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2007 Burgoo Saddler Taylor University of South Carolina - Columbia, [email protected]

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Publication Info Published in New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture - Foodways (Volume 7), ed. John T. Edge, 2007, pages 132-133. http://www.uncpress.unc.edu/browse/book_detail?title_id=1192 © 2007 by University of North Carolina Press Used by permission of the University of North Carolina Press.

This Article is brought to you by the McKissick Museum at Scholar Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Staff ubP lications by an authorized administrator of Scholar Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. sian of munon is the major difference between burgoo and Brunswick . Otherwise, the nyo are quite similar, in both preparation and con­ sumption. While western burgoo recipes are distinguished by this critical difference, many of them actually in­ clude other as wel l. Some recipes call for squirrel, veal, oxtail, or , bringing to mind jokes told by stew­ masters that refer to «possum or animals that got too close to the paLM Ihe story­ telling and banter during the long hours of stew preparation are keys to strong social bonds that develop over a period of time. Kentuckians tell stories about the legendary Gus Jaubert, a member of Morgan's Raiders during the Civil War, who supposedly prepared hundreds of gallons of the spicy hunter's stew for the general's men. The origin of the term burgoo is ambiguous. Ihe term could be a cor­ ruption of the word bulghur, referring to a cereal commonly fed to 17th-century English sailors, or a deriva­ tive of the Arabic word burghu/, which refers to boiled cracked wheat. Another possibility stems from the French term ragout (pronounced ra-goo), which is a heavy soup or thick stew. Nomenclature aside, the most striking charactt:r istic of burgao remains the inclusion of sheep as the primary ingrt:dient. While sheep raising is not (om­ Burgoo manly associated with the South, both Virginia sheep stew and Ken tucky bur­ the Spanish and English brought shet!p goo are unique among southern stews to the New V·torld during the earliest in their use of mullon or lamb, hinting years of colonization. Early breeds such at the historical importance of shetp in as Native Florida and Hog Island sur­ southern culture and diet. lhe indu- vive today. Domestic sheep production

132 I! lI RGOO Cooking bu'9oo fora btntfit barbtcue sup~ron the grou nds ofSI. Thomas' Church, nN r Bardstown, K~., '940 (Marion ron Wolcott, photographer, l ibrar~ of Conil rm ·fLC ·USF33-0 3097,-M 31, Washington, D.c.) increased dramatically in the Owens­ dent than in the annual church parish boro area after high tariffs on imported picnic. During the summer, through­ sheep were established in 1816. Both out western Kentucky, no less than 36 the topography and dimate of west­ churches cook hundreds of gallons of ern Kentucky were suited for the low­ burgoo.1hese picnics serve as fund­ maintenance, grazing livestock. Able raisers, homecomings, and community to survive on the most scant vegetation festivals. Most parishes have bumper and capable of withstanding wide fluc­ sti ckers and signs proclaiming their bar­ tuations in temperature, sheep were a bewe and burgoo the region's Hfinest. M natural fit. Like other stews, burgoo is commu- Accomplished stew makers gener­ nal by nature, not only in preparation, ally are men, sometimes dubbed Qstew­ but also in consumption. Through this masters" by their peers and stew con­ sense of congregation, community stew sumers alike. The veneration of elders makers come to identify with a particu­ who carry closely guarded knowledge lar tradition and proclaim a true sense pertaining to Hsecret ingredients" and of stew ownership. special techniques is an essential part SADDLER TAYLOR of the burgoo tradition. The subsequent McKissick Museum, Columbia, variety of burgoo recipes lends itself to a South Carolina very localized sense of pride and dis­ tinctiveness from community to com­ W. E. R. Byrnt , Tale of tlrt lilk (199S); munity. [n no situation is this more evi- Claudia Rodtn, The Book ofJewi~h Food

BU'tGOO 133 (1996); Reay TannahiU, Food in History (1973); Stan Woodward, SOllthem Stews: A Taste of the SOllth (documentary film, loOl).

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