The skill involved can be similarly misunderstood. “When I started, some chefs would look down on this as a lower art form,” Mursal tells me. “But you have to learn how to form and adapt very particular chemical equations, the sound of fire at different stages. You’re working with nitrates, haemoglobin, figuring out whether to go slower or not.”
Another challenge is how Southern food is perceived. “There are still biases about Southern cooking,” says Tom Zahir Browne, founder of Louisiana-focused hospitality project Decatur. Having lived in the US and travelled extensively, particularly around New Orleans, he felt that much of the representation when he returned here in 2013 was “a poor facsimile” of the food he had come to revere.
For Safiya Robinson, who champions Southern Black foodways under the moniker Sisterwoman, the problem is acute around soul food. Of Jamaican, British and Black American heritage, she felt that “a lot of people didn’t extend their appreciation of gastronomy to Southern Black American food.” She adds, “there’s this belief that it’s just fried chicken, unhealthy, scraps, full of salt. My work around the philosophy of ‘intentional nourishment’ deconstructs this.”
Another meaty dish lines the marble countertop at Appalachia
Her plant-based cooking foregrounds the breadth of this culinary tradition, with dishes like butter beans and hot pepper vinegar, grilled okra with ackee spicy mayo, and peach and hemp barbecue sauce alongside smoked jackfruit brisket.
These misconceptions affect perceptions of price. Southern food can be perceived as low-value because its most recognisable dishes are associated with affordability, despite the skilled labour and quality, often farm-to-table produce involved.“We’re cooking fresh and from scratch,” Malika tells me. “That has to be accounted for!”
Then there is the nebulous question of ‘authenticity’. What does it mean to attempt to reproduce a cuisine thousands of miles away from the culture and agriculture that birthed it?