Browse  ▾ How to… ▾ Poetry Prize About the Press shopping_cart search The Food We Eat, the Stories We Tell Contemporary Appalachian Tables Edited by Elizabeth S. D. Engelhardt and Lora E. Smith Afterword by Ronni Lundy “Nothing else besides food nourishes us as profoundly as stories. Here we have a celebration of both, presented in an original, beautiful, and delicious manner. This book fairly bursts with a bounty of words—and wonderful illustrations—that manage to articulate just why food is so important in the way it connects and sustains us. I didn’t realize how much Appalachian Literature needed a book like this until I sat down and devoured the whole thing.“ Silas House, author of Southernmost “Appalachian food is more than beans and corn bread, and this anthology explores its depth…. There are several takes on the food of immigrants, from Korea, Mexico, Spain, and Switzerland…. In all, (The Food We Eat, the Stories We Tell) contains a diversity of voices, styles, and cuisines that will be a pleasant surprise to those unfamiliar with the region.” Booklist "Foodways have become such a fad, that it is tempting to respond to a new book on the subject with a ho-hum. NO! Not this book. It builds on the foundation that previous books have provided. It expands upon their reach. (The Food We Eat, the Stories We Tell) features writers who are more diverse and well-versed, scholars who are more accomplished, story-tellers who are more proficient, and poets who are more gifted.” Appalachian Mountain Books “Everything we have been handed down, from cookbook to rosette wand, everything we receive, from egg roll to taco, everything we jones for, from red hot hotdogs to candies, becomes a piece of our history, a thread in the story leading to more story. Sitting at the Appalachian table we can taste the proof of a strong, lasting, surprisingly diverse, and infinitely textured history.” From the afterword by Ronni Lundy Blue Ridge tacos, kimchi with soup beans and cornbread, family stories hiding in cookbook marginalia, African American mountain gardens—this wide-ranging anthology considers all these and more. Diverse contributors show us that contemporary Appalachian tables and the stories they hold offer new ways into understanding past, present, and future American food practices. The poets, scholars, fiction writers, journalists, and food professionals in these pages show us that what we eat gives a beautifully full picture of Appalachia, where it’s been, and where it’s going. Contributors: Courtney Balestier, Jessie Blackburn, Karida L. Brown, Danille Elise Christensen, Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle, Michael Croley, Elizabeth S. D. Engelhardt, Robert Gipe, Suronda Gonzalez, Emily Hilliard, Rebecca Gayle Howell, Abigail Huggins, Erica Abrams Locklear, Ronni Lundy, George Ella Lyon, Jeff Mann, Daniel S. Margolies, William Schumann, Lora E. Smith, Emily Wallace, Crystal Wilkinson Elizabeth S. D. Engelhardt is John Shelton Reed Distinguished Professor of Southern Studies in the department of American studies at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Her family roots in western North Carolina extend back to the 1700s. Among her publications are A Mess of Greens: Southern Gender and Southern Food, The Tangled Roots of Feminism, Environmentalism, and Appalachian Literature, and The Larder: Food Studies Methods from the American South (edited with John T. Edge and Ted Ownby).   MORE INFO → Lora E. Smith directs the Appalachian Impact Fund, a social impact investment fund focused on economic transition and opportunity in Eastern Kentucky. Smith is a founding member of the Appalachian Food Summit and a writer whose work has appeared in Gravy, the New York Times, PUNCH, and NPR’s The Salt. In 2015, Lora accepted the John Egerton Prize from the Southern Foodways Alliance for her work with the Appalachian Food Summit and supporting local agriculture movements in Central Appalachia.   MORE INFO → FEATURED WUTC-NPR Scenic Roots interview with editors and contributors ORDER A PRINT COPY Paperback · $19.96 · Add to Cart Retail price: $24.95 · Save 20% ($19.96) Hardcover · $52 · Add to Cart Retail price: $65.00 · Save 20% ($52) BUY FROM A LOCAL BOOKSTORE IndieBound US and Canada only BUY AN EBOOK Amazon Kindle Store Barnes & Noble NOOK Google Play iBooks Store Availability and price vary according to vendor. SHARE REQUESTS Desk Copy Examination Copy Review Copy Permission to reprint Permission to photocopy or include in a course pack via Copyright Clearance Center RELATED SUBJECTS Food Studies Appalachian Studies Appalachia American Studies Click or tap on a subject heading to sign up to be notified when new related books come out. IN SERIES New Approaches to Appalachian Studies LINKS Review in Appalachian Mountain Books WEKU-NPR “Eastern Standard” interview with editors and contributors Contributor Dan Margolies on WUNC-NPR, talking about Blue Ridge tacos Audio interview with Elizabeth Engelhardt and Courtney Balestier on the New Books Network (May 25, 2020). Blue Ridge Outdoors Staff Shares the Podcasts, Books, TV Shows, and Tunes that Have Kept Us Inspired during Quarantine WUTC-NPR Scenic Roots interview with editors and contributors New