Vertamae cooks in the Americas' family kitchen1996

Storyteller, poet, and culinary anthropologist Vertamae Grosvenor displays the pleasures of Afro-Atlantic cooking in this soulful companion to the new PBS series The Americas' Family Kitchen. Here, as in the series, she shows how African tastes and traditions have influenced the various cuisines of America, acquiring new flavors and ingredients along the way in Central America, South America, and the Caribbean. You'll find more than a hundred mouth-watering, down-home.

Recipes, spiced with Vertamae's anecdotes, humor, and historical insights. The recipes range from the surprising to the happily familiar, from zesty Bahian shrimp creole to the simple pleasures of sweet potato pie. And everything from Hoppin' John to Sunshine Soup to Low Country Red Rice has a story.