Southern Food and Beverage Museum

Last September, the Inn at Hunt Phelan hosted a fund-raising dinner for the Southern Food & Beverage Museum (SoFAB). While the museum, which was established in New Orleans in 2004, had a website and traveling exhibits, it never had a permanent site.

On June 5th, SoFAB will hold a grand gala celebrating the opening of its space in New Orleans’ Riverwalk Marketplace.

“I had been involved with several museum openings in New Orleans and always felt that there was a need for a food and beverage museum in New Orleans,” says SoFAB president Liz Williams. “Of course, there are museums across the country that focus on a specific food item, such as mustard or chocolate, but there is nothing like SoFAB — a museum that looks at foods we love and eat in a cultural context.”

All the museum needed to make it “real” was an exhibition.

“For our first exhibition, ‘Toast of New Orleans,’ we borrowed space in a mall. We felt that it was important to show our presence through exhibitions, and that’s how we have been operating for the past four years.”

“Toast of New Orleans,” which explored the signature beverages of the Crescent City — from chicory-spiked coffee and Luzianne iced tea to Barq’s Root Beer, Sazeracs, and Hurricanes — was followed by “Tout de Sweet,” an exhibition that focused on the story and history of sugar. More recently, the museum put on “Restaurant Restorative,” a traveling exhibition that spotlighted the rebuilding efforts of New Orleans restaurants after Hurricane Katrina.

“Although we are the Southern Food & Beverage Museum, we still have a very broad appeal,” Williams says. “We aren’t a museum where you will see replicas of food items on display. We are here to explore the impact of food on our culture, which leads to many, many great exhibition subjects. We could look at agriculture and the foodways, the history of fishing and hunting, the tradition of church and funeral dinners. The list is endless and exciting.”

The museum’s debut exhibitions at its new home include “Louisiana Eats: Laissez Faire-Savoir Fare,” “Eating in the White House — America’s Food,” and “Wish You Were Here — Postcards from the South.”

“We are really excited to have a permanent exhibit space and a place to begin our formal programming, like lectures, tastings, book signings, and demonstrations,” Williams says. “We want to grow our library and archive, and we are now in the right place to do that.”

The museum’s opening events include the grand gala on June 5th, the ribbon-cutting ceremony on June 7th, and the “Art of Taste” dinner with Jacques Puisais, the founder of the Institut du Goût in Paris, at the Mélange Restaurant in the New Orleans Ritz-Carlton on June 19th.

The museum is also offering discounted memberships until the opening in June. For more information, visit southernfood.org.

The Corkscrew, the downtown wine and liquor store, has reopened under new ownership. Hank and Barbara Cowles, who own the property at 511 S. Front (the same building that houses the newly opened Blue Monkey), felt that downtown needed a liquor store and took it upon themselves to provide their neighborhood with one.

“There was definitely a void when the Corkscrew closed,” Hank Cowles says. “We have been living downtown for a long time and felt that this area needs a liquor store.”

The Corkscrew carries about 600 wines and 500 spirits and is managed by Scott Vincent, also a downtown resident.

The store is open from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Thursday and until 10 p.m. on Friday and Saturday.

The Corkscrew, 511 S. Front (523-9389)

The Grove Grill will host a five-course bourbon dinner on Wednesday, June 4th, at 6:30 p.m. The dinner will start with prosciutto-wrapped figs and a taste of Sazerac Rye Whiskey, followed by cedar-planked salmon paired with Eagle Rare Single Barrel, a Texas Kobe beef slider paired with Buffalo Trace, medallions of venison au poivre paired with Pappy Van Winkle’s Family Reserve, and whiskey-sour ice-box pie paired with Blanton’s Single Barrel. Cost for the dinner is $55 plus tax and gratuity.

The Grove Grill, 4550 Poplar (818-9951)

Local chefs Stephen Hassinger (Inn at Hunt Phelan), Ken Lumpkin (Umai), and Ben Smith (Tsunami) will join culinary forces on June 23rd to raise money for Evergreen Montessori School. The three-course meal at the Inn at Hunt Phelan starts with champagne and hors d’oeuvres at 6:30 p.m., followed by dinner at 7 p.m. Price for the dinner is $55 without wine and $70 with wine pairing. Tax and gratuity are included.