Books in Food podcast (May 2020) WMMT radio, “Mountain Talk” interview Bookmark This, a publication of UNC College of Arts & Sciences DOCUMENTS Elizabeth S. D. Engelhardt (credit: Marcie Cohen Ferris) Lora E. Smith (credit: Meg Wilson) High Resolution Cover Image (3 in. wide, 300 DPI) Table of Contents Introduction Review in Food, Culture & Society, February 2021 FORMATS Paperback 978-0-8214-2392-9 Retail price: $24.95, T. Release date: November 2019 12 illus. · 218 pages · 5½ × 8½ in. Rights: World Hardcover 978-0-8214-2391-2 Retail price: $65.00, S. Release date: November 2019 12 illus. · 218 pages · 5½ × 8½ in. Rights: World Electronic 978-0-8214-4687-4 Release date: November 2019 12 illus. · 218 pages Rights: World ADDITIONAL PRAISE FOR THE FOOD WE EAT, THE STORIES WE TELL “Engelhardt and Smith bring together a diverse group of writers who deftly use foodways to tackle a number of important themes, from identity and power to placemaking and the meaning of ‘Appalachia.’ Working against lingering but misleading and politicized regional signifiers, this riveting and readable book offers a fresh perspective on Appalachia, using foodways as a lens.” Jessica Wilkerson, author of To Live Here, You Have to Fight: How Women Led Appalachian Movements for Social Justice “In The Food We Eat, the Stories We Tell, Engelhardt and Smith offer an important and informed antidote to Hillbilly Elegy. The contributors handily debunk commonly held narratives and stereotypes, offering a well-rounded, balanced, and insightful look into Appalachia’s peoples and their foodways.” Ashli Quesinberry Stokes, author (with Wendy Atkins-Sayre) of Consuming Identity: The Role of Food in Redefining the South “This book is a creative and challenging anthology about food and Appalachia. I don’t know anything else like it. It both pokes fun at nostalgia but also absorbs it. It doesn’t bow to so-called foodies but is most definitely focused on the power of food to mediate memory, place, social stratification, pleasure, and resistance.” Katherine J. Black, author of Row by Row: Talking with Kentucky Gardeners “This is how I want to understand a place, and particularly a place so resistant to definition (and pronunciation) as the diverse and complex region studied here. Pick the most interesting, compelling, and irreverent voices of the region’s best contemporary writers and thinkers, and say, ‘Food. Here. NOW. Tell us of your Appalachia—its flavor, joys and sorrows, inequalities, dialects, the shape of IT, heritage, work, soil, movement, and always, always, change.’ And, there you have it: a tremendously dynamic collection representing food studies as the engaging and enlightening scholarship it can be.” Marcie Cohen Ferris, Professor Emeritus, UNC-Chapel Hill RELATED TITLES Row by Row Talking with Kentucky Gardeners By Katherine J. Black For two and a half years, Katherine J. Black crisscrossed Kentucky, interviewing home vegetable gardeners from a rich variety of backgrounds. Row by Row: Talking with Kentucky Gardeners is the result, a powerful compilation of testimonies on the connections between land, people, culture, and home.The people profiled here share a Kentucky backdrop, but their life stories, as well as their gardens, have as many colors, shapes, and tastes as heirloom tomatoes do. FOOD STUDIES · ENVIRONMENTAL CONSERVATION · GARDENING · KENTUCKY Saving Seeds, Preserving Taste Heirloom Seed Savers in Appalachia By Bill Best Foreword by Howard L. Sacks The Brown Goose, the White Case Knife, Ora’s Speckled Bean, Radiator Charlie’s Mortgage Lifter—these are just a few of the heirloom fruits and vegetables you’ll encounter in Bill Best’s remarkable history of seed saving and the people who preserve both unique flavors and the Appalachian culture associated with them. FOOD STUDIES · ENVIRONMENTAL CONSERVATION · GARDENING · ESSAYS IN HORTICULTURE · APPALACHIA · UNITED STATES · OHIO AND REGIONAL Gone Dollywood Dolly Parton’s Mountain Dream By Graham Hoppe Country music superstar Dolly Parton’s Dollywood is a 150-acre fantasyland that hosts three million people a year. What does it tell us about the modern South, and in turn what does that tell us about America as a whole? Hoppe blends tourism, public history, and personal reflection into an unforgettable interrogation of Southern American identity. POPULAR CULTURE · APPALACHIAN STUDIES · APPALACHIA · AMERICAN STUDIES · MUSIC, HISTORY AND CRITICISM Walk Till the Dogs Get Mean Meditations on the Forbidden from Contemporary Appalachia Edited by Adrian Blevins and Karen Salyer McElmurray In essays that take wide-ranging forms—ideal for creative nonfiction classes—established and emerging writers with roots in Appalachia take on the theme of silencing in Appalachian culture. They write about families left behind, hard-earned educations, selves transformed, identities chosen, and risks taken. AMERICAN LITERATURE · APPALACHIA · LITERATURE · CREATIVE NONFICTION Sign up to be notified when new Food Studies titles come out. Name Email Sign up We will only use your email address to notify you of new titles in the subject area(s) you follow. We will never share your information with third parties. 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