Ice Cream Series: Part 4 Carvel Ice Cream

A Carvel ice cream stand something like the one in Croton-on-Hudson. The stand closed sometime after I graduated high school in 1981. The town now has two very good ice parlors in each section of town. Click the image to enlarge it. Links to related stories and recipes below.

When I think about summer, I think about time spent at the Carvel ice cream stand in the Harmon section of my town Croton-on-Hudson. The Harmon name of the community is related to the Croton Harmon station on the Metro North and Amtrak rail line. Croton is one of many small Hudson Valley towns less than an hour north of New York City that never became overrun by fast food restaurants. In the summer the Carvel stand served as one of the main middle school and high school hang outs on Friday and Saturday nights from grades 8 to 10 or thereabouts; those years in teenager’s life when you were cool but car less. I lived a 15 minute bike ride away from the Carvel stand on the opposite side of town. As I road closer and closer to the stand on my bike, a glowing light grew brighter and revealed droves of classmates eating ice cream cones, flying saucers (ice cream sandwiches), ice cream Sundays, root beer floats, and lots of flirting between boys and girls. In reflection, Carvel provided a space for Croton youth just entering purity to flirt. That Carvel stand in Harmon remains linked in my mine with my middle and high school years and some my first attempts to talk with young women. Tom Carvel was a Greek immigrant from Athens who started the business in 1929 in Hartsdale, New York also in Westchester County where I grew up. The product is available all over the country now! Here is a link with more history about him and the company below and some other related links

Tom Carvel: http://www.carvel.com/about_us/history.htm

Carvel Stand photos: http://www.agilitynut.com/eateries/carvel.html

The Croton Dinner, another celebrated intuition: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/2010/09/back-to-school-foodways-series-croton.html

Ice Cream Series: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/search?q=Ice+Cream+Series%3A

Ice Cream Series: Part 3 Homemade Ice Cream

Homemade cherry ice cream, recipes below

The summer heat makes me think about the culinary meaning of this time of the year for my southern relatives who died long ago but my memories of them remain very alive. They migrated north to Ossining and North Tarrytown from rural North Carolina and Virginia. Long ago, rural folks would purchase a block of ice and chip off what they needed with an ice pick to make homemade ice cream. Making ice cream from scratch required lots of churning of the dasher filled ice, fresh cream, sugar, and the local fruit in season. In the South folks most often made ice cream in late June and the month of July because that was the fruit picking season when the fruit would be sweet—peaches raspberries, cherries (perhaps my favorite summer fruit), strawberries, or whatever local fruit grew in abundance where you lived. The in season fruit would be picked on say a Saturday and the ice cream made for the Sunday the evening dessert following a long hot church service and dinner on the grounds. Thus for many with southern roots, ice cream is closely associated with this time of the year, the local fruit in season, and Sunday evenings. Older relatives would tell me growing up that there is nothing better than homemade ice cream no matter who makes it. Today there are a lot of automated machines that allow you to make ice cream at home with your knowledge of what’s in it. Here are two ice cream recipe one traditional and one vegan.

Traditional Peach ice cream recipe: http://www.whats4eats.com/desserts/peach-ice-cream-recipe

Vegan strawberry ice cream video recipe: http://www.youtube.com/watch#!v=jwWuL1m1T1M&feature=related

  

Ice Cream Series: Part 2 Popsicles

Started a series yesterday on ice cream and cold related desserts that correspond to summer. The material comes from autobiographies, travel accounts, and stories in my developing food memoir. Today story comes from the Harlem Renaissance contributor Langston Hughes. Born in 1902 in Joplin Missouri, Hughes grew up in Lawrence, Kansas, and several other Midwestern communities, at the turn of the century before making his way to Harlem. He served as war correspondent  in Spain during the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) Reflecting on eating hardships in Madrid during the War and what he missed most about home, Langston Hughes wrote “I found myself thinking a great deal about hamburgers, hot dogs, sugared doughnuts and ice cream—things one can get on almost any American Corner. . . .” His mention of ice cream reminded me of a cold treat I like to concoct for my children on a hot day—home made fruit juice popsicles! I take some frozen strawberries, pineapples, and peaches or whatever kind of fruit I have and chuck them in the blender with a fruit juice (Orange, Mango, and Pineapple Juice work particularly well) for a short time. Then I pour them into a popsicle maker available at stores. I just purchase some new ones for about $4.95 each at a World Market store in Dallas. The popsicles are inexpensive to make, natural, and super healthy. My 5 and 8 year old (along with their mother) love them!

