The Center's second Southern Foodways Symposium, held October 29-31, assembled cooks, chefs, food writers, and inquisitive eaters to explore "The Creolization of Southern Cuisine" and to sample a variety of foods from the South.

The symposium centered around three days of talks, including Damon Lee Fowler's discussion of English influences on Southern foods, John Martin Taylor's look at cooking in the South Carolina Lowcountry, Kathy Starr on foods of the Mississippi Delta, Psyche Williams on an African American culinary icon, fried chicken, and Ronni Lundy on the foodways of the Hillbilly diaspora.

Discussions were complimented by enjoyment of Southern foods. Retired farmer Ed Scott served fried catfish and hushpuppies, chef John Folse provided a rich spread of traditional Louisiana foods, and chef John Currence prepared pimento cheese stuffed celery ribs, deviled eggs, and other delicacies for the closing dinner on the grounds, served as the University gospel choir performed. Booksignings at Square Books offered tastings of tamales on Friday and Lowcountry pilau on Saturday before Vertamae Grosvenor, accompanied by musician Steve Cheseborough, performed her work celebrating African American food in all its varieties.

Joining the Center for the Study of Southern Culture as sponsors of the event were G. P. Putnam's Sons, publishers of A Gracious Plenty: Recipes and Recollections from the American South; the American Center for Wine, Food, and the Arts; the Georgia Pecan Commission; Hal & Mal's Restaurant and Brewpub; the Southern Peanut Farmers Federation; and Viking Range.

Pictured at the 1999 Southern Foodways Symposium are, left to right, front row: Leah Chase, proprietor of Dooky Chase Restaurant, New Orleans, Louisiana; Jane Crump, of Viking Range in Greenwood, Mississippi, a sponsor of the event; Nathalie Dupree, author, Social Circle, Georgia; Toni Allegra, author and writing consultant, St. Helena, California; Jessica Harris, from Brooklyn, New York, author and professor of English at Queen College; Lolis Eric Elie, author and newspaper columnist, New Orleans, Louisiana; second row: Joe Randall, chef, Savannah, Georgia; Vertamae Grosvenor, National Public Radio personality, composer of the folk opera NYAM; Terry Ford, newspaper publisher, Ripley, Tennessee; John Egerton, author, Nashville, Tennessee; Charles Reagan Wilson, director of the Center for the Study of Southern Culture.

Photograph by Joe Ellis