Fried Chicken Beard Award

With the closing of Nana's, and several years since Magnolia Grill closed, I have taken note of this shift away from white tablecloth restaurants and towards a culinary approach to traditional American Soul Food.  Franklin's BBQ won best chef in 2015, Rodney Scott won in 2018, along with a pastry win for Dolester Miles of Highland Cafe who makes traditional Southern desserts like Peach Blueberry Cobbler.  Some might say this turn began with David Chang winning Rising Star chef in 2007 (also nominated in 2006) with his ramen revolution.  Whatever the case, we are seeing a sociological shift here where once eating out was rare and mostly for the rich.  Culinary students were taught how to prepare charcuterie and foie gras with the expectation of working in a fine dining restaurant.  The restaurateurs of today are not opening fine dining restaurants - those are only for the super-wealthy (e.g. Alinea, Eleven Madison Park).  Restaurateurs of note are opening fried chicken spots and pizza joints. 

I think the takeaway from this is that good fried chicken is just as exalted as foie gras.  Fried chicken will never be refined (your fingers will still be greasy at the end), but diners now recognize the difference between KFC and something they are going to pay $16 a plate for.  They are not only purchasing the dialed-up, dialed-in comfort food, but they are enjoying it more than a stuffy meal that demands a jacket, tie, and certain degree of etiquette.  American foodways have experienced a seismic shift in the years since Iron Chef began on the Food Network.  New culinary celebrities are democratizing the food landscape and making room for ethnic food stars that previously only cooked in the shadows of restaurants like Nana's.  We are "enlightened" now to the use of local ingredients.   At the same time large swathes of North America still eat highly processed foods from big box store corporations.  Will the foodie revolution trickle down the demographic ladder as the soul food revolution has trickled up, or will the whole thing look in retrospect like Elvis appropriating an entire musical blues genre without apology, reference, or footnote?