T he bright orange and yellow room smells of hot, fried chicken and sweet potato pie. The croon of Smokey Robinson evenly flows throughout the restaurant to the smokey kitchen. Tucked in a corner of trendy but funky boutiques located on Hayes St., Powell's Place, famous for more than 29 years for its southern fried chicken, still brings the heart of southern cooking into the Bay Area. You got to cook the food with feeling, otherwise you won't bring out the soul of the food. It might be the warm comforting smell of mom's chicken soup on a rainy day, or the smell of piping hot, crispy fried chicken that brings back the memories of family dinners gathered around the table.
Soul food derives from many African traditional foods such as lentils and yams.
These were brought to the United States and mixed with seasonings and spices from the south. Gravy's Soul Food, located on Geneva Avenue, is a great idea for take out. Sylvia Johnson, a small woman in her 60's is a weekly customer at Gravy's. I miss the food that I grew up on and used to cook for my family. Sylvia, a mother of three grown sons, stopped cooking after she divorced her husband four years ago.