X5304

Celebrity Chefs

Edna Lewis

Collins Cover Announcement

Celebrity Chefs

Edna Lewis

This amazing chef was born on April 13, 1916 in the small Virginia farming community of Freetown. She was the granddaughter of an emancipated slave who had co-founded the town. At age 16 her father died and she moved to Washington, DC and eventually New York City. After working as a seamstress and in a newspaper office, she became a cook preparing her own specialties of roast chicken and cheese soufflés.

Her café became an instant success, and it was frequented by many famous people such as William Faulkner, Marlon Brando, Tennessee Williams, Truman Capote, Gloria Vanderbilt, and Marlene Dietrich. Eventually, with encouragement and help from cookbook editor Judith Jones (who had edited Julia Child), The Edna Lewis Cookbook was published in 1972. This was followed by The Taste of Country Cooking in 1976, and that work is considered a classic study of Southern cooking.

Edna's career continued into the 1990s with chef positions at several famous restaurants along the East Coast from the Carolinas to Brooklyn. My individually hand painted cachet shows her surrounded by many Southern dishes including corn bread, butter beans, green tomatoes, busy-day cake with rhubarb sauce, collard greens, sweet potato pie and, of course, Southern fried chicken with mashed potatoes. Now ready is "the South's Answer to Julia Child." Chef Edna Lewis — Collins #X5304 at $15.00.