Foods Made in N.C. Often Continue Family Traditions
by Ray Linville Have you ever wandered through a festival that showcases the best flavors and tastes of North Carolina? Imagine attending an event that highlights the best of N.C. agriculture and celebrates specialty foods made in our state. The three-day, family-friendly Got to Be NC Festival held each May at the State Fairgrounds in […]
Simmering Stew Brings a Community Together
by Ray Linville The center of small town is not always a town hall, courthouse, or church. Sometimes it’s a pot of bubbling stew as it is each fall in Mount Gilead, a community of slightly more than 1,000 residents in Montgomery County. Although the community is small, just about everyone knows about the Brunswick […]
Sweet Potatoes: Providing Fresh Food for the Needy
by Ray Linville Please contact the Food Bank of Central and Eastern North Carolina directly f you are needing food: 919-875-0707 North Carolina produces about half of all the sweet potatoes grown in the United States, and it has consistently ranked as the top producing state for more than 30 years. More than half of […]
Lumbee Fish Market: As Fresh as Being on the Coast
by Ray Linville Drive to the beach along U.S. Highway 74 and tune in a local radio station. If you do, you might hear an ad for Lumbee Fish Market in Pembroke that is so intriguing that you want to visit. It’s a market with fish that you might not expect in a location about […]
Time for Persimmon Pudding
by Ray Linville Cool temperatures mean fall fruits and vegetables. When the summer temperatures drop, one tree becomes more noticeable as its round fruit ripens and takes on an orange-brown hue. Is it time to pick persimmons and make pudding? Many of us remember days from childhood when we asked if the persimmons could be […]
Food, Service, and Prices from Yesterday at the Chicken Coop
by Ray Linville A few places serving food in our state are caught in a time warp and remain unchanged since the days that they opened. Price’s Chicken Coop, established in 1962, in the South End of Charlotte is definitely one. Seeing the name of Chicken Coop, you know exactly what to order. The classic […]
New Farmers in North Carolina: Karen Refugees
by Ray Linville More than 14,000 refugees have been resettled in North Carolina in the past decade, according to the U.S. Office of Refugee Resettlement. As these refugee communities grow, they are beginning to transform food traditions of our state and expand the agricultural offerings at farmers’ markets and farm-to-home deliveries provided through community-supported agriculture. […]
Festival of the Peach: Candor Is the Scene
by Ray Linville Communities that spread over a multi-county area often unite each year for a common celebration. For the N.C. peach community, that event occurs on the third Saturday in July in Candor, a small town in Montgomery County that brings everyone in the peach-growing Sandhills region together. Although Candor is the home of […]
Heirloom Seeds and Plants: Preserving State Food Traditions
by Ray Linville Do you wish that you could grow the same vegetables that Grandma grew? The flavors that she tasted and the nutrients that she enjoyed are legendary, and many of us reminisce about how we miss the flavors of yesteryear. Because this desire to appreciate traditional foods is growing, a cultural movement to […]
Finding the Source of Your Food
by Ray Linville When you eat in a restaurant, do you think about the farms that provide your meal? An excellent way to visit the source of your food is the annual farm tours conducted in our state. Earlier this year I explored several farms as part of the Piedmont Farm Tour, held on the […]
Grilling on the Side of the Highway
by Ray Linville What makes our state so special for grilling ribs? Most of us can remember our first cookout when someone in the family, neighborhood, or church served home-cooked ribs. They were so tender that the meat literally fell off the bones. The homemade sauce was delicious, and often the recipe was a secret […]
Home of Collard Sandwich Expands on Soul Food Day
by Ray Linville A collard sandwich is not the typical attraction to establish a regional reputation. But it is for Chef Kenneth Collins and his UPro restaurant in Aberdeen, NC, where he has developed an extensive following of appreciative customers. The star attraction of his business begins with fresh, hand-cut collards. The greens are cooked […]
Local Seafood: Kitchen on the Roll
Where can you get fresh fish prepared by an award-winning chef? Sometimes the location may not be on the coast or a river but instead from a mobile kitchen. In downtown Wilmington, I found Chef Keith Rhodes hustling to serve customers eagerly standing in line at his food truck parked on North Fourth Street in […]
Getting Romantic on Valentine’s Day with N.C. Food Traditions
by Ray Linville How do you celebrate Valentine’s Day? Many celebrate with traditional gifts such as sweet chocolates or red roses. Not me. I take advantage of the foodways traditions of North Carolina to make the day special. First, start with a breakfast treat that says love better than chocolate: BoBerry Biscuits from Bojangle’s, which […]
Sorghum Molasses: A Tradition Worth Preserving
Is sorghum molasses sweet and flavorsome for you, or is it a syrup that is sticky and sinister? Although I only occasionally eat sorghum molasses, I’m sure that I would have learned how to make it if I had grown up on a farm. It was syrup that my father grew up eating regularly, and […]