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| At the hearth in Old Salem |
Grandparents
on both sides endured hard times and lived by a motto: “Waste not, want not.”
But I wonder if they ever filled their bellies with pigtail stew? If so, they
never mentioned it. Pigtail stew was unknown to me until I encountered it in North
Carolina and Old Salem Cookery, a collection of commentary and recipes that
I very much enjoyed reading.
Old Salem is a historic district of
Winston-Salem, NC, where museums and restorations preserve links to the founding
Moravians, a Protestant sect established long ago in the Czech Republic.
Moravian missionaries apparently liked what they found in North Carolina and
sent a “Y’all come!” message back home, encouraging settlers.
But back to pigtail stew. “We grew up on foods now called soul foods
because they were the foods available to keep body and soul together,”
according to the
author, Elizabeth Hedgecock Sparks. (She was well known by her
pen name, Beth Tartan, as food editor of the Winston-Salem Journal. She was
winner of many honors and awards).
Her interpretation of the term “soul food” might provoke an argument in
some circles these days. But I know what she means: The book brims with
down-home recipes that originated in country kitchens of long ago – Sparks’
version of “soul food.”
Pigtail stew of course traces to those good old days when all parts of
the pig were put to use.
If you were to research the matter on the Internet you would find pigtail
stew identified as a Jamaican dish, but in this book it is given as a regional
recipe “from an old Negro cook,” delivered in vernacular – which might be
judged a cultural slight these days. It is necessary to keep in mind that the
book was written back in the 1950s, a different world.
The book has been updated several times, quite possibly the most recent
edition frames the recipe in modern terms. (It does appear that an updated
paperback version was issued in the 1990s; I haven’t seen it. My copy dates to
1972).
I’ve hunted high and low for a pigtail stew recipe in plain English that
would qualify as regional to North Carolina and not a Caribbean dish, but no
luck. Somehow, I don’t think it is a great loss. I can’t imagine that many
readers are truly hankering for a big plate of pigtails.
Recipes in the book aren’t limited to Old Salem by any means, though most
recipes appear to originate in the Piedmont area of the state. However, the
author points out the wide range of cooking styles from the Eastern coast to
its Western mountains. For instance, along the coast, which is more Southern
oriented, the primary bread would likely have been cornbread. Out to the West,
in the mountainous Appalachian area, the bread was more likely biscuits or
muffins. Of course both breads were common to both sections, but she is
pointing out the more dominant dish for each area.
The book is chocked full of stews and chowders, plus lots of Old Salem
and North Carolina culinary history. There are excellent depictions of old time
kitchens.
Livestock, game and seafood are given good coverage, as is wild and tame
vegetable produce. References are not just passing remarks but, quite often,
extensive and thorough commentary on the subject at hand.
Some Native American dishes are mentioned, such as fried grasshoppers. A
claim is made that Europeans first discovered potatoes being cultivated by
Indians of North Carolina, though Peru seems to have a stronger claim.
Overall the book passes on a portrait of a time when people believed in
gathering from near and far to share a meal because “those who break bread
together are united in fellowship” – a ritual that still exists as church and
community suppers but is increasingly rare.
A sampling of the book is available on line, here.
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