Eugene Hicks, 65, leans on the front counter of his Clarksdale, Miss. restaurant, and his elbows thud on the wooden countertop. Hicks is a large man, and his establishment, Hicks’ Hot Tamales and Barbeque Banquet Hall, is a local institution. With one meaty finger he scratches his chin and moustache, thinking. The scratching sounds like sandpaper on wood.

“I don’t rightly know, but I suppose the hot tamale came up to us in the Mississippi Delta from Mexico. At least that is how I heard it.”

When? During the Mexican-American War? Brought by returning soldiers or captured Mexicans? Migrant laborers?

Hicks raises his eyebrows. He doesn’t know. Like everyone I talked to in the area, he is not certain how the hot tamale—traditionally a south of the border food staple—traveled to the Mississippi Delta. Neither guidebooks nor history books have an answer. Not even an Internet search was able to crack this enduring mystery.

Eugene Hicks talks about his Delta tamales with great pride, but like everybody else, he can only speculate about its origins.

Whatever its origins, Delta hot tamales are now a ubiquitous presence in this land of the blues, cotton mills and southern fried everything. No matter how small or remote the town, there is guaranteed to be at least one place that serves this spicy treat.

I decided to seek out the hot tamales establishments and find out for myself, and score some samples for myself in the discovery process. Hicks’ place is my first stop in my search for the ideal Delta tamale and the roots of how the heck they got here.

Steamed chili and corn meal fill the air in Hicks’ restaurant. I order a half dozen. Traditionally wrapped in a corn husk, a hot tamale is corn meal surrounding chili sauce and meat boiled to greasy perfection. Hicks explains that while the hot tamale has only a few basic ingredients, there has to be the right mix of meat and spices.

“No one has ever told me that they didn’t like one of my hot tamales,” Hicks says. “That is, to my face.” I don’t doubt this. Hicks’ hands are the size of compact cars.

There's no argument. Hicks' hot tamales are famous.

When I’m done, I walk outside, my stomach filled and my mind sleepy. Running alongside the restaurant is the Sunflower River. The water is so still, though, that “run” is just a traditional term.

Known worldwide as simply “the Delta,” this northwest quadrant of Mississippi was an uninhabited wilderness before the Civil War. Yearly floods from the Mississippi River kept away would-be pioneers. With modern levees and dams, early settlers transformed the rich land into an agricultural bonanza. Swamps were drained and trees removed, revealing farm-friendly alluvial soil created by centuries of river flooding.

When the Delta opened up, African-Americans, Italians, Germans, French, Chinese, Lebanese, and Russian Jews flooded the land as the river had before them. The economy boomed. Huge cotton farms were built between the years 1865 and 1930. The owners became rich. The share-croppers merely eked out a living.

Hot tamale fame is everywhere in the Delta, including Vicksburg, Mississippi.

John T. Edge, director of the Southern Foodways Alliance, has researched the topic and theorizes that African-American share-croppers most likely picked up the recipe from migrant workers from Mexico some time after 1920.

Yet the Mexican tamale is a different than the Mississippi Delta tamale. Wrapping corn meal in a corn husk or corn “shuck” is standard for both, but Mexicans fill theirs with combinations of pumpkin, chocolate, meat, pineapple, raisins, vegetables and green corn to name just a few of the possible ingredients. The Mississippi Delta tamale, on the other hand, is filled only with beef, chili and spices.

Hicks: Presiding over an institution.

Barreling down Highway 61, I hear the snap-snap of insects in the 100-degree heat. Ribbons of soybeans, corn and rice spread out seemingly forever into the flat horizon. As I drive, I see surprisingly few cotton fields—the fields where Latino migrants might have once shared tamale secrets with share-cropping African Americans.

Agriculture has become mechanized and the vast cotton crop is all but gone, replaced by newer, more lucrative crops. As I drive through the tabletop vistas, I imagine that somewhere, in one of these farm fields, the Delta tamale tradition was planted alongside “king cotton.”

