The shoebox lunch from Beans and Cornbread. (Photo: Facebook)
A Southfield soul food restaurant is marking Black History Month with a lesson in how African-Americans were forced to eat during the Jim Crow era.
Beans and Cornbread's shoebox lunch tells the story of how African-Americans had to pack their lunches in shoe boxes when traveling throughout the south, as they were banned or refused service at white-owned establishments.
Owner Patrick Coleman tells Black Enterprise, “You could not go into the dining cars if you were on the train or pull over to a Denny’s or a Cracker Barrel and walk in… you could potentially end up getting killed.”
According to the website:
Coleman launched his “shoebox lunch” idea last February, which was a hit. “The shoeboxes were extremely popular last year,” said Coleman. The idea was so successful that he added a “shoebox lunch” to the Beans & Cornbread lunch menu back in November, which consists of southern fried wings in a decorative box commemorating black history.
The box also pays tribute to African American trailblazers and includes information about Freedom Riders and the Green Book, a guide that instructed black travelers on where to find safe havens throughout the deeply-segregated ’60s South. “It’s a history lesson [that] we call ‘lunch and learn.’”
