date=20 May 2024}}</ref>

[[File:Authentic Gullah Hoppin John.jpg|thumb|Authentic Gullah [[Hoppin' John]]]]
[[Charleston red rice]] is made with rice and tomato paste. This dish originated from [[jollof rice]] in West Africa, which is made with a tomato product giving the rice its red color.<ref>{{cite web |title=Discover the History of Charleston in Three Mouthwatering Meals |url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/sponsored/discover-history-charleston-three-mouthwatering-meals-180976563/ |website=Smithsonian Magazine |publisher=Smithsonian Institution |access-date=25 May 2024}}</ref> In the Lowcountry of South Carolina and Georgia, enslaved Gullah Geechee people's main source of food was rice paired with meats and shellfish. These rice cooking techniques, influenced by rice dishes made in West Africa, are practiced today in Gullah communities.<ref>{{cite web |title=Origins of Soul Food |url=https://libguides.sunysccc.edu/soulfood |website=SUNY Schenectady |publisher=Begley Library |access-date=3 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Food History and Family Travel: Rice Culture and Black Heritage in Berkeley County, SC |url=https://www.blacksouthernbelle.com/food-history-family-travel-rice-culture-black-heritage-in-berkeley-county-sc/#:~:text=Rice%2C%20which%20is%20oftentimes%20considered,%2C%20flour%2C%20puddings%20and%20cakes. |website=www.blacksouthernbelle.com | date=23 March 2021 |publisher=Black Southern Belle |access-date=3 June 2024}}</ref>

There are many documented parallels between the [[foodways]] of West Africans and soul food recipes.<ref name=":4">{{Cite book|title=Hog & Hominy: Soul Food from Africa to America|last=Opie|first=Frederick Douglass|isbn=9780231517973|location=New York|oclc=648458580|date=2008-10-08}}</ref> The consumption of [[sweet potato]]es in the United States echoes the consumption of [[Yam (vegetable)|yams]] in West Africa. The presence of cornbread on African-American tables is analogous to West African use of [[fufu]] to soak up sauces and stews.<ref name=":4" />

Harris starred in the 2021 docuseries ''[[High on the Hog: How African American Cuisine Transformed America]]'' and traveled to [[Benin]], West Africa, where she saw women making a leafy sauce called ''feuille'', prepared similarly to how African Americans cook collard greens.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Batey |first1=Nicole |title=Soul food, African culture embedded in American cuisine |url=https://afro.com/soul-food-african-culture-embedded-in-american-cuisine/ |access-date=1 June 2024 |agency=Afro the Black Media Authority |date=2021}}</ref>

West Africans also cooked meat over open pits and brought their methods of barbecuing and making barbecue sauce to the Americas. The [[Hausa language|Hausa]] word for barbecue is ''babbake''.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Twitty |first1=Michael |title=Barbecue is an American Tradition – of Enslaved Africans and Native Americans |url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/04/barbecue-american-tradition-enslaved-africans-native-americans |access-date=4 June 2024 |agency=The Guardian |date=2015}}</ref> [[Indigenous peoples of the Americas|Indigenous peoples]] in North America also barbecued their meats. African Americans use African and Native American techniques of barbecue.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Rao |first1=Vidya |title=Barbecue: The Black and Indigenous roots of an American tradition |url=https://www.today.com/food/barbecue-black-indigenous-roots-american-tradition-t222467 |access-date=30 June 2024 |agency=USA Today |date=2021}}</ref><ref name=":3" /><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.sofritoforyoursoul.com/baebecue-is-more-american-than-you-think-it-is-a-native-american-culinary-art/|title=Barbecue is more American than you think... it is a Native American culinary art.|website=Sofrito for Your Soul|language=en-US|access-date=2019-06-26}}</ref>

It was not uncommon to see food served out of an empty [[gourd]]. Many techniques to change the overall flavor of staple food items such as nuts, seeds, and rice contributed to added dimensions of evolving flavors. These techniques included roasting, frying with [[palm oil]], baking in ashes, and steaming in leaves such as [[banana]] leaf.<ref name=":13">{{Cite document|title=History of "Soul Food"|last=Arrington|first=Kathye Edwina|date=3 February 2013|id={{ProQuest|1283537628}}|publisher=Press & Sun-Bulletin|location=[[Binghamton, New York]]}}</ref>

