The phrase “Southern Hospitality” has been jumping around in my head a lot as I’ve gotten older. What does it REALLY mean? What does it mean to have so much of your entire culture hinged on virtually this one ideal?
For me, so much of it is rooted in food.
A meal can speak any language, tell any family’s story, and fuel any journey.
So much of being a true Southerner is predicated on what you eat and how well you can cook. It’s almost a rite of passage to get your first grill and cast iron. And whether it’s BBQ, crawfish, cornbread, buttermilk pie, or biscuits and gravy — there’s an item of Southern fare that is anchored in the very core of your childhood and usually plagues your adulthood with the fact that yours doesn’t taste JUST like memaw’s did.
Food has been tied to both how I have introduced myself and viewed myself since I was 18 years old. When people ask what I do, my default is simply to shrug my shoulders and say, “I cook.” I’ve worked in restaurants and bars, a candy shop, a resort, a strict farm-to-table hotel, and catering. I’ve held both front of house and back of house as well as pastry and savory positions. I went to culinary school in New York and I won best chef of the Pine Belt a few months into my first (and only) executive chef position. I wanted to learn everything about everything to do with food and I think I will always be chasing that. So now that I’ve been out of the food industry for a year, I have to measure my response. Because whatever it means to be Southern outside of food, I’m honestly not sure.
The rest of the world may see being from Mississippi as being poor or uneducated. But for those of us who really call this place home, sometimes it simply means that you’ll never let someone leave your home without a full belly and a happy heart.
To this day, when I go home to visit my grandparents, my grandmother always makes a fresh pot of coffee and offers me a snack. Usually, it’s pecan sandies or a slice of pound cake. If it’s lunchtime, you can bet there’s a sliced tomato fresh from the garden, cornbread, and crowder peas over rice. My grandfather, who is in his 80s, will not let me leave without him and my grandmother rounding me up a “care package” of a few things from their garden, homemade pickles, or blueberries. Until about two years ago, there was usually a two-liter Coke bottle full of homemade wine included in my care package as well. But I never leave empty-handed. And I always leave feeling more whole than what I did when I walked in the door.
That’s the thing about being Southern. There’s something about simplicity that has the ability to fill a void that nothing else can. So much of what I understand of who I am today came from sitting at a little round table in the middle of nowhere with a cup of coffee and a slice of cornbread straight out of the cast-iron skillet.
Being Southern means you can and will always fill someone else’s cup — even if yours is empty.
