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Recipes Resurrected : North Carolina Culinary Treasures from the Archive

Dairy farm near Asheboro, N.C., 1964

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Farm to Table: Agriculture and Piedmont Foodways
The Piedmont region of North Carolina has a rich agricultural history that has influenced its foodways through time. Situated between the western Mountain and eastern Coastal Plain regions, the Piedmont is uniquely positioned with a temperate climate, providing an environment where agriculture flourishes. Although some crops --such as cotton-- were produced for profit, others greatly influenced local and regional foodways throughout history through subsistence and industrial farming. Before European contact, Indigenous peoples, including the Occaneechi, Sappony, Catawba, and Eno, practiced hunting, gathering, and subsistence farming of staple foods. Most notably, this included farming the “Three Sisters”- corn, squash, and beans. After contact, these local foodways shifted dramatically as Europeans introduced other foods and cash crops into the region’s agriculture over time.
During the 18th and 19th centuries, Piedmont agriculture expanded and began producing many of the most notable foods North Carolinians still consume today. In this period, crops such as strawberries, potatoes, pecans, cabbage, and other vegetables began appearing in daybooks, receipts, and other manuscripts kept by families in the region. Archival material from this era also includes receipts for and recipes using chicken, pork, beef, and dairy products (Montford McGehee Papers #01125). Residents, namely women, also included these ingredients in cookbooks, newspaper columns, and recipe scrapbooks. Evidence of women's importance in recipe development can be seen in various community cookbooks, such as Calico Cupboard and Soup to Nuts, where recipes are often credited to women under their husband's title, as well as archival manuscripts from the 19th and 20th centuries. For example, in the Montford McGehee Papers (#01125) manuscript recipe books are explicitly attributed to the family's women, as in the "Recipe book of Annie Skinner."

Enslaved Black people forcibly completed most large-scale agriculture in this period at plantations across central North Carolina. Most notably, the Bennehan-Cameron family owned upwards of 30,000 acres of land in the region and forcibly enslaved over 900 people at a given time, many of whom engaged in agricultural labor (Cameron Family Papers #00133). While enslaved people completed this labor, they also heavily influenced regional foodways, which was often an act of resistance itself. Enslavers used food as a tool of control, often limiting the types of ingredients offered to enslaved people, so by blending traditional African cuisines with crops farmed in the United States, communities resisted dietary control (Regelski). Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, enslaved people "developed a uniquely African American culture, presence and influence on the South, strongly preserved by today’s Southern cuisine" (Regelski). Fundamental North Carolina foods including pork barbecue, greens, and cornbread, to name only a few, are traditions directly sourced from enslaved Black people in the state and the broader South. Ultimately, Central North Carolina's agricultural history cannot be separated from its reliance on enslaved labor.
As the industrialization of the South, and the Piedmont more specifically, continued, the availability of commerical foods diversified the region's food sources. In the 20th century, branded ingredients such as Bisquick and Lipton's Onion Soup Mix, for example, began appearing in community cookbooks developed by churches, women's clubs, and other organizations (Calico Cupboard, 5, 33). Featured below is a recipe from Calico Cupboard, developed by Burkhead United Methodist Church in Winston-Salem, that highlights the use of branded products like Bisquick.
Sausage Balls - Calico Cupboard, 1974 - Mrs. Thomas S. Irwin (Janie)

1 lb. sausage
10 oz. cheese (grated)
3 c. Bisquick

Mix all together at room temperature. Pinch into small balls (1 teaspoon). Bake 10 to 15 minutes at 375°. Freeze. To reheat, remove from freezer at bake at 300° for 10 minutes.
These new inclusions largely resulted from a more diversified economy, which allowed these branded items to be produced elsewhere and shipped to local stores. Additionally, the nation at large experienced an increased desire for convenience items, such as condensed soups and boxed cake mixes, as more women began working outside of the home. While those phenomena are not necessarily unique to the Piedmont, they greatly impacted the region's foodways. Despite these changes, local agriculture remained an important part of the regional diet, with dairy, meat, and vegetables from industrial farms maintaining particular prominence.
Agriculture remains a significant cultural and economic driver in central North Carolina. Across the region, the remnants of historic farms are interspersed with modern industrial farms producing a variety of niche crops such as grapes for craft wineries or pumpkins for festivals, as well as key food sources like corn, wheat, and soybeans. Additionally, local farmers' markets and farm-to-table restaurants intentionally promote locally produced foods that eventually make their way to tables across the region. Even as modern conveniences intertwine with traditions, local Piedmont foodways persist within homes and organizations such as Piedmont Grown and the Piedmont Triad Regional Food Council. These organizations and others like them work with North Carolinians to highlight the importance of local agriculture on what we eat and how we eat it.
References and Further Reading:
Calico Cupboard. Burkhead United Methodist Church, 1974, https://archive.org/details/calicocupboard00unse.
Cameron Family Papers #00133, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Special Collections Library, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Cathey, C. (1956). Agricultural Developments in North Carolina, 1783-1860. The University of North Carolina Press.
Egerton J., Egerton A. B., & Clayton A. (1987). Southern Food: At Home, on the Road, in History. 1st ed., University of North Carolina Press.
Montford McGehee Papers #01125, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Special Collections Library, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Piedmont Grown, 1 Mar. 2024, https://www.piedmontgrown.org/.
“Piedmont Triad Regional Food Council.” Piedmont Triad Regional Council, https://www.ptrc.org/services/regional-planning/food-council.
Regelski, C. “The Soul of Food: Slavery’s Influence on Southern Cuisine.” U.S. History Scene, https://ushistoryscene.com/article/slavery-southern-cuisine/.
Soup to Nuts: A Cook Book of Recipes Contributed by Housewives and Husbands of Alamance County and other Sections of State and Country. The Woman's Auxiliary of The Church of the Holy Comforter, 1900, https://archive.org/details/souptonutscookbo00unse.
Twitty, M. (2017). The Cooking Gene: A Journey Through African American Culinary History in the Old South. Amistad Press.