The Guardian: Whites Stole Barbecue from Native Americans and Africans

The Social Memo ^ | 7/4/15 | Aurelius

[rightistight]

To celebrate July 4, the Guardian published an article to tell the people of America that one of their favorite ways of cooking, barbecue, was stolen from enslaved Africans and Native Americans.

The article is titled, "Barbecue is an American tradition – of enslaved Africans and Native Americans" and was written by Michael Twitty, who calls himself a culinary historian.

"The traditional holiday cookout has its roots in the cooperation between black and indigenous peoples struggling to get or keep their freedom from colonialists," Twitty's secondary headline reads.

"If America is about people creating new worlds based on rebellion against oppression and slavery," he writes, "then barbecue is the ideal dish: it was made by enslaved Africans with inspiration and contributions from Native Americans struggling to maintain their independence."

However, according to Twitty, Europeans took the credit from Africans: "The common cultural narrative of barbecue, however, exclusively assigns its origins to Native Americans and Europeans... Some American barbecue masters have taken to attributing the innovation of barbecue to their German and Czech ancestors."

The truth is, however, "Enslaved Africans and Native Americans had a lot in common, culinarily-speaking: they had been cooking and eating in similar ways. despite [sic] an ocean between their civilizations. It only makes sense that, when their foodways, crops, cooking methods and systems of preservation, hunting, fishing and food storage collided, that there would be deep similarities and convergences of technique, method and skill."

That led to barbecue. And in the Americans, "enslaved men became barbecue’s master chefs." If indeed whites added anything to barbecue, they just "added to a base created by black hands forged in the crucible of slavery."

Twitty concludes, "Barbecue is laced with the aspiration of freedom, but it was seasoned and flavored by the people who could not enjoy any freedom on Independence Day for almost a century."

[ThomasThomas]

Isn’t the Guardian an British newspaper? Other than english muffins what have they given to the culinary world?

Black Pudding
Haggis
Jellied Eels
Mushy Peas
Stargazey Pie
Spotted Dick

I didn’t bother to read the complete article before I posted and I don’t plan to read it afterward. So I don’t know if they even got barbecue right. It isn’t a sauce you put on grilled meat. But I can see why a British paper would look to other cultures for food,

[Darksheare]

Memory says “yup!”

[Still Thinking]

Spotted Dick

I believe there's a cure for that now.

[ealgeone]

Some real inferiority complex issues being revealed in this article.

[Texas resident]

Well, ok I stole it.
At this point, what difference does it make?

Besides, I make a brisket better than anyone.

so sue me.

[AEMILIUS PAULUS]

He may have been “nasty” but most of the modern world is based upon Edison inventions. Granted Tesla opted for the right current. To deny Edison’s accomplishments is folly.

[Hulka]

“Ergo, the first pitmasters were probably women”

But they did it wrong and men took over. . .and women let them just so they would get out of the kitchen and belch and fart with their friends outside.

[Oztrich Boy]

Actually, for extensive research (I checked Wiki), barabicu was observed by the Spanish, in the Caribbean c.1500. A time when Africans were still eating animals raw in Africa - possibly.

[xzins]

See post #16

[Oztrich Boy]

[Oztrich Boy]

How do you hold a gypsy barbecue?

First, steal the barbeque

[Oztrich Boy]

The Spanish introduced pigs to barbecue,

It Galls me to hear you say that.