Top 20 Southern Dishes

Biscuits and gravy is a popular breakfast dish in the United States, especially in the South. The dish consists of soft dough biscuits covered in either sawmill or meat gravy, made from the drippings of cooked pork sausage, white flour, milk, and often (but not always) bits of sausage, bacon, ground beef, or other meat. The gravy is often flavored with black pepper.

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Cornbread is a quick bread made with cornmeal, associated with the cuisine of the Southern United States, with origins in Native American cuisine. Dumplings and pancakes made with finely ground cornmeal were staple foods of the Hopi people in Arizona. The Hidatsa people of the Upper Midwest called baked cornbread naktsi. Cherokee and Seneca tribes enriched the basic batter, adding chestnuts, sunflower seeds, apples or berries, and sometimes combining beans or potatoes with the cornmeal. Modern versions of cornbread are usually leavened by baking powder.

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Pit barbecue is a method and/or apparatus for barbecue cooking meat and root vegetables buried below ground. Indigenous peoples around the world used earth ovens for thousands of years. In modern times the term and activity is often associated with the Eastern Seaboard, the "barbecue belt", colonial California in the United States and Mexico. The meats usually barbecued in a pit in these contexts are beef, pork, and goat.

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Southern fried chicken, also known simply as fried chicken, is a dish consisting of chicken pieces that have been coated with seasoned flour or batter and pan-fried, deep fried, pressure fried, or air fried. The breading adds a crisp coating or crust to the exterior of the chicken while retaining juices in the meat. Broiler chickens are most commonly used.

The first dish known to have been deep fried was fritters, which were popular in the European Middle Ages. However, it was the Scottish who were the first Europeans to deep fry their chicken in fat (though without seasoning). Meanwhile, many West African peoples had traditions of seasoned fried chicken (though battering and cooking the chicken in palm oil). Scottish frying techniques and West African seasoning techniques were combined by enslaved Africans and African-Americans in the American South.

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Jambalaya (/?d?æmb??la?.?/ JAM-b?-LY-?, /?d??m-/ JUM-) is a Creole rice dish of West African, French (especially Provençal cuisine), and Spanish influence, consisting mainly of meat and vegetables mixed with rice. Traditionally, the meat includes sausage of some sort, often a smoked meat such as andouille, along with pork or chicken and seafood (less common), such as crawfish or shrimp. The vegetables are usually a sofrito-like mixture known as the "holy trinity" in Cajun cooking, consisting of onion, celery, and green bell pepper, though other vegetables such as okra, carrots, tomatoes, chilis and garlic are also used. After browning and sauteeing the meat and vegetables, rice is added with seasonings and broth, and the entire dish is cooked together until the rice is done.

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Key lime pie is an American dessert pie made of Key lime juice, egg yolks, and sweetened condensed milk. It may be served with no topping, topped with a meringue topping made from the egg whites, or with whipped cream; it may be cooked in a pie crust, graham cracker crust, or no crust. The dish is named after the small Key limes, which are more aromatic than the common Persian limes, and which have yellow, not green, juice. The filling in a Key lime pie is also yellow, largely because of the egg yolks.

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Red velvet cake is traditionally a red, red-brown, crimson, or scarlet-colored chocolate layer cake, layered with ermine icing. Traditional recipes do not use food coloring, with the red color due to non-Dutched, anthocyanin-rich cocoa.

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Apple butter is a highly concentrated form of apple sauce produced by long, slow cooking of apples with cider or water to a point where the sugar in the apples caramelizes, turning the apple butter a deep brown. The concentration of sugar gives apple butter a much longer shelf life as a preserve than apple sauce.

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Shortcake is a sweet cake or biscuit in the American sense that is a crumbly bread that has been leavened with baking powder or baking soda. In the UK, the term shortcake refers to a biscuit similar to shortbread. They are generally less dense and more crunchy and dry than shortbread.

Shortcake is typically made with flour, sugar, baking powder or soda, salt, butter, milk or cream, and sometimes eggs. The dry ingredients are blended, and then the butter is cut in until the mixture resembles cornmeal. The liquid ingredients are then mixed in just until moistened, resulting in a shortened dough. The dough is then dropped in spoonfuls onto a baking sheet, rolled and cut like baking powder biscuits, or poured into a cake pan, depending on how wet the dough is and the baker's preferences. Then it is baked at a relatively high temperature until set.

