[gentle music] [gentle music] - I think that when most people think about greens in the South, they think about collards stewed with ham hocks, but I grew up in a house where we ate something called salad.

Now, it's not salad lettuce at all.

Salad refers to like a mixture of greens often turnip mustard greens, henpeck greens.

My mom would fill the sink overflowing with greens and then agitate them and she'd do this like three times.

Now, that's an appropriate amount of seasoning to me.

My mom would put them in the pot and they would boil away with that sausage.

And to tell if the greens were ready, mom would scoop out a little bit of pot liquor and drink it from a teacup.

She said it was a cure all.

Do you all use sausage when you cook greens ever?

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

- And the pot liquor is wonderful.

- is in there.

- I know.

The feeling that cooking greens created in the kitchen, all the humidity and the sharp smell and how happy a big pot of greens made my mom, that's one of my most profound food memories.

[upbeat music] I'm Vivian and I'm a chef.

The food I cook tells a story of southern food as I know it, but that story is more complex than I thought.

♪ I don't know where I'm going ♪ ♪ But I'm on my way ♪ ♪ Lord if you love me ♪ ♪ keep me upright ♪ - So I set out to find the dishes that bind and define us.

Along the way, I saw that when we eat together, we share more than a meal.

The American South is my classroom and the dishes we share will be my roadmap.

[upbeat music] My new year's resolution this year was actually to do more social media.

This week I am shooting this tip on how to wash greens.

There's a way to wash it and a way not to wash it and that's the point.

Of my tip.

Did you get that?

The point of my tip?

[chuckles] When you're cooking greens like this cabbage, it's important for them to include the darker, tougher leaves in the pot as well because they provide bitterness to the course sweetness.

And so that's why often when cultures have a particular way of cooking greens, it's not just about one flavor of green.

It's about building like the perfect pot of greens with bitter and sweet notes.

I started doing these tips 'cause I thought it would be an easy way to tell stories on social media, but so I spent a lot of time with food on the floor and my iPhone.

They don't look so good.

You can wash greens in the sink, which is my preferred method.

All it takes is just a few granules of sand to ruin an eating experience.

Madison, can I get you to be my production assistant here?

Make sure you get these dark outer leaves, but the purple dark and the green dark 'cause that's kind of one of the points of the tip.

What kind of greens does your mom cook?

- I don't think she really cooks any greens, honestly.

Maybe spinach.

- In this part of the South, we cook our greens for a long time til they're really soft.

I crave pizza, or French fries, but I also occasionally crave greens.

And it feels like my body's actually requiring the nutrients that greens offer.

[upbeat music] Our tastes are different.

Some of us do turnip salad, cabbage and collard greens for a long, long time.

Under the will of extended heat, these greens grow soft and spoonable and produce an elixir we take great pains to sop or scoop up with the cornbread of our kitchens.

But many of us pursue more push back from our greens.

We cook kale and rob with oil, flip them with garlic, ginger or chilies and cook them quickly.

We wanna taste the bite and the bitterness screams like a rugala and bok choy offer up.

whatever our preference, greens represent good.

Both for our bodies and our souls.

[birds chirping] Southerners are known to love greens that have been cooked date long, long, long, long, long, long, long time.

But there is a community of southerners who are an exception to this role.

The Lumbee Indians, the largest native American tribe east of the Mississippi, cook their greens and their cornbread actually their own unique way [gentle music] I am headed to the Lumbee Homecoming, it's a festival that goes on for a period of days here in Pembroke, North Carolina and they are famous for this collard sandwich.

I've heard about it for years.

My friend Malinda, who is a professor at UNC and a Lumbee Indian, is going to be my guide this weekend.

All right.

[car honking] Sorry.

Hey.

- Hey.

- How are you?

- Good.

- Happy Lumbee Homecoming.

- Thank you.

[crowd singing] - Most Lumbees live in this area.

Around the Lumber river?

- Well, the Lumber river is kind of a corridor to the Lumbee community.

This was an impenetrable territory.

The swamps were so large in the aftermath of European settlement between warfare, disease, survivors turned into refugees.

And they were looking for a place to hide where they could be safe, and the Lumber river was that safe place to be the nurture of community.

There are about 55000 enrolled tribal members.

Lumbee Homecoming is an annual necessity because if we're not here in Robeson County, where 40% of the population is Lumbee, you're living where less than 1% of the population is native and there might not be another Lumbee within a hundred miles of you.

- It looks like there's a lot of collard sandwiches.

- There's plenty of vendors.

We can take a little tour.

[gentle music] - So y'all are the godfathers of the collard sandwich?

- Yes, ma'am.

- If you want[mumbles] - If possible, yes.

Woo, look at that cornbread.

- We talking bout real cornbread.

Pure cornbread.

The real deal stuff.

- That's awesome.

Look how thin it is.

- This is our oldest son, Graylin.

- Hey, how y'all doing?

- You've been doing this your whole life, I guess, every year.

- I've been here the whole time.

- No choice.

- Here they are deep frying the collards.

- This' like ribbons.

How do you do your collards?

