The Importance of Cooking in Ecology of a Cracker Childhood Janisse Ray wrote the book, "Ecology of a Cracker Childhood." In the story, the author describes how she grew up, the influences that her family history, culture, and nature had on her, and how she is an individual as well as part of a whole. The memory that I believe gives a very personal insight into the author's identity details her mother's down home, southern cooking and the imprints, that her cooking impressed on her. In this exert, Ray describes her mothers cooking. My mother was a simple cook. She prepared foods she'd been raised on, plain Southern fare-rice, gravy, sliced tomatoes, turnip greens, cornpone, grits, eggs, chicken and dumplings, pot roast, ham, field peas, lima beans, potato salad, stewed okra, pumpkin pie, salmon balls. We didn't have fancy casseroles or lasagnas or spaghetti, and nobody had ever heard of a burrito or an egg roll. I didn't know what an artichoke or a parsnip or kiwi or papaya was-certainly had never taste them. We drank sweet iced tea and sometimes lemonade. Mama made biscuits the old-fashioned way, hollowing a well in the bowl of flour and cutting the shortening in with her fingers, then pouring milk into the reservoir and stirring until she had a ball of dough. She pinched the biscuits off one by one, rolling them into small balls and pressing them out on a cookie sheet. Each biscuit bore the mark of the backside of her knuckles (page 198-199). This passage reveals a personal truth because, throughout the chapter, Ray keeps repeating how she never wants to ... ... middle of paper ... ...ir food reflected this. Ray's mother was not only making biscuits to feed her stomach, she was also feeding her soul with the rich culture that exists in the south. Ray accepted her mother's wisdom with a grain of salt, vowing never to become her mother. She did not become her mother, but she did acquire her mother's undying love for that which lives around her. Through the simple act of making a Cracker staple, Ray reveals the truth that she loved her mother and disapproved of her giving up on her dreams, but at the same time she embraced her mother's love for all things and for the Cracker culture that can be described simply by the food we southerners love to call soul food. It's good for the body and the soul. Works Cited Ray, Janisse. Ecology of a Cracker Childhood. Minneapolis: Milkweed Edition, 1999.
In Jack Hitt’s “A Confederacy of Sauces”, the reader learns that there is a sibling feud between two brothers over barbecue sauces. This feud was like the “icing on the cake” after numerous years of the two brothers not getting along. This dispute between Maurice and Melvin exemplify that barbecue has become mixed up with the concerns of race and heritage. Heritage refers to characteristics or practices that are passed down from generation to generation. In this particular story, Maurice and Melvin had a few other brothers in the barbecue business as well. Jack Hitt tastes each brother’s sauce, realizing that the brothers’ versions of their father’s original sauce had very subtle but noticeable distinctions (310). Thus, carrying on their father’s legacy through his sauce.
The meal, and more specifically the concept of the family meal, has traditional connotations of comfort and togetherness. As shown in three of Faulkner’s short stories in “The Country”, disruptions in the life of the family are often reinforced in the plot of the story by disruptions in the meal.
In her short story, Toasters, Pamela Painter is able to effectively portray a mother’s heartbreaking decision to conceal the truth of her marriage
By reading Ecology of a Cracker Childhood, it is safe to assume that Janisse Ray, the main character, author, is one who doesn't conform and has a stubborn nature. For instance, when Ray wants to play football with the boys in her class at recess she gets angered when they tell her no she can not play with them; so instead of accepting their reply she jumps in the game anyway and tackles the boy with the football. The boys angry with the fact that their friend, a guy, got tackled by a girl went chasing after her. Why did Ray feel the need to make a statement by taking down the boy with the football? Perhaps it was her feminist nature, driving her to show the boys that just because she was a female didn't mean that she was not able to do as they did. Whether or not it was feminism, Ray, still has the heart of a revolutionary.
about. (Lines 593 - 626) He tries to talk to her, but his words serve no
Joseph Smith or Brigham Young's Contributions to the Mormon Movement Many settlers travelled east, but the most important religious group to travel east was the Mormons. The Mormon religion was started by a person called Joseph Smith. A Smith grew up on his farm, angles appeared telling him there was a book (written upon golden plates) on a hillside near Manchester, New York. Once dug up, the plates were published in a translated version, which contained statements of his father and brothers saying they had seen the plates. Smith started to preach his new religion.
worked seven days a week and up to fourteen hours a day. In London in
In the second paragraph of Jones` article, she describes that throughout her youth in the 80`s, her family`s homemade food was not a way of boasting a talent to the neighbors or a hobby they would take part in on the weekends. It was
to be able to read and write. Much of the time before they went out on
My mother was Jewish and chose to raise me as Jewish. Since my father was not Jewish and he was the only one cooking, we didn’t have stereotypical Jewish food very often. Even when we did have latkes for Chanukah or brisket for Passover, it was with my Dad’s own French influenced spin on it. My father’s dominance in the kitchen was present as he would take Jewish foods and make them his own. This is where honoring food with ritual really came into play. Since he was trained as a professional French chef, most of the meals I had growing up were amazing creamy soups or savory sauces. The meals that he created always had his signature style to it and would differ from the norm. This taught me to have a distinct pallet different from my Jewish peers. I was overjoyed to be introduced to various amounts of different foods that my friends didn’t know about or wish they could have. It also become obvious that among my friends, sleeping over at my house became a popular choice just so they could enjoy my father’s
They ate a lot of biscuits and syrup and beans. Her mother would can everything she could get. They picked blackberries for their mom to can. They also had a persimmon tree in the yard, but they weren’t very good to
The legacy of World War II is often perceived as one of the most impactful events of the 20th century. The war began in 1939 when Germany invaded Poland and seized control of the nation. Other nations took and formed sides, and World War II developed into a conflict between two sides, the Allied Powers and the Axis Powers. Ultimately, the Allied Powers were able to defeat the Axis Powers and brought about important changes, such as the improvement of human rights. However, World War II also brought about other less appalling changes. During the 20th century, conflicts, primarily World War II, caused the foreign policy of the world’s nations to focus on intervening, rather than isolation.
In her book Semiotics and Communication: Signs, Codes, Cultures, Wendy Leeds-Hurwitz describes the wide use of food as signs, and also as social codes. The reason foods are so useful as signs and social codes is because they are separable, easily adaptive to new environments, and it is not difficult to cook, or eat for that matter. Food is a major part of our daily lives, Not only for survival, but it plays a substantial social role in our lives. We will look deeper into the semiotics of food, how food is used as identity markers, and also the role that foods play in social change in our lives. First let us start with the semiotics of food.
Even though I still curl my lip at the "Easter soup" (a vile concoction of vinegar and curdled milk that's sure to trigger acid reflux), I realize that it is a valuable skill to be able to cook for yourself. To be able to cook something that you like is to have the entire culinary world in the palm of your hand. After taking cooking lessons for the first time in third grade, I was constantly on the search for new recipes. I cooked anything that sounded good--Italian food, Korean food, French food, but certainly not Polish food!
We sit at the table, and the smell of all the food hits me. Everything that I imagined earlier is now a reality. Too bad I’m not in the mood to devour it… While Mrs. Rowley goes into the kitchen, Mr. Rowley attempts to be humorous with me. “Don’t look so sad. We’ll be eating soon.” I stare at him as leans over and nudges me. My mother laughs to fill the silence and knees me in the leg. “She’s shy,” she says, after I remain silent. Mr. Rowley chuckles. “It’s okay to be a little quiet. That ain’t never hurt