Creole food might be unique to southern Louisiana, but did you know that it was influenced by food from around the world? Enslaved people were taken from their homes in Africa by Europeans and brought to America as part of the Transatlantic Slave Trade between North America, Africa, and Europe. Enslaved people brought their cooking traditions with them to Louisiana, but also picked up cooking techniques from the Europeans who enslaved them. That’s why Creole food is influenced by African, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and even Dutch foods. The artifacts below can help us see how some of those influences are still in the food we eat today.Cast Iron Pot “Spider Cast Iron Pot,” Vermilionville Educational Enrichment Program, Vermilionville Living History Museum and Folklife Park collections.  City Point, Va. African American army cook at work. United States City Point Virginia Petersburg, None. [Between 1860 and 1865] Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2018666649/. Cast iron pots like the one you see above were essential to cooking everyday meals. Enslaved people made grits from hominy corn for breakfast and rice for dinner, or sometimes even oyster stew (Murray). Big pots, like the ones in the photograph of the army cook above, could feed big communities of people. When Europeans took and enslaved Africans, they forced them to live in large communities on plantations. After the Civil War, which was fought over slavery and resulted in the end of slavery, African Americans still preferred to live in Black dominant communities that helped protect them and allowed them take care of each other. Many families today pass their cast iron down to the next generation as a family heirloom in order to continue the tradition of sharing the food they make. Do you have one in your home? Primary Sources: Murray, Chalmers S, and George Brown. Fish, Hominy and Cotton. South Carolina, 1939. Manuscript/Mixed Material. https://www.loc.gov/item/wpalh002108/ . Secondary Sources: Holt, Thomas C. 2013. Children of fire: a history of african americans. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. https://www.overdrive.com/search?q=9BE5AEF7-50C3-469D-9A1F-400C9C1CCF8B. Witty, Michael W. “Food On a Maryland Plantation: Frederick Douglass Speaks,” July 19, 2014. https://afroculinaria.com/2014/07/18/food-on-a-maryland-plantation-frederick-douglass-speaks/. Tipton-Martin, Toni. “Plantation Cooks.” The Jemima Code, 2011. https://thejemimacode.com/category/plantation-cooks/. Mortar and Pestle “Mortar and Pestle,” Vermilionville Educational Enrichment Program, Vermilionville Living History Museum and Folklife Park collections.  Calewaert, Louis H. S., Artist. Woman in Kitchen. , 1913. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2003655871/. Mortar and pestles such as the one in the photo above can be used to grind herbs or plants to create spices for food. Due to the Transatlantic Slave Trade, spices were being shipped to America from all over the world. Like the women in the slideshow, spices were brought in bulk, brought home and crushed using a mortar and pestle. Enslaved women wanted to continue cooking their traditional food when they arrived in America, but did not have access to many African plants other than okra, which was also brought to America as a novelty, so they adapted their traditional recipes to include these new spices such as paprika and cayenne from South America and turmeric from Asia. They also adapted local food sources such as local plants, animals, and seafood. Primary Sources: 2 men grinding substance with mortars and pestles. West Indies. , ca. 1910. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2003680250/. Going to market--a scene near Savannah, Georgia / E.A. Abbey. Georgia Savannah, 1875. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/90716806/. Lee, Russell, photographer. Aged Cajun woman using crude mortar and pestle in process of hulling rice. Near Crowley, Louisiana. Acadia Parish Crowley Crowley. Louisiana United States, 1938. Oct. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2017781667/. Dutch Oven Kennedy, Stetson, photographer. The Rice and Chicken Is Boiled Together in Iron Kettles. Florida, None. [Between 1930 and 1941] Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2005691261/.  Lee, Russell, photographer. Cook of SMS Ranch making bread in Dutch oven. Near Spur, Texas. , 1939. May. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2017783375/. Dutch ovens like the ones you see above help to make rice based meals you might be familiar with, such as jambalaya or dirty rice. Similar to the cast iron pot, Dutch ovens can be used to make large quantities of food to feed a community, just as you see in a photo of women making rice in the slideshow above, and used in everyday meals (Murray). Rice was originally brought to America from Africa because Europeans saw how good the Africans were at growing it and wanted them to grow it on American land by using the same methods they used in Africa. This skill made an enslaved person very valuable to a slave owner(Berry) because the enslaver would make considerable profit off of the rice that enslaved people grew. These knowledge and skills of enslaved Africans is why rice is a big part of the Creole diet today. Primary Sources: Murray, Chalmers S, and George Brown. Fish, Hominy and Cotton. South Carolina, 1939. Manuscript/Mixed Material. https://www.loc.gov/item/wpalh002108/. Secondary Sources: Berry, Daina Ramey. The Price for Their Pound of Flesh: The Value of the Enslaved, from Womb to Grave, in the Building of a Nation. United States: Beacon Press, 2017. Blassingame, John W. The Slave Community. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1979. Secondary Sources: Global, Nada, ed. “‘Soul Food’ a Brief History.” African American Registry, October 14, 2020. https://aaregistry.org/story/soul-food-a-brief-history/. Bray, Matt. “What Is Creole Seasoning? The Story Behind The Spice.” PepperScale, September 5, 2019. https://www.pepperscale.com/what-is-creole-seasoning/. Cleaver, Molly. “What's the Difference between Cajun and Creole-or Is There One?” The Historic New Orleans Collection, October 16, 2020. https://www.hnoc.org/publications/first-draft/whats-difference-between-cajun-and-creole-or-there-one. Deetz, Kelley Fanto. “How Enslaved Chefs Helped Shape American Cuisine.” Smithsonian.com. Smithsonian Institution, July 20, 2018. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/how-enslaved-chefs-helped-shape-american-cuisine-180969697/. Bultman, Bethany Ewald. “A True And Delectable History Of Creole Cooking.” AMERICAN HERITAGE, October 1, 2020. https://www.americanheritage.com/true-and-delectable-history-creole-cooking. Richard LSU, Kris. “How To Make Real Creole Food.” Spoon University, July 26, 2016. https://spoonuniversity.com/how-to/how-to-make-real-creole-food. Addison, Sydney, Kailey Bryan, Taylor Carter, J.T. Del Tufo, Aissatou Diallo, and Alyson Kinzey. “African Americans and Southern Food.” Race Project, 2013. https://libraries.mercer.edu/ursa/bitstream/handle/10898/1521/Race%20Project.pdf;sequence=5. Bourque, Ted Chef. “A Visit With The Cajun Creole Dutch Oven Cookers.” YouTube. YouTube, 2015. https://www.youtube.com/. Rhodes, Phillip. “A Classic Cajun-Country Stew.” Garden & Gun, 2019. https://gardenandgun.com/recipe/classic-cajun-country-stew/. Food Desk , NDTV. “How To Use a Mortar and Pestle: 6 Tips to Grind Spices Better.” NDTV Food, November 23, 2017. https://food.ndtv.com/food-drinks/how-to-use-a-mortar-and-pestle-6-tips-to-grind-spices-better-1779051. Admin. “The Keys to Good Cajun Cooking in New Orleans.” Brand, 2017. https://www.safeguardit.com/blog/post/2017/08/31/the-keys-to-good-cajun-cooking-in-new-orleans. Graham, George. “Cajun Pork Jambalaya Is a Defining Recipe of Cajun Cooking.” Acadiana Table, June 26, 2017. https://acadianatable.com/2015/07/06/cajun-pork-jambalaya/comment-page-1/. Thiam , Pierre. “Chef Pierre: In Africa, Mortar and Pestle Has a Rich History,” April 25, 2014. https://face2faceafrica.com/article/mortar-and-pestle-uses. |