==Native American influence==
[[File:2021-08-19 19 01 31 A half loaf of corn bread in the Franklin Farm section of Oak Hill, Fairfax County, Virginia.jpg|thumb|right|Cornbread, a traditional Native American food, became a staple in African-American cooking]]
Southeastern [[Native Americans in the United States|Native American]] culture is an important element of [[Southern cuisine]]. From their cultures came one of the main staples of the Southern diet: [[maize|corn]] (maize), either ground into meal or limed with an alkaline salt to make [[hominy]], in a Native American process known as [[nixtamalization]].<ref>{{cite book|title=The Cornbread Gospels |author=Dragonwagon, Crescent |publisher=Workman Publishing |year=2007 |isbn=978-0-7611-1916-6}}</ref> Corn was used to make all kinds of dishes, from the familiar [[cornbread]] and [[grits]] to [[liquor]]s such as [[moonshine]] and [[whiskey]] (which are still important to the Southern economy<ref>X, Malcolm, and Alex Haley. The Autobiography of Malcolm X. Grove Press, 6. 1966</ref>). Black Americans in [[Tuskegee, Alabama]] combined [[molasses]] and leftover cooked grease, a combination they called "''sap''", to pour over their cornbread and "hoe cakes".<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Dirks |first1=Robert |title=What Early Dietary Studies of African Americans Tell Us About Soul Foods |journal=Research Gate |page=6 |url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/356596105 |access-date=20 May 2024}}</ref>

The foods of [[Black Seminoles]] in Florida and Oklahoma are influenced by [[Gullah]] rice and bean dishes and [[Seminole]] foodways. Black Seminoles cooked rice, "sometimes applying a sauce of okra or spinach leaves".<ref>{{cite web |last1=Opala |first1=Joseph |title=Black Seminoles—Gullahs Who Escaped From Slavery |url=https://glc.yale.edu/sites/default/files/files/Black%20Seminoles%20.pdf |website=The Gullah: Rice, Slavery, and the Sierre Leone Connection |publisher=Yale University |access-date=26 August 2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Harris |first1=Jessica |title=High on the Hog: A Culinary Journey from Africa to America |date=2011 |publisher=Bloomsbury |isbn=9781596913950 |page=59 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SaszAQAAQBAJ&q=black%20seminoles}}</ref> Historian Ray Von Robertson conducted oral interviews with sixteen Black Seminoles from 2006 and 2007 and found that Seminole cultural influences were incorporated into their daily lives in practices such as foodways and herbal medicine. Black Seminoles cooked and ate fry bread, ''sofkee'', and grape dumplings.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Robertson |first1=Ray Von |title=Estelusti Marginality: A Qualitative Examination of the Black Seminole |journal=The Journal of Pan African Studies |date=2008 |volume=2 |issue=4 |page=70 |url=https://www.jpanafrican.org/docs/vol2no4/2.4_Estelusti_Marginality.pdf |access-date=6 April 2024}}</ref>
[[File:Bowl of Grits.png|thumb|[[Grits]] originated among [[Indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands|Southeastern Native American tribes]] and have become a staple in soul food dishes.]]
Many [[fruit]]s are available in this region: [[Blackberry|blackberries]], [[muscadine]]s, [[Raspberry|raspberries]], and many other wild berries were part of Southern Native Americans' diets as well.{{Blockquote|To a far greater degree than anyone realizes, several of the most important food dishes that the Native Americans of the southeastern U.S.A live on today is the "soul food" eaten by both Black and White Southerners. Hominy, for example, is still eaten: Sofkee lives on as grits; cornbread [is] used by Southern cooks; Indian fritters -- variously known as "hoe cake" or "Johnny cake"; Indian boiled cornbread is present in Southern cuisine as "corn meal dumplings" and "hush puppies"; Southerners cook their beans and field peas by boiling them, as did the Native tribes; and, like the Native Americans, Southerners cured their meats and smoked it over hickory coals...|sign=Charles Hudson|source=''The Southeastern Indians''<ref name=c_hudson>{{cite book |last=Hudson |first=Charles |title=The Southeastern Indians |year=1976 |publisher=The University of Tennessee Press |chapter=A Conquered People |pages=498–99 |isbn=978-0-87049-248-8}}</ref>}}African, European, and Native Americans of the American South supplemented their diets with meats derived from the hunting of native game. What meats people ate depended on seasonal availability and geographical region. Common game included [[opossum]]s, [[rabbit]]s, and [[squirrel]]s.<ref>{{Cite book|title="To love the wind and the rain": African Americans and environmental history|last=Glitner|first=Scott|publisher=University of Pittsburgh Press|year=2006|isbn=9780822972907|editor-last=Glave|editor-first=Dianne D.|location=Pittsburgh, PA|pages=21–36|oclc=878132911|editor-last2=Stoll|editor-first2=Mark}}</ref>

