Coming to America

During the slave trade, slaves were taken mostly from West Africa and the coast. According to Jessica Harris, “Peculiar as it may sound, slave traders really understood African cultures – especially West African. If you read slave ship logs, you realize the captains knew that people from one region of Africa ate yams and would not eat rice and so, in their own self-interest, they brought on board foods the slaves would eat. The healthier a slave looked at auction, the higher the price he or she could garner” (Wolf). Slaves were also given an occasional piece of fruit. In an attempt to fill their stomachs, a “slabber” sauce made from old beef, rotten fish and salt was poured over rice and beans. Another story is of Africans hiding seeds (watermelon, okra, and sesame) in their ears, clothes and hair. Although this could be true, the former is more likely (A History of Soul Food).

The last remnant of home on this treacherous journey was the meals they received from their captors. Alexander Falconbridge, and English doctor who made several voyages on board slave ships, describes a typical meal in his 1788 narrative Account of the Slave Trade on the Coast of Africa: The diet of the Negroes while on board, consists chiefly of horsebeans [fava beans] boiled to the consistence of a pulp; boiled yams and rice and sometimes a small quantity of beef and pork. They [(the sailors] sometime make use of a sauce composed of palm-oil mixed with flour, water and red peppers, which the sailors call slabber-sauce. Yams are the favorite food of the Eboe or Bight Negroes, and rice or corn of those from the Gold and Windward Coasts; each preferring the produce of their native soil (Stow and Baldwin).

Foods that were brought over to the New World due to the slave trade would forever become linked to the enslavement of Africans. “For example, slaves ate yams, peanuts, corn, and rice during the middle passage (see figure 1). Citrus fruits, like limes and lemons, hot malegueta peppers, herbs, and spices were provisioned during the middle passage for medicinal purposes. West African or Gold Coast slaves, who had centuries of experience, cultivated rice in the lowlands of South Carolina and Georgia. Sugar cane traveled the circuitous route North Africa to Spain, Portugal, Madeira, the Canary Islands, Santo Domingo, and finally to Louisiana in 1751” by way of Columbus (United States: African American Foodways).


Figure 1

http://www.waywelivednc.com/maps/historical/middle-passage.htm