Plain on the outside. Delicious on the inside.

If I listen closely, I can make out the low hum of giant automated farm sprayers shooting water over the fields. Every now and then, an old moss-covered sharecropper home rots in the distance. Even less frequently, I see shacks that have been transformed into lodging for intrepid tourists.

The demise of the cotton crop led the occupants of these shacks—the African-Americans who created the blues and the Delta hot tamale—to move to large American cities such as Memphis, Chicago and New Orleans. Their remaining descendants are spread throughout the multitude of small river-hugging towns across the region.

Willie Harmon, in front of his hot tamale restaurant in Hollandale, Mississippi.

I’m driving toward one of these small towns to speak with the self-proclaimed “King of the Hot Tamale,” Willie Harmon.

Part businessman, part raconteur, and part preacher, Harmon, 64, sits across from me in the shade of the tamale restaurant he is building in Hollandale, Miss. The tiny town teeters on the brink between civilization and reclamation by Mother Nature. Many of the buildings are boarded up and abandoned.

Locals drive by in cars and call out, “Hey, Hot Tamale Man!” and Harmon gives them a slow, regal nod. He leans forward and places his hands together. The knuckles on his right hand are still crooked from a brawl at a juke joint he owned before he became a hot tamale man.

“When I was a young man I met a traveling man,” he relates. “The traveling man told me that if a man could sell hot tamales in a place where there was no hot tamales, well then, that hot tamale man could make a lot of money. I couldn’t stop thinking about how hot tamales were my future.”

Heaven in Greenville, Mississippi.

Harmon says he’s been selling hot tamales out of his car and from carts in these small towns for the past 35 years. He believes the hot tamale came to the Mississippi Delta from Mexican workers, but he doesn’t agree that the tamale is a purely Mexican dish.

“As far as I know from a Mexican up the street, Indians in Latin America made the first tamales and they were the ones who showed the Mexicans how,” he suggests. “Actually, the tamale is an Indian dish.”

Did Native Americans really make tamales? Did the recipe emerge independently of the Mexican version? I try to imagine Choctaw Indians showing Delta settlers how to make them.

“Could be, could be,” Harmon says with an uncertain shrug. Lawns and hedges are growing wild here, and sidewalks are broken. Gypsy moths have enveloped a large oak, making the tree appear as if it is covered in fog despite the bright sunshine.

Homemade signs are as authentic as the food.

I’m getting hungry again. I tell Harmon I am hunting for the history of the great hot tamale of the Mississippi Delta. He laughs and tells me his son Willie has a hot tamale stand, called “Hot Tamale Heaven,” just up the road in Greenville.

It sits amid a strip of fast food joints, between a Wendy’s and a root beer shop. I order half a dozen from Willie’s air-conditioned stand. Today, everything is locked up tight against 100-plus degree heat. No children are playing outside in the Delta summer sun.

Willie’s hot tamales are fat, and the meat is loaded with cumin and garlic. They’re delicious, but I’m on a mission. I set off for Nelson Street, in the old part of town.

The wide street once bustled with musicians, field hands, hustlers and juke joint owners. Now the juke joints are boarded up, metal bars cover broken windows, and shingles are falling from the sides of dilapidated buildings.

Doe's Eat Place, which started in Greenville, Mississippi, has been discovered and written up.

At the end of the street is a small white house; the sign says “Doe’s Eat Place.” There are Doe’s franchises throughout this part of the Deep South. But this one is the original, started as a juke joint by Dominick “Doe” Signa and his family.

Doe’s wife, Mamie, developed a still-secret hot tamale recipe, and by 1941, the couple ran a steak and tamales restaurant out of the back of the house. In those segregated times, the sit-down restaurant was only for white people. It became so profitable Doe and Mamie shut down the juke joint.