When game or livestock was killed, the entire animal was used. Aside from the meat, it was common for them to eat organ meats such as [[brain]]s, [[Liver (food)|livers]], and [[intestine]]s. This tradition remains today in hallmark dishes like [[chitterlings]] (commonly called ''chit'lins''), which are the small [[intestine]]s of [[Hog (swine)|hogs]]; [[livermush]] (a common dish in the Carolinas made from hog liver); and pork brains and eggs. The fat of the animals, particularly hogs, was rendered and used for cooking and frying. Many of the early European settlers in the South learned Native American cooking methods, setting in motion the [[cultural diffusion]] of Southern cuisine.{{Citation needed|date=May 2024}}

== Sauces and seasoning ==
[[File:Crystalhotsauce.jpg|thumb|Hot sauce is used to add flavor to food.]]
Since the mid-20th century, Black Americans have seasoned cooked meats and vegetables with [[Lawry's Seasoned Salt]]. Because Lawry's is economical and offers multiple herbs and spices in one product, Black Americans use it in most of their dishes except sweet dishes.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Hutcherson |first1=Aaron |title=The Seasoning That Inspires Salty Looks and Kanye Hooks |url=https://tastecooking.com/seasoning-inspires-salty-looks-kanye-hooks/ |website=www.tastecooking.com |date=16 August 2018 |access-date=20 May 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Collette |first1=Abby |title=Body and Soul Food |year=2021 |publisher=Penguin Publishing Group |isbn=9780593336182 |pages=314–315 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gD8jEAAAQBAJ&q=hot%20sauce}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Leckey |first1=Ryan |title=Soul Food Recipes |url=https://www.wnep.com/article/entertainment/television/leckey-live/soul-food-recipes/523-5c161186-b074-4707-88b9-acc8b36e70b2 |website=www.wnep.com |date=6 February 2013 |publisher=16WNEP |access-date=20 May 2024}}</ref> For extra flavor and spice, hot sauce is sprinkled over fried chicken and fish, collard greens, and other cooked foods. West Africans made variations of hot spicy sauces using hot [[African pepper|peppers]] indigenous to the region. After their enslavement and transportation to the southern United States, they continued to make their own versions of hot sauces using spices and peppers from North America. By the mid-20th century, Black Americans were turning to store-bought hot sauces to add flavor and spice to their food.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Lumpkins |first1=Charles |title=Soul Food |url=https://oxfordaasc.com/display/10.1093/acref/9780195301731.001.0001/acref-9780195301731-e-46221 |website=Oxford African American Studies Center |publisher=Oxford University |access-date=20 May 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Slave trade: How African foods influenced modern American cuisine |url=https://www.un.org/africarenewal/web-features/slave-trade-how-african-foods-influenced-modern-american-cuisine |website=www.un.org |date=27 March 2015 |publisher=United Nations |access-date=20 May 2024}}</ref> During slavery times, enslaved people had flavored their vegetables with bacon grease or other parts of the pig. This tradition continues today with [[The Black Family in Slavery and Freedom|Black families]] using [[Pig's trotter|pig feet]], bacon grease, or turkey necks to flavor collard and turnip greens.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Thomas |first1=Clarence |title=Soul food roots: West Africa in Central Georgia kitchens |url=https://maconmagazine.com/soul-food-roots/ |website=Macon Magazine |date=23 February 2024 |access-date=26 May 2024}}</ref>

== Cultural relevance ==
{{American cuisine|expanded=ethnic and cultural}}
[[File:Jacksonville August 2017 38 (Sylvia Mae's Soul Food).jpg|thumb|Soul food restaurant in Texas]]
Soul food originated in the southern region of the US and is consumed by African-Americans across the nation. Traditional soul food cooking is seen as one of the ways enslaved Africans passed their traditions to their descendants once they were brought to the US. It is a cultural creation stemming from slavery and Native American and European influences.<ref name=":4" /><ref name=":3" />

Soul food recipes are popular in the South due to the accessibility and affordability of the ingredients.<ref name=":4" /><ref name=":6" /> Scholars have observed that while white Americans provided the material supplies for soul food dishes, the cooking techniques found in many of the dishes have been visibly influenced by the enslaved Africans themselves.<ref name=":3" /> Dishes derived by slaves consisted of mostly vegetables and grains because slave owners felt more meat would cause the slave to become lethargic with less energy to tend to the crops.