I've never seen any collards cut like that.

- We use silver hand all over.

We first started and I whipped up to four or five on a gallon that I have with me and her.

- For a small group, I think that's okay.

But not for what's about to go down here, I don't think.

[gentle music] - This is the fatback frying.

We'll use some of the grease from the fatback to fry the collards.

- And then where does the fatback go?

- They eat it with the sandwich.

- I was worried that the collard sandwich was not gonna have any meat on it and I'm relieved to see that I was wrong.

- This is my homemade chow-chow.

- Oh, that's fabulous- looking chow-chow.

- You wanna go around there and make it?

- No ma'am.

[laughs] - I want it to be right.

It will be right.

All right.

- Enjoy it.

- Thank you, we will.

- Thank you so much.

- What's kinda been left forgotten is how native people not only used to influence Southern food, but still do.

And this collard sandwich is a good example of that.

We enjoy this combination together and we've kind of laid claim to it.

- And you can't make a sandwich out of stewed collards 'cause there's too much liquid.

- Right.

- So the way we cook these, it creates this perfect texture and you also get a real sense of flavor, I don't taste when I eat stewed collards.

- You taste the collard.

- Exactly.

It wasn't until I went to college in the Northeast that I ever had any other kind of collard.

And so I don't know what that says about Southern food when I was born and raised in North Carolina.

- It shows that we eat what we eat and we don't trust other people.

Or their cooking, at least That is delicious.

- Good, I'm glad you like it.

[gentle music] [crowd cheering] - I didn't just come here for a collard sandwich.

This is a native community that's close to my home that I didn't know well.

Malinda was kind enough to host me and my kids throughout homecoming.

And introduce us to not only the food but Lumbee culture.

That is Miss Lumbee.

She's the four-time title holder.

[marching band playing] - One of things that people don't really know about American Indians is that, our population has the highest rate of military service per capita than any other American population.

It seems so ironic.

- So wild - We would express our patriotism in that way.

And so you think about the fact that it's our land.

- We're still fighting for land that we want to hold on to, or principles that we fundamentally believe in like freedom.

We value that too.

People are fighting for the United States.

- And they're fighting for this place.

- They're fighting for this place.

[gentle music] - Thank you.

- So yeah, túhis is the epicenter of Lumbee Foodways.

And what we've got here is catfish, fatback, you got your vegetables.

Rutabagas collards, limas.

The chicken and pastries on that table.

And this is desserts.

Lumbee chocolate cake.

Really, really thin layers of yellow cake, with like a chocolate syrup.

- So what would you call Lumbee food then?

'Cause everything that you're describing, those are things that I would call, Southern food.

- Southern food.

So many of the things that we think of as Southern food, originated with native people.

Whether it's corn, sweet potato squash.

So really like when I think of Southern food, I think of Lumbee food.

Are you ready to go eat?

- I'm ready.

This is one of the delicacies of the Lumbee nation.

We don't bake cornbread nearly so much as we fry it.

- You fry it.

- Now my mother always made turnip greens.

- So you think these are turnips?

- Oh, those are definitely turnips.

- There is the collard?

- That's a collard, yeah.

- This is one of my favorite greens, which is just a whole head of cabbage kind of stew.

- Lightly stewed.

We don't tend to cook our greens to death.

- All right, you ready?

- I'm Ready.

- These turnip greens, they've got this like bitterness and spiciness.

I love.

- Well again, the Lumbee food that I know, we don't like to cook all the flavor out of our greens.

- When people interview me about Southern food, they always say, how do you reconcile all the fat and the fried and the meat?

And I get like my quills go up because historically like Southern food and therefore native food, was all about vegetables and grains and just a little bit of meat.

Yes, I would say that all three of these greens on this plate are distinctly Southern.

There's collards, these turnips that are stewed and then this cabbage.

- Hollywood movies teaches that native people were nomads, hunting buffalo or things - And with teepee's.

- With teepee's.

Here in this community, and in places across the nation, native people have been farmers for centuries.

Since, well, before Europeans arrived here.

[gentle music] - One of the great things we have in the museum is we have a cabin.

And everybody, when they go to a native museum, they expect to see teepee's and hair dresses, and bows and arrows.

And this gives us an immediate chance to dispel stereotypes.

This stuff or this pedestal goes back over 120, 130 years.

- What's that called, is it mortar and pestle?

- This would have been used to pound up corn, make corn meal.

This is a dugout canoe.

It's about 1100 years old.

It was found in the Lumbee river.

They would have known the current, known how to navigate the river up and down.

- My specialty is hydrology.

So I study the movement and the quality of water.

- Is the Lumber river a specialty?

- It is.

This river helps shape the identity of my people.

Of the Lumbee.

We came to this place because it offered a shelter and it offered us someplace where we could avoid settlers during the colonial period.

Ancestors of the Lumbee, many of them came here from places that had already experienced colonization.

This was a safe spot and it felt like home.

And they made it their home.

- Do you have children?

- I do.

They're enrolled members of the tribe.

- They come to homecoming?

- They do, yeah.

They're here this weekend.

