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Paul:

We all have dishes that anchor us, recipes that carry stories, flavors that connect us to people and places we can't get back to any other way. In the South, food isn't just sustenance, it's memory, it's heritage, it's the way we show love and claim belonging. And certain dishes, certain traditions, they're more than meals, they're an inheritance.

Hey, it's Paul Wolf, with a front-row seat to conversations on culture from Jackson, Mississippi. We call our podcast Soul Sessions. It's the people, places and events that make the City with Soul Shine. On today's show, we're talking about Southern food traditions with two women who are keepers of those traditions in very different ways. Chef Enrika Williams trained at a culinary school in Atlanta and came home to Jackson, the city that's always felt like endless possibilities for her imagination and creativity.

She's honoring the matriarchs who taught her while bringing her own vision to dishes she grew up with. And Glenda Cage Barner opened Sugar's Place on West Griffith Street with her son, Chef Donovan Barner, in 2008. Named for her mother, Velma—everyone called her Sugar—the restaurant feeds everyone from law students to judges, bringing people together over soul food. One honors tradition through intentionality and ritual, preserving her grandmother's techniques. The other carries forward her mother's spirit of feeding everybody, calling it her ministry. Both understand that soul food is never just about what's on the plate. It's about healing, memory, and love made visible. Let's start with Chef Enrika Williams.

You grew up in Jackson and you trained in Atlanta and then you came back home. What pulled you back here? What does Jackson mean to you as a place to do the work you do?

Enrika:

I don’t think of it as a pullback because even when I went to culinary school, I was always visiting home. Growing up, born and raised in West Point, and then I moved here when I was 10. Even in that process, I spent a lot of time in Jackson. So I was always looking for a reason to visit and come home to Jackson. But the thing that really just solidified it for me was when Craig Noon was looking for chefs to open Parlor Market a very long time ago. And I met Craig Noone. I came in for the interview actually from Atlanta and I thought it was going to be a long drawn out process and I had some time to continue to live in Atlanta but it was an immediate like, ‘Okay, so when can you come home?’ And so after that I made my way back home. Jackson for me has always been a place of exploration. I went to elementary school here and I went to APAC when it first started at Bailey Alternative.

And I just always saw the arts and I always saw possibilities of things. My cousins lived here and there were so many things to do. So my experience of being here in Jackson, people, the legacy and the history, even as a kid, you don't think about legacy and history, but it was just always something about Jackson that felt like home to me. It was just always like endless possibilities. So my imagination and my creative self have always just felt connected to Jackson.

Paul:

Chef, I know, training can take you really deep into technique, but there's another kind of culinary education that happens in the family kitchen. What did you learn there and who taught you?

Enrika:

I come from a family of people who are great at eating, great at cooking and great at growing things. I think I inherited two of those traits, the growing things I'm still learning. And I just, I saw how food made people feel. I saw how food made a difference and it was never like an it was never the idea of food had to be fancy in order for it to taste good and to be good for you. A lot of times it was the company that came with feeding the people and also just the sense of community like food to me is it's a healer it's a healing thing. I always just saw how people felt around food, you know, how they would relax. Or even if it was for, you know, a sad occasion, a funeral or, you know, for a repast or someone was ill or something. I just always saw that whenever somebody needed something, food was not far behind in providing some sort of comfort. So I just grew up with it. And seeing people take great care with that was just always. Something that I was never far from. didn't have to like find food. think I was just like born into it. I just, I just want, was born into a family in a place where that was just part of the way that you love. That was part of the light, the love language.

Paul:

Yeah. There's a history there and soul food itself carries such a history and you you're going way beyond recipes when you talk about soul food. So when you're cooking the dishes in the soul food genre, what kind of weight does that carry for you? What does it mean to you personally to be working in the soul food traditions?

Enrika:

It doesn't require a lot of thought to be intentional. And what I mean by that is, is that, I think that people associate soul food as meaning that it's, just something that's just put together and is heavily seasoned. me, soul food is the ritual of preparing food, a dish that then turns into this healing, this self. so, food, for me, can be many things. Soul food is a dish that my friend may prepare because she knows I like this thing. And she took her time and care to provide it and to cook it for me. That's soul food. Honoring the recipes of my grandmothers and the ways and the techniques that they prepared the food.

