Grain and Fire

A History of Baking in the American South

Rebecca Sharpless

• Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press
• Year: 2022
• Print ISBN:
  9781469668369
• eBook ISBN:
  9781469668376
• Topic: Art
• Subtopic: North American History

While a luscious layer cake may exemplify the towering glory of southern baking, like everything about the American South, baking is far more complicated than it seems. Rebecca Sharpless here weaves a brilliant chronicle, vast in perspective and entertaining in detail, revealing how three global food traditions—Indigenous American, European, and African—collided with and merged in the economies, cultures, and foodways of the South to create what we know as the southern baking tradition.

Recognizing that sentiments around southern baking run deep, Sharpless takes delight in deflating stereotypes as she delves into the surprising realities underlying the creation and consumption of baked goods. People who controlled the food supply in the South used baking to reinforce their power and make social distinctions. Who used white cornmeal and who used yellow, who put sugar in their cornbread and who did not had traditional meanings for southerners, as did the proportions of flour, fat, and liquid in biscuits. By the twentieth century, however, the popularity of convenience foods and mixes exploded in the region, as it did nationwide. Still, while some regional distinctions have waned, baking in the South continues to be a remarkable, and remarkably tasty, source of identity and entrepreneurship.

Notes

Introduction

1. Cooper and Knotts, Resilience, 79.

2. Ferris, Edible South, 1.

3. Fuller and Gonzalez Carretero, “Archaeology of Neolithic Cooking Traditions,” 111.

4. Campbell, At the First Table, 15.

5. Carney and Rosomoff, Shadow of Slavery, 19, 31, 52, 57; La Fleur, Fusion Foodways, 55.

6. Benét, Western Star, 116.

7. Neal, Southern Cooking, 5.

Chapter 1

1. Stevens, “Story of Plants,” 206–7; Chapman and Shea, “Archaeobotanical Record,” 69.

2. Sassaman, “Multicultural Genesis,” 26; L. Thomas, “Gender Division of Labor,” 32.

3. Ruhl, “Spanish Mission Paleoethnobotany,” 566; Gremillion, “Human Ecology,” 24.

4. Le Page du Pratz, History of Louisiana, 213; Messner, Acorns and Bitter Roots, 14, 16.

5. Adair, History of the American Indians, 409; Bartram, Travels, 38; Messner, Acorns and Bitter Roots, 14.

6. Hamor, True Discourse, 23; Lawson, New Voyage, 99.

7. Messner, Acorns and Bitter Roots, 17–18.

8. J. Smith, Map of Virginia, 12; Hariot, Briefe and True Report, [31].

9. Bourne, Narratives of the Career of De Soto, 123.

10. J. Smith, “Description of Virginia,” 90. Pecans have thin shells that crack easily, so most of them were eaten raw rather than baked. McWilliams, Pecan, 8.

11. Scarry and Reitz, “Herbs, Fish, Scum, and Vermin,” 349–50; Ruhl, “Spanish Mission Paleoethnobotany,” 567; Milanich, “Life in a 9th Century Indian Household,” 34.

12. Messner, Acorns and Bitter Roots, 17.

13. J. Smith, “Description of Virginia,” 90.

14. Messner, Acorns and Bitter Roots, 16.

15. Milanich, “Life in a 9th Century Indian Household,” 34; Hann, “Use and Processing of Plants,” 94.

16. Laudan, Cuisine and Empire, 32.

17. J. Franklin, “Bedrock Mortar Hole Sites.”

18. Messner, Acorns and Bitter Roots, 66; Milanich, “Life in a 9th Century Indian Household,” 22.

19. Romans, Concise Natural History, 84; Stevens, “Story of Plants,” 197.

20. Stevens, “Story of Plants,” 197.

21. Strachey, Historie of Travell, 118; Romans, Concise Natural History, 84; Le Page du Pratz, History of Louisiana, 348–49.

22. Hann, “Use and Processing of Plants,” 92, 94; Fontaneda, Memoir, 15; Romans, Concise Natural History, 84; Strachey, Historie of Travell, 121.

23. Laudan, Cuisine and Empire, 30, 31, 35.

24. Hann, “Use and Processing of Plants,” 92; Messner, Acorns and Bitter Roots, 20.

25. J. Smith, Generall Historie of Virginia, 26.

26. Wright, “American Indian Corn Dishes,” 160.

27. Walls and Keith, “Cooking Connects Them.”

28. Marcoux, Cooking with Fire, 8, 10.

29. Balter, “Corn.”

30. Mann, 1491, 223.

31. Hardeman, Shucks, 6, 8; Kalm, Oxholm, and Chase, “Description of Maize,” 112; Weatherwax, Indian Corn, 86.

32. McCann, Maize and Grace, 5.

33. Milanich, Florida Indians, 23, 26; Milanich, “...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Illustrations
• Introduction: The Meeting of Grain and Fire
• Acorn Bread
• Rosquetes de Azucar
• Plumb Cakes
• Hoecake
• Raison Cake
• White Mountain Cake
• Jelly Roll
• Chiffon Pie
• Pastel de Tres Leches
• Acknowledgments
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index