The cuisine of the Southern United States is defined as the historical regional culinary form of states generally south of the Mason Dixon Line dividing Pennsylvania from Maryland and Delaware as well as along the Ohio River, and extending west to southern Missouri, Oklahoma and Texas.
The most notable influences come from English, Scottish, Irish, German, French, Native American, and African American cuisines. Tidewater, Appalachian, Cajun, Creole, Lowcountry, and Floribbean are examples of types Southern cuisine. In recent history, elements of Southern cuisine have spread north, having an effect on the development of other types of American cuisine.
Many items such as squash, tomatoes, corn (and its derivatives, including grits), as well as the practice of deep pit barbecuing were inherited from the southeastern American Indian tribes such as the Caddo, Choctaw, and Seminole. Many foods associated with sugar, flour, milk, eggs (many kinds of baking or dairy products such as breads and cheeses) are more associated with Europe.
The South's propensity for a full breakfast (as opposed to a Continental one with a simple bread item and drink) is derived from the English fry up, although it was altered substantially. Much of Cajun or Creole cuisine is based on France, and on Spain to a lesser extent. Floribbean is more Spanish-based with obvious Caribbean influences, while Tex-Mex has considerable Mexican and Native American influences.
Read more about Cuisine Of The Southern United States: Traditional Southern Dishes, Southern Cuisine For The Masses, Southern Cuisine By Region
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“Thank God for the passing of the discomforts and vile cuisine of the age of chivalry!”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
“And hereby hangs a moral highly applicable to our own trustee-ridden universities, if to nothing else. If we really wanted liberty of speech and thought, we could probably get it—Spain fifty years ago certainly had a longer tradition of despotism than has the United States—but do we want it? In these years we will see.”
—John Dos Passos (1896–1970)
“Thank God for the passing of the discomforts and vile cuisine of the age of chivalry!”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
“Thank God for the passing of the discomforts and vile cuisine of the age of chivalry!”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
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—Billie Holiday [Eleanor Fagan] (1915–1959)
“The parallel between antifeminism and race prejudice is striking. The same underlying motives appear to be at work, namely fear, jealousy, feelings of insecurity, fear of economic competition, guilt feelings, and the like. Many of the leaders of the feminist movement in the nineteenth-century United States clearly understood the similarity of the motives at work in antifeminism and race discrimination and associated themselves with the anti slavery movement.”
—Ashley Montagu (b. 1905)
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—Rhonda Cornum, United States Army Major. As quoted in Newsweek magazine, “Perspectives” page (July 13, 1992)