In a large, heavy stockpot, bring 2.8 litres water, the smoked meat, onions, celery, carrots, garlic, peppercorns and bay leaves to a boil. I like the way this poem by Aneb Kgositsile, which I first saw in The African American Heritage Cookbook: Traditional Recipes and Fond Remembrances from Alabama’s Renowned Tuskegee Institute (2001), honours the memory of the dish: “Collards and cornbread, communion meal of daily resurrection./I ate the survival leaf as I stood at the field’s edge,/soaking its cure through pores and spirit.”įirst make the stock. Choose a state of doneness that best suits your tastes and your collards. This is a totemic soul food dish – greens simmered long and slow until quite tender, though young greens cook in half the time. Collard greens with cornmeal dumplingsĬornmeal dumplings dropped into a bubbling pot of turnip greens, collards or cabbage will remind some of African fufu, the pones made from pounded yam, cassava, or potato flour – or their contemporary adaptations featuring cream of wheat, farina or even instant potato flakes. The unexpected addition to our holiday dinner table thrilled my niece the year she turned vegetarian. With those words in mind, I tweaked the recipe for sauteed greens, so they cook quickly and their bright colour and firm texture are preserved. When using meat to season greens, cook the meat until well done, leaving only a small amount of water with meat, then add greens and cook for a short time, or until done.” Pick carefully, wash thoroughly and cook over a low flame, only water that clings to the leaves. Here is what Frankie Field had to say in The Chef, published by the City Federation of Colored Women’s Clubs of Tulsa in 1944: “Select the best vegetables. That notion, though, hasn’t always been set in stone.ĭescendants of the African diaspora have always prepared cultivated and wild greens by myriad methods. Any other way, and you might as well just designate the dish #fakesoul. But there is also an impression that old-fashioned, Southern or country-style greens must be boiled to death to be authentic soul food. But it’s also fair to ask: what is that tradition? In this case, it may have been the peanuts that shocked people. “For other people, collards are a trend – for us, they are a tradition,” food writer and historian Michael Twitty said at the time of Whole Foods’ announcement. For many on Twitter, this recipe was a bridge too far.

Jubilee toni tipton martin