The bountiful vegetables found in Africa were substituted in dishes down south with new leafy greens consisting of dandelion, turnip, and beet greens. Pork, more specifically hog, was introduced into several dishes in the form of cracklins from the skin, pig's feet, chitterlings, and lard used to increase the fat intake into vegetable dishes. Spices such as thyme, and bay leaf blended with onion and garlic gave dishes their own characteristics.<ref name=":13" />

Red drinks are ubiquitous at African American social functions. When black people congregate for special occasions and food is present, a red drink will be found there. Any restaurant with a mostly black clientele serves at least one red drink. Red drinks are important in soul food culture because they represent social connections between friends and family, and a link with the [[African diaspora]].<ref name="Miller2013">{{cite book |last1=Miller |first1=Adrian |title=Soul Food |year=2013 |pages=223–230 |publisher=UNC Press Books |isbn=978-1-4696-0763-4 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Od8VAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA223}}</ref> Newbell Puckett, a southern sociologist who documented African American folk beliefs in his 1926 study, ''Folk Beliefs of the Southern Negro'',<ref name="Morrisey20018">{{cite web |last1=Morrisey |first1=Larry |title=Niles Newbell Puckett {{!}} (1897–1967) Scholar |url=https://mississippiencyclopedia.org/entries/niles-newbell-puckett/ |website=Mississippi Encyclopedia |access-date=9 June 2024 |date=April 14, 2018}}</ref> suggested that there was cultural and historical continuity between African American culture and West African societies where red had been an important ritual and royal color for hundreds of years. There were two notable red drinks in West Africa, kola tea and [[hibiscus tea]], by the time the Atlantic slave trade began. Kola tea was made from the nuts of West African trees, especially ''[[Cola nitida]]''. Tea made from the dried red flowers of the hibiscus ([[Hibiscus sabdariffa]]), a plant related to okra, is used to make a tea called ''bissap'', from the French ''jus de bissap''. It is popular in Senegal and Gambia. ''Bissap'' was called sorrel tea or red sorrel in the Americas.<ref name="Miller2013"/>

Figures such as LeRoi Jones (Amiri Baraka), [[Elijah Muhammad]], and [[Dick Gregory]] played notable roles in shaping the conversation around soul food.<ref name="Witt1999c">{{cite book |last1=Witt |first1=Doris |title=Black Hunger: Food and the Politics of U.S. Identity |year=1999 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-535498-0 |page=14 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VSuArSmUcn8C&pg=PA80}}</ref><ref name=":4" /> Muhammad and Gregory opposed soul food because they felt it was unhealthy and was slowly killing African-Americans.<ref name=":5" /> They saw soul food as a remnant of oppression and felt it should be left behind. Many African-Americans were offended by the Nation of Islam's rejection of pork as it is a staple ingredient used to flavor many dishes.<ref name=":4" />

[[Stokely Carmichael]] also spoke out against soul food, claiming that it was not true African food due to its colonial and European influence.<ref name=":4" /> Despite this, many voices in the Black Power Movement saw soul food as something African-Americans should take pride in and used it to distinguish African-Americans from white Americans.<ref name="Witt1999a"/> Proponents of soul food embraced the concept and used it as a counterclaim to the argument that African-Americans had no culture or cuisine.<ref name=":3" /><ref name=":4" />

