Melissa Vance-Assignment 5

Final Character

Note: I was trying to use illustrator which I am very unfamiliar with. It was an interesting attempt.

First Try

Research, listed under works cited

Works Cited

Lastname, Firstname. Title of Book. City of Publication: Publisher, Year of Publication. Medium of Publication.

Kemble, Edward Windsor. Until dinner began to come in across the yard',

slaves carry a prepared meal from a cookhouse to a plantation mansion. 1886. Engraving. Private Collection.

Prewitt, Milford C. Changing the Culinary Landscape. New York. American Visions,

1994. Print.

Barton, Keith C. Good Cooks and Washers: Slave hiring, domestic labor, and the

market in bourbon county, Kentucky. Journal of American History. 1997. Print.

Covey, Herbert C. What the Slaves Ate: Recollections of African American Foods and Foodways From the Slave Narratives. Santa Barbara, Calif: Greenwood Press, 2009. Print.

What the slaves ate paraphrasing:

Slaves ate together, one cook special for them with 2 or 3 women to help and a man who was the actual cook. One woman was there (called “mammy”) her job was to feed all the children, the man was to feed all the workers throughout the day.

Slave cooks had high value on plantation. Showed high social status on the plantation owner. Cooks usually well treated, but under pressure and sometimes abused. Female cooks were the most valued slaves, often were within close proximity to their white owners.

Role of cook in big house usually done by older women. Viewed as “nonthreatening”.  Old people also took care of the slave children. Any mistakes (such as burning bread) were punishable by extremely violent abuse.

Changing the Culinary Landscape Paraphrasing:

Story about Hemings, the first African-American chef. Used cooking to get his freedom. Owned by Thomas Jefferson who sent him to paris for 4 years to learn to cook classic French culinary skills. Came back and worked for Jefferson until earning his freedom.

Interesting (disturbing) Fact:

While cooks in “the big house” were usually treated better than the regular slaves, making a mistake (even something as small as burning bread) was punishable. In one story, a pregnant woman who was the main house chef was taken out to the barn, stripped naked, and whipped with a spurred whip all over her body.