Reviews

Edge is a well-known food writer and the director of the Southern Foodways Symposium at the Center for Study of Southern Culture (Univ. of Mississippi), which is also listed as an "author" of this book. With coauthor Ellen Rolfes, he has gathered more than 400 recipes for Southern home cooking, most of them from community cookbooks, which he sees as historical documents as much as recipe books. In addition to the recipes, which include both what could be called "signature dishes" of Southern cooking like Fried Chicken and Chess Pie and little-known regional specialties, there are nostalgic reminiscences from Southern authors ranging from Eudora Welty (whose fruitcake recipe also appears here) to Roy Blount. Although informative headnotes appear with most recipes, the authors haven't included the dates they were first published, which would have been helpful. That aside, this is recommended for all regional and most other collections. Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.

Food writer Edge and Rolfes, a cookbook packager, present an introduction to Dixie food, from Gumbo Z'herbes, Smothered Chicken, Crawfish Jambalaya and Turnip Greens to an assortment of sweet desserts. More than 400 recipes have been chosen from dozens of community cookbooks (e.g., High Cotton Cookin', The Black Family Reunion Cookbook and True Grits), some dating back to the Civil War. These dishes, from real home cooks, are simple and dependable. The authors maintain that "the best cookbooks are storybooks," and theirs is liberally peppered with stories from Southern writers, artists and cooks. Novelist Reynolds Price muses on pimiento cheese ("It was the peanut butter of my childhood"), B.B. King extols the virtues of yams and Edna Lewis (The Taste of Country Cooking) gathers all kinds of bitter greens for eating and medicine. Vintage black-and-white photographs add charm, and a closing selection of menus advises cooks how to plan a New Orleans Jazz Brunch or a Texas Barbecue. (Nov.) Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.