Announcing “Hot Mix” An Exploration of South Side Foodways

 

Fall 2012, Chicago:

 

Eric May and E-Dogz Center for the Preservation and Advancement of Street Food Present:

 

Hot Mix:
An Exploration of South Side Chicago Foodways

 

When asked where I am from I typically say “the South side”. This is not an entirely true statement, which I usually get called out on in the company of folks that grew up on the right side of the city border. And please don’t ask me which baseball team I followed as a kid… To my credit, I did grow up just about 6 miles from the city limits and I do have deep south side roots-  my great great great grandmother remembered the days of Pottawatomie traders landing in their canoes on the beaches south of Roosevelt Rd- an area at the time that “was wooded and provided good hunting”.  These days, you just don’t meet many south siders (or south suburbanites for that matter) outside of the south side, so what’s wrong if I flaunt pride in my heritage for the sake of visibility for a region that my family has called home for five generations. I could romanticize the no- nonsense, working class earnesty of the folks that generally hail from the area. But the south side is more complicated than that- its narrative is also one of segregation and prejudice- a site of shifting cultural populations that haven’t always behaved so neighborly. That said, sometimes wonderful things result from cultures rubbing up on one another and the clearest demonstration of this cross pollination can be found in food traditions. The south side has produced iconic foods that have been born of cross- cultural exposure. Take the Chicago style hotdog for instance- a product of that great egalitarian, entrepreneurial breeding ground, the Maxwell Street Market. Built on a Hungarian spiced, kosher all beef sausage, a canvas to which Jewish vendors contributed mustard and pickles, Greeks added tomato, while the relish has English origins, and the sport pepper was brought up from the south during the Great Migration. Food traditions such as this are evidence that the south side truly has its own unique hybridized culture.

This fall in a series of events staged at Chicago cultural institutions, I will be navigating through the foodways of the South Side of Chicago attempting to celebrate and unpack the cultural lineage of these great food traditions. A calendar of events follows below. More programming may be added in the later months of the fall, so please stay tuned!

 

August 19th- November 11thHot Mix at Ground Floor at the Hyde Park Art Center. This exhibition will be the main site of Hot Mix with an installation of original artworks in the gallery and a regular schedule of E-Dogz programming happening in front of the Art Center. The opening exhibition on September 23rd from 3-5 pm will feature E-Dogz serving a menu of Chicago street food classics. E-Dogz will keep regular hours serving street food classics and mongrelized creations onWednesdays, Fridays, and Saturdays from noon to 3 beginning September 19th, through November 10thPlease note, E-Dogz will not be serving October 26th- 27th. A publication of interviews, essays, recipes, maps, and other ephemera will be available at the opening exhibition and onward. More info here: http://www.hydeparkart.org/exhibitions/

5020 South Cornell Avenue  Chicago, IL 60615 (773) 324-5520

 

September 14th, 5- 7:30 pm: A Real Mutha For You at the Afterimage exhibition opening at the Depaul Art Museum. E-Dogz takes a ride north of Roosevelt to serve an original creation, the “Real Mutha For Ya” an Italian beef Mother-in-law. The Mother- in- law is a Chicago style tamale (a factory produced Mississippi style, made with corn meal and ground beef) smothered in chili nestled in a hotdog bun, optionally dressed as a Chicago style hotdog. The Real Mutha For Ya will be a Mississippi style tamale stuffed with home made Italian beef in a bun covered in chili and giardiniera. An original artwork will be on display in the museum as well through Nov. 18th. More info here: http://museums.depaul.edu/exhibitions/upcoming/

935 W Fullerton Chicago, IL 60614 (773) 325-7506

 

October 14th, 1-3pm: Gringo Authenticity. E-Dogz will be serving up Americanized Mexican cuisine with family and friend’s recipes from my childhood. At Hyde Park Art Center.

 

Hot Mix is a name with twofold references: On one hand it represents my deep love of Chicago house music, another great south side cultural tradition. The Hot Mix 5 were a DJ crew of the 1980’s who played DJ sets on “Saturday Night Live A’int No Jive” on WBMX. Hot mix is also the name for a delicious fresh giardiniera produced by Pop’s Beef, where I ate my first and subsequent hundreds of Italian beefs during my childhood, always topped with “hot mix”.

 

E-Dogz operates as a non-profit business model, with foodstuffs available for reasonable donation charges. Proceeds are re-invested in the project.

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