World Market: http://www.worldmarket.com/home/index.jsp?ab=header:logo

More Langston Hughes stories with recipes:  http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/search?q=Langston+Hughes

Ice cream series:  http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/2009/08/custard.html

Ice Cream Series: Part 1 Custard

(Photo from http://www.agilitynut.com/eateries/carvel.html)

Starting a new series today on ice cream and other cold related treats. My dad had a sweet tooth and loved ice cream; so did his three boys. I am the youngest of three and I remember when I was about  six our family would load into the Rambler station wagon and head north to the base of Bear Mountain just outside of Peekskill to buy “custard.” This was the late 1960s early 1970s. My dad and his North Tarrytown family with roots in Cloverdale, Virginia were the only ones I knew who called soft serve ice cream by that term. On a hot summer evening there would be a line jutting out from the serving window of the ice cream stand. The stand was very basic stand with an offering of vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, or twist with all three flavors. One could order a large or small cone or cup; an ice cream sundae in a cup with cherries, nuts, and sprinkles; or, a banana split which was just a sundae as I recall it in a boat like paper container served with slices of banana instead of cherries and served with whipped cream on top. When I close my eyes now I can see my brothers and I at 6, 7, and 12 furiously licking the ice cream cones covered in chocolate or multi-colored sprinkles. Nobody talked we just licked and licked trying to stay ahead of the ice cream dripping from the cone onto our little chocolate-covered hands and wrists on a hot summer night.

Peter Falk’s Ossining Roots and Foodways

1920s Dry Goods Store

Actor Peter Falk died on Thursday June 23 at the age of 83. He best known for as role portraying Lieutenant Columbo but I want to remember is food related history.  What many don’t know is that Falk is a native of Westchester County and in fact grew up in village of Ossining along with my mother’s side of the family. I want to talk about his experience growing up in a small town in the Hudson Valley in a suburb of New York City and the food angle of family history. Westchester has a reach Italian culinary heritage which can be tasted in many ways including pizza shops, bakeries, delis, and dry goods stores. Falk father ran a dry good store in Ossining a town that bordered with my hometown of Croton-on-Hudson. My Cousin Katie graduate from Ossining High in the same class or one close to Falk’s. She would often mention Falk’s family and life in Ossining. Before 1920, a sort of bartering system functioned in which people could exchanged the foods they produced with store managers in exchange for goods they could not or preferred not to produce. After 1920, well-stocked dry goods stores had almost everything available in cans and radically transformed the lives of working class women relieving them of hot labor intensive canning in July and August. Some of these early stores expanded become chains. In the Hudson Valley we had A&P and Grand Union. Below there are other Ossining food history stories with recipes and a link to more about Falk.

Ossining’s Food Related History: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/search?q=ossining

Remembering Peter Falk: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/remember/jan-june11/peterfalk_06-24.html

Wedding and Food Series: Part 6 Wedding Cake in Rural Early 20th Century Florida

Coconut layer cake, this and other recipes below

I am concluding my series on weddings today talking about wedding cakes in early 20^th century Florida using a scene from Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God.  Hurston tells us Janie Crawford and Logan Killicks got married in her grandmother’s parlor on a “Saturday evening with three cakes and big platters of fried rabbit and chicken.” I want to discuss the cake description in the context of analyzing links with African and American foodways. The two types of cakes one sees described in largely pre-civil war travel accounts are every day cakes made from corn (and cassava in the others parts of the Americas) and special occasion cakes made with more refined grains like wheat flour. The Mandinka on the coast of the Gambia for example, made “sweet cakes [made from] pounded rice and honey” (There is no indication if these were special occasion or every day cakes). Most of what we describe today as cakes were prepared for special occasions like weddings or in smaller amounts as fast food sold on the streets in urban centers. For instance, in nineteenth century Cuba and Brazil enslaved African women hawked sweets and tempting cakes for their masters.   We also have an account from the Norwood Estate in nineteenth century Louisiana of a slave owner who served her slaves a lavish Christmas meal including “frosted cake, and pastry of many kinds.” Finally, a 1904 description of a special occasion in Georgia describes a table spread with chicken, gingerbread, and “a jelly-cake.” So in short, the term cake described in Their Eyes Were Watching God shows, I would argue tenuous links to Africa and other parts of the Americas. Admittedly, there is an insufficient description of the cake in Janie’s West Florida wedding to be more conclusive about diasporic links and possibilities

