The Styles & History of Traditional Southern Cooking
The South's unique cuisine consists of influences from many different cultures and countries, reflecting the region's history, economic fluctuations, and multicultural population. During the beginnings of the American South, people cooked with whatever was available, which created a regional cuisine that's famous for its rich flavors and unique ingredients.
Types of Southern Cooking
Some of the most well-known types of Southern cooking are soul food, Cajun, Creole, Lowcountry, and Floribbean cooking. These cooking styles get their roots from African, Native American, British, Irish, French, and Spanish influences. All of these types of foods have certain traits that are specific to that cooking style and can be recognized nearly anywhere in the United States.
Table of Contents
Soul Food
"Soul food" was created by slaves in the deep south, with its origins traceable to Africa. Slaves were given meager rations upon which to survive, consisting of cheap, low quality food, which were then adapted into versions of the African dishes from their various cultures.1 Alongside the slave trade, indigenous African crops were brought to the Americas, including okra, rice, and many others that were used in these original "soul food" dishes. Other dishes take American ingredients and prepare them in ways reminiscent of African dishes, as with collard greens. Enslaved African people had to use what little food they could get to try and survive the brutal conditions they suffered through every day, but these recipes have endured to become commonplace across the South.
The tops of turnips, beets, and dandelions were used, while people also cooked with collards, kale, cress, mustard, and pokeweed. The worst cuts of meat, such as pigs feet, beef tongue and tail, ham hocks, chitterlings, pig ears, hog jowls, tripe, and skin were given to the slaves as main dishes, which were flavored with onions, garlic, thyme, and bay leaves to enhance the otherwise lacking flavor. Hot peppers and vinegar were also used to improve the flavor of these less-desirable cuts, which led to the genesis of many of the different types of barbeque sauce found across the South today.
Wild game – such as raccoons, opossums, turtles, and rabbits – were also caught and used in cooking. More recently, traditional soul foods such as country fried steak, fried chicken, fried fish, and ribs are used as main dishes. Biscuits and gravy, beans and cornbread, and grits are common side items.
Cajun
Cajun cuisine uses locally available ingredients and simple preparations to create full meals. Cajun type meals typically consist of 3 pots: a main dish, a grain dish, and a readily available vegetable. The "holy trinity" of ingredients – celery, bell peppers, and onions – are used extensively. This style of cooking originated out of necessity when Acadian refugees from Canada were forced to move to the American South and live off the land after the British expulsion left them destitute.2
The Acadian refugees mixed this with traditional Louisiana cuisine, such as rice, crawfish, and sugar cane, to create a variety of foods with a definitive kick of spiciness. There are certain cooking methods that are frequently used in Cajun cooking, such as barbecue, smoking, stewing (otherwise known as fricassee), deep frying, and grilling. Jambalaya, gumbo, boudin, crawfish, potato salad, fried frog legs, Tabasco sauce, and Cajun rice are popular around the country, regardless of geographical location.
Creole
Creole-style cooking originates in Louisiana, near the greater New Orleans area, the same area Cajun food comes from. The primary difference between the two is that Creole uses tomatoes and tomato-based sauces, while Cajun food usually doesn't.3 Creole-style cuisine blends influences from the French, Mediterranean, Caribbean, and African cultures. Creole cooking uses the "holy trinity" ingredients extensively, and has classical European influences.
During the 1980s, a new strain of Creole began to emerge that is characterized by a renewed emphasis on fresh ingredients and lighter preparations. Creole cooking is a dominant cuisine in the South, particularly in the Louisiana/New Orleans area. Common and well-known types of Creole foods are crabmeat, oysters, gumbo, dirty rice, red beans, french toast, pralines, and pecan pies.
Lowcountry
Lowcountry cuisine is traditionally associated with Georgia and South Carolina. This cuisine uses a diversity of seafood from the coastal estuaries, and strongly resembles the cooking of Creole and Cajun styles. Rice is prevalent in this type of cooking because it's so readily available in this area. Common types of Lowcountry cuisine include sweet potato and crab soup, okra soup, catfish stew, shrimp and grits, oyster roast, macaroni and cheese, and fried cabbage.
Floribbean
Floribbean cooking can be found all over Florida, from homes to restaurants. This unique style of cooking is heavily influenced by visitors and immigrants from the Caribbean. Floribbean cooking has an emphasis on extremely fresh ingredients, spices, seafood and poultry, and the use of fresh fruits and juices. These dishes use less heat than the dishes that inspired them and use gentle flavorings such as mango, papaya, rum, almond, coconut, key lime, and honey.
Resources
- The Humble History of Soul Food. Black Foodie. Accessed May 2021.
- A Brief History of Cajun Cuisine. The Culture Trip. Accessed May 2021.
- Cajun or Creole. NewOrleans.com. Accessed May 2021.