- Oh cool.

Most Americans are taught to believe that Indians are long gone far away.

Folks just learn that we don't exist anymore and when we did exist, we all looked the same.

There were dozens and dozens of different tribal communities.

Speaking different languages.

And we were as different from one another as the nations of Europe.

[crowd cheering] [gentle music] - This is gonna be super fun.

Collards and cornbread.

- Oh good.

- At my cousin Raymond's house.

- Hi Vivian.

- Hey.

- Come on in.

- My wife Betsy.

- Hey, nice to meet you.

- Nice to meet you.

- My sister Barbara.

- How are you?

- Hey, how're you doing?

We gonna put you to work.

- Okay, good.

- You've already put the grease in the pot and I'll just drop the sausage.

And we can actually cut the collards.

And I like to lay them out flat.

I always try and take the big leaf to be the last one 'cause it's easier.

It'll hold.

I just roll.

- We like to cut them thin, Vivian.

- That's what I noticed at the hands.

It was spaghetti thin.

That's a lot of work.

For collard green.

- It is called love.

That's a lot of love.

- Now grease has actually turned brown.

It's a darker brown.

The salt and pepper and add it on top.

Just sprinkle a little bit of sugar to help tenderize the collard.

- That little pinch of sugar is something that we see in a lot of Southern food.

They're so green.

They're greener than they were when you put them in.

Almost like seaweed.

- Get your fork if you wanna try it.

- I might accidentally stab a little nugget of sausage.

- Okay,that's what you're supposed to.

- It's amazing.

And the texture, their crunchy.

- That's the texture we like.

- We've talked so much about what's different between the Lumbee food and Southern food.

On the surface it's hard to find much difference, but it's also that hospitality ethic, without our being hospitable, Europeans never would have survived here, and Africans of course suffered mightily in this region but yet brought their own hospitality and so sometimes I like to tell people that it's not about which kind of food it is, it's about how we do it together.

[gentle music] - The Lumbee way felt familiar like going to homecoming in my mom's church.

But it did remind me that there's definitely more than one way to be American or to be Southern for that matter.

And there's certainly more than one way to cook greens.

- Need some collards for breakfast?

- Always.

- Von Diaz is a friend of mine, I met at a writer's retreat.

She was working on her first book, "Coconuts and Collards."

And it's title made my ears perk up because to be honest, coconut is not an ingredient I think about when I think of collards.

But as I said, there's more than one way to cook a collard and Von is about to show me her Puerto Rican Southern mashup.

Then we're gonna go see where she grew up.

All right, so how do we do this?

- Typically what I do, I trim them like this.

And then I like to like roll them.

I'm gonna slice right down the middle.

Something like that usually works really well.

- You grew up in the Atlanta area?

- I grew up in the fabulous suburbs outside of Atlanta.

- Did you grew up eating collards?

- I grew up in a very Puerto Rican family, and my mom cooked what I would say is like American food and Puerto Rican food.

Rice and beans.

Meat that had been marinated in Adobo.

All of my childhood, I would encounter collards and be like, I don't know about that.

You know like the smell of collards hit you as soon as you walk into the room, and you're like, Oh, they're making collards.

And I don't like my collard super smooshy 'cause I wanna feel like there's a vegetable or something am chewing on.

[gentle music] - All right, so what do we do now?

We've got collards.

- And our scallions.

Cut a tablespoon of butter.

We're gonna do one more tablespoon of coconut oil.

- I love coconut oil.

- It's incredibly versatile.

I think people shy away from it 'cause they think it's gonna make their food taste like coconut, but it doesn't necessarily right.

So now I'll go ahead and put these scallions in, They're gonna sweat and saute.

- All right, you want your collards?

- Yeah, I'm ready for it.

- Go ahead.

So they'll saute around for a second.

I like to let them get super bright green, it helps them preserve a little bit of that texture.

- But I think you're absolutely right that coating them in that little bit of fat, maintains their integrity.

Kind of like toasting rice before we risotto.

- Now we're gonna add just a whole can of coconut milk.

- Awesome.

Just put them right in there.

- Coconut is just all throughout Puerto Rican cuisine and collards just feel like they epitomize the South.

A collard just didn't excite me as a child, but I grew to love them in the same way that I grew to love the South and grew to claim it.

And feel just as home there as I felt in Puerto Rico when I would go back and forth.

So it just felt right.

- It's beautiful.

- Thank you.

- So now we'll add our soy sauce.

We can start with about a tablespoon.

- The combination of this umami soy, really creamy coconut milk, kind of fools you that it's vegetarian.

- Very good.

I want a bowl.

- Nice work.

- Thank you.

- So here's what you'll do.

I'm from North Carolina and my green is collards.

That's it.

- Oh, okay.

Okay - Rewind.

- We start?

- Yes, ma'am.

- Hi.

I'm Malika, I'm from India, I'm a Hindu and I love this green.

[upbeat music] - I'm from Bhurma, my green is scallion.

- I'm from Nashville, Tennessee.

My favorite green is collard greens.

I like to eat it because I'm from the South.

