I would agree wholeheartedly with the posting by Tom (Eastern Shore)--the flood of postings about food, cooking, memories, and culture has been fascinating. We are what we eat, in more ways than one. The history of food is a burgeoning specialty. Look at the two fat volumes of the recent Cambridge World History of Food if you want confirmation of that. I don't know whether any of the recent postings has mentioned "chitlins" (I confess I haven't read every word of every posting). I do recall some discussion of using every part of a pig. Chitlins are made with the pig's intestines. I found in the court records of Accomack County what may be the first documentary evidence that they were, in fact, consumed by Virginians of African (and mixed) descent, if not by other Virginians at the time (1679). A grandson of Anthony and Mary Johnson--Richard Johnson Jr.--was working as a hired laborer on a plantation at Matomkin along with a few English servants. They were busy slaughtering and dressing some hogs for their employer. When the Englishmen were about to dispose of the hogs' guts "a good way from the house for fears of stinking," Richard interjected, "I wish I had the... hoggs guts at home, the fatt and offil would serve me to frey with homine all the winter." (You never know what you'll find in county court records....) Anyway, food is a very important "marker" of culture and object of memory, individual and collective. Doug Deal To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html