**In this classic Southern cookbook, the "first lady of Southern
cooking" (NPR) shares the seasonal recipes from a childhood spent in a
small farming community settled by freed slaves. She shows us how to
recreate these timeless dishes in our own kitchens--using natural
ingredients, embracing the seasons, and cultivating community. With a
preface by Judith Jones and foreword by Alice Waters.
**
With menus for the four seasons, Miss Lewis (as she was almost
universally known) shares the ways her family prepared and enjoyed food,
savoring the delights of each special time of year.
From the fresh taste of spring--the first wild mushrooms and field
greens--to the feasts of summer--garden-ripe vegetables and fresh
blackberry cobbler--and from the harvest of fall--baked country ham and
roasted newly dug sweet potatoes--to the hearty fare of winter--stews,
soups, and baked beans--Lewis sets down these marvelous dishes in loving
detail.
Here are recipes for Corn Pone and Crispy Biscuits, Sweet Potato
Casserole and Hot Buttered Beets, Pan-Braised Spareribs, Chicken with
Dumplings, Rhubarb Pie, and Brandied Peaches. Dishes are organized into
more than 30 seasonal menus, such as A Late Spring Lunch After
Wild-Mushroom Picking, A Midsummer Sunday Breakfast, A Christmas Eve
Supper, and an Emancipation Day Dinner.
In this seminal work, Edna Lewis shows us precisely how to recover, in
our own country or city or suburban kitchens, the taste of the fresh,
good, and distinctly American cooking that she grew up with.