- I'm from Myanmar, this is my green leaf.

- I'm from Afghanistan and my favorite green is spanish.

- I'm from Nigeria and my favorite green is cabbage.

- My favorite green is spinach.

- I'm from Vietnam, and this is my green sweet potato leaf.

- I'm from Bangladesh.

And my favorite leaf is, this is called [speaks in foreign language] - I'm from Flowery Branch, Georgia.

And my favorite leafy green is spinach.

- They're green.

That makes it look like leaves.

I like it.

I like it.

- My grandmother used to make turnip greens and like them things banging.

They just good.

- It's good and I love to munch it.

- Now I'm headed with bond to DeKalb County outside Atlanta.

- Okay.

How do I look?

- You look great.

- You look great.

- I had to get a bag.

- Yeah, yeah, yeah.

That bag is cute.

- So this is it, huh?

- Sure it is.

And I love that it's called "Your Dekalb Farmer's Market" Belongs to you.

Because I've moved so much in my life, I don't have a lot of places that feel like home.

Welcome to one of my favorite places on the planet.

[gentle music] Oh my Lord.

- I know.

- Oh, wow.

Beautiful.

- Yeah.

I have a sensory overload, right now.

- I bet, I bet.

So many greens from-- - So much to everything.

- So at Thanksgiving, they'll put literally just like plain flats, this high of collards, just pallets and pallets and pallets and pallets.

And they'll bring them out and in like five minutes flat just gone.

- You know the interesting thing about the way they're selling these, so gone.

This would make a perfect pot of collards because the outside leaves are tougher and more bitter and the inner leaves, are sweeter.

But farmers don't like to harvest it like this because they can just pick leaves off of the exterior, and the collard plant can keep growing and they can continue to sell it.

These are from California, clearly they don't know how to harvest collards.

- So where do you wanna go next?

- Let's further down the green aisle.

[gentle music] - Here are all the Asian greens.

- Oh, callaloos, - Which is something we eat a lot in the Caribbean, particularly in Jamaica, but baby bok choys are my obsession 'cause you can just throw them completely into a soup or something.

- They're so pretty on a plate too.

- Chive flowers, which I remember I bought once just 'cause they were so cool-looking.

- Oh that is like very oniony.

Ben and I got married in China and fell in love with gai lan and broccoli.

The leaves are like miniature collard leaves.

- Yeah, they're so good.

Not that...

Skip that one.

- This I've never seen before apparently some kind of-- - Try that.

Almost like parsley.

That's so interesting.

- Oh that tastes good.

- They're gonna charge me for all these greens am eating.

- Hi.

Can we ask you some questions?

- Yeah.

What's your favorite green that's up here?

- This one.

Look like collard green.

Onion, garlic, hot pepper.

- Delicious.

- Your making me hungry.

Where are you from?

- I'm from an Ethiopian.

- Ethiopia?

- Yeah.

- How long have you been here?

- 26 year.

- Wow.

A long time.

You live in Clarkston?

- Clarkston.

- Amazing.

Thank you.

- Thank you.

- And there's the hot bar.

- Let's go.

Check out their collard.

- Whoa, that looks really good.

- I'll try some goat stew.

Is that overwhelming?

Going in?

- Yeah.

I have bok choy, I have lentil, a doll here.

I have eggplant Parmesan.

I don't know that I've ever been anywhere that had more cultures and countries represented in food than this place.

I've read this article about Clarkston, Georgia being like the Ellis Island of the South.

- Clarkson is actually a pretty sleepy little town and you'd never imagine that there are so many different people.

It's been a refugee resettlement area for a really long time .

For a lot of different communities and obviously they feel safe and they have places like this where they can come and find all the things that remind them of home.

[gentle music] - Clarkston, Georgia has been dubbed the most diverse square mile in America.

And for good reason.

Roughly one third of the population arrived here as part of a national refugee resettlement program and they brought their cultures with them.

Opportunities to grow familiar foods can offer a sense of comfort when your entire life has been uprooted and replanted in a new place.

Hey there.

- Hey, how are you?

- I'm good.

How are you?

- I'm Robin.

- Vivian.

- I'm Halieth.

- Halieth?

- Yes, ma'am.

- Nice to meet you.

- Nice to meet you too.

- It's so beautiful out here.

- It is.

The women are out here harvesting for their Saturday farmer's market.

- Global growers network is a network of farm and garden sites and a network of growers who are primarily international farmers who have come to this country as legal refugees or as legal immigrants.

And so we partner with farmers like Halieth, who come to this country with a lot of expertise in agriculture and create spaces like this one for them to continue their identity as as farmers.

- And where are you from?

- I'm from Burundi.

- Burundi?

- Yes.

- Burundi where Miss Halieth is from, is one of Africa's smallest countries.

It's social and political unrest over the past couple of decades, forced people to flee in search of a less turbulent life.

Can I help you?

Is there a root?

- Down.

If you are looking the big one-- - Oh, yeah.

- Take it off.

And take it home for eat.

You'll be, take it off of these, see?

- Oh, wow.

You just peel it off?

- One year or two year is big one.

