Collards: A Southern Tradition from Seed to Table

We really enjoyed this book. Well written and does an excellent job of tracing the sometimes complicated history of collards in southern folkways. This vegetable is initimately tied to questions of race, status, living standards and sustainability as well as to those of the path to the new world of this plant and nutrition.I am the son and grandson of Sicilian immigrants (my father and my maternal grandparents were from the same town in the center of the island). I grew up with collards as an indigenous part of our diet. Many of the same questions that inform the history of collards in the United States also are part of our story. My wife is half Greek and the same is true for her family.

Well I’m not sure what I expected but reading “Racial divides still exist, but the city’s residents mingle now with less attention to skin color.” In relation to Birmingham, Alabama was not it. Guess I thought I’d read about collards in the way that I read about okra in the book THE WHOLE OKRA which is an amazing book. And discussed everything possible about okra. Only on page 12 and I’m hugely disappointed and uncomfortable.

I love this book! Davis and Morgan take the commonplace Southern “mess of greens” and use them to shine a light on the rich and complicated story of the Southern past and people. Who would have thought that the collard green, that icon of soul food, could trace its pedigree back to ancient Greece and Rome?This book is chock full of surprising people and stories told with an ear tuned to the cultural complexities of the American South. By following the path of collards from Anglo Europe to the pots of enslaved Africans, Davis and show how a single plant, through human creativity, became a powerful sustainer of both soul and body.I especially love the work on the geography of collard eating, i.e. where folks favor the collard green and where they prefer turnips and/or mustards. And they deserve a medal for the many varieties of collards they collected across the South from seed savers and added to the seed bank, preserving them for future generations.A "mess of greens" will never taste the same.

about collards! The authors did a lot of research to give us a wonderful insight into all things collards

This is an interesting little book for the Southern Cook in your life!My wife welcomed this gift to her kitchen library.