By Aaron Hutcherson, The New York Times, October 26, 2021
An award-winning author who has been writing plant-based cookbooks for the better part of two decades, Bryant Terry calls his latest project, “Black Food,” “a communal shrine to the shared culinary histories of the African diaspora.” He writes in the introduction: "These pages offer up gratitude to the great chain of Black lives, and to all the sustaining ingredients and nourishing traditions they carried and remembered, through time and space, to deliver their kin into the future. We pray that this collection facilitates reflection on and veneration of our sacred foodways.” The anthology includes essays, poems, recipes and more from more than 100 contributors from around the world, including the likes of Gabrielle E.W. Carter, Stephen Satterfield, Paola Velez, Zoe Adjonyoh and Leah Penniman. (Wanting the contributors to share what’s authentic to them, some of the recipes include animal products, contrary to Terry’s culinary philosophy.) I chatted with Terry to discuss his new publishing imprint with Ten Speed Press, 4 Color Books, his latest book and why it’s also his last, what music he’s listening to and more.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
How did the imprint come about?
An imprint had always been something that I imagined running, but it was always just so far off. It was really a sense of urgency that I felt in 2020 — post Breonna Taylor and George Floyd’s murderers and the uprisings, and then the revelation about racism within a lot of media, specifically food media — to use my power, platform, social capital and decades of experience in the publishing world to make a difference. We are very clear that we want to support those voices that have been traditionally erased, marginalized or just unsupported.
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