- A whole year?

- Yes.

- Wow, but you can pull the greens off the whole time.

- Yeah.

You be, you become tomorrow my house?

- Yes, yes.

You'll cook them?

- Yes, I show you from my house.

[gentle music] - What have we got?

What's it called?

- Mandazi.

- Mandazi.

- Doughnut.

- This is something you eat for breakfast?

- Yeah, breakfast, yeah.

- And it's made with wheat flour or cassava flour or?

- No, wheat.

- Wheat.

- Very nice.

- And Jack you are a translator, right?

- Yeah, true.

- And where are you from?

- I'm from Congo.

- And your first language is?

- My first language is Swahili, then French, Kinyarwanda, then comes English.

- My first and only language is English.

Well, feeling very inadequate.

[speaking in foreign language] - Because we consider this garden now as ours.

So we take it as we used to care for our own gatherings back home.

[speaks in foreign language] - When I want to cook I remove the leaves.

- So you cook that?

It's tender.

[speaks in foreign language] - I have plus to pound them.

- Are we gonna do that tomorrow?

- Yes.

- Where do you gonna make?

[speaks in foreign language] - I will show you.

You will like it.

- Okay good, I know.

I'm excited.

Thank you.

[gentle music] Refugees of all ages end up in Clarkston.

And these community gardens have sprouted to help families grow the foods they miss the most.

Jolly Avenue garden is another such oasis.

I'm here to meet a group of teenagers who is part of an after-school program tend these gardens.

I'm Vivian.

- I'm Htoo Meh.

- Htoo Meh.

- I'm May.

- May.

- Selly.

- Selly?

Okay, nice to meet you.

- I'm Johnny.

- Hey Johnny.

- Yeah, nice to meet you.

- Nice to meet y'all.

Tell me where are you from?

- Myanmar.

- I'm from Thailand.

- I'm from Burma.

- I'm from Tale refugee camp.

- Can we go pick some stuff?

- Yeah, sure.

- Y'all are gonna cook something for me, right?

- Yeah.

- Usually I have to do that and I'm just so grateful I don't today.

This is beautiful.

- This is the garden where we have to pick up the roselle.

- This is so fascinating.

And they've planted their whole plot with roselle.

- We're gonna pick up the roselle list.

- You're just clipping the tops off.

- Yeah.

You've planted all Roselle in here.

Why only that?

- Because in wintertime Roselle they cannot grow and so we are save for their winter time so that we can eat it.

- It must be really important in your kitchen.

- It's like a soup, the main soup side dish that we eat.

- Can you buy it in a store?

- It's really rare.

It's more fun to make your own garden.

- Absolutely.

- Yeah.

- Absolutely.

- We're going to see the peppers now?

- We're going to see the pepper for-- - Htoo Meh.

Look at all these chilies.

- The more darker the color is, it's gonna be so spicy.

- How many chilies are we putting in this?

I'm gonna need a level one dish.

What do you call this?

- We call [speaks in foreign language] in our language.

The ingredient is the bamboo shoots, the chilie and the roselles.

This is the bamboo shoots.

- Oh my word.

It's like a brain.

You've got pretty good knife skills, Johnny.

- Thank you.

What year are you in high school?

- I'm senior - You're a senior.

What are you interested in studying?

- Nursing.

- Nursing.

- And what do you wanna be?

- I wanna be a teacher.

- What about you, Johnny?

- I wanna be electrical engineering or mechanical engineer.

- I wish so much that I were better at math, but I still like count on my fingers.

You're putting oil in?

- Yeah, I put in oil.

This is Tumaric - Tumaric.

Smells good.

[speaks in foreign language] Now I can put the garlic.

- That's the garlic going in.

Those are the bamboo shoots?

- Yeah, this is the bamboo shoots.

- Those are little tiny dry chow?

I can feel the chilies in the air.

[Vivian sneezes] Excuse me.

Sorry.

What is this?

- It's MSG.

- It's MSG.

This gonna make it taste good.

Do the greens always get that soft?

- Yeah.

- It's like the greens and the onion and the garlic, all has become one thing and the bamboo shoots are kind of separate.

It's like they're almost like a sauce or there.

You gotta taste it for seasoning, right?

- Yeah.

It's not bad.

Your faces were, it is kind of spicy.

[coughs] I think it's better than y'all are letting on.

I love the texture of the bamboo shoot, how it's like a little bit crunchy.

- Okay, now it is ready, we can eat.

- Okay, let's eat.

Let's take it outside.

- Yes, let's take outside - This is pretty.

What do you think?

- It's spicy.

- Sorry that it is like, I don't know.

- It does not matter.

Look, you know about these competition cooking shows on TV?

I've been asked to be on stuff like that before and I have always said no because cooking on TV under pressure, it's very hard to do and I don't think my food would be very good.

So you did great.

- Yeah, it taste good.

- I think it tastes good, but I tastes like the tartness, the sourness of the greens.

I kinda like that.

So you're all in high school?

- Yeah.

- And it sounds like you all have plans to be either a teacher or a nurse or an engineer.

