Victuals: An Appalachian Journey, with Recipes

While reading “VICTUALS: An Appalachian Journey, with Recipes”, I was humming, tapping my feet, grinning, and “itchin’ to get to the kitchen”. Author Ronni Lundy and photographer Johnny Autry have wonderfully captured the essence and timelessness of the Appalachian region of America and the amazing spirit of its people. I was born and raised in the beautiful mountains of Virginia, where I still reside. This is the land of my mother and her family. My father and his family were from the hills of East Tennessee. I laughingly and proudly call myself a “Mountain-Billy”. I have many friends and acquaintances from the proud state of Kentucky, and I long ago embraced, and was embraced in return, by the people of the marvelous show more mountain state of West Virginia. “VICTUALS” (the term is also plainly called “vittles”) offers an inside look at an area of our country which is frequently stereotyped. It’s a way of life where great poverty often exists alongside great pride. Traditions that will never die out are buffeted by the encroachments of modern society. Appalachia is a country within a country where a violin became a fiddle, and the music and dance of Scottish-Irish heritage became known as “Blue Grass”. It’s where you fix up a “mess of kress”, make apple butter outdoors in a big copper kettle over a wood fire, and you cook a pot of beans or a pan of greens with a ham hock or a hunk of fatback or side meat. You make perfectly delicious and golden-crusted cornbread in a well-seasoned and blackened old cast iron skillet, and you wait, impatiently for hand-cranked vanilla ice cream served with fresh peaches or strawberries. Author Ronni Lundy and photographer bring to vivid life the fine food and fine folks of the Appalachias. This is a journey you don’t want to miss. Along the way, enjoy these scrumptious vittles: “Karl Worley’s Roasted Chicken & Dumplings”; “Mama’s Mashed Potatoes”; “Killed Lettuce”; “Country Ham, Ramps, and Taters”; “Old-Style Vanilla Ice Cream”; “Real Cornbread”; “Buttermilk Brown Sugar Pie”; “Mountain Green Beans & Taters”; “Pork & Kraut in Cider Gravy with Noodles”; “Old-School Tomato Gravy”; and many, many more equally memorable recipes. Born in Corbin, Kentucky, RONNI LUNDY has long chronicled the people of the hillbilly diaspora as a journalist and cookbook author. She is the former restaurant reviewer and music critic for The Courier-Journal in Louisville, former editor of Louisville Magazine, and has contributed to many national magazines. Her book Shuck Beans, Stack Cakes and Honest Fried Chicken was recognized by Gourmet magazine as one of six essential books on Southern cooking. In 2009, Lundy received the Southern Foodways Alliance Craig Claiborne Lifetime Achievement Award. She has contributed to Eating Well, Gourmet, Bon Appétit, Esquire, and other magazines.

Book Copy Gratis Clarkson Potter Publishers via Blogging for Books show less

After spending some time in WNC over the last year or so, falling in love with the area, and now blessed to have found family there, I’ve become interested in all things Appalachia.

I’m doing my own version of the personal curriculum trend this year, but with yearlong learning quests around three topics. One of them is Appalachian cooking and so, I picked up a copy of this and read it cover to cover, soaking it in, the day it arrived.

This book is a love letter to rural Appalachian life by an author with close, lifelong ties. It does have recipes, yes, but also there’s context and history around the dish and some lush photography, too. These are simple foods, made with love, and there’s a reverence and appreciation for them that show more shines through well beyond the recipe itself. There are also essays, remembrances really, of the author’s upbringing and kinship to those that call the mountains home.

I’ve marked the recipes I’ll be tackling this year on a monthly basis. I don’t live near Appalachia and maybe never will, but it’s my way of loving and honoring the people and places from afar. Homecoming and connection through food - isn’t that how it is, really?

Highly recommended if you love Americana, are drawn to regional cooking/recipes, or have any attachment or kinship - literal or figurative - with Appalachia and its residents. show less

As I said in another review, I love the word Victuals and the cover of this book made me need to buy it, read it, and find the recipe. I was not disappointed. I never bore of the stories of Appalachian people and their life and love of community and food. This will remain one of my favorite cookbooks.

Very pretty book.. Recipes that use simple ingredients. Seemed like many more photos of Appalachia and ingredients than finished food, so if you like a recipe that includes photos for each dish, this one might not be for you. However, there are a TON of recipes, so there's a lot of substance. It's on my wishlist.