You have to wonder what Tate Reeves would have done if he had known what his first few months in office would be like.
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Marshall Ramsey: Tate’s Day
COVID-19 data
Click on the above links or scroll down to view our interactive charts describing the trends around the coronavirus in Mississippi.
View our COVID-19 resource page for more information about coronavirus in Mississippi.
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Hosemann says session to resume on May 18, business as usual plus pandemic response
Eric J. Shelton/Mississippi Today, Report For America
Delbert Hosemann during the opening day of the legislative session in the Mississippi House chambers at the Capitol in Jackson, Miss., Tuesday, January, 2020.
Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann said he hopes it is “business as usual as much as possible” when the Legislature returns on May 18 from its coronavirus-induced recess.
Both Hosemann, who presides over the Senate, and House Speaker Philip Gunn announced the return date in simultaneous news releases Monday.
As the releases were sent out, Hosemann, in his first year as lieutenant governor, was speaking during a virtual meeting of the Mississippi State University Stennis Institute of Government/capitol press corps. He said the plans are to take up most of the legislation that was pending when the recess occurred in mid-March and then take up the overall state budget in June.
Hosemann also said he hopes to pass a teacher pay raise when the session resumes as well as increase funding for early childhood education.
Referring to the teacher pay raise and early childhood education, he said, “The things we need to do are generational. Hopefully this pandemic is temporary.”
Early in session, the Senate passed essentially a $1,000 per year pay raise that will cost about $75 million annually. It is pending before the House.
“I believe we passed a bill and we need to go forward with it,” Hosemann said.
While Hosemann stressed the importance of passing the pay raise, he also conceded that passing an overall state budget for the coming fiscal year, beginning July 1, might be difficult. State revenue collections are expected to drop significantly during the coming months because of the dramatic economic slowdown associated with COVID-19. He said he and Gunn had been in communications with state agency heads asking them to look for ways to save funds during the final months of the current fiscal year to help alleviate some of the demands on the upcoming budget year.
While Hosemann said the plans are to resume the session where it ended in early March with business as usual, he conceded that some bills that normally would have passed might be sacrificed because of the focus that the Legislature might need to place on the pandemic.
For instance, he said leaders are exploring the possibility of purchasing for emergency situations a supply of medical masks, gowns and other items that have been in short supply at times during efforts to combat the pandemic.
And, he said there will be a focus on voting that was not present before the recess. He said laws might need to be amended to ensure the safety of people going to polls to vote if the coronavirus is still a factor during the general election in November.
“We need to pray it does not come back but prepare in case it does,” he said.
Hosemann said Senate Elections Chair Jennifer Branning, R-Philadelphia, and Sen. David Blount, D-Jackson, have been looking at elections laws. Blount has a background in voting issues. Hosemann did not commit as to what changes might need to be made, but said everything from expanding early voting in case of emergencies to providing more protection at the polls will be considered.
“We want every (eligible person) to vote and we want them to be in a safe environment to do that,” he said.
Mississippi is one of a handful of states (less than 10) that do not have “no excuse” early voting or have not taken up measures to help ensure the safety of voters in November
Hosemann said consideration also is being given to what safety measures will need to be in place in the Mississippi Capitol when the session resumes. Hosemann said the press will be allowed in the building to cover the session, but indicated that access might be limited to some groups to deal with the need to continue social distancing.
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Inside Gov. Tate Reeves’ struggle to weigh health data versus politics in crucial coronavirus decision
Eric J. Shelton/Mississippi Today, Report For America
Gov. Tate Reeves and Mississippi State Health Officer Dr. Thomas Dobbs speak to the media about the coronavirus during a press conference at the Governor’s Mansion in Jackson, Miss., Thursday, March 26, 2020.
Deborah Birx, the White House Coronavirus Task Force coordinator, listened during a phone call Friday morning as Mississippi Health Officer Thomas Dobbs walked her through the details he and Gov. Tate Reeves planned to announce later that day that would relax parts of Mississippi’s previous statewide shelter-in-place order.
