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Sweet Carolina ARROW-CIRCLE-LEFT By Zella Palmer

During the pandemic, I was home gardening, writing and doing what I could — like everyone else — to keep my mind off everything that was happening in the world. To my surprise, my cousin Lisa, a lawyer in Atlanta, texted me: “I’m driving to New Orleans for a porch visit for my birthday.” I was thrilled! Finally, company (even though it was from a distance). Lisa is originally from Wilson, North Carolina, a small rural town an hour from Raleigh where my matriarchal family runs deep. Lisa has been the family historian for quite some time, finding archival articles, connecting lost relatives and lifting up the story of our mutual relative, my mother’s grandfather, Dr. Joseph Henry Ward, a Black surgeon during World War I, a Wilson native and the first African American director of a Veterans Administration hospital. I anxiously awaited her arrival. T hat morning before Lisa arrived, I received an email from Mr. Ed Mitchell, the legendary email from him. Once Lisa arrived at my home, I told her, “I forgot to tell you, Mr. Ed Mitchell’s team reached out to me requesting a meeting. They are inter ested in me telling his story.” Lisa’s eyes glistened and she said, “Answer that email now and tell them you have roots in Wilson!”

Ed Mitchell’s Eastern North Carolina whole-hog barbecue, “the last vestige of Southern barbecue,” according to barbecue historian Dr. Howard Conyers. Ed Mitchell was cooking the old-fashioned way, cooking hogs that were raised by small farmers with no frills, just generational skills; “fast and slow” was how he learned from men who were never recognized for their talent but were called to cook for every political rally or shindig since the inception of our country. Mr. Mitchell, in his signature overalls and baseball cap, invited me to pull up a lawn chair and watch him, his

Eastern North Carolina whole-hog barbecue pitmaster, requesting a meeting. I knew of Ed Mitchell from the many family trips we made to North Carolina and from his appearances on the Food Network’s Beat Bobby Flay and the late Anthony Bourdain’s A Cook’s Tour programs, but I had never officially met him. Extended family members in Wilson, North Carolina raved about Mr. Mitchell’s barbecue, so I was excited to tell Lisa about my

And so it began, the journey back to Wilson, where whole-hog barbecue is king. Of course, there are so many regional styles of barbecue that are beloved throughout the United States, from Texas brisket to Louisiana cochon de lait to Kansas City style ribs, but nothing could prepare me for

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