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Texas toast is a toasted bread that is typically made from sliced bread that has been sliced at double the usual thickness of packaged bread. Texas toast is prepared by spreading butter on both sides of the bread and broiling or grilling it until it is a light golden brown. Commonly, garlic is added to the butter, yielding a form of garlic bread. The toast may include cheese on one or both sides, similar to an open-faced grilled cheese sandwich.

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A po' boy (also po-boy, po boy or poor boy) is a traditional sandwich from Louisiana. It almost always consists of meat, which is usually roast beef or fried seafood, often shrimp, crawfish, fish, oysters or crab. The meat is served on New Orleans French bread, known for its crisp crust and fluffy center.

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Gumbo (Louisiana Creole: Gombo) is a soup popular in the U.S. state of Louisiana, and is the official state cuisine. Gumbo consists primarily of a strongly-flavored stock, meat or shellfish, a thickener, and the Creole "holy trinity" ? celery, bell peppers, and onions. Gumbo is often categorized by the type of thickener used, whether okra or filé powder (dried and ground sassafras leaves).

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Cobbler is a dessert consisting of a fruit (or less commonly savory) filling poured into a large baking dish and covered with a batter, biscuit, or dumpling (in the United Kingdom) before being baked. Some cobbler recipes, especially in the American South, resemble a thick-crusted, deep-dish pie with both a top and bottom crust. Cobbler is part of the cuisine of the United Kingdom and United States, and should not be confused with a crumble.

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Pulled pork is an American barbecue dish, more specifically a dish of the Southern U.S., based on shredded barbecued pork shoulder. It is typically slow-smoked over wood (usually outdoors); indoor variations use a slow cooker. The meat is then shredded manually and mixed with a sauce. It may be served on bread or eaten on its own.

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Pecan pie is a pie of pecan nuts mixed with a filling of eggs, butter, and sugar (typically corn syrup). Variations may include white or brown sugar, cane syrup, sugar syrup, molasses, maple syrup, or honey. It is popularly served at holiday meals in the United States and is considered a specialty of Southern U.S. origin. Most pecan pie recipes include salt and vanilla as flavorings. Chocolate and bourbon whiskey are other popular additions to the recipe. Pecan pie is often served with whipped cream, vanilla ice cream, or hard sauce.

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Cobbler is a dessert consisting of a fruit (or less commonly savory) filling poured into a large baking dish and covered with a batter, biscuit, or dumpling (in the United Kingdom) before being baked. Some cobbler recipes, especially in the American South, resemble a thick-crusted, deep-dish pie with both a top and bottom crust. Cobbler is part of the cuisine of the United Kingdom and United States, and should not be confused with a crumble.

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A hush puppy (or hushpuppy) is a small, savoury, deep-fried round ball made from cornmeal-based batter. Hushpuppies are frequently served as a side dish with seafood and other deep-fried foods.

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Chicken fried steak, also known as country-fried steak or CFS, is an American breaded cutlet dish consisting of a piece of beefsteak (most often tenderized cube steak) coated with seasoned flour and either deep fried or pan-fried. It is sometimes associated with the Southern cuisine of the United States. It is breaded and fried with a technique similar to the more common fried chicken, hence "chicken fried". When deep-fried, it is usually referred to as "chicken fried steak". Pan-fried versions are typically referred to as "country fried steak".

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Pulled pork is an American barbecue dish, more specifically a dish of the Southern U.S., based on shredded barbecued pork shoulder. It is typically slow-smoked over wood (usually outdoors); indoor variations use a slow cooker. The meat is then shredded manually and mixed with a sauce. It may be served on bread or eaten on its own.

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Mashed potato (British English), mashed potatoes (American and Canadian English) or mashed taters, colloquially known as mash (British English), is a dish made by mashing boiled potatoes, usually with added milk, butter, salt and pepper. It is generally served as a side dish to meat or vegetables. When the potatoes are only roughly mashed, they are sometimes called smashed potatoes. Dehydrated instant mashed potatoes and frozen mashed potatoes are available. Mashed potatoes are an ingredient in other dishes, such as dumplings and gnocchi.

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