Gravy Quarterly No. 84

Guest edited by writer and oral historian Audrey Petty, the Summer 2022 issue of Gravy tells stories of the Great Migration and its culinary legacies. Articles and essays explore how Southerners have both maintained and adapted their foodways at home and in restaurants when they leave the South to make homes in new places. The pieces in this issue are set primarily in the Midwest: Cleveland to Chicago, Kankakee to Kalamazoo. They span four generations—roughly a century—of movement, placemaking, tradition-bearing, and evolution.

Janice Harrington recalls a lifetime of foraging in the Deep South and the Midwest. Rosalind Bentley connects with a Hmong farmer over collard greens in Minneapolis. From Chicago, Charla L. Draper recalls her years directing the Ebony magazine test kitchen, and Lolly Bowean reports on the city’s Black tacos. Kidiocus Carroll meditates on his family’s dressing recipe, which has evolved over four generations and many geographic changes. Mark V. Reynolds conjures the vibrant Black-owned restaurants and nightclubs of Cleveland in the mid-twentieth century.

In This Issue:

SFA MVP (Most Visited Places)
Worms, Chavonn Williams Shen
The Migration Less Traveled, Donna Battle Pierce
Black Tacos, Lolly Bowean
Just Above My Head, Kidiocus Carroll
Reflections on Becoming Ebony’s Food Editor, Charla L. Draper
Of Chitlins and Care, Emily Hooper Lansana
Foraging, Janice N. Harrington
In Search of My Parents’ Cleveland, Mark V. Reynolds
Snow Falling on Collards, Rosalind Bentley
Learning to Snap Green Beans, Tara Betts
The Relation of Greens, Michelle S. Johnson
Come Here and Watch, Lyletta Robinson
Yeast, Khalisa Rae
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