Treme Culinary Online Exhibit, Coming Soon!

On cold Chicago winter nights, where I am originally from, former New Orleanians in my Southside neighborhood would cook up a pot of gumbo and talk about days gone by in their native land and complain about the quality of seafood in Chicago. To make gumbo, with all its ingredients was hard in itself, coming from a red meat packing industrialized city as Chicago. New Orleanians could only find a fishery way out in the boondocks where they had to buy overpriced, unsatisfying seafood and frozen andouille sausage. But what were their options?, not much. For us Chicagoans, especially those of us who grew up around New Orleanians who fled Storyville and then later Katrina, frozen gumbo in a bag was a treat but to them it was a saddening reality that they were far away from home. We would watch them with envy, wishing that they would take us into their kitchens to teach us their Creole & Cajun food majic while we smelled their warm spicy food as it traveled from door to door.

Some time later, I was accepted as a 3 month intern at the Southern Food & Beverage Museum where I am currently interning while I pursue my Master's degree in Museum Studies at the University of Toronto. I jumped at the offer. So when the director, Liz Williams, gave me one of my first assignments; to help collect and plan an online exhibit of the culinary memories and traditions of the Treme neighborhood, I was thrilled to be able to work with a community that embodies so much history and culinary feats and probably have family in my Southside Chicago neighborhood.

So far, I have reached out to various members of the Treme community but I am hoping that as many as possible communicate with me so I can make sure that their culinary memories become part of what I know will be an amazing online exhibit to celebrate the culinary history of Treme. We do have some previous research done by Bethany Bultman where she researched and interviewed Italians and African-American former residents of Treme. However, we still need more to contribute. So, if you are a former resident or resident of Treme and have any culinary memories, family recipes, and/or would like to be recorded please contact me. Also, if you are a scholar or writer on Treme your participation in this project would be greatly appreciated.

*Tremé is one of the oldest neighborhoods in New Orleans. It was a Mecca for free people of color, Creoles, African-Americans, Sicilians, Caribbeans and Caucasians. It is also the home of the historical Congo Square, Storyville red-light district and Jazz. For more information on the history and culture of the Treme neighborhood, watch a film documentary called Fauborg Tremé: The Untold Story of Black New Orleans which was produced by Dawn Logsdon & Lolis Elie and look for an upcoming HBO series called Treme which will be based on Post-Katrina and the residents who live there.

Spinning Top or Gyroscope?

Now that we are open, opportunity keeps knocking - a collaboration in Medellin, Colombia, podcasting, new exhibits - while we have to keep operating. This is exciting, but crazy-making. I am trying to decide whether we are a spinning top: something that is kept in balance by outside forces caused by the spinning or whether we are a gyroscope: something that is in intrinsic balance despite outside forces. The jury is still out.

Yet, despite this feeling of controlled chaos, (or perhaps because of it, I admit), the future seems very bright. We have assembled a remarkable staff, both paid and volunteer. We have the support and interest of a terrific board. We are deepening the exhibits and planning for very strong future exhibits. Our library continues to grow. Our partnerships with l'Institut du Gout and other institutions are expanding. Our work with children is also growing.

I look at it all in wonder. It must be a gyroscope that is at the center of all of this activity. It will keep our activities balanced as we go forward.

This and That

Last night we had a very interesting program presented by Walter Wolf - thanks, Walter - which was attended by people interested in opening a food based business in New Orleans. It was very heartening to see people who are interested in taking the plunge and start a new business in the city.

I am also excited about the success of the Invitation to the Southern Table events. We have events coming up in Memphis and in Lafayette. More are in the works.

We have a summer camp called "Eating in New Orleans - Who I Am" starting in August. This camp will combine art projects and culinary projects, teaching the art of dining and good nutrition.

We are planning a great event with the French Cultural Attache in New Orleans, our newsletter is being received by an ever-expanding list of people, our library, our artifact collection, archives and menus are growing. We are just riding a rocket, and it is a great experience, establishing this new institution in a city that is emerging from its disaster.

Thanks to everyone who is part of this. And here is a way to celebrate. If you make a show of preparing this, it is even more festive. Ladling flaming coffee into cups is very dramatic. Enjoy.

Café Brûlot

Serves 8

8 sugar cubes
peel of one orange, without pith
peel of ½ lemon, without pith
1 small stick cinnamon
½ tsp. whole cloves
½ cup brandy or bourbon
3 cups hot, freshly brewed dark roast coffee (with chicory if possible)

Rub the sugar cubes with the orange and lemon rinds. Place a sugar cube in each of 8 demitasse cups. Heat the cinnamon stick, orange and lemon rinds, cloves and brandy together in a chafing dish. Flame the mixture. Carefully add the hot coffee. Stir. Ladle the mixture into the prepared demitasse cups.

Salting the Region

Our first goal in establishing this new museum was to become established. By that I mean that we wanted people to know who we are and what we do. So we held exhibits in borrowed spaces, we created a website, we began an ambitious project to collect menus from all over the South. We let folks know about our doings and we became "established." But we knew that we would eventually need a bricks and mortar home. Finding that became our second goal.

Now that we have found that place, although we are not occupying it yet, it is time to make sure that the entire region - the South - is not only aware of us, but knows that we represent them. To this end we have embarked on a series of parties, Invitations to the Southern Table, which will take us to cities and towns throughout the South. This week-end we are driving to Memphis. Besides trying to set up an "Invitation" event, we are planning to meet with people and learn about the region and find our how to best represent Memphis in the museum.

Elizabeth Pearce, the Senior Curator, and I will be taking a classic road trip. I am looking forward to road food, barbeque and Southern hospitality. I'll let you know how it went and who we visited.