Where do you wanna do that?

- If it's possible, I'm gonna go back to my country and work for my people, yeah.

This is my plans.

- And what about you?

- When I get educated here, I wanna teach English in my country, but at the same time I grew up here, so I wanna teach here too so.

- This is kind of your home too?

- Yes.

- This is your home.

Y'all are really amazing young people.

And thank you for having me here.

- Thank you for coming.

[gentle music] What I see is that when you're forced to leave the home you know, to forge your home somewhere else, you do what you can to make the new place feel familiar.

In a lot of cases, that means you grow food to feed your homesick soul.

For some people that's roselle, for others it's cassava.

- You like it this way?

- Yeah.

- Good morning?

- Good morning.

- How are you?

- I'm good.

- Everything looks beautiful.

- Yeah.

- I'm looking forward to you cooking.

- Yes.

- You're the only one who has these peanuts that I'm seeing.

- Best deal in town.

- I've never eaten cassava greens and have no idea how something that looks to me like a leaf from a tree, cooks down into what I would call a pot of greens.

So it's garlic and green pepper-- - It's whole garlic cloves.

Roughly chop green bell pepper, and green onion.

- Green onions.

- It's getting close?

- Yeah.

I am close to finish.

- May I touch it?

- Yes.

- You're looking for like a paste?

- Only cook these.

[gentle music] - That's just water?

- Yeah.

- How long does that cook?

- Maybe 40 minutes.

- 40 minutes.

- Then you put these.

- Oh, okay.

Yes, in here?

This is seasoning.

This smells like beef boyan.

Do you cook like this every Sunday?

- Every Sunday I cook and put it in the fridge.

- We're gonna have a feast.

- What is a feast?

- A lot of different food.

- Yeah.

- And then a nap.

- Go to sleep?

- Yeah.

Can you tell me what this is?

- Is the African oil.

- And does it have like lots of flavor?

I mix for me because it's a very nice color.

- Oh yes, beautiful color.

Is this you?

- It is my mom.

- How old is your mom there?

- 100.

- She lived to be 100?

- Mm-hmm.

- How many children did she have?

- Nine.

- Nine.

Is any of your brothers or sisters in-- - America?

No, America.

It's me and my husband and the kids.

- And the grand baby?

- Number six.

- You have six grand babies?

- Here America, yeah.

- Look at that color.

So wild.

That's peanut?

- Yeah, it's peanuts.

- Okay.

What are the peanuts for?

- Need for soup for here.

- And the soup is for the cassava?

- Yeah, I cooked together the-- - Okay.

- Now we finish we put onion, green pepper and the tomato.

Peanuts.

- Okay.

Coming with the peanuts.

I'm so confused.

You're blowing my mind right now.

Why didn't you put it all just straight in here?

- Nope.

'Cause this is hot, peanuts got like this.

- Right, okay I see.

The peanuts are gonna thicken, the broth, but if you put it in there together, they will clump together?

- Yes.

- All right, I'm understanding.

There's a lot of work for this.

This is for the fufu?

- Yes.

- Okay.

I'm excited.

I've always heard about this, but I've never seen it or had it.

This is the cassava root that's dried and ground.

Sometimes we call it Tapioca flour, 'cause it feels kind like cornstarch.

So is fufu for breakfast, lunch, dinner, all?

- All day.

- All day.

Having to work hard, in there.

- Yeah.

- That's the fufu.

- Yes.

- It has a lot of structural integrity.

I'm amazed.

- Cheers.

- Cheers.

Thank you, Halieth.

- Let's cheers in Kirundi what do you say?

- It's the same.

- Cheers.

Okay.

- Take a these.

Then put in the soup, cassava and then you eat.

- That's good.

I'm so in love with these cassava greens.

They have so much flavor.

And seeing you pound it is a lot of work.

This is an amazing experience.

Thank you.

- Thank you.

[gentle music] - My friend Farhan grew up in the burbs of Atalanta, not too far from Clarkston.

He's a dentist during the week and a chef on the weekends.

Yep, Farhan's busy.

But I was able to get him to take me to one of his favorite restaurants in the area.

Hello.

- Hey, what's up.

Good seeing you again.

How've you been?

- I'm good, I'm hungry.

I've never actually had any Ethiopian food and I feel like a loser because of it.

But you can guide me.

- Oh, 100%.

We used to come here once a week.

This was like our favorite spot in college.

Hey man, how's it going?

Thank you.

We're gonna do the tibs.

Can we get the lamb, the chicken and the filet minon.

And then for the starch we gotta do the injera.

- Of course.

And then for the sides we gotta do the Gomen.

- The gomen, of course.

- Gotta do it - And if I serve on a big plate it's fine?

- Yeah, that's perfect.

That's the way to do it.

The tips are really cool.

'Cause it's almost like a little stir fry.

First time I had it, it reminded me of this dish my mom makes storing up called karai.

Most typically you'll stir fried spicy onions and peppers and mix all together.

The flavors and the spices they use in the tibs is very similar.

As soon as I had it for the first time like it just took me back home.

- Like I didn't know there was so many similarities.

