In Class: Food, a history

Walking into classroom 557 — the ProduceOne Food & Nutrition Lab in Fitz Hall — class is already underway. More than 20 students are out of their seats, pulling on aprons and hair nets. 

The course, History of Food, taught by Bobbi Sutherland, associate professor of history, is part lecture, part lab.

“What is more fundamental to being human than food?” Sutherland asks, describing the class as a study of food through lenses such as geography, environmental justice, racial justice and gender, noting that food is “part of our biology … our religious understanding, our self-identity, our family heritage.”

She directs students to split into groups at cooking stations throughout the room, pulling photocopied recipes from a folder — Jollof rice, Hoppin’ John, black-eyed pea hummus, African soul fried rice and a West African plantain dish called kelewele.

This semester, students read culinary historian Michael Twitty’s James Beard Award–winning book, The Cooking Gene: A Journey Through African American Culinary History in the Old South. Welcomed in February as culinary historian-in residence and keynote speaker at the Alumni Chair in the Humanities’ Food & Culture Festival, Twitty joins the lab this afternoon as a special guest lecturer. Several of the dishes students are preparing are his own recipes.

He slips off his coat and moves toward a group near the front of the room as the sounds of chopping vegetables, bubbling butter and clanging pans fill the space. A student lays a strip of bacon into a sizzling pan — part of the Hoppin’ John recipe.

When asked, students admit they have never tasted the traditionally Southern dish of black-eyed peas, rice and pork.

Twitty pauses. “Well, what are the cultures we have in this circle?”

One by one, students respond.

“Middle Eastern, from Lebanon.”

“My mother is from Congo.”

“I’m African American — my family’s from Virginia and South Carolina.”

“My dad’s Irish and my mom is German.”

Twitty tells the students about cooking at Colonial Williamsburg, where he holds a residency as an interpreter of African American colonial life, describing outdoor cooking in the early 19th century and preparing food for interpreters from across the country.

“Community is the best part,” he says.

About an hour later, groups place their finished dishes on the table at the center of the room. One by one, students take a small taste from each plate. The room fills with small nods, full mouths and understanding — and history is passed on, one bite at a time.

 A version of this article appears in print in the Spring 2026 University of Dayton Magazine, Pages 20 & 21. EXPLORE THE ISSUE — MORE ONLINE