Everything you wanted to know about cake: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/2010/08/everything-you-wanted-to-know-about.html

Six cake stories and recipes and more: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/search?q=cakes&updated-max=2011-06-14T07%3A39%3A00-07%3A00&max-results=20

Link to Complete Wedding Series: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/search?q=Wedding+and+Food+Series

Wedding and Food Series: Part 5 Early 20th Century Rural Florida

Fried chicken and other recipes below

To conclude my series on weddings and foods I turn today and tomorrow to the work of Zora Neale Hurston and her ethnographic and semi-biographical novel Their Eyes Were Watching God. The novel provides an insightful description of a Floridian country wedding in the early 20^th century. Janie Crawford, the novel’s griot, describes her wedding to Logan Killicks a farmer twice her age. The two gott married in her grandmother’s parlor on a “Saturday evening with three cakes and big platters of fried rabbit and chicken. Everything to eat in abundance,” Her “Nanny and Mrs. Washburn [a white family who employed her grandmother as a live in domestic] had seen to that.” The preparation of chicken on a special occasion like a wedding has links to West Africa. In my own work I found that the Igbo, Hausa, and Mande of West Africa ate poultry on special occasions as part of religious ceremonies.  In fact, travel accounts dating back to before the 1800s show Mande women batter frying chicken. In short, I maintain that eating fried chicken at the Wedding in West Florida is an example of an African survival and one seen in the Caribbean and other parts of the Americas. During the antebellum period most enslaved Africans only had time to make labor intensive fried chicken on days their master gave them off such as Sundays, a few holidays, and religious days. As for the fried rabbit as part of the wedding reception, my research on foodways also found that the West African inhabitants of the city of Accra, in the Kingdom of Ghana, commonly hunted and prepared rabbit. In addition, after their arrival in the Americas, Native American reinforced this practice introducing Africans and Europeans to local varieties of rabbit and the methods they used to trap and cook them. Frying became the preferred method because it proved quick and required only a large pot and few utensils. In places like the Caribbean and Brazil people fried wild game in more readily available palm oil instead of pork lard.

Southern Fried Chicken Recipe

Ingredients

Fried Chicken Batter

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 egg or egg substitute

1 cup buttermilk or soy milk            

2 teaspoons chicken-style seasoning

½ teaspoon salt

Combine all ingredients and mix well.

Seasoning Flour

½ cup all-purpose flour     

2 teaspoon chicken-style seasoning

1 teaspoon garlic powder  

  

Chicken

Fresh cut and cleaned chicken or Vegan chicken substitute.

Method

Add 1 teaspoon garlic powder. Let Stand for one to two hours. Drain Dip in batter and then dredge in flour mixture. Deep fry until golden brown in canola oil. Serves four people.

Video vegan fried chicken recipe: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=te6Cv7RTazU

Link to Complete Wedding Series: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/search?q=Wedding+and+Food+Series

My fried Rabbit experience: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/2009/11/my-bizarre-thanksgiving-day-memory.html

Wedding and Food Series: Part 4 The Antebellum Period

Strawberry rhubarb cobbler, recipes below

Doing a series that takes a historical look weddings and food. Today I am delving into what the available written record says about the south. What I write is based on research I did for my book Hog and Hominy http://cup.columbia.edu/book/978-0-231-14638-8/hog-and-hominy/webFeatures using travel accounts and autobiographies from the nineteenth century. What follow are scenes of weddings on large plantations and families who owned enslaved Africans.  Often the master class bank rolled the wedding receptions of their family and the family of those they owned.  In these cases masters brought in a preacher and food— tables filled with roasted turkey, chickens, side dishes, pies and cakes—all elaborately prepared of course by black cooks—for the reception that followed. We know that the wealthy had some wedding receptions indoors in their mansions and the enslaved and free folk as well as white and black family, friends, and neighbors attended. This might sound odd but the kind of Jim Crow segregation that the Civil Rights movement sought to end began a little more than a decade after the end of the Civil War. Before then allot more interaction occurred in rural societies between black and whites—at all different degrees of power relationships—then is commonly known.  At antebellum weddings, both black and whites would eat together from a large buffet table filled with roasted turkey, chickens, pies and cakes—that black cooks prepared. Other receptions had enslaved blacks and freedmen eating in the yard while whites ate inside the Big House. In some instances the bride served as both guest of honor and server to the party held inside. If you’re planning a wedding and you want some old and some knew, try these fruit cobbler recipe as one of your desserts at rehearsal dinner or the wedding reception.

