Toni Tipton-Martin Author Talk • In Celebration of The Taste of Country Cooking: 50th Anniversary Edition

Toni Tipton-Martin is a three-time James Beard Book Award winner, and recipient of its Lifetime Achievement Award. She recently wrote the forward to the new 50th Anniversary edition of Edna Lewis' A Taste of Country Cooking, and has published three acclaimed cookbooks: Juke Joints, Jazz Clubs & Juice: Cocktails From Two Centuries of African American Cookbooks, Jubilee: Recipes From Two Centuries of African American Cooking, and The Jemima Code: Two Centuries of African American Cookbooks. Toni is former Editor in Chief of Cook’s Country magazine by America’s Test Kitchen, a cast member of its PBS television show, and in 2024 she shepherded a first-of-its-kind cookbook for the celebrated brand, When Southern Women Cook, which showcases the hard work, hospitality, and creativity of Southern women. She is the founder of a nonprofit organization using cultural heritage and cooking to build community; for this work she received the prestigious Julia Child Award, and the International Association of Culinary Professional’s Trailblazer Award.

The Taste of Country Cooking: 50th Anniversary Edition- the most beloved Southern cookbook of all time: a glorious celebration of seasonal eating that has shaped generations of home cooks, from “the first lady of Southern cooking” (NPR). Beautifully repackaged and redesigned, with a new foreword by Toni Tipton-Martin.

With the publication of The Taste of Country Cooking in 1976, Edna Lewis proclaimed the food of the American South one of the world’s great cuisines. From the field greens and salads of spring; pan-fried chicken and crushed peaches in summer; preserves and sweet potatoes for fall; and hearty soups and stews during the cold winter months, Miss Lewis (as she was almost universally known) extolled the vir­tues of the good food of her childhood, spent in a Virginia farming community founded by her grandfather and his friends after Emancipation.

A celebration of eating locally—decades before “farm to table” became common parlance—the book showcases the joys of cooking with the seasons.

The 150 accessible recipes in its pages include:
•Baked Virginia Ham, Buttered Jerusalem Artichokes, and Rhubarb Pie in Spring
•Green Tomato Preserves, Wilted Lettuce with Hot Vinegar Dressing, and Fresh Blackberry Cobbler in Summer
•Crispy Biscuits, Green Bean Salad with Sliced Tomatoes, and Country-Fried Apples in Fall
•Oyster Stew, Pan-Braised Spareribs, and Coconut Layer Cake in Winter

An affirmation of a distinctly American way of eating, fifty years after its publica­tion, The Taste of Country Cooking remains the definitive book on Southern food.