The flavors of Juneteenth are as vast as Boston’s African diaspora

“There is no vacation just for African Americans, or just for Africans, or just for the Caribbean, because at the end of the day, we are all connected,” said Asim Shakur-DuVall, director of coffee and catering to Nubian Markets, a Roxbury grocery store focused on Black diaspora cuisine. “It’s better to share our culture with each other and expose each other to different experiences.”

Juneteenth commemorates June 19, 1865, the day slaves in Texas learned of their freedom. The order issued by Union Major General Gordon Granger abolished slavery in the country, excluding tribal reservations.

The celebration evolved from solemn commemorations to light jubilees, from small religious gatherings to parades of thousands. On Saturday, Bostonians gathered in Hyde Park for the fourth annual Juneteenth Joy celebration, and Embrace Boston kicked off its four-day Embrace Ideas Festival on Tuesday with an awards ceremony, panels and a block party at multiple locations from the city.

But for most of the holiday’s short history, what has remained relatively static is the food people eat: barbecue, watermelon, and red drinks, red-hued goods that represent the bloodshed of the Enslaved Americans, said Adrian Miller, a Denver-based soul. food specialist and author of “Soul Food: The Surprising History of American Cuisine, One Plate at a Time.”

In recent years, however, food enthusiasts have said that 2020’s “racial reckoning” and federal and state recognition of the holiday brought Juneteenth into the mainstream and pushed new generations people to include this day in their list of annual jamborees. – and bring their own food to the table.

“The blacks of Boston: they are Puerto Rican, they are Haitian, they are Jamaican. It’s a place of immigration,” added Jumaada Abdal-Khallaq Henry Smith, co-chair of the Boston Juneteenth Committee, which is coordinating a flag-raising ceremony. and parade in honor of the holiday Wednesday in Roxbury.

Shakur-DuVall’s earliest memories include her mother’s rich macaroni and cheese. He remembers joking with his family as they broke collard greens from their sturdy stems and placed them in cold water in preparation for the next potluck.

“Food has always been about family and fun,” Shakur-DuVall said. “Picking collard greens from the stem is something so simple, but it shows how food can really bring people together.” »

Shakur-DuVall’s family encouraged culinary exploration, so her table was covered with dishes from different corners of the world.

“With all the different cultures, all the different types of cuisines, you might as well try something new,” he said.

Shakur-DuVall translates his philosophy into his vision of Juneteenth, a holiday he admits he didn’t know much about until he did some research in the quiet of the pandemic. If chosen as chef for a Juneteenth feast, he would cook “comfort food,” which could mean his mother’s creamy macaroni. Or, for one of Nubian Markets’ many customers, a hearty lamb stew with injera flatbread.

“It just shows the beauty of the African diaspora and the culture that they have,” Shakur-DuVall said.

For Gaitskell “Chef Gates” Cleghorn Jr., his palette was shaped by two pieces of the diaspora. He watched his African-American mother knead and roll her famous cinnamon roll dough and grab a piece to mold with her little hands when she wasn’t looking. Or he relished the few days his Jamaican father made homemade beef patties, because the difficult process of preparing the dough made them an occasional treat.

But there were also influences from outside the diaspora; When his military family was stationed in Germany, he could “smell the fresh bread coming from down the street.”

Such an education laid the foundation for Cleghorn’s current role as a culinary instructor at the Cambridge School of Culinary Arts. and founder of Delectable EATS, a company that provides catering, community outreach and educational services.

For the holidays, he prepared two versions of candied yams. This, he says, shows how African slaves, not finding the yams they were accustomed to on their native continent, substituted the North American sweet potato as a viable alternative. The main dish would be jerk chicken, which gets its unique marinade and cooking method from the exchange of African slaves and indigenous peoples on what is now Jamaica.

“It will give an outlet and an opportunity to tell a story and connect food to culture,” Cleghorn said.

Similar to Shakur-DuVall, Cleghorn’s knowledge of Juneteenth is new, but he sees its growing popularity as a positive sign.

“It’s better representation. For me, it’s awareness,” Cleghorn said. “Awareness of our history here and awareness of our history here in Boston.”

Unlike Shakur-DuVall and Cleghorn, Glorya Fernandez’s experience with Juneteenth spans decades. Fernandez, a Cambridge native, moved to Roxbury in the ’90s and began attending Juneteenth barbecues at nearby Franklin Park. Plates included the standard African American barbecue, served with maybe a side of Haitian rice and peas.

“You can travel with the world and it’s just the same food piled into something else,” she said.

Fernandez, who has Bajan, Cape Verdean and African-American roots, has fond culinary memories of her aunt who “could make spam taste like steak” and “make liver melt in your mouth.” But there are also heavy ones, of her mother drowning her sorrows in tubs of ice cream, and of her family members battling cancer and diabetes because of what she thinks was a poor diet.

“There’s a lot of work to be done, so I’m taking this opportunity and working with organizations like the Sierra Club, the Farmer’s Market and, in this position at the library, to inspire people to investigate nutrition and food properties that they that we ingest,” said Fernandez, who is the Boston Public Library’s first chef-in-residence as part of its Nutrition Lab initiative.

Fernandez, who started her own company, gogobytes, to provide health-conscious cooking instructions and resources to Boston residents, uses her family’s talent for preparing flavorful foods and her nutritional knowledge to prepare dishes based on plants. And that’s exactly what she’s doing for Juneteenth with black-eyed pea donuts. Grab some carrots, black-eyed peas, maybe a little sweet potato for sweetness and red chili peppers for heat, and tie it all together with flaxseed – “egg-free, dairy-free”.

Then coat it in crumbs and fry it in avocado oil, “because that crispiness just adds all kinds of heaven to your world,” Fernandez said.

Beyond bringing more nourishing foods into people’s lives, Fernandez views June 17 as a day to celebrate the humanity of Black people and their role as the “original people.”

“I’m happy to remind us of that. I’m excited to cheer us on,” she said. “And I love a good holiday, girl.”

Tiana Woodard can be contacted at tiana.woodard@globe.com. Am here @tianarochon.