Soul food spread throughout the United States when African-Americans from the South moved to major cities across the country such as [[Chicago]] and [[New York City]] during the Great Migration. They brought with them the foods and traditions of the Southern United States, where they had been enslaved.<ref name="Wallach2018"/> Later, the magazine ''Ebony Jr!'' was important in transmitting the cultural relevance of soul food dishes to middle-class African-American children who typically ate a more standard American diet.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Henderson|first=Laretta|date=Winter 2007|title="Ebony Jr!" and "Soul Food": The Construction of Middle-Class African American Identity through the Use of Traditional Southern Foodways|journal=Society for the Study of the Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States (MELUS)|volume=32|issue=4|pages=81–97|jstor=30029833}}</ref> Today Soul food is frequently found at religious rituals and social events such as funerals, fellowship, Thanksgiving, and Christmas in the black community.<ref name=":4" /><ref name=":0" /><ref name=":1" />

Soul food is culturally similar to [[Romani cuisine]] in Europe.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://sfbayview.com/2013/09/african-americans-and-the-gypsies-a-cultural-relationship-formed-through-hardships/ | title=African Americans and the Gypsies: A cultural relationship formed through hardships | date=27 September 2013 }}</ref>

== Health concerns ==
{{Further|Soul food health trends}}
Soul food prepared traditionally and consumed in large amounts can be detrimental to one's health. Opponents of eating soul food have been vocal about health concerns surrounding the culinary traditions since the name was coined in the mid-20th century.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/soul-food-cuisine | title=Soul food &#124; Description, History, & Ingredients &#124; Britannica }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Ford |first1=Alexander |title=Food from the soul: A history of African American culture and nutrition |url=https://thedo.osteopathic.org/columns/food-from-the-soul-a-history-of-african-american-culture-and-nutrition/ |website=www.thedo.osteopathic.org |date=December 2022 |publisher=American Osteopathic Association |access-date=20 May 2024}}</ref>

Soul food has been criticized for its high [[starch]], [[fat]], [[Sodium in biology|sodium]], [[cholesterol]], and [[Caloric concentration|caloric content]], as well as the inexpensive and often low-quality nature of the ingredients such as [[Salt pork|salted pork]] and [[cornmeal]]. In light of this, soul food has been implicated by some in the disproportionately high rates of high blood pressure ([[hypertension]]), [[type 2 diabetes]], clogged arteries ([[atherosclerosis]]), [[stroke]], and [[heart attack]] suffered by African-Americans.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Singh |first1=Maanvi S. |title=Southern Diet Blamed For High Rates Of Hypertension Among Black Americans |url=https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/10/02/653798353/southern-diet-blamed-for-high-rates-of-hypertension-among-blacks?t=1659856511016 |website=NPR |access-date=7 August 2022 |language=en |date=2 October 2018}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Belle |first1=Genesis |title=Can the African-American Diet be Made Healthier Without Giving up Culture — York College / CUNY |website=www.york.cuny.edu |date=Spring 2009 |volume=5 |issue=2 |url=https://www.york.cuny.edu/english/writing-program/the-york-scholar-1/volume-5.2-spring-2009/can-the-african-american-diet-be-made-healthier-without-giving-up-culture |access-date=7 August 2022}}</ref> Figures who led discussions surrounding the negative impacts of soul food include Dr. [[Alvenia Fulton]], [[Dick Gregory]], and [[Elijah Muhammad]].<ref name="Witt1999c"/><ref name=":4" />

On the other hand, critics and traditionalists have argued that attempts to make soul food healthier also make it less tasty, as well as less culturally/ethnically authentic.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0206/p20s01-lifo.html|title=Backstory: Southern discomfort food|last=Jonsson|first=Patrick|date=February 6, 2006|work=[[The Christian Science Monitor]]|publisher=[[The First Church of Christ, Scientist|The Christian Science Publishing Society]]|access-date=2006-11-09}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=F. Mitchell |first1=William |title=African American Food Culture |date=2009 |publisher=ABC-CLIO |isbn=9780313346217 |pages=98-99 |url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/African_American_Food_Culture/UufEEAAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq=diet%20and%20health}}</ref> There is also often a foundational difference in how health is perceived; perceptions of healthiness by consumers of soul food may differ from normal understandings in American culture.<ref>{{cite book | chapter-url=https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-64537-3_26 | doi=10.1007/978-3-030-64537-3_26 | chapter=Four Fundamental Distinctions in Conceptions of Wellbeing Across Cultures | title=The Palgrave Handbook of Positive Education | year=2021 | last1=Joshanloo | first1=Mohsen | last2=Van De Vliert | first2=Evert | last3=Jose | first3=Paul E. | pages=675–703 | isbn=978-3-030-64536-6 | s2cid=237932558 }}</ref>