Even the way they stock their pantry, I still use ingredients and I source ingredients that they use that I remember seeing in their cabinets. To me, that's like, it's an honoring. It's like my, I'm obligated. I am, that's my responsibility to preserve those things that are special to me in food ways. And a lot of times, you know, food and recipes are either wrote down very hastily or they are what they like to call oral tradition, which is, they, they tell, but a lot of it is just being present. And whenever I get to replicate that, feel like I am honoring my family. I'm honoring my, I'm especially the matriarchs of my family in the ways that they did to provide and nourish people with the food that they prepared. So that's what soul food is for me. You've described food as something that can break down barriers.

Paul:

So what have you seen food do for people in your work and in your life that nothing else could possibly do?

Enrika:

I think breaking down barriers is such a heavy lift for something that is so sustainable. What I can say is that food makes people talk. It brings up conversations. It brings up memories and recall. It gives you an opportunity to honor to remember. And I think a lot of times what gets lost in traditions, in family traditions, in oral traditions, in food traditions, is that a lot of those things get lost in translation because people don't preserve them by archiving it, by writing it down, by telling a story of it. So I think that what food has done for me and as it does, it's a way to express it and it's a way to honor. I love where I'm from, I always have. I love being Southern. I love being country. I love being a Southern, rural, Black woman, right, and coming from that legacy and what that looks like for me. But I'm also a child of the 80s. So I grew up with all of the pop culture phenomenon and the things that form our pop culture now. Videos, music videos, CDs, DVDs, movies, like all of those things. It brings about conversations and this perspective and lens.

So I would say it shifts the lens because a lot of times people just get a narrative from a particular perspective of food and they assume that that's going to cover all the bases. But food is so broad and Southern food traditions is so broad. And then there's just so many caveats to that that needs a perspective.

And so what I love about food and the way that people are preparing and talking about it is that they're starting local. They're starting in their homes. They're starting with their families. They're starting with traditional things. And then it's going out. I think that people are starting to understand the connectivity of food and also the bigger picture of food, like, you know, food accessibility and being mindful of where we get our food from the way that you know, kitchen culture is paying homage to people who created these things and making sure they get their just do those are things that I think are doing great strides to break down the barriers.

Paul:

What do you want people to feel when they eat your food?

Enrika:

Besides full? I want them to feel heard. I want them to feel visible. I want them to feel something, anything that makes them either good or uncomfortable. If it makes them feel uncomfortable, sit with that. Why is that uncomfortable? Is that something that has been put upon you or is that something that you have put out to others in regards of how you're receiving the food? I love the idea of people in their recall and I'm the most affected and it makes me the most full and the most emotional. When people directly tell me something about a dish or something that I've prepared and it reminds them of a family member. And then they all tell me the story of a thing. And most of the time it's a very small thing. It's a small ingredient or a small, you know, just a very small technique and it just takes them back there. And for people to share that intimacy with me, most of the time people...

For whatever reason, when they talk to me, they always lead with how the food made them feel. For the most part, people want to be a part of something. They want to be able to connect over the things that matter to them and how they feel and what is important to them. It's just that reminder of how much bigger the work is outside of just preparing a meal and people eating it. just...you take it serious. I mean, you know, it's is food is not serious, but you take what people in their feelings and their things that they're sharing. You take that seriously and you take care of it. So it's very personal for me. It's very intimate the way that I want people to feel and they can take that and share that with someone else.

Paul:

Chef Enrika Williams, honoring her grandmother's techniques, understanding that soul food is ritual and intentionality and creating dishes that make people feel heard, that bring up memories and stories they need to share.

There's something about what Enrika does that's rooted in preservation and perspective, honoring the matriarchs while understanding the bigger picture of food and making sure the people who created these things get their due.

But there's also something powerful about the daily practice of feeding people, about opening a restaurant that becomes a gathering place, about naming it for your mother, making sure her spirit lives on. That's the work Glenda Barner has been doing for almost two decades at Sugar's Place.

