Welcome to the Georgia Mountains Foodways Alliance (GMFA)
We are a statewide non-profit organization dedicated to the celebration, promotion and
preservation of the authentic food culture of the GeorgiaMountains. We are an organization of farmers,
producers, vintners, inquisitive eaters, good cooks, culinary historians,
chefs, food journalists, restaurateurs, culinary tourists, artisans and
manufacturers.
Our alliance encompasses a
field to table spectrum from agriculture to fine dining, with emphasis on all
the specialty foods, farm markets, diners and hands-on restaurants in between
that are so dear to the hearts of southerners who love fresh and local food.
The Georgia Mountains Foodways Alliance is the first association of its kind in Georgia
dedicated to the development and promotion of the local food culture and small
businesses from field to table. The Alliance identifies and nurtures Georgia's
varied community culinary heritages through education, networking, public
relations, regional cooperation and the sponsoring and promotion of local food and local wine events.
The mission
of the Foodways Alliance is to:
Serve
as a conduit for communities, towns, businesses, residents and visitors
in pursuit of authentic dining experiences that enhance the
understanding of local cultural heritages of the NorthGeorgiaMountains
Seek out and promote information and events related to
these experiences
Encourage private and public support for
educational and promotional activities which benefit local communities by
creating vibrant culinary tourism
Encourage, at all times, the use of local
ingredients and products, the preservation of local food culture identity
and the search for excellence in culinary pursuits.
Encourage the use of sustainable, organic and environmentally
practices
Linton Hopkins of Restaurant Eugene, Atlanta
The Georgia Mountains Foodways has some great upcoming events. On June 1 Chef Linton Hopkins will be in the Georgia Mountains at Glen ella Springs cooking-up some fresh and local ingredients.
Hopkins moved back to Atlanta from Washington, D.C., two-and-a-half
years ago and opened Restaurant Eugene, named after his grandfather who
was an early influence in cultivating Hopkins' love of food. Since that
time, Restaurant Eugene has been serving some of the most thoughtful,
pleasurable and lovingly prepared food to come to Atlanta in a long
time. His food recently earned him the title of Iron Chef Atlanta,
where he competed against Anne Quatrano of Bacchanalia, Gerry Klaskala
of Aria and Kevin Rathbun of Rathbun's. When Hopkins opened his own restaurant, he was very particular about
weaving his business into the fabric of the community, and one of the
keys was to connect with local farmers. "I know the farmers, and every ingredient that's on my menu, I can
tell you exactly where and who it came from," he says. "I just love
that; I love the sense of connection. And being from Atlanta, I feel a
pride and almost a duty as an adult to make it a better place, and to
highlight those people." To keep his menu as local as it is -- he estimates that during
summer months he is cooking with 80 percent local ingredients.
Are you a grower, producer, sponsor of an event, restaurant, vineyard, dairy, rancher, canner that offers fresh and local products from the North Georgia Mountains? Then let us know and we will be glad to link to you. Contact us at info@georgiafoodways.org
We will be glad to add your event or add your link to this website.
Georgia Moonshiners
What are Local and Regional Foodways?
Just how is it that particular foods become associated with particular geographic locations -- communities, regions, sections of the country, states? What is the relationship between foodways and locales? By speaking of "foodways" rather than "cuisine," we place more emphasis on those restaurants and cooks who focus on tradition rather than innovation. This is the culinary aspect of everyday culture. We also mean by "foodways" not only food, but the entire complex of ideas and behaviors centered on its preparation, serving, and consumption.
Georgia Foodways, and in particular the Foodways of the Georgia mountains, are the product of gradual development; passing food fads at a particular place and time are not regional foodways. Regional foodways are accepted by the people in that region as the natural way of food. Often regional foodways have heavy symbolic meaning and are important in marking off the social boundaries between one group of people who live (and eat) here and that other group of people who live (and eat) there.
There is nothing that all Georgians eat in common and that only they eat - or drink. Rather, Georgia foods are those of the many communities -- ethnic, occupational , local -- that constitute Georgia. What's more, state boundaries never conform to cultural boundaries. People don't stop eating grits or making Moonshine at the South Carolina border. And, no matter how closely we may associate the Georgia Mountains with Moonshine, it is really a part of the subculture of the Southern Appalachian Mountain region that extends into parts of North Carolina and South Carolina.
The Georgia Foodways Alliance considers not only the food but the entire complex of behaviors and ideas related to its preparation, serving, and consumption. Hunting, fishing, and gathering, for example, are significant social, recreational, and occupational activities and their products comprise large additions to our diets. As an important agricultural state, Georgia is thought of for many crops and farm products, including: peaches, peanuts, blueberries, melons, muscadines, chickens, pecans, shrimp, catfish, pumpkins, and a host of truck gardens and nursery products.
Culinary Tourism in the Georgia Mountains
Culinary tourism is a theoretical framework for analyzing the role of food in tourism. It refers to the "intentional, exploratory participation in the foodways of an Other." It is voluntary and consciously contains an element of curiosity—that is, people eating out of choice, not only physical need.The term "foodways" involves all the other aspects of food, referring to the network of activities and systems—physical, social, communicative, cultural, economic, spiritual, and aesthetic—surrounding the product itself: Procurement, preparation, preservation, presentation, consumption, clean-up, and conceptualization. In this sense, culinary tourism can occur in any aspect of foodways, from purchasing familiar ingredients from a new grocery store to adding exotic ingredients to a familiar recipe. It can also include behaviors connected to thinking and talking about food: collecting recipes, watching televised cooking shows or films incorporating food, conversing about restaurants, reading cookbooks and food columns, reminiscing about food experiences.The culinary other is simply anything different from the known and familiar. It can be broken into six overlapping categories. National or cultural identity is the most commonly perceived category and includes "ethnic" foods as well as "foreign" foods. Foods become a cultural Other by being placed in a context in which they are different. Thus, kimchi is standard fare in Korea, but is ethnic and foreign in the United States.
