Kugels & Collards: Stories of Food, Family, and Tradition in Jewish South Carolina, with Rachel Gordin Barnett and Lyssa Kligman Harvey (VIRTUAL)

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Where people go, so goes their food. In Kugels & Collards: Stories of Food, Family, and Tradition in Jewish South Carolina (University of South Carolina Press, 2024), Rachel Gordin Barnett and Lyssa Kligman Harvey celebrate the unique and diverse food history of Jewish South Carolina. They gather stories and recipes from diverse Jewish sources—Sephardic and Ashkenazi families who have been in the state for hundreds of years, descendants of Holocaust survivors, and more recent immigrants from Russia and Israel—and explore how cherished dishes were influenced by available ingredients and complemented by African American and regional culinary traditions. These stories are a vital part of the South’s “Jewish geography” and foodways, stretching across state lines to shape Southern culture.

Rachel Gordin Barnett and Lyssa Kligman Harvey have an interest in all things Southern, Jewish, and historical, including foodways. Native South Carolinians, Barnett hails from small town Sumerton, and Harvey from Columbia. They have been instrumental in preserving Jewish history across the state. Founding members of the Historic Columbia Jewish Heritage Initiative, they created the Kugels & Collards blog to preserve and share Columbia’s Jewish history by collecting food stories, recipes and photographs in a digital venue. Barnett is a past president and current executive director of the Jewish Historical Society of South Carolina. Harvey is a teacher, therapist and artist. Exploring Southern and Jewish foodways enable Barnett and Harvey to honor their own family histories and preserve those stories for future generations of South Carolinians.