Glenda, you've built something really special. Sugar's is a place where people can get together and eat food and food is the part of routines and rituals. So is it everything you imagined it would be? Has it turned out the way you've hoped it would?

Glenda:

It certainly has and more than I could have ever imagined. When we moved in, our primary customer base was the MC Law students, which are right across the street. We knew that that would be a good fishing pond for us because those children love some homemade macaroni and some chicken tenders.

And then as we were there longer, we spread it to the four corners, which encompass the Robert E. Lee building, the Department of Education, MDOT, and the Department of Corrections, all of those state employees found us. And we're only one block over from the federal building. And then we're within walking distance of downtown the courthouse and the district attorney's office and those places. And they all find their way to Sugar's. And as well as Jackson Police and the Sheriff's Department, they all patronize Sugar's.

Paul:

You said your mom taught you about cooking and she was really integral into that learning process. What did that teach you about how soul food is supposed to be and, what it's supposed to do for people?

Glenda:

Soul food is supposed to make you feel good. I mean, it, it feeds the soul. Food is very spiritual. Also, I love it. Enrika said breaks down all barriers. At Sugar’s, we have a table in the middle of the room called the community table. At that table on any given day, you'll find doctors, lawyers, Indian chiefs, students. I mean, they all sit there and they commune and they talk and they enjoy the food. Food is the great uniter. We forget about race, class, creed, color. We just enjoy some good food.

Paul:

You're talking about how food breaks down barriers and unites cultures and unites people. What is it about food that does that? I mean, what is it about food that brings people together in general?

Glenda:

I think it's because when you're enjoying a good plate of food, nothing else matters. I mean, it doesn't matter where you came from, who you are. It's, we're just enjoying some good collard greens and macaroni and cheese and some yams and fried catfish and baked chicken. And, you know, you start a conversation about the food and then it leads to where you're from and who your people are and you know, that kind of thing. So guess it's just a, it's just a good feeling. You forget all that other stuff around you and enjoy just a good meal.

Paul:

Talk to me about your location there across from MC law. It's a good central spot, but have you ever wanted to be anywhere else or has it always been the place where you felt like sugars should be?

Glenda:

Well, no, we really need to enlarge with our catering business. It has grown exponentially. I mean, we started out doing small catering jobs, 30, 40, 50, and now we feed up to six and 700 people for Nissan. So we need a much larger kitchen. And we actually did purchase a property on Medgar Evers Boulevard with the intention of that being our catering kitchen. But we have not made that foray into making that happen yet. We've had the plans drawn up. And when the process of looking at some contractors to maybe make that happen. So that is really something that we're looking at possibly getting into in the near future. And maybe downtown, because downtown is about to explode. I know when our new Mayor got elected, his mantra was, ‘The time is now,’ but now it's ‘Jackson's Rising.’ And we hope to rise with it.

As a matter of fact, when I came to the Farish Street area, me being a child of the 50s, my parents shopped for our clothes. You know, back then it was segregated. So we were restricted to shopping downtown on Farish Street because a lot of those stores, you know, we still weren't welcome in.

But I remember going down there shopping groceries with my parents and buying clothes and all that. So when the opportunity came up to be in the Farish Street District, That was really exciting for me because I remember so very well, you know, being down in that area. And I wanted to be a part of the revitalization. That was all the talk back in 2007 was we're going to revitalize Fair Street. We're going to be, I said, Oh, I want to be a part of that. And after being there about seven or eight years, I realized that it wasn't about to happen right now. And I had to unhook my style from theirs and rise alone. And that's kind of what I've done now.

Funny enough here all these years later, I'm serving on the historic Farish Street board. And I'm back in the throes of revitalization. The JRA has taken on that task and they have some great plans. So hopefully we're going to see some new changes and stuff coming for the Farish Street area pretty soon.

Paul:

Let's look at food as kind of a core memory maker. I know that when I was growing up, when I was a child, if I brought home a bad grade or somebody picked on me that day, it was like, let's make you something good to eat to make you feel better. If I won an award or I was really happy, like let's celebrate, let's eat. So food is kind of a uniter of everyone and everything, isn't it?

