List of soul foods and dishes facts for kids

This is a list of soul foods and dishes. Soul food is a style of cuisine that is associated with African Americans in the Southern United States It uses a variety of ingredients and cooking styles, many of which came from Europe, and some that came from Africa and were brought over by enslaved Africans. Some are indigenous to the Americas as well, borrowed from Native American cuisine.

Meat dishes

Some meat soul foods and dishes include:

Name	Image	Description
Fatback		Fatty, cured, salted pork, especially the first layers of the back of the pig primarily used in slow-cooking as a seasoning. Pictured is breaded and fried fatback.
Fried chicken		A dish consisting of chicken pieces usually from broiler chickens that have been floured or battered and then pan-fried, deep fried, or pressure fried. The seasoned breading adds a crisp coating or crust to the exterior. Southern fried chicken derives from Scottish American cuisine. Chicken and waffles, in particular, is a soul food dish associated with special occasions.
Fried fish		Any of several varieties of fish, including catfish, whiting, porgies, bluegill, sometimes battered in seasoned cornmeal. Adapted from method of frying chicken.
Ham hocks		Typically smoked or boiled, ham hocks generally consist of much skin, tendons and ligaments, and require long cooking through stewing, smoking or braising to be made palatable. The cut of meat can be cooked with greens and other vegetables or in flavorful sauces.
Hog jowl		Cured and smoked cheeks of pork. It is not actually a form of bacon, but is associated with the cut due to the streaky nature of the meat and the similar flavor. Hog jowl is a staple of soul food, but is also used outside the United States, for example in the Italian dish guanciale.
Hog maw		The stomach lining of a pig; it is very muscular and contains no fat. As a soul food dish, hog maw has often been coupled with chitterlings, which are pig intestines. In the book Plantation Row Slave Cabin Cooking: The Roots of Soul Food hog maw is used in the Hog Maw Salad recipe.
Offal		Such as chitterlings or "chitlins" (the cleaned and prepared intestines of pigs, slow cooked and also often eaten with a vinegar-based sauce or sometimes parboiled, then battered and fried). It is adapted from early European cuisine, or hog maws (the muscular lining of the pig's stomach, sliced and often cooked with chitterlings).
Ox tails		The tail of cattle, oxtail is a bony, gelatin-rich meat, which is usually slow-cooked as a stew or braised.
Pickled pigs' feet		Slow cooked, sometimes pickled or often eaten with a vinegar based sauce.
Pigs' feet		The feet of pigs: the cuts are used in various dishes around the world, and their usage has increased in popularity since the late-2000s financial crisis.
Pork		As a meat dish, such as ham and bacon, and for the flavoring of vegetables and legumes, gravys and sauces.
Pork ribs		The ribcage of a domestic pig, meat and bones together, is cut into usable pieces, prepared by smoking, grilling, or baking – usually with a sauce, often barbecue – and then served. The method of barbecuing is of Native American influence.
Poultry		Giblets, such as chicken liver and gizzards. Pictured is a chicken gizzard dish.
Turkey		Neck bones

Vegetables and legumes

Beans, greens and other vegetables are often cooked with ham or pork parts to add flavor.

Name	Image	Description
Black-eyed peas		Often mixed into Hoppin' John or as a side dish. Pictured are black-eyed peas with smoked hocks and corn bread.
Collard greens		A staple vegetable of Southern U.S. cuisine, they are often prepared with other similar green leaf vegetables, such as kale, turnip greens, spinach, and mustard greens in "mixed greens". They are generally eaten year-round in the South, often with a pickled pepper vinegar sauce. Typical seasonings when cooking collards can consist of smoked and salted meats (ham hocks, smoked turkey drumsticks, pork neckbones, fatback or other fatty meat), diced onions and seasonings.
Hoppin' John		A dish traditional to the Low country region of South Carolina consisting of black-eyed peas (or field peas) and rice, with chopped onion and sliced bacon, seasoned with a bit of salt. Some people substitute ham hock, fatback, or country sausage for the conventional bacon; a few use green peppers or vinegar and spices. This dish originated in the South Carolina Low Country but is now popular in many areas of the south.
Mustard greens		A species of mustard plant. Subvarieties include southern giant curled mustard, which resembles a headless cabbage such as kale, but with a distinct horseradish-mustard flavor. It is also known as green mustard cabbage.
Okra		A vegetable that is native to West Africa, and is eaten fried or stewed and is a traditional ingredient of gumbo. It is sometimes cooked with tomatoes, corn, onions and hot peppers
Sweet potatoes		Often parboiled, sliced, then adorned with butter, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, vanilla or other spices, and baked; commonly called "candied sweets" or "candied yams"
Turnip greens		Turnip leaves are sometimes eaten as "turnip greens", and they resemble mustard greens in flavor. Turnip greens are a common side dish in southeastern US cooking, primarily during late fall and winter. Smaller leaves are preferred; however, any bitter taste of larger leaves can be reduced by pouring off the water from initial boiling and replacing it with fresh water. Varieties specifically grown for the leaves resemble mustard greens more than those grown for the roots, with small or no storage roots.

Breads and grains

Name	Image	Description
Cornbread		A quickbread often baked or made in a skillet, commonly made with buttermilk and seasoned with bacon fat; inspired by the great availability of corn in America. Cornbread is of Native American origin. Traditional southern cornbread is baked in European cake and bread baking style. Pictured is skillet cornbread.
Grits		A cooked coarsely ground cornmeal of Native American origin.
Hoecake		Also known as Johnnycake, a type of cornbread that is thin in texture, and fried in cooking oil in a skillet, whose name is derived from field hands' often cooking it on a shovel or hoe held to an open flame.
Hushpuppies		Balls of deep-fried cornmeal, usually with salt and diced onions. Typical hushpuppy ingredients include cornmeal, wheat flour, eggs, salt, baking soda, milk or buttermilk, and water, and may include onion, spring onion (scallion), garlic, whole kernel corn, and peppers.

Desserts

Name	Image	Description
Sweet potato pie		Parboiled sweet potatoes, then pureed, spiced, and baked in a pie crust, similar in texture to pumpkin pie