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Denise Thompson, the owner of Coopers Cookin’ and Catering in Orange, Virginia, discovered Edna Lewis, a Black American chef known for her contributions to Southern cuisine, through a customer who saw similarities between Thompson’s food and Lewis’ cooking. Despite being a revered figure in culinary circles and a pioneer in refashioning people’s perceptions of Southern cuisine, Lewis remains relatively unknown. Thompson and her cousin, Phillip Cooper, started their restaurant as a tribute to their family and decided to incorporate Lewis’ dishes into their menu as part of a menu trail commemorating her first cookbook’s 50th anniversary. Lewis’ culinary innovation stemmed from her kinship with the land and the agricultural lifestyle she experienced as a child, which set her apart from popular but limiting descriptions of Black American food as “soul food.”