The Inn at Hunt Phelan, 533 Beale (525-8225)

Some people eat to live.

Elizabeth Pearce, senior curator for the New Orleans-based Southern Food and Beverage Museum (SoFAB), lives to eat.

The pint-sized Louisiana native has feasted al fresco in Mexico City, hosted cookouts in Sienna, Italy, dined at the elite Chicago eatery Alinea, and eaten her way across her home state. Earlier this month, she handed out cups of red beans and rice — cooked according to Louis Armstrong’s favorite recipe — at the Cotton Museum in downtown Memphis. And next Monday, she’ll return to Memphis to host “Invitation to the Southern Table,” a museum fund-raising event at the Inn at Hunt Phelan.

“I want Memphians to feel an investment in this venue that will celebrate its food culture,” she says of the museum, which was founded in 2004 and slated to open a year later when Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans and put the physical part of the project on hold.

Although SoFAB’s doors have yet to open, the unflappable Pearce already has curated two traveling exhibits, “Toast of New Orleans: A Salute to the Beverages of the City” and “Tout de Sweet: All About Sugar,” and begun work on a third “Come Hell or High Water: Stories of Eating, Drinking, and Surviving in Katrina’s Wake.” She’s also cataloging an archive, which already includes 3,000 volumes of cookbooks and hundreds of restaurant menus from across the South. Along with a four-person staff that includes museum director Liz Williams, Pearce has planned programs and lectures promoting SoFAB’s mission to many hungry audiences.

“I am really excited about Memphis,” Pearce says. “It’s such a welcoming place, and all the food people have been so supportive. I feel like I picked the right place to start this tour,” she says of the Southern Table dinners, which are scheduled for nine more cities, including Birmingham, Louisville, San Francisco, Nashville, and Boca Raton.

For Monday night’s event, Kjeld Petersen, co-founder of the Slow Food Memphis convivium, and his wife, Edible Memphis editor Melissa Petersen, are already on board, along with Hunt Phelan chef Stephen Hassinger, who has created a special menu, including sweet-tea-marinated chicken wings, crawfish beignets, and grilled pork with chow-chow.

“It’s a pleasure to work every single night, but doing events like this is fun for everybody in the kitchen,” says Hassinger, who learned about SoFAB when he worked as a chef at Bayona and Café Degas, two acclaimed Crescent City restaurants.

“It’s important to preserve our local culture,” he adds. “Although Memphis has a sort of redheaded stepchild attitude, we have a lot to offer the food community. Sure, we’re famous for barbecue and Elvis Presley, but we’re also able to get locally grown lamb, tomatoes, corn, okra, and all-natural prime, dry-aged beef, and there’s a core group of chefs here who understand that.”

“It’s gonna be a party,” Pearce says of the event, which will feature live music, food stations, a new beer unveiled by the crew at Jim ‘N Nick’s Bar-B-Q, and a pomegranate cocktail created by the inn’s resident bartender David Parks.

Proceeds from the dinner will be earmarked for new exhibits at the museum’s soon-to-be-announced location in downtown New Orleans, current exhibits on the road, and the menu-collecting initiative, which is an integral component of SoFAB’s mission.

“My personal goal is to make sure this museum functions regionally,” Pearce says. “I hope our traveling exhibits will come to Memphis and that we’re able to partner with institutions here doing cooking demonstrations or talks, because Memphis is a vital component in this larger Southern food story.”

Pearce also hopes to collect hundreds of menus during her time here, from legendary restaurants like Justine’s, Anderton’s, and the Four Flames, as well as the multitude of contemporary dining spots around town.

“Sometimes it’s easier to understand a city by looking at 10 restaurants over a 20-year period,” she says, explaining that menus can document a region’s culinary histories and traditions, as well as its economic and cultural values. “You can see how regional and local dishes are preserved or how they’ve changed. Take grits. It’s the food of the poor, and it should cost 99 cents, but you can get grits in any fancy restaurant nowadays, too. What does that say about what Southerners are valuing now? You also have the influx of organic farms and local purveyors, which is reflected on menus that list where ingredients come from, which is another kind of a trend.

“Nothing beats meeting someone and hearing their food stories in person,” Pearce insists. “If you’re interested in promoting and celebrating Memphis’ food culture, please come to this dinner and talk to me!”