Apricot Berry Cobbler Recipe: http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/apricot_berry_cobbler/

Vegan Strawberry Rhubarb Cobbler Recipe: http://dairyfreecooking.about.com/od/piesandcobblers/r/strawrhubcobbler.htm

More Rhubarb Recipes: http://indianapublicmedia.org/eartheats/rhubarb-ways-nobake-strawberry-rhubarb-tart-rhubarb-compote/

Wedding and Food Series: Part 3 Colonial America

Jamaican run down a one pot meal, recipes below

The survival of wedding traditions and cookery depended on the region of the Americas to which  Europeans and Africans, disembarked, and the Amerindians who inhabited those regions. Those who lived and worked in the Caribbean or the Carolinas did so in largely black majority populations where the African influenced the European more than the European the African. Thus African wedding traditions survived. In Virginia, Africans lived in a more restricted cultural environment than the Caribbean and the Carolinas because they were in the minority, making up only 30 to 40 percent of the population thus European weddings traditions dominated the Chesapeake region of the colonial south. Most indentured servants and enslaved people conducted their weddings and receptions in and around their living quarters with and without the consent of their masters. As the links below illustrate, these early colonial inhabitants across the Americas created creolized traditions with lots of cultural syncretism including unique food and music with African, European, and Amerindian influences. British and later US laws did not recognize slaves marriages but Spanish and Portuguese laws did; but in either case white and black indentured servants and enslaved Africans held weddings followed by and receptions full of good music and food. I imagine the food would have been similar to that served at enslaved held balls. A travel account from 1790 informs us that the cooks for a black ball in the British West Indies prepared “a number of pots, some of which are good and savory; chiefly their swine, poultry, salt beef, pork, herrings, and vegetables with roasted, barbecued, and fricasseed” meats. Here are two perfect West Indian wedding recipes:

Fish ceviche recipe: http://www.easyliving.co.uk/recipes/fish/caribbean-ceviche

Vegan Jamaican run down recipe: http://www.vegan-food.net/recipe/774/Jamaican-Yam-Run-Down-Casserole/

Related link on indentured servants and music: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1794557

Wedding and Food Series: Part 2 Everybody Pitch In

West African Black-eyed peas, roasted chicken, and Jollof rice, traditional and vegetarian recipes below

On special occasions, like a wedding, the Congolese entertained their guests with a banquet complete with rice, roasted and dressed venison, fowl, and milk. Similarly, an Igbo hostess cooked stewed meat and duck and served it with foofoo instead of rice. Africans held a belief that an honorable person showed reverence to God, community leaders, friends, and family through the use of music and food. As a result, West African incorporated music and food into their wedding celebrations. For example, a week before the day of a wedding in West Africa, the bride’s family organizes a family meeting to solicit contribution for the wedding feast. Some contributed palm oil, rice, fish, and firewood. But the message is clear; the bride’s family had the charge of providing great food on the wedding day for their guest and especially the groom’s family. Here is a recipe for jollof rice which made all over West Africa sometimes with fish or chicken. There is also a link to a vegetarian version.

Jollof Rice Recipe:

Ingredients
Oil for frying (palm or regular vegetable oil)
1 chicken
1 or 2 finely chopped onions
salt, black pepper, cayenne pepper according to taste
Flavoring:
chopped chili pepper
2 or 3 crushed cloves of garlic
bay leaf
curry powder
2 cups of chicken or beef stock or Maggi cubes or vegan substitutes
3 ripe tomatoes, chopped
bell pepper or sweet green pepper, chopped
green peas or string beans
(carrots/cabbage chopped)
four cups rice
4 tbsp can tomato paste
2 tbsp dried shrimp or crayfish or vegan substitute
Garnishes: fresh parsley and cilantro chopped and lettuce shredded

Method
Heat oil and brown chicken or fish. Remove the meat and add the onions, the salt, pepper, cayenne pepper, garlic, bay leaf and curry in the oil. Fry for a moment and add vegetables. Fry the mixture until the onions become tender. Add the stock and the chicken and boil for about 20 minutes. Then add the dried shrimps/crayfish and the chili and bring to boil and simmer for 5 minutes. Put the rice in a separate saucepan. Add water and tomato paste. Cover and cook for about 20 minutes until the rice is done (add warm water or broth if necessary). Adjust seasoning. Serve with garnishes according to taste.