Birx, who has been in close contact with Mississippi officials, expressed support for the plan and optimism about the state’s pandemic outlook, according to a source with direct knowledge of the call.
A few hours later, as hundreds of thousands of Mississippians watched and listened live, Reeves announced he would allow most retail businesses in the state to reopen, but not close-contact establishments such as hair and nail salons, barbershops, spas, gyms, casinos and entertainment venues.
“This weighs very, very heavily on me,” Reeves told Mississippi Today in a phone interview on Thursday, the day before he announced his new order. “We’re doing this methodically and cautiously. Obviously the health and safety of Mississippians is my top priority, but part of that conversation has to be about whether to reopen the economy. It’s a difficult balance to strike.”
In the days leading up to the Friday announcement, government officials across the state had considered it to be an inflection point in the state’s response to the pandemic. State agency heads and even administrators at the University of Mississippi Medical Center, the largest medical center in the state, prepared for the governor to completely reverse his previous decision to order many Mississippians to stay at home.
Reeves, Dobbs and several people close to the two officials spoke several times last week with Mississippi Today to provide insight into the deliberations that would culminate in Reeves’ Friday announcement. The governor’s chief consideration last week: weighing the state’s health data and newly issued reopening guidance from the White House versus the political and economic effects of relaxing or extending his earlier shelter-in-place order.
The state’s COVID-19 data available to Reeves and Dobbs on Friday morning, paired with the White House’s guidance on how states should start to reopen, showed it was too soon to fully roll back shelter-in-place restrictions. Mississippi Today analyzed the data available to the two officials on Friday shortly before they announced the decision.
Cases will never flatten or decrease until the disease is eradicated. But metrics such as the number of new cases, when folks become ill and total tests completed, when analyzed both daily and weekly, paint a picture of the state’s progress in flattening or plateauing the curve of cases.
Before moving to lift shelter-in-place orders and reopening state economies, the White House guidelines issued April 16 generally suggest that states should see three things over a two-week period before beginning to roll back shelter-in-place orders:
• Flu- and COVID-like symptoms should trend down.
• Number of new daily cases should decrease or represent a smaller proportion of all tests, while test volume increases or flattens.
• Hospitals are able to treat patients without crisis care, while also ensuring health care workers can access tests.
By Friday, Mississippi had not met the first two White House thresholds. And while total tests run have consistently increased and continue to outpace most other states per capita, the average daily tests run and weekly total tests have started to decline. As of Friday, looking back a week, total weekly new cases grew by 25 percent and total weekly tests decreased by 27 percent.
Tracking new and total cases is dependent upon testing — the more tests completed, the more cases are identified, traced and, ideally, isolated. Last week saw the most and second-most new cases ever last week, at 300 and 281, though officials have reiterated that testing delays and reporting lags — even when operating efficiently — can lead to varied peaks and valleys in new cases reported any given day.
As for the health care system’s capacity, Mississippi officials have said the state successfully thwarted capacity issues and avoided extreme projections, meaning Mississippi’s data satisfied the third White House guideline. However, while intensive care unit and ventilator usage remain relatively stable, the number of patients hospitalized with confirmed and suspected COVID-19 is still growing.
By most metrics, Mississippi’s new cases have not leveled or declined – and appear to still be climbing. Over the last two weeks, chronological new cases over a rolling seven-day period averaged 159 daily cases two weeks ago, 189 daily cases one week ago, and 234 daily cases Friday. (Averaged daily cases over a week reached a new peak over the weekend at 249 new cases Saturday.)
The burden of cases and deaths is disproportionately carried by African Americans. As of Friday, black Mississippians comprised 53 percent of cases and 61 percent of deaths despite accounting for less than 40 percent of the state’s populations. Limited data suggest this is echoed nationally.
Though the state’s COVID-19 data failed to satisfy all the White House guidelines, political pressure to reopen the state crescendoed last week as Reeves was weighing his decision.
Last week, Republican governors in other Southern states ignored those guidelines and loosely reversed their previous shelter-in-place restrictions. Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, a Republican whom Reeves has contacted regularly in recent days, received sharp criticism from both sides of the political aisle — including from President Donald Trump — after drastically reversing his previous shelter-in-place order.
When asked last week if Trump’s suggestions were playing a role in his decision-making, Reeves replied: “What (Trump) has said to me is to open up Mississippi as soon as it’s safe to do so.”
As the influence of national and regional politics crept into the state, Reeves and his political advisers were also strapped with the reality that the central pillars of his successful 2019 gubernatorial campaign — a steady state economy and positive trends in public education — are breaking down.
After Reeves had issued stay at home restrictions and the virus continues to spread, small businesses across the state are struggling to survive or are closing outright, and unemployment filings are at a record high. Public education advocates fear the state’s testing gains will be erased as schools have been closed since spring break and many students and districts have inconsistent access to virtual learning options.
Voters like Jessica Cobb, a self-described conservative Republican in Gulfport who said she voted for Reeves last year, have lost faith in the governor’s ability to lead.
“I know people who are hurting and wondering where their next meal is going to come from,” Cobb, who is unemployed and looking for work, told Mississippi Today. “They’re not getting the help they were promised, they don’t qualify for unemployment because they were self-employed. This is just insanity. It’s people’s livelihoods at stake. This state is a working class state, these people are working class people. He needs to open the state.”
In a Thursday phone interview with Mississippi Today, Reeves acknowledged that small business owners are struggling and called his late March defining of essential businesses “a mistake.”
“Defining any business as essential or not doesn’t take into consideration that any business is essential for many Mississippians,” Reeves said. “So many people have invested everything they have into building their small businesses, and they’re looking at this as the moment when they could lose everything they’ve worked their entire lives for. Government cannot be the reason that happens, and I’m doing everything I can to make sure it doesn’t.”
Eric J. Shelton/Mississippi Today
Mississippi State Health Officer Dr. Thomas Dobbs addresses media during a press conference at the State of Mississippi Woolfolk Building in Jackson, Miss.
But through the growing political pressures and criticisms from unemployed Mississippians and small business owners, Reeves has leaned into Dobbs as his closest adviser during the pandemic, several people close to the two leaders told Mississippi Today. Dobbs, an epidemiologist by training, is the head of the Mississippi State Department of Health, a state agency independent of the governor’s office. Dobbs reports to an appointed Board of Health, not Reeves.
Dobbs himself ratcheted up his cautionary rhetoric last week, conceding that it appears the curve is flattening but going out of his way to publicly use phrasing like “still very, very concerned about outbreaks in places where people are close together,” “big box stores are still pretty crowded, it makes me very nervous,” and “I’m not seeing a lot of people wearing masks in the community.”
“The governor has been very thoughtful,” Dobbs told Mississippi Today in a phone interview on Tuesday. “He’s got a lot to balance and I certainly don’t envy certain decisions he has to make. He is extremely attentive to the health implications of this.”
Response to Reeves’ decision has varied, with critics believing that even the slight relaxation of the shelter-in-place order is irresponsible, and proponents believing that the decision was appropriate and measured.
Reeves clarified on Friday that though his new order is statewide, it will not preclude local governments from implementing tighter restrictions on their residents. For instance, if a municipality wants to close restaurants, that option would be available.
“I respect Governor Reeves safer-at-home order, and I appreciate him reopening our state’s economy slowly versus wide open as I feel that is a safer approach to slow the spread of COVID-19 and prevent a relapse in the future,” said Greenwood Mayor Carolyn McAdams. “Leflore County’s numbers are not leveling off but climbing, which tells me we need more time to slow the spread even though strict measures have been put into place and enforced.”
Anna Wolfe and Bobby Harrison contributed to this report.
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Ganucheau named Mississippi Today’s interim editor-in-chief
Adam Ganucheau, Mississippi Today’s interim editor-in-chief
Mississippi Today is pleased to announce Adam Ganucheau as interim editor-in-chief.
Ganucheau joined Mississippi Today pre-launch in 2016 as a politics and state government reporter and has advanced to a senior staff member in his four years with the company.
“Adam was hire number one when we began building the newsroom,” said Andy Lack, Mississippi Today founder. “I’m so impressed by the way Adam has built relationships both in the newsroom and around the state. He is a natural leader for the next wave of growth at Mississippi Today.”
Ganucheau, who closely covered the 2018 and 2019 statewide elections and hosts the state’s only weekly political podcast, earned his bachelor’s in journalism from the University of Mississippi. A native of Hazlehurst, Ganucheau has worked as a staff reporter for AL.com, The Birmingham News and The Clarion Ledger, and his work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, USA Today and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
“I’m humbled to step into this role and lead Mississippi’s largest and most dynamic newsroom,” said Ganucheau. “As outlets across the South face tough challenges and the future of journalism is in question, Mississippi Today’s mission has never been more critical. Our staff will continue to cover and contextualize the effects of the coronavirus pandemic and hold Mississippi’s most powerful in check.”
Ganucheau is preceded by Ryan “R.L.” Nave who served nearly two years as editor-in-chief. Nave has accepted a leadership position with a partner newsroom and will assume his new role in May.
“I consider myself lucky for being part of Mississippi Today’s journey for the past four years,” said Nave. “I also consider myself lucky for getting to work with so many talented and dedicated journalists who came into the newsroom every day with a strong passion for our mission and for their state. Mississippi is better off because of Mississippi Today, and I am eager to support the newsroom into its next chapter.”
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Mayor’s Music Series: Chris Vasquez
Join us every day as we enjoy some great music from local musicians!
Marino Casem, Hall of Fame Alcorn coach and ‘Godfather of the SWAC,’ dies at 85
Rick Cleveland
Marino Casem, left, with Leslie Frazier at Frazier’s 2017 induction into the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame.
This was 17 years ago, the summer of 2003. My assignment was to cover the inductions of Alcorn State’s Marino Casem, the legendary coach, and Jackson State’s Willie Richardson, the splendid pass receiver, into the College Football Hall of Fame, then located at in downtown South Bend, Ind.
Of the countless trips made over the years to cover various athletic events, this one stands out. Number one, Casem and Richardson were by then long retired and had become dear friends of mine. Number two, here were two authentic Mississippi sports heroes who had spent most of their college football years in relative anonymity, finally getting their just due on the national stage. That weekend they shared the stage with the likes of Dan Marino, Reggie White, Kellen Winslow and Ronnie Lott.
Believe this: They belonged. Obviously, Richardson, an NFL star for the Baltimore Colts, would have caught touchdown passes at Southern Cal, Notre Dame, Alabama or Ole Miss had he been given the chance. Casem, hailed as The Godfather of the SWAC, would have won as a coach at any of those places and charmed the national media, just as people such as John McKay, Bear Bryant and Johnny Vaught did.
Rick Cleveland
Don’t just take it from me. Listen to Leslie Frazier, who played for Casem at Alcorn, won a Super Bowl ring with the Chicago Bears, has been an NFL head coach and is now the highly respected defensive coordinator of the Buffalo Bills.
“All that success Coach Casem had at Alcorn in the SWAC would have translated in the SEC, the Big 12, the ACC or anywhere else,” Frazier said. “The reason I say that is discipline is the foundation at every level of football, and he was a disciplinarian of the first order. He was also a great teacher, who was compassionate with his players. Those qualities resonate at every level. When the players know you care and you give them structure and you teach, they’ll play for you. That’s a fact.”
This is written today because of sad news of Casem’s death Saturday. The old coach and athletic director passed away at 85 at home in Baton Rouge. We lost Willie Richardson suddenly and far too early four years ago.
What also made that assignment 17 years ago so memorable was watching the two aging gentlemen soak in the long overdue acclaim. Here’s what Casem, who coached Alcorn to seven SWAC championships said: “After 42 years of involvement in college football, the greatest thing to ever happen to me is happening here today.”
Mississippi Department of Archives and History
Then-Gov. William Winter makes a presentation to football star Willie Richardson at his 1979 induction into the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame.
And this, from Richardson: “When I was at Jackson State, we had players who could have played anywhere and I mean anywhere. Maybe a lot of people back then didn’t know that, but we as players knew it. I feel like I represent a whole lot of players here.”
That weekend, Casem told me for the first time about how he almost did not become a football coach. He grew up in Memphis and graduated from college at Xavier in New Orleans, where he had studied to become a physical therapist. But while Casem waited for a job offer, his future wife lined up a football coaching job for him at Utica Junior College, where she then worked as an assistant to the president.
“The day I took the coaching job all the hospitals started calling,” Casem said. “So later on, every time Betty Jean would complain about the coaching business and all the long hours, I’d tell you, ‘Well if it hadn’t been for you I’d be running a hospital by now.’”
He probably would have, too, because Casem was a force of nature, possessor of a magnetic personality, high intellect and a work ethic that never stopped. Casem took over at Alcorn, a remote outpost, even for the SWAC. “One way in, one way out, unless you know the gravel roads,” Casem once told me.
“To me, Alcorn was the perfect place to be a football coach,” Casem said. “It was a great place to train an athlete because you didn’t have all the distractions you had other places. Our players focused on football. You had their attention.”
Casem said the key to winning at the Alcorn was no different than that at Southern Cal or Notre Dame.
“Hard work, discipline, integrity, fundamentals and more hard work,” Casem said. “We didn’t take any short cuts at Alcorn.”
Yes, he said, there had been times since he had retired from coaching that he wondered about what it might have been like to coach at one of college football’s national powerhouses and earn the kind of money those “big-time” coaches were making.
“But I never thought about it back then; I never envied what others had,” he said. “I was totally focused on winning where I was. That was plenty.”
Plenty, indeed. And leave it to The Godfather to put college football’s pull on our society in perspective with these immortal words:
“On the East Coast, football is a cultural experience. In the Midwest, it’s a form of cannibalism. On the West Coast, it’s a tourist attraction. And in the South, football is a religion, and Saturday is the holy day.”
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Marshall Ramsey: Bobby Rush beats COVID-19
When I heard that Bobby Rush had COVID-19, my stomach sank. We had just lost John Prine to the virus and the thought of losing a living legend like Bobby seemed too much. On Thursday, I read that he had beat the disease. And during a time when hope seems to be as scarce as toilet paper, I found joy.
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COVID-19 relief bill: Espy says Hyde-Smith blasting Democrats for advocating for what she supports
Eric J. Shelton, Mississippi Today/ Report for America
The Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, Mike Espy rematch rematch is shaping up to be competitive despite the current limitation on campaigning because of the coronavirus.
While the coronavirus has brought a halt to in-person campaigning for the November general election, incumbent Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith and her Democratic opponent, former Secretary of Agriculture Mike Espy, are still jockeying for electoral advantages.
That jockeying played out over the last few weeks as Congress took up and passed a fourth relief package to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic.
As the bill was considered, Hyde-Smith spent a considerable amount of time criticizing congressional Democrats, Espy in absentia, for holding up the latest relief package to get what she said was “unrelated” items added to the legislation.
Bobby Harrison
But the Espy campaign pointed out that after the legislation passed, Hyde-Smith sent out a news release touting those “unrelated” items as needed to help fight the pandemic.
Politics can be confusing.
About two weeks ago it became apparent that legislation was going to be considered to add more funds to the Paycheck Protection Program, which among other things provides forgivable loans to small businesses that use the money to continue to pay their employees for at least eight weeks during the significant economic downturn caused by COVID-19.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, apparently with the backing of Hyde-Smith, wanted the legislation to deal solely with the Paycheck Protection Program. He said as much to the full Senate.
But congressional Democrats said the program also should include funds for hospitals hit hard by the coronavirus, money for COVID-19 testing and funds to state and local governments that have seen their tax revenue plummet because of the economic downturn.
After Democrats blocked efforts to pass legislation dealing only with the Payroll Protection Program, Hyde-Smith tweeted on April 15, “Democrats must stop blocking new (Paycheck Protection) funding.”
In the end, Democrats prevailed in including funds for hospitals and for testing but not for beleaguered state and local governments.
Despite her objections to adding items other than the Payroll Protection Program, after the bill passed she praised the items added to the bill at the insistence of the Democrats.
“The ongoing needs and hardships spread across the health care system and our economy are obvious. The longer the economic shutdown goes on, the more it becomes apparent that it is unsustainable. This legislation is intended to help as we move toward a safe reopening of more day-to-day commerce across the nation,” Hyde-Smith said in a news release voicing her support for the bill she described as “adding paycheck Protection Program funds, further support for hospitals and testing.”
In the very same news release, she again criticized Democrats, saying “they delayed completion of this new legislation for more than a week with new demands on issues unrelated to important ongoing relief programs.”
Were those issues – funds for hospitals and coronavirus testing – important to deal with the pandemic or were they unrelated?
Eric J. Shelton/Mississippi Today, Report For America
Mike Espy, a former congressman and former U.S. agriculture secretary is running for U.S. Senate.
“If ever there was a demonstration of political hypocrisy, look no further than Sen. Hyde-Smith,” Espy alleged. “After a week of complaining about Democrats in the Senate trying to ensure the latest round of coronavirus relief included funding for hospitals and coronavirus testing, she is now all too happy to try and take credit and celebrate the very funding she was fighting against being in the bill.
Justin Brasell, a spokesperson for the Hyde-Smith campaign, countered, “It took the Democrats two weeks to agree to a deal that contains virtually nothing that Republicans ever opposed. Republicans have always supported more medical funding as soon as necessary… Democrats have delayed critical resources getting out the door at every turn. Is this the new precedent Mississippians should expect moving forward? To be exploited for partisan leverage?”
The bill McConnell wanted to pass and supported by Hyde-Smith would have simply increased funding for the Payroll Protection Program by $300 billion. Nothing else.
“I am literally talking about deleting the number 350 and writing 650 in its place,” McConnel said on the Senate floor before Democrats blocked that effort.
Earlier Brasell said more could be done later.
“It’s important to understand that this fourth relief bill is likely not the last legislation that will be needed as the nation continues to respond and recover from COVID-19,” he said. “McConnell has tried to keep the focus on simply refunding the SBA Paycheck Protection Program. Aid for state and local government could be negotiated as part of future legislation.”
Money for hospitals and for testing already has been addressed. Everyone, despite the rhetoric, seem to concede it was needed.
In the 2018 special election to replace long-term Sen. Thad Cochran who resigned for health reasons, Espy and Hyde-Smith engaged in a spirited campaign. The rematch is shaping up to be just as competitive despite the limitation that could be placed on campaigning because of the coronavirus.
Disclosure: Mississippi Today, as a nonprofit news organization and a small business, applied for and received a loan through the Paycheck Protection Program in the amount of $257,500.
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‘A Good Meal is Hard to Find’ cookbook showcases charming blend of Southern food, art and storytelling
On a spring day in 2014, while in the parking lot of a H-E-B supermarket in Houston, Amy Evans received a phone call from a close friend from the Mississippi Delta.
“Martha randomly dialed me up and said, ‘Amy, the titles of your paintings would make really good headlines for recipes,’” Evans recalls. “I was like, ‘Yeah, whatever.’”
Denny Culbert
Amy C. Evans
Evans, who had just moved back to her home state of Texas after living in Oxford for about 13 years, was not convinced when Martha Foose, award-winning chef and cookbook author, first presented the idea of collaborating on a cookbook.
It wasn’t until about a year later that Evans finally began to see the potential of Foose’s vision. While attending a panel discussion on collaboration during the Southern Food Writers Conference in Knoxville, Evans decided to reach out to Foose without hesitation.
“I was sitting in the audience, and I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, this is what Martha is talking about. We could do this,’” Evans said during a phone call with Mississippi Today. “So I texted her from the audience during that panel and was like, ‘Do you still want to do that book with me?’”
Soon after, Evans and her daughter, Sofia Grace, took a road trip to Foose’s hometown of Pluto. Evans brought her paintings, which she describes as “folksy, nostalgic and Southern,” and camped out in Foose’s kitchen where the two women talked about the recipes that would best correspond with each piece of art.
“I just remember being in that kitchen and being so excited that these paintings I’ve done for the past 15 years were being given another life through Martha’s recipes,” Evans said. “It just all clicked. It was so easy for us to connect the dots and have the paintings inspire the recipes and then fully develop these characters I introduced in the titles of my paintings.”
“A Good Meal is Hard to Find: Storied Recipes from the Deep South” features 60 recipes and 60 paintings categorized under the quirky cookbook’s five chapters: “Morning Glories,” “Lingering Lunches,” “Afternoon Pick-Me-Ups,” “Dinner Dates & Late-Night Takes” and “Anytime Sweets.” The cookbook’s release date is Tuesday, April 28.
Copies are currently available at Square Books in Oxford, where Foose first fell in love with cookbooks as a teenager in the 1980s.
With headlines like Lucille’s Lemon Lavender Float and Ula Mae’s Spoonbread with Oysters and Artichokes, the book’s recipes all begin with a short paragraph providing a glimpse into the lives of these Southern, female characters and their finesse in the kitchen.
“It was such a fun process,” Evans said. “I flushed out my painting titles to kind of extend the stories and wrote a short little paragraph that told you a little bit more of my original character that I conjured up for the painting.”
Evans, who attended graduate school at the University of Mississippi’s Center for the Study of Southern Culture and worked for the Southern Foodways Alliance, says her paintings have always been about Southern women with old-fashioned names like Josephine and Esther. The theme is inspired by her maternal grandmother, Alla Grace Browder Riley, whom Evans would visit every summer in Alabama as a child. It was in her grandmother’s kitchen where she developed an interest in the South and a love of Southern food and culinary traditions.
“This wouldn’t have happened without Amy’s paintings,” Foose said. “I had always been a fan of her artwork. The titles of her paintings always tickled me. It was so fun for us to just sit around and think about the characters and what they would do in their kitchens.”
Miki McCurdy
Martha Hall Foose
Foose says readers can expect a broad range of recipes suited for any type of cook. Some recipes, like Grace’s Four-Corner Nabs, require a more involved process. But, on the other hand, one can still come across simple recipes with Jiffy mix on the ingredient list. And the Yazoo City native doesn’t think anyone should be embarrassed for freestyling or wanting to do things their own way in the kitchen.
“I don’t think folks should be shamed,” she said. “Everybody’s busy. And these days, now that we’re all locked in, you just have to make due with what you have. If you’re making an effort to cook for people you love or even yourself, do what you have to do and make the best of it.”
Foose points out that with the popularity of social media sites, such as Pinterest and Instagram, known for their food-styled visuals, it’s easy for folks at home to feel the pressure to emulate what is pictured. She hopes the photo-less cookbook she created with Evans will encourage people to take a leap of faith and be more creative.
“This cookbook is for whoever wants to read a fun story and get in the kitchen,” Evans said. “In the back of the book, we encourage people when they make a dish to send us an image of it so we can put it on the Good Meal is Hard to Find site. We’re letting readers and home cooks drive how the story ends in their kitchen.”
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