Glenda:

It is. And I'm glad you used that word celebrate. We learned years ago, Donovan and I realized after we got into the restaurant business that we had been caterers all our life because all the family reunions, my mom had 15 siblings, my dad had nine. I have 120 first cousins. So when we get together, it's the time and it's always centered around food. I mean, just fish fries, barbecues, soul food spread. It's just what we do to celebrate. And like you said, with graduation, what do we do? We go out to eat. With baby showers, we go out eat. There's a whole culture centered around baby shower food. Baby shower food used to just be whatever, but now there's certain things you have to have for a baby shower. And of course, there's wedding food, and there's funeral repasses, and just all kinds of celebrations that center around food. And it makes you feel good because at a repass you're hurt because you've just put away your loved one, but you come back and you get that fried chicken, that potato salad, those collard greens, and you forget about who you just buried for a little while and enjoy the family that's present with you.

So it's about being present in the moment and enjoying the good times together.

Paul:

Glenda, the food culture here in Jackson, Mississippi, you know, people say we are a well-kept secret, and we have a little bit of everything, but sometimes people think Southern food is just chicken and macaroni and cheese, but you've experienced more than that, especially in your time working downtown. You've just seen the food scene absolutely explode, right?

Glenda:

It has. And even just right now on our Capitol Street, we've got the Mayflower that's been there forever and two days. Wonderful seafood. Then you move down the block, you've got Ray’s Barbecue on the other end. And then you have the Subway in the, I think, the Regions Building. And then you have Names and Faces with the great appetizers and wings and or Philly cheesesteaks and things. So just up and down Capitol Street in the last, I'd say the last three years, the food scene has changed so much because downtown there wasn't a whole lot at one time. And now it's really, really changing.

And Capitol Street is really, really coming back. It used to be a food mecca back in the eighties and nineties when I started at the phone company the day after the Easter flood of 1979. Back then there were all kinds of restaurants downtown. And then in time that faded away, but now it's coming back. And it is so important. And here in Jackson, we have a foodie group that has over 20,000 members in it. And we're very active and we go out and we eat and we review each other and we support each other. And there's Indian food, there's Italian food, there's soul food. I mean, Mexican food. There's just, I mean, a plethora of things to eat in Jackson.

Paul:

You've been doing this for almost two decades now. So what keeps you in the kitchen? What is it about feeding people that still matters to you?

Glenda:

You want to make a difference. Like I said, in our area where we are, it's almost a food desert. Now, fortunately, in the Fair Street area where we are, we have a big apple land that's been there forever. Johnny T's is now there. The Fair Street Burger Place is there. But with that being said, I think it's pretty much just the four or five of us in that little two-block radius. So there's still so much more that can be added and that's coming with this new Farish Street revitalization. But it means a lot to me because I know I make a difference. People don't have to travel far. Like the people at the Federal Building and the people at MDOT and MDE, you know, they can just walk down. So I'm glad that I'm within walking distance and people come to us for breakfast and lunch and some of us pick up a dinner plate at lunch. So I know that we're making a difference and that has been a whole lot to me in that area.

Paul:

Chef Enrika Williams and Glenda Cage-Barner at Sugar's Place, two women carrying forward the culinary traditions of Black southern cooks who came before them. Grandmothers who taught them that food is a love language, mothers who fed everybody. Both understand that soul food is ritual and healing. It's the way you stock your pantry with your grandmother's ingredients. It's taking time to prepare something because you know someone likes it. It's collard greens and macaroni bringing people to the same table. That's tradition. That's inheritance. And that's what Enrika and Glenda are keeping alive. Not just the recipes, but the spirit behind them.

Food lovers, JXN Food & Wine is March 20th through 22nd, and we'd love to see you there. The event will feature chefs from around the city, state, region, and country showcasing the best in food and beverage over three days. You can get your tickets now. We'll have links in our show notes to this and to Chef Enrika Williams and Sugar's Place at visitJackson.com/soulsessions.

This podcast is produced by Visit Jackson, the destination organization for Mississippi's capital city. Our executive producers are Jonathan Pettus and Dr. Ricky Thigpen, and I'm our managing editor. You can learn more about all of the great things happening in Jackson at our website. It's VisitJackson.com.

I'm Paul Wolf and you've been listening to Soul Sessions.

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