Carolina Life & Lore

by David Cecelski One of the loveliest places you can be on a late summer Saturday night is Big T’s in Hope Mills, a town a little south and west of Fayetteville. I was down there tonight to watch my son compete in a cross country meet and I thought the scene around Big T’s was […]

by David Cecelski This is the beginning of the walking trail at the JunaluskaMuseum and Gravesite in Robbinsville. The Snowbird community of Cherokees here in Graham County operates this little museum and walking trail at the gravesite of the 19th-century Cherokee leader Junaluska and his second wife, Nicie. I enjoyed the museum’s exhibits, but what really grabbed me was the […]

by David Cecelski Last week we happened to be passing through Stecoah, inGraham County, on one of the two Friday nights each summer that the Stecoah Valley Cultural Arts Center hosts a supper of Cherokee traditional foods. Located in a beautiful old stone schoolhouse, the Center is a non-profit community group dedicated to preserving Appalachian mountain heritage and supporting the local community. […]

by David Cecelski When we were in the mountains last week, we found some lovely things at produce stands and farmers markets. We discovered these dried yellow-eyed peas at Duckett’s Produce Stand on US 19 in Maggie Valley, in Haywood County. Yellow-eyes are a variety of cowpea, like black-eyed peas, and are a mountain delicacy, rich and […]

by David Cecelski This week, my family and I are taking classes at the John C.Campbell Folk School on the border of Cherokee and Clay County. I’m spending most of my time in the blacksmith shop with my son and daughter, but I’m also keeping an eye out for interesting, traditional foods from this part of the Southern Appalachians. Our first adventure […]

by David Cecelski I’ve been eating at the Sanitary Fish Market and Restaurant in Morehead City all my life. My mother’s been eating at the Sanitary almost all her life—and she’s 82. She remembers when the restaurant first opened in 1938. At that time, the little waterfront café had only 12 stools and a two-burner kerosene stove. She had one […]

by David Cecelski Late in the 19th century, the little rural community of Ridgeway, in Warren County, attracted immigrants from Germany,Switzerland, France, and the British Isles. They raised many kinds of fruits and berries, but Ridgeway gained a special fame for the sweetness of its cantaloupes. At its peak, Ridgeway’s farm cooperative was loading 14 railroad cars a day with cantaloupes. […]

by David Cecelski Every evening this week, my children and I have picked wild blackberries by the creek in our city park. We have filled buckets with the sweet, sweet berries. They taste so summery and good, and are so fresh, that at first we just ate handfuls of them as we stood in the […]

by David Cecelski When my daughter and I visited Durham’s Green Flea Market for the first time today, we were reminded of the lively, colorful, and exciting neighborhood mercados that you find in Mexico or El Salvador. More than a hundred mostly Latin American vendors were selling everything from CDs to baptismal gowns there. What enthralled us most, though, were the cafés, […]

by David Cecelski Tonight my son and daughter baked Irish potatoes in the hot coals left from a fire we built earlier in the day. They wrapped the potatoes in tinfoil and cooked them with fresh onions and a little butter. When they pulled them out of the coals, the tender young potatoes had a […]

by David Cecelski Today I took a friend who is a jazz lover to explore John Coltrane’s childhood world in High Point. The great jazz saxophonist and composer lived in the city from soon after his birth in 1926 until he graduated from high school in 1943. We visited his family’s old house on Underhill Street, his […]

by David Cecelski When I opened the Pakse Café’s door, I felt like I was walking into another world. Named for a city in Laos, the little café has 7 or 8 tables and a specials board written in Lao. Everybody there was speaking Lao, too. At one of the tables, a group of older men […]

by David Cecelski Yesterday I visited the annual 4-H Livestock Show and Auction in Ponzer, a rural community on the Pungo River. The children had worked all year to raise their hogs, sheep, and goats and I could see the pride in their faces. Some of the boys and girls were in middle school, but many were […]

by David Cecelski “Wash tub” fish stews are a spring-time tradition along theNeuse River.  When the shad and rockfish swim upriver to spawn, local fishermen take to the water and cooks get out their biggest pots. In the old days, that stew pot was often literally a tin wash tub. These days it’s more likely a big cast […]

by David Cecelski Last week we gathered next to the old millpond, on a little rise between the orchard and a field of purple clover. My cousin had been on the river the day before and came home with several bushels of oysters, probably the last we’ll have this winter. We stood around the fire, […]

by David Cecelski I was standing in the parking lot at Morris Barbeque in Hookerton this morning when I got to talking to the owner’s mother. She was a charming woman and she told me that her father-in-law, Willie “Pop” Morris, started this wonderful little ‘cue joint back in 1956. He had been cooking in […]

by David Cecelski   I love visiting Meredith College in Raleigh because I can walk across Hillsborough Street and explore the Al Baraka Market. Run by a very gracious gentleman from Syria, the little store carries Middle Eastern staples like olives, bulk lentils, Halal meats, and a large assortment of the region’s spices, as well as sublime delicacies such as grape molasses […]

by David Cecelski   There is a kind of an ascetic purity to eating at Bill’s Hot Dogs in little Washington. The unadorned storefront (the window says only “Bill’s Hot Dogs”), the bare shop floor (no chairs, no tables), the simplicity of the fare (hot dogs only), the bare-bones condiments (chili, onions, and mustard only—no ketchup, […]

by David Cecelski A little west of Conetoe, in Edgecombe County, there’s a fabulous little country-cooking café called Blackbeards BBQ & C-Food. You can get some of the state’s best wood-cooked barbecue there and a wonderful array of country-style vegetable side dishes. And as good as the ‘cue is, I think I like the daily specials even […]

by David Cecelski I’m sad to report that Tom Robinson died of the H1N1 (swine) flu on Friday night. He will be missed something terrible. Tom was a graceful, caring soul, with a light heart and an incandescent spirit. He was also a great fishmonger. For four decades, his Carrboro seafood market has been the […]