- Oh yeah, 'cause Ethiopia is on the East coast of Africa and so it's neat because of the spice trade.

A lot of the spices that came over from India, always hit that area first.

And so they kind of adopted the same sort of spices and stuff that are used in a lot of Western Indian food.

Because the spices are so similar, it tastes like home.

And same with the gomen.

- What's the gomen?

- The gomen is like an Ethiopian style, stewed down collard green.

Very Southern, right?

- Yeah.

- It was just fitting 'cause we're in Georgia, - But you grew up pretty close to here?

- Yeah, so we kind of grew up all around Georgia, but I was in middle school, sixth grade and my dad's like, Hey we're moving.

So he bought an Indian restaurant, inside of a motel in Rome, Georgia.

For the first month we didn't have anywhere to live.

So we lived in the hotel.

My parents on one double bed, me and my sister end of the other Like for a month we stayed in a motel room.

That's one of the points I realized how much work it takes to get there.

Restaurant industry is really hard.

For me I didn't want that same thing for my family.

The decision to go to dental school and be a dentist was something that I thought about hard and I'll still have a couple of days a week to pursue the food interests.

But for me, I really do feel like food is my calling.

I always loved playing with people's perspectives.

[gentle music] - Oh my.

- Oh, yes.

- We need another table.

- You have the chicken tibs with awaze over here and then right here you have the lamb toast and then over here is the fray tibs, and then you have to gomen.

- So these are collard greens, cooked Ethiopian styles.

Are they collards cause we're in Georgia or like if we were in Ethiopia, would they still be the same?

- It's still the same thing.

- Really?

- Collard greens, yeah.

- That's cool.

- And the you've got some in Injera over here.

Typically you eat Ethiopian food with your hands, so you're gonna use the injera or do you like some silverware?

I can bring that as well.

- No,I'm not going down that road.

- Authentic, OG style.

- OG style, exactly.

- I guess I'm trying to make a wrap.

- I'm excited to try these collards.

- And they're like delicious.

But also-- - They're cooked perfectly-- - Cooked down the way that my grandmother would have, I guess.

Not to state the obvious, but a lot of our ingredients that we consider traditionally Southern come from Africa.

I think my mind's like kind of blown right here, I'm having a dork moment.

It's interesting to me that all the greens are something that can be cooked really quickly.

We have this tendency or desire to cook them for a long time.

Y'all make saag?

- Yes.

So saag is like, it can be almost any green.

Typically a spinach and it's just sort of like a same idea where there's garlic, ginger, coriander, cumin, a little bit turmeric and just kind of cook it down low and slow.

- The thing that I've noticed with greens, we generally have some kind of bread to sop it.

- And deliver the goodies.

- I mean that's been the really interesting part about growing up in this area, is getting to see the diversity.

But then also you kind of get to see the familiarity.

'Cause like the greens are just like Southern greens.

- That's like home.

- Just like home.

This for me is like home.

We both get a sense of home and community.

Eating food does not necessarily of our community, and I think that's really what I love and really what opened my mind up to exploring these different avenues and food.

- Yeah, there's all these common threads here.

It's wild to think about how people all over the world cook and consume greens in kind of the same way.

In the case of saag from India, Ethiopian Gomen, cassava from Burundi and Southern style collards, we all choose to stew them low, slow, and for a long, long time.

Then, we all have something starchy at the ready to sop up that slow-stewed goodness.

I have to wonder if these common threads evolved independently of one another or if they're the result of food traditions that travel around the globe and take on a new life based on the place they land.

There are a lot of cities in the American South that demonstrate this idea.

Clarkston, Georgia is certainly one.

Cary North Carolina is another.

[upbeat Indian music] Rakesh and Archna Anand used to dine in that restaurant all the time.

Rakesh is a passionate cook who for years, has promised to show me how to make a few of the things we've eaten a dinner parties in their home.

How are you?

- Good morning.

- Good morning.

- How're you?

- I'm good.

Hey, I'm Vivian.

- Manisha, I'm the owner.

- Thank you for letting us do this.

- Oh yes, we're all excited.

I love to brag about Indian food.

- Awesome.

I love Indian food and but it's so complex.

And that's what we were talking about.

The different states have different kinds of cuisines.

So we have like 14 states in India.

Each is like a different country.

Different language, different dialects, different food.

What they probably eat in their state, we don't eat my state.

- And what's your state?

- Our state is Punjab.

And yours?.

- And mine is Gunjarat.

- Gunjarat.

- I was reading about that and that's not how I would have pronounced it.

- Let's go shopping.

- Let's get some stuff.

[gentle music] - What are we making today?

- Saag paneer.

- Saag means what?

- Spinach.

- Spinach?

Is that the green that you eat?

- Yeah and it's not only just spinach, it's like three different kinds of greens.

- Paneer is?

- Paneer is cheese.

- So much stuff I know nothing about.

And now we're gonna use the fresh ginger in the saag paneer recipe.

Yes.

- We need some garlic.

- Garlic, tomatoes, jalapenos - I think I'm gonna pick up this mustard, I've been using the can.

