Bound to the Fire: How Virginia's Enslaved Cooks Helped Invent American Cuisine

Many of the foods, oyster stew, gumbo, finely fried fish, that are taken for granted as being part of an elevated American cuisine, came from slaves. Deetz’s intensive research methods involved delving into historical and archaeological records. She sheds light on how the concept of southern hospitality was dependent on the cooking ingenuity and finesse of enslaved cooks.