FARE Issue 3: Charleston

Charleston is a gem of the American South both old and new, where on gas-lit cobbled streets locals rediscover and reckon with the city’s weighty past.  

Fare Issue 3: Charleston explores one of America’s oldest and best preserved cities—the site of major turning points in American history, and the seat of a culinary renaissance where visionaries both in and out of the kitchen explore Southern identities through careful historical research and the cultivation of centuries-lost ingredients. 

Consistently ranked as the “best small city” in the US, Charleston  owes much of the foundations of its culture to the significant contributions and struggles of its diasporic African communities, the descendants of enslaved workers, who are frequently overlooked for their considerable influence on the local cuisine and wider society. 

In Issue 3: Charleston, Fare goes deeper into the connections of food, history, and people—exploring how entire cities are built on the weight of food systems, with a myriad of effects that ripple into the present. Charleston is a city of contrasts and contradictions, lush with life, storied in its pasts, and alive with a depth of cuisine that truly belies its size.