So we're gonna give that a try today.

- Trying new stuff on me.

I'm seeing all kinds of things that I need.

- What is this?

- Manti, which is Fenugreek - Fenugreek.

- Very good digestive thing.

- So what is this?

- Fatra leaves.

- That elephant ear.

- Yeah, exactly.

We'll put chickpeas flour spice on it, roll it up and steam it.

What is this?

- Poi leaves.

That's South Indian.

This is a good aisle.

Spiced masalas.

- This is the one when I did spinach and the greens in the pressure cooker.

I'll put that in there to kind of add the flavors, yes.

So here's the paneer.

- It's like tofu.

It has no flavor on its own, but it takes on the flavor of whatever dish you're making with it.

- So you've gone through the entire store in different aisles and nothing here sold at Harris Teeter.

- No, no, that's amazing.

[gentle music] Cary, North Carolina used to be the poster child for cookie cutter suburbia.

But in the last decade, it's evolved into the most culturally diverse community in North Carolina.

In fact, the Indian population alone has quadrupled since the year 2000 growing from 7000 people to 28000 people.

People all over the state know, you want good Indian food, go to Cary.

The Anand's moved here to be part of the larger Indian community.

- Hello - Hey.

- Hello, how're you?

- I'm good, how are you?

- So we're making saag paneer, The saag typically means a combination of greens.

We are gonna have the spinach, we have the mustard.

This one actually has a combination of spices in there too.

And here's the rapini.

So this is a rapini.

And have you used rapini before?

- Oh, I love it.

- Oh, you do?

- People also call it broccoli rob - Right, exactly.

[gentle music] - Y'all both grew up in Kenya?

- Yes.

- And how did you get there?

- We can start with Rakesh's family.

Since they came in the early 19-- - 1880.

- 1880.

- Is when my granddad emigrated from India as a seven year old to work as a servant.

- Historical background, India and Kenya or East African countries were all part of the British colony.

- And the British were always looking for labor.

- I've put the spinach, the rapini, and the frozen mustard greens.

- Do you put some salt in there?

- Yeah.

Just a little bit of salt please.

And this much you should do about 10 minutes.

- While that's going, I'm gonna put the Indian Holy Trinity together-- - Onions, and garlic, and ginger.

- This is the sauce that's going to go into that.

Then it's gonna cook for three hours or so.

- Talking about killing the green vegetables?

- Seriously.

- I'm glad to know that we're not the only ones who cook greens to death.

Then how did you meet?

- We were always told love comes after, first you commit and then love grows.

I was like, okay mom.

- Sure.

- You get married, then you have kids and then you fall in love.

- Rakesh and I were introduced-- - Few days and then one evening I asked her out.

- And he was just - No.

- No, I'm kidding, exactly.

Needless to say one date and guess who proposed?

- One date?

- One date.

- Yes.

And guess who said yes?

[gentle music] - I've already got ginger ready.

And this is a butter cup.

- That's a lot.

- It is.

- It's a heck of a lot.

So we're just gonna let them cook a little bit.

It's all nicely caramelized and you see that.

- That looks great.

- And in here now, is coriander powder.

Your choice for the wusses paprika, for the adventurous adventure.

You add tomatoes and the cheese.

- Green's cooked to death is a very distinct smell.

- We're gonna put it in the food processor for killing the greens.

Another step, right?

- It's literally like a paste.

- How are our spices doing?

'Cause I think they're ready to go in here.

So there we go.

And we're gonna let it cook now for three to four hours.

- The saag's been cooking for,three to four hours.

And we're gonna go ahead and put the paneer in.

That'll take on the flavors of the saag while it's marinating.

And I'm gonna let it still cook for another few hours.

- This ends up being a very rich-- - And a tedious, process.

- Yeah, of like all day.

- Yes.

- Well let's eat it.

- Let's do it.

- Is it good?

- It's good.

- It's letting it cook, and letting all the spices just blend.

- I've never paid so much attention to it.

Thank you all so much.

Cheers.

This has been just the most fun.

[gentle music] - Hey.

- Hi, mom.

- I'm here to pick up my greens.

Is Warren in yet?

- No, we're waiting on him.

- Okay.

- If it's all right, can I wash your greens and cook them?

- That will be wonderful.

- Oh look, Miss Lily's here.

- There you go, there you go, there you go.

- Let me ask you this.

What's your favorite type of green?

- A collard.

- You like the collard?

- I like the collard.

- And you cook them with what?

- Smoked meat.

- I eat the ham hocks, smoke.

- I've got a ham, I'm doing it right.

- See ya.

- It's very nice to see you.

Love you.

- Smells good.

- How does that look to you, Warren?

It looks wonderful.

- Life is like a big pot of slow stewed greens.

It melds and evolves over time.

Its texture changes, but its character and flavor are defined by what's in the pot.

I want good stuff in my pot.

You want a little bit?

- Just a little bit.

- It's delicious.

- It's good?

- The greens are very good.

- Thank you.

- To order some more South on DVD, visit shopPBS.org This program is also available on Amazon prime video.