Do any Google search for topics related to the history of Black American cuisine, and you’re bound to see one name come up again and again, in article after article, whether as a quoted source or as the bylined author: Adrian Miller. Since winning a James Beard Foundation award for his very first book, “Soul Food: The Surprising History of an American Cuisine, One Plate at a Time,” in 2014, Miller has been recognized as a foremost expert in Black foodways — a reputation he only bolstered with the release of “The President’s Kitchen Cabinet: The Story of the African Americans Who Have Fed Our First Families, From the Washingtons to the Obamas” in 2017, to be followed this spring by “Black Smoke: African Americans and the United States of Barbecue.”
And yet you’d never guess from his biography prior to publication that illustrious culinary scholarship would come to define his resume. For that matter, neither would he. (Heck, even today, he holds a day job, namely executive director of the Colorado Council of Churches.) Growing up in Denver, Colorado — which, he jokes, “immediately loses me all street cred on the subject of Southern food” — he went on to get a degree in international relations from Stanford and a law degree from Georgetown; from there, he took a position on the Clinton administration’s One America task force, with every intention of returning to his home state to launch a U.S. Senate campaign.
But a funny thing happened on the way to the Capitol: unemployment. Well, that’s not the funny part. Faced with a slow job market back in Denver, he explains, “I was watching a lot of daytime television and thought, ‘I should read something.’ So, I went to the bookstore, and I found this book on the history of Southern food, ‘Southern Food: At Home, on the Road, in History.’ And in it, the author, John Egerton, wrote that the tribute to Black achievement in cooking had yet to be written.”
Granted, it also brings to light the resilience — and ultimately, no small amount of pride — of the Black cooks, butlers and stewards who, over generations, managed the enormous pressures of not only pleasing the palates of the most powerful people in the world but meeting their nutritional needs while even, at times, protecting their egos. Take the kitchen staff of President William Howard Taft. As Miller recounts, “Taft was really into apple pie, but [he] was a hefty guy. One of the longest-running cat-and-mouse games in presidential history is the president usually arriving in office in not-so-great health, and it’s a stressful job, so they crave comfort food — but then you’ve got the first lady and the White House physician trying to keep the president on a diet.” Because neither happened to be accompanying him on a particular train ride from D.C. to Ohio, “when Taft was rolling out from the train station … he went to the person in charge of food and ordered an apple pie, and there was none available.” Or so they told him. “What he found out was that his staffers were basically hiding it from him. He played along with it, but eventually he got a slice.”
Or take Alonzo Fields, who served as a butler under four administrations. “In White House history, the butlers are usually the ones in charge of the drinks,” Miller explains. On Harry and Bess Truman’s first night in the White House, “[They] asked for an old fashioned, and so he makes it like he had been for presidents before, right? … [But] the next morning, First Lady Truman said, ‘Fields, can you make our old fashioneds less sweet? We’re just not used to having them that way.’ He’s like, ‘All right.’ He reconfigures the recipe; the next time they have one, Bess Truman takes a sip and says, ‘These are horrible. They taste like fruit punch.’ Now, Fields has an attitude, so the [third] time they ask for an old fashioned, he just gives [them] straight bourbon and two ice cubes. And Bess Truman takes one sip, looks at him, and says, ‘Now that’s how you make an old fashioned.’”
Be they comical or horrific, frustrating or inspiring, such personal anecdotes of the Black cooks and workers who have shaped American cuisine as we know it ground all three of Miller’s books — and one can only hope, works yet to come. Asked about topics he hopes to delve into in the future, he says, “The story of [19th century] African American street vendors is a cool story to tell. They … were such pictureqesue characters,” selling everything from pepper pot in Philadelphia to the rice fritters known in New Orleans as “calas.” “In Gordonsville, Virginia, there was a whole core of Black women who were known for selling fried chicken and pancakes at the train station. There was no dining car, so these women would just walk up and down the platform with these beautiful baskets of food; passengers would pay and then just reach out of their window to get it.”
Warming to the subject, he adds, “The cool thing is that I have the sheet music [and lyrics] for their street cries, so somebody who can read sheet music can replicate what somebody in the 1800s was hearing every morning. To put it to the universe, I’m hoping I can sign up Beyoncé and her pals for a companion musical piece.”
Given Miller’s accomplishments to date, we have no doubt the universe is listening.
Pedernales River Chili provided by Adrian Miller
- 2 tablespoons oil
- 4 pounds chili meat (coarsely-ground round steak or well-trimmed chuck or substitute Jennie-O® lean ground turkey)
- 1 large onion, chopped
- 2 cloves garlic
- 2 cups hot water
- 1 1/2 cups canned whole tomatoes
- 6 teaspoons chili powder, or more, if needed
- 1 teaspoon comino seeds or cumin
- 1 teaspoon ground oregano
- 2 to 6 generous dashes liquid hot sauce
Instructions
In large, heavy pot or Dutch oven over medium high heat, heat oil. Crumble turkey into saucepan. Add onion and garlic. Cook 14 to 16 minutes, stirring occasionally. Always cook to well-done, 165°F as measured by a meat thermometer. Add remaining ingredients. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat to simmer; cook 1 hour. Serves 12.
