Emory Reads

Moving beyond familiar myths about moonshiners, bootleggers, and hard­-drinking writers, Southern Comforts explores how alcohol and drinking helped shape the literature and culture of the U.S. South. This is a collection of seventeen essays. As the first collection of scholarship that investigates the relationship between drinking and the South, Southern Comforts challenges popular assumptions by examining evocative topics drawn from literature, music, film, city life, and cocktail culture. The essays collected here illustrate that exaggerated representations of drinking oversimplify the South's relationship to alcohol, in effect absorbing it into narratives of southern exceptionalism that persist to this day.
Book available online.

An illustrated collection of herbal fact and lore of the historical kitchen garden. Rather than offering a how-to of gardening methods, the authors trace herbs and their uses back to earlier times and places. Includes reflections and observations from manuscripts and published herbals that detail the historical uses and fascinating stories surrounding plants of documented interest in the early American South and mid-Atlantic. Practicality and necessity were the guiding theses for gardening in eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century rural and frontier settlements in the Southeast. There were plants for food, for seasoning, for medicine, for dye, for insect repellency, and for scent. The gardens detailed in these pages are generally of the "middling sort"--of townspeople and farmers, of "housewives," merchants, and artisans.
Book available in print.

A history of Southern food that reveals how the region came to be at the forefront of American culinary culture and how issues of race have shaped Southern cuisine over the last six decades. It tells the story of food and politics in the South over the last half century. Beginning with the pivotal role of cooks in the Civil Rights movement, noted authority John T. Edge narrates the South's journey from racist backwater to American immigration. He traces how the food of the poorest Southerners has become the signature trend of modern American haute cuisine.
Several print copies and an online copy available.

Adapted from historical texts and rare African-American cookbooks, the 125 recipes paint a rich, varied picture of the true history of African-American cooking- a cuisine far beyond soul food. Toni Tipton-Martin, the first African-American food editor of a daily American newspaper, is the author of the James Beard Award-winning The Jemima Code, a history of African-American cooking found in--and between--the lines of three centuries' worth of African-American cookbooks. Tipton-Martin builds on that research in Jubilee, adapting recipes from those historic texts for the modern kitchen. What we find is a world of African-American cuisine--made by enslaved master chefs, free caterers, and black entrepreneurs and culinary stars--that goes far beyond soul food. It's a cuisine that was developed in the homes of the elite and middle class; that takes inspiration from around the globe; that is a diverse, varied style of cooking that has created much of what we know of as American cuisine.
A print copy is available.

By the time he was twenty-seven years old, Kwame Onwuachi (winner of the 2019 James Beard Foundation Award for Rising Star Chef of the Year) had opened--and closed--one of the most talked about restaurants in America. In this inspiring memoir about the intersection of race, fame, and food, he shares the remarkable story of his culinary coming-of-age. Growing up in the Bronx, as a boy Onwuachi was sent to rural Nigeria by his mother to "learn respect." However, the hard-won knowledge was not enough to keep him from the temptation and easy money of the streets. But through food, he broke out of a dangerous downward spiral, embarking on a new beginning at the bottom of the culinary food chain. A powerful, heartfelt, and shockingly honest story of chasing your dreams--even when they don't turn out as you expected.
Several print copies are available

An exploration of the foodways, people, and places of Appalachia. Written by Ronni Lundy, regarded as the most engaging authority on the region, the book guides us through the surprisingly diverse history of food in the Mountain South. Victuals explores the diverse and complex food scene of the Mountain South through recipes, stories, traditions, and innovations. Each chapter explores a specific defining food or tradition of the region-such as salt, beans, corn (and corn liquor). The essays introduce readers to their rich histories and the farmers, curers, hunters, and chefs who define the region's contemporary landscape.
A print copy is available.

2018 James Beard Award Winner: Here is real food--our indigenous American fruits and vegetables, the wild and foraged ingredients, game and fish. Locally sourced, seasonal, "clean" ingredients and nose-to-tail cooking are nothing new to Sean Sherman, the Oglala Lakota chef and founder of The Sioux Chef. Sherman shares his approach to creating boldly seasoned foods that are vibrant, healthful, at once elegant and easy.  Sherman dispels outdated notions of Native American fare. The Sioux Chef's Indigenous Kitchen is a rich education and a delectable introduction to modern indigenous cuisine of the Dakota and Minnesota territories, with a vision and approach to food that travels well beyond those borders.
A print copy is available.

In this stunning and deeply heartfelt tribute to Black culinary ingenuity, Bryant Terry captures the broad and divergent voices of the African Diaspora through the prism of food. With contributions from more than 100 Black cultural luminaires from around the globe, the book moves through chapters exploring parts of the Black experience, from Homeland to Migration, Spirituality to Black Future, offering delicious recipes, moving essays, and arresting artwork.  As much a joyful celebration of Black culture as a cookbook, Black Food explores the interweaving of food, experience, and community through original poetry and essays.