The Cooking Gene

Rentals

For African American culinary historian Michael W. Twitty there was a giant hole in the story of American cooking as big as the one in the story of most African American families. Putting the microscope on himself, Michael decided to fully trace his family history through the story of Southern and American food. Using genetic research, historical interpretation, nature study, heirloom gardening, and interviews with contemporary voices in food, his journey led him back to his family’s origins in West and Central Africa and a front-row seat in the debate over race and food in American life.

Michael W. Twitty is a culinary historian and food writer, of African American and Jewish descent, who blogs at Afroculinaria.com. He’s appeared on Bizarre Foods America with Andrew Zimmern, Many Rivers to Cross with Henry Louis Gates, and most recently Taste the Nation with Top Chef’s Padma Lakshmi. HarperCollins released Twitty’s The Cooking Gene, in 2017, tracing his ancestry through food from Africa to America and from slavery to freedom, a finalist for The Kirkus Prize and The Art of Eating Prize and a 3rd place winner of Barnes & Noble’s Discover New Writer’s Awards in Nonfiction.

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