The cover of Charleston Receipts latest edition hasn’t changed much since its debut 75 years ago, but inside, the cookbook offers an homage to the culinary skills of Black cooks who inspired Lowcountry foodways.
“We now recognize that Charleston Receipts is largely a compilation of Gullah/Geechee recipes originally produced by African-descended cooks,” reads the introduction in the book’s 39th printing, which arrived recently at local bookstores.
More than 885,000 copies of Charleston Receipts have been sold since the Junior League of Charleston (JLC) first published it as a fundraiser for the women’s service organization, founded in 1923. Each edition has more than 350 pages crammed with recipes for soups and salads, meats and seafoods, pies and cakes and more.
The JLC said each Charleston Receipts printing transcends its original fundraising mission to become “a conversation across generations — between women who first gathered these recipes and those who now revisit them with deeper understanding.”
JLC’s executive director Amelia “Amy” Jenkins said many of the JLC members whose names are associated with the old recipes learned them from the mostly Black female cooks in their homes.
Why did it take so long?
Jenkins acknowledges that the JLC has been somewhat slow to fully recognize the contributions of Black cooks. “The Junior League is a volunteer organization and volunteer organizations tend to move slow,” said Jenkins, one of two paid employees who help manage the 1,000-member organization.
“We look at this book as an evolution,” she said. “We have done major updates to the book in the last 40 years, and we’ll continue to do updates as our understanding of the rich history of the Charleston cultural heritage evolves.”
The impetus for the recent update came from Charleston-native and author Margaret Seidler, Jenkins said.
“I grew up on this cookbook. This cookbook is akin to a family bible,” Seidler told the Charleston City Paper. “These incredibly delicious and time-tested recipes came from the Black women who were cooking for White women in Charleston, and I thought we needed something that told a more complete truth.”
Three years ago, Seidler said she approached the JLC and asked if they would update the book’s introduction. Kevin Mitchell, an instructor at the Culinary Institute of Charleston at Trident Technical College, historian Dr. Bernie E. Powers Jr., professor emeritus at the College of Charleston, Simon Keith, a CofC English professor, and Seidler wrote a draft for a new introduction for the JLC to consider.
The new introduction tells “a more complete truth that does not take anything away from the past but gives us a better picture of the past so we can understand it in the future,” Seidler said.
JLC president Helen Wolfe said the organization is preparing events to promote the updated Charleston Receipts.
“We have a plan to make sure this historical document stay alive,” she said. “We plan to give a modern take on some of these historic recipes and share that on our website. We want to make sure a new generation of readers see this book.”
Public presentations, Wolfe said, are being planned in the late fall. “We think this book is best experienced with others, so we hope to have a public opportunity to do that,” she said.
A question at a Charleston Receipts book talk will likely include what is the meaning of receipts in the title? “It was titled ‘Receipts’ because these recipes are gifts to the readers and the community,” Jenkins said.
A Gullah chef’s reaction
Gullah chef Charlotte Jenkins said, “This cookbook has been out for a long time, and they are just now acknowledging where most of the recipes come from. I think it is good because you need to pay homage to the real people who did it and to correct that situation. It was not mentioned before.”
Jenkins said the book’s okra pilau and red rice recipes aren’t the way a Gullah cook would prepare them. However, she added, “everybody has different methods of cooking.” Techniques vary even in local Gullah communities, “but it is basically a Gullah style, and it is a matter of taste,” said Jenkins, owner of the Awendaw-based Miss Charlotte Gullah Catering.
The book’s she-crab soup recipe, she explained, “is not the way I’d do it. I also think they should pay homage to William Deas. He created it, and it has made Charleston famous.”
Many of the recipes in the new and earlier editions appear with phrases in the Gullah language.
In the current and earlier editions, the late Virginia Mixson Geraty, who taught Gullah at the College of Charleston, wrote: “By using Gullah in Charleston Receipts, the Junior League of Charleston is helping record and document a fascinating part of America’s heritage.”
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