Food Inheritance by Michelle Petty-Grue

Collard greens aren't the same without 

smoky neck bones and unctuous 

ham hocks. I've tried making them without these 

queens because I was taught from a young age that

fat would steal my crown, 

diminish my own royalty.

Fat on the body and fat in the mouth were equal 

transgressions.

Standing in my reclaimed nobility, 

I invite the collard greens back and all the "bad fat" 

foods that gained those labels for little better reason than 

Black people ate them. 

I invite back the memories of the five of us at the table, 

embodying the lyrics of that Babyface song – the simple 

times of yesterday.

Drowned out by diet culture, those collard greens tried to 

teach me and now I’m listening:

-               Eating for pleasure is more virtuous than using 

                 food to punish or alter ourselves. 

-               Eating ethnic food is good, especially your own. 

-               My diet doesn't need to be any more white than I do, and 

I don't need to be white.