The nutritional value of most processed foods, and not just those implicated in a traditional perception of soul food, has degraded as the agricultural system in the United States became industrialized, fueled by federal subsidies.<ref>{{cite book|last=Belasco|first=Warren|title=Food: The Key Concepts|date=2008|publisher=Berg|isbn=978-1845206734}}</ref> This urges a consideration of how concepts of racial authenticity evolve alongside changes in the structures that make some foods more available and accessible than others.<ref>{{cite book|last=Julier|first=Alice|title=The Political Economy of Obesity: The Fat Pay All|date=2008|publisher=Routledge|location=Food and Culture: A Reader|isbn=978-0415977777|pages=482–499}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Guthman|first=Julie|title=Weighing In: Obesity, Food Justice, and the Limits of Capitalism|date=2011|publisher=University California Press|isbn=978-0520266254}}</ref>

An important aspect of the preparation of soul food was the reuse of cooking [[lard]]. Because many cooks could not afford to buy new [[shortening]] to replace what they used, they would pour the liquefied cooking grease into a container. After cooling completely, the grease re-solidified and could be used again the next time the cook required lard.<ref>[https://health.usnews.com/health-news/blogs/eat-run/articles/2017-01-26/healthy-soul-food-ideas-and-recipes Healthy soul food ideas and recipes] US News January 26, 2017</ref> With changing fashions and perceptions of "healthy" eating, some cooks may use preparation methods that differ from those of cooks who came before them: using liquid oil like [[vegetable oil]] or [[canola oil]] for frying and cooking, and using smoked [[domesticated turkey|turkey]] instead of [[pork]], for example. Changes in hog farming techniques have also resulted in drastically leaner pork, in the 21st and late 20th centuries. Some cooks have even adapted recipes to include vegetarian alternatives to traditional ingredients, including [[tofu]] and [[soy]]-based analogues.<ref>{{cite web|last=Shelf |first=Angela |url=https://www.enotalone.com/article/food-and-nutrition/african-vegetarian-recipes-r5638/ |title=African Vegetarian Recipes : The Ethnic Vegetarian |publisher=Enotalone.com |access-date=2009-06-20 }}</ref> Several Black chefs have opened [[Black veganism|vegan soul food]] restaurants to cook healthier foods rooted in African American culture.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Carter |first1=Christopher |title=Is Black Veganism the Future of Soul Food |url=https://www.zocalopublicsquare.org/2022/01/31/black-veganism-future-soul-food/ideas/essay/ |website=www.zocalopublicsquare.org |date=31 January 2022 |publisher=Zocalo Public Square |access-date=8 June 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Crimarco |first1=Anthony, etl. |title="We're Not Meat Shamers. We're Plant Pushers.": How Owners of Local Vegan Soul Food Restaurants Promote Healthy Eating in the African American Community |journal=Journal of Black Studies |date=2020 |volume=51 |issue=2 |pages=168-193 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/26985178?searchText=soul+food&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3Dsoul%2Bfood%26so%3Drel&ab_segments=0%2Fbasic_search_gsv2%2Fcontrol&refreqid=fastly-default%3Abf2fdb87b17b419229de6d08ce3aa93c |access-date=1 July 2024}}</ref> Others, such as Jenne Claiborne, author of the ''Sweet Potato Soul Cookbook'', have chosen to start a [[YouTube|YouTube channel]] and show people how to prepare healthier soul food.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Givens |first1=Dana |title=Meet 5 Black Women Paving the Way for Vegan Soul Food |url=https://www.essence.com/lifestyle/essence-eats/black-women-vegan-soul-food/ |website=Essence Magazine |date=23 October 2020 |access-date=26 May 2024}}</ref>

Several of the ingredients included in soul food recipes have pronounced health benefits. [[Collard greens|Collard]] and other greens are rich sources of several [[vitamin]]s (including [[vitamin A]], [[vitamin B|B6]], [[folic acid]] or vitamin B9, [[vitamin K]], and [[vitamin C|C]]), minerals ([[manganese]], [[iron]], and [[calcium]]), [[Dietary fiber|fiber]], and small amounts of [[omega-3 fatty acid]]s. They also contain a number of [[phytonutrient]]s, which are thought to play a role in the prevention of [[ovarian cancer|ovarian]] and [[breast cancer]]s.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.whfoods.com/genpage.php?tname=foodspice&dbid=138 |title=Collard greens |publisher=WHFoods |date=2006-05-04 |access-date=2009-06-20}}</ref>{{dubious|reason=non-medical source, and everyone knows veggies are good -- doesn't make a high-fat/high-sodium diet with veggies okay.|date=October 2023}}