Vegetarian-jollof-rice recipe: http://www.recipezaar.com/recipe/vegetarian-jollof-rice-401724

More on wedding traditions: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/2010/06/wedding-and-food-series-part-i-origin.html

Wedding and Food Series: Part I Salt

Blocks of salt

Tomorrow is the first day of summer. Lots of people are planning June and July weddings. Today I am rolling out a series on Weddings and Food in history. I am starting in Africa then moving to the Americas. Here is an interesting look at food related wedding gifts in West Africa. For many West African societies eating with a generous amount of salt represented the favorite way to consume food. For example, in the late eighteenth century, West Africans living in the interior of the Gambia River region viewed salt for seasoning their food as “the greatest of all luxuries,” writes English traveler Mongo Park. So here’s the wedding link—in pre-colonial Meta society in Cameroon the groom’s family sent a gift basket with a large cylindrical block of dried salt to the bride’s mother on the day following the wedding night. If the bride proved to be a virgin, the groom’s family sent an entire block of salt. But if the bride turned out not be a virgin, the groom’s family sent a block of salt with a hole drilled through it. Thus women who received a complete block of salt were praised in their village for doing such an honorable job raising their daughters and those who received a block with a hole were held in contempt for failing to raise a sexual pure daughter. Boy have times changed!

Dad I Remember: A Father's Dad Poem for Foodies

Vanilla "Custard" with strawberries, related stories and recipes below

For father’s day I decided to share a foodie excerpt from I poem I wrote for my Father in September of 2007. He had just been diagnosed with terminal cancer and so many memories overwhelmed me as road the train from work to see him at Sloan Kettering Hospital in New York City. My father asked me to speak at his memorial service. Despite being professional speaker, that served as one of the most difficult talks I have ever given This is part of what I shared on that day in April of 2008. Happy Father’s day:

Dad I Remember

Frederick Douglass Opie, September 2007

Dad I remember once we subdued the weeds and poison-ivy in our yard how you and I played catch with my first baseball mitt. How proud you were watching me and Marshall compete on our village’s minor and little league teams. How ecstatic you were at the news that I made the all-star team and how disappointed you first were when I abandoned baseball for lacrosse. I remember how you helped me get over the insecurity I felt when people laughed at how pigeon toed I was and still am. You shared with me that one of the greatest athletes of whole time, your hero Jackie Robinson, ran with a similar gate. Dad, that really helped me as I struggled with being so different and so many ways from my white peers in such a white town.

Dad I remember how hard you worked to provide for your family, to give us opportunities that you never had as a child. I remember the academic tests and tutors you worked overtime to pay for and the camps and leagues you paid for. I remember the camping trips and the car rides to the base of Bear Mountain to buy “custard.” You were the only one I knew who called soft serve ice cream by that term.

Dad I remember that you were very well read and a gifted oral historian. As I compose this poem I do so to share with you and others all the great memories that you have given me. The way you faced your final days with such dignity and acceptance is truly amazing. I know the last dozen or more years of your life have not been easy and that you endured allot of pain. But Dad thanks for sticking around as long as you did and sharing yourself with me. As Bob Hope sang, Dad, thanks for the memories.

My Dad and Food stories below:

Going for Custard with my Dad: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/2009/08/custard.html

My Dad, Frank’s Fuel, and Food: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/2010/09/hispanic-history-month-and-foodways_19.html

My Dad and the Great Depression: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/2010/11/thanksgiving-day-series-thanks-for-acts.html

Juneteenth Colors and Cakes

Red velvet cake, recipes below

On June 19, 1865 in Galveston, Texas, General Gordon Granger declared all slaves free 2.5 years after the Emancipation Proclamation was signed. “Juneteenth” (a mixture of June and nineteen) began thereafter in Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, and Oklahoma with parades and festivals. Food has been a staple of Juneteenth from the first celebrations and as a summer event barbecue with red sauce became a staple along with some mysterious reason red food and drink like strawberry drinks and red velvet cake. Juneteenth as a link with “Watch Night,” or the distinctive way African Americans have historically celebrated New Year’s Eve. I talk about this tradition in my book Hog and Hominy http://cup.columbia.edu/book/978-0-231-14638-8/hog-and-hominy/webFeatures. Watch Night dates back to the end of the Civil War. In 1862, President Abraham Lincoln declared his famous Emancipation Proclamation, which set slaves in Confederate territories free as of January 1, 1863. As a result, African Americans across much of the South held religious services, many of them secretly, in which they praised and worshiped God as they watched the New Year and freedom arrive at midnight. Thus, after 1863, African Americans began observing Watch Night and New Year’s Eve in honor of Emancipation Day. Southerners carried their religious traditions with them when they migrated north including recipes for good old fashion church cakes like red velvet cake. Here are some recipes below and additional links.

