Gravy

The black-eyed pea is not your average bean. Like many staple foods of the African Diaspora, it’s become a powerful symbol of food sovereignty and survival. With the migration of the black-eyed pea from West Africa during the transatlantic slave trade came a superstition about good luck. This belief combines folklore from West Africa and Western Europe in the American South. Our episode follows the journey of the black-eyed pea, time traveling through the folklore of the past and an Afrofuturist vision of what’s still to come. This episode was reported and produced by Sarah Holtz. Special thanks go to: Michael Twitty Adrian Miller B. Brian Foster Ira Wallace Music by: "Neuanfang" by Kielicaster "Shangri La" by Kielicaster "Dusty" by Crowander "Clay Pawn Shop" by Blue Dot Sessions Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In “What Makes Gumbo...Gumbo?” Gravy producer Katie Carter King takes us all the way to Northern California to understand what folklorist John Lauden meant when he said, “Gumbo is not a word, it’s a syntax, a way of putting something together.”   Cooks and culinarians have long argued about gumbo. Is it Creole or Cajun in its roots and history? Is it a soup, a stew, or some mysterious third thing? But perhaps nothing gets Southerners more heated than conversations about how you make gumbo—from the ingredients to the recipe technique, the dish has long provoked spirited debates. But in the southeast corner of San Francisco, one man has become known as Mr. Gumbo, and he’s not looking to pick a fight, but rather start a conversation.   Mr. Gumbo—also known as chef Dontaye Ball—grew up making gumbo with his grandmother. But after she passed away and he took helm of the family’s gumbo tradition, Dontaye began to realize the limitations of a single pot of gumbo. The seafood-centric recipe he’d long made accidentally excluded many of his loved ones: vegans, vegetarians, folks with shellfish allergies. So, he decided to cook up something new, something a bit unorthodox. He created a gumbo bar, complete with all the delicious possibilities his friends and family could dream up, including both different soup bases and different accouterments. A recurring event sprung to life, quickly morphing from holiday party to block party to pop-up business.   Growing up, community was always at the forefront of Dontaye’s mind. His grandmother centered serving the community in her cooking. Dontaye was raised in the Bayview, a sunny, geographically isolated neighborhood that has been the last corner of the city to gentrify. Once home to Maltese farmers and Chinese shrimpers, the area became home to thousands of Black workers who migrated following the eruption of World War II. A tight-knit community formed, one that took care of its own. While Dontaye had never planned on opening a full restaurant, when a space became open on a prominent corner in his own neighborhood, he saw how much possibility gumbo could offer—and knew he couldn’t say no.   In this episode, Katie Carter King learns about Dontaye’s path to becoming a restaurateur and community leader. Additionally, geographer and UC Santa Cruz professor Lindsey Dillon helps situate the Gumbo Social story in the larger landscape of Bayview and San Francisco’s Black residents and culture. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In “The Joyful Black History of the Sweet Potato,” Kayla Stewart reports for Gravy on sweet potatoes, which Southern-born Black Americans have baked, roasted, fried, distilled—and long revered. Stewart takes listeners across the United States to learn how African Americans are finding new, interesting ways to enjoy sweet potatoes. Harvey and Donna Williams own and operate Delta Dirt Distillery in Helena, Arkansas. Both grew up in Arkansas, and Harvey was raised on a farm that has been in his family for generations. His father began growing sweet potatoes to make efficient use of his small acreage, and Williams grew to love the root for its nutritional value. At a conference, he met an entrepreneur distilling sweet potatoes and decided to try it himself. In 2021, Delta Dirt Distillery was born, earning a host of beverage awards. But for the Williams family, success is about more than medals. It’s about recognizing the history and pride associated with sweet potatoes–a history that’s likely made the product even more compelling to Black Americans in the area.  Jeremy Peaches is an agriculture consultant who works at Lucille’s 1913, a non-profit organization operated by Houston chef Chris Williams that aims to combat food insecurity in vulnerable communities. While sweet potatoes are beloved for their sweet, earthy flavor, Peaches says they were also one of the first major sources of economic opportunity for Black American farmers, in part thanks to their resilience during the annual harvest. Though sweet potatoes can be enjoyed raw, roasted, or distilled, there’s nothing quite like the sweet potato pie. To understand how these pies have been comforting Southerners around the holidays for centuries, Stewart steps into the kitchen with restaurateur and cookbook author Alexander Smalls, who explains the history of sweet potato pie and why Black Americans make such a strong claim to the dish. Finally, Joye B. Moore, owner of Joyebells Desserts and Countrysides, tells of the generational traditions that make her famous sweet potato pies so exceptional. For this episode, Stewart interviews Harvey Williams, Jeremy Peaches, Alexander Smalls, and Joye B. Moore to learn how this root vegetable nourishes Black entrepreneurs, cooks, and communities—bodies and souls.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In “Eating at the End of the World,” Gravy producer Katie Jane Fernelius takes a close look at the culture of disaster prep, especially how people eat when disaster strikes. As it turns out, how people provision for disaster can differ wildly from how they actually feed themselves, and each other, once a storm blows through.   After living without power for almost two weeks following Hurricane Ida, Fernelius fell down a rabbit hole of prepper content. She discovered cartons of shelf-stable water, large cans of peaches and green beans, wide varieties of dehydrated meals, and large “apocalypse buckets” full of everything a person might need following a disaster. In short, she discovered a booming industry.   So, she was curious: Who preps? For what? And why?   In this episode, Fernelius talks to cultural anthropologist Chad Huddleston, who studies the rise of prepper culture—and consumerism—following Hurricane Katrina. He talks about how the kinds of food that preppers keep in their pantries has shifted over time, and how “prepper” foods have never been so popular and available as they are today.   Fernelius also interviews a mutual aid organizer in New Orleans named Miriam Belblidia, who contrasts the utility of “prepping” against her actual experience of living in the aftermath of a hurricane. She says that when we think of prepping, we should be far more concerned with how we prepare community resources than how we prepare individual ones.   Special thanks to Chad Huddlestone, Miriam Beblidia, and all the people who organized mutual aid in New Orleans following Hurricane Ida. Thank you to Heather Cole for her fact-checking. Thank you to Clay Jones for his sound design and mixing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices