A Tale of Two Laredos
Gravy
In “A Tale of Two Laredos,” Gravy producer Evan Stern visits Laredo, Texas, which shares history, culture, and memory with its sister city across the border, Nuevo Laredo. For decades, Mexican border towns were renowned for refined, white tablecloth restaurants where jacketed waiters served a café society that transcended international boundaries. Among the most celebrated was Nuevo Laredo’s Cadillac Bar, which opened in 1926 and grew famous for delicacies such as frog legs and Ramos Gin Fizzes until it was forced to close in 2010. Chosen for its location on the river we now call...
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A Texas Cabrito Communion
Gravy
In “A Texas Cabrito Communion,” Gravy producer Evan Stern invites us to ride along as he joins the Avila and Aguirre families for a celebratory reunion and cabrito cookout at their YY Ranch, which sits below the Nueces River in Texas. The river once served as the boundary between Texas and the Mexican states of Coahuila and Tamaulipas, and some advocate for viewing this region and Northern Mexico as a singular landscape, united by shared terroir and culture. As a beloved delicacy enjoyed on both sides of the Rio Grande, cabrito—a roasted baby goat nourished strictly on a diet of...
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Blessed Egg Rolls and the Evolution of Rockport, Texas
Gravy
In “Blessed Egg Rolls and the Evolution of Rockport, Texas,” Gravy producer Evan Stern takes listeners to the small town of Rockport, Texas, which hugs the shores of Aransas Bay on the state’s Gulf Coast, about 35 miles northeast of Corpus Christi. There, he visits Saint Peter’s Catholic Church, founded by Vietnamese arrivals in the early 1980s, and whose congregants host a monthly fundraiser selling such dishes as bun, egg rolls, and shrimp. Following the collapse of Saigon, in the aftermath of the Vietnam War, hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese, Laotians, and Cambodians fled...
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A Taste of Sicily on Galveston Bay
Gravy
In “A Taste of Sicily on Galveston Bay,” Gravy producer Evan Stern takes listeners to Galveston, Texas. Once perhaps the greatest town of significance between New Orleans and San Francisco, today its population doesn’t even crack the top fifty of Texas cities. But while Austin is often referred to as a small town with growing pains, some say Galveston is really a big city disguised as a small town. Much of this is owed to its immigrant history, as its port provided a point of entry for over 750,000 newcomers from its opening in the 1830s, until the early 1920s. Settled by a French...
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Noodling with the Texas Wends
Gravy
In “Noodling with the Texas Wends,” Gravy producer Evan Stern takes us to the small, Central Texas town of Serbin, which was last included in the Census more than 20 years ago, when the population was only 37. But its sign still proudly announces itself as the “Home of the Texas Wends”—and the locals take their noodles seriously. An ethnic minority, primarily concentrated in the region of Lusatia—which sits just between Germany and Poland—for generations the Wends wrestled with wars, poverty, and discrimination. Those troubles only escalated after they embraced confessional...
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The Gulf’s Last Generation of Black Oystermen?
Gravy
In “The Gulf’s Last Generation of Black Oystermen?” Gravy producer Kayla Stewart takes listeners to south Louisiana, where Black men have played a key role in the region’s oyster industry—and where today, they are few and far between. Stewart speaks to one of the area’s last Black oystermen about how we got here, and what this means for the future of south Louisiana’s oystering culture. Black men have played a key role in Louisiana's oyster industry since the 18th century. During enslavement, they would oyster for their slave owners, and those white slave owners kept the...
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Buying and Selling Food in the Black South
Gravy
“Buying and Selling Food in the Black South” is the fourth installment in reporter Kayla Stewart’s 2022 Gravy podcast season, where she explores Black foodways in the South and beyond. For this episode, she speaks to Black business owners who are trying to improve food access in Black communities. Stewart explores the history of Black-owned grocery stores and shops, and why these institutions matter in Black communities. For centuries, Black Americans have been finding their own ways to feed themselves and their communities. From farms, to grocery stores, to corner store...
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In Houston, Three Tastes of West Africa
Gravy
In the episode “In Houston, Three Tastes of West Africa,” Gravy producer Kayla Stewart takes listeners to her hometown of Houston, Texas, which boasts one of the most vibrant international food scenes in the country. It’s a city where Black Americans have built their own communities and pathways to success, and where diversity is prized. It’s also where West African immigrants—from Ghana, Senegal, Nigeria, and beyond—have created their own stories, including through food. To find out why Houston is the center of this West African renaissance, Stewart starts at Safari...
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The Joyful Black History of the Sweet Potato
Gravy
In “The Joyful Black History of the Sweet Potato,” Kayla Stewart reports for Gravy on sweet potatoes, which Southern-born Black Americans have baked, roasted, fried, distilled—and long revered. Stewart takes listeners across the United States to learn how African Americans are finding new, interesting ways to enjoy sweet potatoes. Harvey and Donna Williams own and operate Delta Dirt Distillery in Helena, Arkansas. Both grew up in Arkansas, and Harvey was raised on a farm that has been in his family for generations. His father began growing sweet potatoes to make efficient use of...
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Annie Laura Squalls and Her Mile High Pie
Gravy
In “Annie Laura Squalls and Her Mile High Pie,” Gravy producer Kayla Stewart tells the story of Annie Laura Squalls, who, in 1960, became head baker at the Caribbean Room, the popular in-house restaurant at New Orleans’ renowned Pontchartrain Hotel. It was there where Squalls created her “Seven Mile High Pie,” known colloquially as the “Mile High Pie.” But while many people know the legendary pie, most don’t know the baker behind it. Squalls was no ordinary baker. Though she never attended culinary school, she could make sweet magic happen, often thinking on her feet to...
info_outlineWhat’s in the fridge? In New Orleans, solidarity means a stocked fridge. In this episode of Gravy, producer Sarah Holtz takes listeners inside a mutual aid society called New Orleans Community Fridges, which formed during the pandemic to help feed people in need. Since its start, the group has been gifted around 20 fridges. They sit on neighborhood sidewalks, plugged into power strips, some powered by generators—filled with food that’s free for the taking.
In this episode, Holtz talks to New Orleans Community Fridges organizer Sarah Rubbins-Breen; Destany Gorham and Tenaj Jackson, two fridge hosts; and Tim Vogel, a fridge contributor, to understand how neighbors are feeding neighbors through the fridges. She also speaks with Devin De Wulf—an educator, artist, and co-founder of the mutual aid organization Feed The Second Line—whose solar panel-topped house became a neighborhood hub during Hurricane Ida power outages. (From there, he hatched an idea to create a network of solar-powered first responders, called Get Lit, Stay Lit.) Together, they demonstrate how mutual aid—by the people and for the people—can lead to greater self-determination within communities.