Red velvet cake recipe with great photos: http://pinchmysalt.com/2008/11/10/red-velvet-cake-recipe/

Vegan red velvet cake recipe: http://www.thedailygreen.com/healthy-eating/recipes/vegan-red-velvet-cake-with-buttercream-frosting

Watch night links and recipes: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/search?q=watch+night

Juneteenth links and recipes: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/search?q=Juneteenth

African American Festivals and Food Part 5: Juneteenth

Emancipation Day Parade, Richmond, Virginia, 1905, related recipes below

The following is a prerecorded radio interview I did on Here on Earth: Radio Without Borders.  

Juneteenth celebrations commemorate June 19, 1865 when the Emancipation Proclamation was finally enforced in the state of Texas, two and a half years after Abe Lincoln made his famous decree. We talk with professor and food writer Frederick Douglass Opie about the celebratory foods of Juneteenth, as well as the rich history of soul food in the United States and the many foods of the African Diaspora.

Guest

• Frederick Douglass Opie, author of Hog and Hominy: Soul Food from Africa to America
• Fabu Carter-Brisco, Madison Poet-laureate, Organizer of the Heritage Tent at the Madison Juneteenth Celebration

Listen: http://www.wpr.org/hereonearth/archive_100618k.cfm

Original broadcast June 18, 2010

Related Links with recipes: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/search?q=The+History+and+Taste+of+Juneteenth+Part+2

African American Festivals and Food Part 4: Juneteenth

Texas Strawberry soda sold at Juneteenth celebrations

Three more days until Juneteenth, the day in 1865 when all U.S. slaves gained their freedom. Two and half weeks earlier, President Abraham Lincoln’s two executive orders set slaves free in confederate states (except for the border states of Kentucky, Missouri, Maryland, or Delaware, and not in Tennessee, Texas and parts of Louisiana and Virginia). The June 19^th declaration informed all slaves that they were now free. “Juneteenth” began thereafter in Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and I suspect other “delayed emancipation states” with annual parades and festivals. In1980, the Texas legislature made the celebration an official state holiday with several other states following suit. By 2002, seven states recognized the day through various proclamations, and four years later, twenty states observed the day in some fashion. In 2005, the U.S. Congress officially recognized the historical significance of Juneteenth, but still has yet to give it official holiday status.  In addition to Texas style barbecue and soul food there is generally plenty of Texas strawberry soda sold at Juneteenth celebrations. Why strawberry soda? One reader commented, “Red foods are popular at Juneteenth such as barbeque, red soda & red velvet cake & always include [red] rice. Not sure why? Can anybody else provide the why part this question?

Related Links with recipes: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/search?q=The+History+and+Taste+of+Juneteenth+Part+2

African American Festivals and Food Part 3: Juneteenth

Pickled watermelon rind, recipe below

Been doing a serious on African American festivals and food this week as a build up to Juneteenth which is this coming Sunday.  On June 19, 1865 in Galveston, Texas, General Gordon Granger declared all slaves free 2.5 years after the Emancipation Proclamation was signed. “Juneteenth” (a mixture of June and nineteen) began thereafter in Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, and Oklahoma with parades and festivals. The celebration spread with the migration of African-Americans from these states. During the Depression celebrations declined but the Civil Rights and Black Power movements of the 1960s and 70s revitalized the holiday in African American communities. Black history, educating people about African American contributions, and agitating for the advancement of African American needs (and sometimes for reparations) serves as the reason for the holiday, but down home cooking has attracted large crowds too. In addition to Texas style barbecue and soul food there is generally plenty of Texas strawberry soda and Texas chocolate cake (recipe below) for sale. Here are two recipes that give you a taste of Juneteenth:

Pickled watermelon rind recipe: http://www.goodbyecitylife.com/cooking/watermelon/

Texas chocolate cake: http://emr.cs.iit.edu/~reingold/ruths-kitchen/recipes/desserts/texscake.html

African American Festivals and Food Series: http://frederickdouglassopie.blogspot.com/search?q=African+American+Festivals