By Martin Luther King Jr. Day. The library held a reading and discussion event that I organized with particular care this year. I chose the readings: excerpts from King's "Letter from Birmingham Jail," a poem by Langston Hughes, a passage from James Baldwin's "The Fire Next Time." The room was full. The discussion was careful, honest, occasionally heated. A white man asked, "When will we stop talking about race?" and a young Black woman said, "When it stops talking about us," and the room was quiet, and I thought: this is what a library is for.
Daddy would have preached a King Day sermon. He did, every year. Daddy met King once, in 1963, at a church in Atlanta. He spoke of it rarely but with a reverence that he reserved for nothing else. "He was small," Daddy said. "Smaller than you'd think. But when he spoke, the room grew." I have carried that image my entire life: a small man making a room grow. It is what language does when wielded by someone who believes in it.
James asked me about Reverend James this week — deeper questions: what Daddy believed, how he dealt with racism, whether he was angry. I told him the truth: Daddy was angry his entire life, and the anger was the fuel for everything he did. "Anger is not the opposite of love," I told James. "It's the proof of it. You only get angry about things you care about." He thought about this. Then he said, "I'm angry sometimes." I said, "Good. Stay angry. And stay kind. The combination is rare and necessary."
I made collard greens this week — the slow-cooked, smoked-ham-hock-flavored greens that are the backbone of Southern Black cooking. Mama's collards cook for four hours minimum. I cook mine for three, which Mama considers insufficient. The greens are served with cornbread and hot sauce, and the combination is both a meal and a statement: we are still here. We are still cooking. The recipes survived what the people sometimes didn't.
We finished the collard greens and the cornbread, and James was quiet in the way he gets when something has settled into him rather than just passed through. I wanted to end the evening with something sweet — not frivolous sweet, but earned sweet, the kind that has its own history. Bananas Foster is a New Orleans recipe, Southern to its core, born in the same geography that shaped so much of Black American food and culture. Mama never made it, but the first time I tasted it I understood it the same way I understand her collards: it is a South that survived, transformed by fire into something worth savoring.
Bananas Foster
Prep Time: 5 minutes | Cook Time: 10 minutes | Total Time: 15 minutes | Servings: 4
Ingredients
- 4 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 1 cup packed dark brown sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/4 cup banana liqueur
- 4 ripe bananas, halved lengthwise and then crosswise
- 1/4 cup dark rum
- Vanilla ice cream, for serving
Instructions
- Melt the butter. In a large heavy skillet over medium heat, melt the butter until it begins to foam. Add the brown sugar and cinnamon and stir to combine, cooking until the sugar dissolves and the mixture is smooth, about 2 to 3 minutes.
- Add the liqueur. Pour in the banana liqueur and stir to incorporate. Let the sauce simmer gently for 1 to 2 minutes until slightly thickened.
- Cook the bananas. Add the banana pieces to the skillet in a single layer. Cook, turning once gently, until the bananas are just tender and coated in sauce, about 2 minutes per side.
- Flame the rum. Remove the pan from direct heat. Pour the dark rum over the bananas. Carefully tilt the pan or use a long match to ignite the rum, allowing the flames to subside naturally, about 30 seconds to 1 minute. If you prefer to skip flaming, simply stir the rum into the sauce and cook for 1 additional minute over medium heat.
- Serve immediately. Spoon the bananas and warm caramel sauce generously over scoops of vanilla ice cream. Serve at once.
Nutrition (per serving)
Calories: 420 | Protein: 2g | Fat: 12g | Carbs: 72g | Fiber: 3g | Sodium: 95mg