The traditional preparation of soul food vegetables often consists of high temperatures or slow cooking methods, which can lead the water-soluble vitamins (e.g., Vitamin C and the B complex vitamins) to be destroyed or leached out into the water in which the greens are cooked. This water is often consumed and is known as [[pot liquor]].<ref name=":0" /> Because it contains micronutrients from the greens cooked in it, pot liquor contributes to the nutritional value of a meal when consumed.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Aubrey |first1=Allison |title=Pot Liquor: A Southern Tip To Save Nutritious Broth From Greens |url=https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/08/06/209543044/pot-liquor-a-southern-tip-to-save-nutritious-broth-from-greens |website=NPR |access-date=3 January 2022 |language=en |date=7 August 2013}}</ref> [[Pea]]s and [[legume]]s are inexpensive sources of [[protein]], and they also contain important vitamins, minerals, and fiber.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/eat-well/beans-and-pulses-nutrition/|title=Beans and pulses in your diet|date=27 April 2018}}</ref>

== Dishes and ingredients ==
{{Main|List of soul foods and dishes}}

==See also==
{{Portal|Africa|Drink|Food|United States}}
* [[African cuisine]]
* [[Black veganism]]
* [[Cajun cuisine]]
* [[Caribbean cuisine]]
* [[Cuisine of Antebellum America]]
* [[Cuisine of Atlanta]]
* [[Cuisine of New Orleans]]
* [[Cuisine of the Southern United States]]
* [[Fried chicken stereotype]]
* ''[[High on the Hog: How African American Cuisine Transformed America]]''
* [[Indigenous cuisine of the Americas]]
* [[List of foods of the Southern United States]]
* [[Louisiana Creole cuisine]]
* [[Native American cuisine]]
* [[Slave health on plantations in the United States#Slave diet]]
* ''[[Soul Food Junkies]]'', a documentary
* [[West African cuisine]]

==References==
{{Reflist|33em}}

==Further reading==
* Huges, Marvalene H. ''Soul, Black Women, and Food''. Ed. Carole Counihan and Penny van Esterik. New York: Routledge, 1997.
* Bowser, Pearl and Jean Eckstein, A Pinch of Soul, Avon, New York, 1970
* Counihan, Carol and Penny Van Esterik editors, Food and Culture, A Reader, Routledge, New York, 1997
* Harris, Jessica, The Welcome Table – African American Heritage Cooking, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1996
* {{Cite book
| publisher = P.B. Mitchell
| isbn = 978-0925117892
| last = Mitchell
| first = Patricia
| title = Plantation Row slave cabin cooking: the roots of soul food
| location = Chatham, VA
| series = Patricia B. Mitchell foodways publications
| year = 1998
}}
* Root, Waverley and Richard de Rochemont, Eating in America, A History, William Morrow, New York, 1976
* Glenn, Gwendolyn, "American Visions", Southern Secrets From Edna Lewis, February–March, 1997
* Puckett, Susan, "Restaurant and Institutions", Soul Food Revival, February 1, 1997

==External links==
{{wiktionary}}
{{Commons category}}
* [https://slowfoodusa.org/african-american-foodways/ African Americans' Deep Roots to the Cultural Foodways of America] from Slow Food USA
* {{Curlie|Home/Cooking/World_Cuisines/North_American/African_American/|Soul Food}}
* [https://archive.org/details/whatmrsfisherkno00fishrich What Mrs. Fisher Knows about Old Southern Cooking]

{{DEFAULTSORT:Soul Food}}
[[Category:Soul food| ]]
[[Category:African-American cultural history]]
[[Category:American cuisine]]
[[Category:Cuisine by ethnicity]]
[[Category:Cuisine of the Southern United States]]
[[Category:Culture of the Southern United States]]
[[Category:Native American cuisine of the Southeastern Woodlands]]
[[Category:Native American culture]]
[[Category:Native American history]]

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