Beef

Only a handful of distinguished beef dishes come from southern kitchens. Judging from the elevation of many more humble food items, one can assume that this was the result of despair at the quality of the meat rather than of any lack of skill on the cook’s part. A general neglect of cattle husbandry is described in the National Register of 27 July 1816 in a “Topographical and Historical Description of the County of Brunswick, in North Carolina”: “Cattle and hogs run wild in the woods, the former are supported in the summer by wild grass, and in the winter by cane rods in swamps…. Neither of them ever consume the hay or corn of a farm, until they are intended to be butchered, and then a small quantity of corn or potatoes are given to the hogs.”