Soul Food Origins: Cultures and Cuisines that Birthed an American Tradition

Though the term “Soul Food” has only existed since about the mid-20th century, what it describes has been around much longer. The origins of Soul Food have their roots in multiple culinary traditions and cultures, as well as out of necessity. On plantations, slaves were offered the “scraps” that the primarily Anglo and European slave owners didn’t eat. In Nigeria, South Africa, Morocco and other places in Africa, however, dishes including pig and chicken’s feet, intestines, neck bones and more were (and still are) popular. 

Thomas Jefferson was far from the only Southern plantation owner to leave much or most of the cooking duties to slaves specifically trained, sometimes for generations, in the secrets of masterfully bringing out flavor. This is why the history of barbecuing, slow-cooking and smoking meats also has a long, storied (if little known) history we hope to cover later this Summer. The distinction between Southern cooking and Soul Food is sometimes a fine line, but there is no doubt that the origins of both were indelibly shaped by Black culinary traditions.

Soul Food draws upon West African cooking techniques such as “one-pot” cooking method and a heavy reliance on boiled greens and stewed vegetables. Other cooking techniques influenced Soul Food as well though such as Indigenous methods of clay pot cooking and indigenous ingredients like corn, field peas, grits and hominy. Many of the ingredients that are today enshrined in both Southern and Soul Food came to the Americas from Africa. 

Arguably, it was a taste for exotic spices and sugar, along with a disregard for equality or basic humanity, that precipitated the Caribbean slave trade in the United Kingdom. Many were brought over during the harsh Middle Passage voyage and then grown here by slaves. 

Meanwhile pickled pigs feet and chitlins infuse the Soul Food palette. Stewed, boiled greens including "pot likker" involving pork fat and seasonings drawing out the flavor and condensing it, making a sort of distilled essence of intense taste. Okra, whether boiled in a stew or breaded in cornmeal (itself borrowed from Indigenous tradition of cooking with maize) was brought over from Africa. Okra has long been popular for use in thickened soups and stews and, of course, gumbos. Okra originated in Ethiopia and made it’s way through North Africa and the Middle East on to South and Southeast Asia finally landing in the colonies by the 18^th century. Okra’s Bantu designation of “ki ngombo” even gives the iconic Cajun dish its name.

Some other popular “Southern” ingredients were also brought over across the Middle Passage. Yams, collard greens, black-eyed peas, for instance, were all “borrowed” from African cooking traditions. The use of rice as a base is also common in Soul Food cooking.

Africa, like Asia, is a vast continent that dwarfs Europe. The ethnolinuistic and cultural groupings are as varied as the biodiversity from climate to climate to begin with. The word “rice” is derived from the Spanish “Ar-ruz” which derived from the Arabic “Ar-ruz.” Especially in Northern Africa and West Africa, many ingredients and cooking styles are shared back and forth with the Middle East. “One-pot” cooking and ample use of rice is definitely shared across the Afro-Asiatic world. 

With the addition of new ingredients, cooking techniques and other elements, the one-pot rice method that resulted in traditional African jollof results in classic America dishes like jambalaya just as Ghanaian waakye and Senegalese thiebou niebe result in the classic rice and bean dish Hoppin’ John.

Not unlike the situation with Jefferson and the making of American mac and cheese, the part of slaves in shaping the southern cooking tradition, often goes unsung which is why this Juneteenth we will continue to share some of the stories of Soul Food's fascinating origins.