I walk into the front parlor and I see a large woman stirring a large pot on a large stove. She doesn’t want to interrupt her preparation for the evening meal by answering questions.

Cathy Wong, the manager, comes over instead and explains how her family, from Hong Kong, was friends with the Italian-American Signa family. I ask about this southern cultural mix in the south as she shows me around the living-room-like restaurant, where four women are rolling tamales by hand.

By hand, of course.

Wong, 55, explains that many immigrants—Lebanese, Italian, Chinese and Jewish—opened up shops in poor parts of Delta towns, and catered to working-class African-Americans. Since Italian and Spanish are similar languages, was it easier for Italians like the Signa family to learn the tamale recipe from Mexican workers?

Noted Mississippi Delta documentarian Amy Evans thinks the language connection is likely, although proof of the origins remain a mystery. Evans has logged many miles on what has been dubbed “The Mississippi Delta Hot Tamale Trail.” 

At Doe’s, the hot tamales have paper wrappers instead of the usual corn husks. The tamales appear rather slender and light, but they are laden with oil, and the seasonings are subtle.

They make a wonderful afternoon snack, and I’m overly fortified for my next stop, in tiny Rosedale, Miss. My stomach gurgles for the help of an antacid. The main street there is named Joe Pope Boulevard, in honor of the man who founded the “White Front Café.”

The town is tiny and pushed up against the Mississippi River levee. The trouble is, I can’t find the café. I see no gaudy signs or flashing lights. Finally, a local points me to a non-descript white house with the tiniest of signs over the door. By the time I walk in, even my sunglasses are dripping.

The price is always right.

Inside, Barbara Pope, 64, is gathering a few dozen hot tamales for a customer. She is the sister of Joe Pope himself, and she says nothing when I introduce myself and explain my hot tamale mission. She goes back to serving the customer in front of me.

Another customer pipes up. “These here are the best hot tamales anywhere. Ms. Barbara don’t even send these tamales in the mail. You have to come here with your own pot to her shop.”

Ms. Barbara sits down and silently turns the pages of the Bible, writing down verses. I bite into one of her hot tamales and I am amazed by the mix of spices and meat, filling but not heavy.

I am finally out of questions. Ms. Barbara stands before my table. Sunlight shines in from the doorway across her face and she smiles. I know I have found what I am looking for, and it doesn’t come in the form of an answer.

Barbara Pope in Rosedale, Mississippi, lets the hot tamales speak for themselves.

Sean David Hobbs is a writer currently based in New Orleans. He has also lived in and written about San Francisco, Berlin, and Istanbul.

To give the other guys a chance for glory, we’ve pitted the righteous Rocky Road, a product of the Annabelle Candy Company since 1950, against the venerable Valomilk candy cups, made by the century-old, family-owned Sifers Candy Company.

In this corner, the Rocky Road bar, a western favorite.

This exercise matters because these are products of a time before the interstate freeway system made candy—and everything else—easily transported around the country. Regional production meant each town had its own bakery, brewery… and candy company.

And, in this corner, the Valomilk candy cup, a mid-Western classic.

The good news: sweets are a recession-proof industry. Even in hard times, customers can usually scrape together a few coins for a candy bar.

The Sifers Candy Company, which makes the Valomilk, could win based on nostalgia alone.

Both of our contestant candy bars are made from chocolate and marshmallow. Both are long-time regional favorites with loyal followings. Neither is produced by a publicly-owned conglomerate.

Let the games begin!

Round 1 – Package Prettiness

You can’t help but judge a candy bar by its cover.

Summary: The easy-to-spot metallic red makes Rocky Road simple to make a grab for. But because the point is to recreate the experience of walking to the town candy shop and eating sweets off dishes with paper lace doilies, we’ll have to go with the olde shoppe look.
Winner: Valomilk

Easy to tear into. Easy to bite into.

Round 2 – Packaging Function and Ease

If the candy is smashed, will it taste as good?

Summary: Rocky Road has nothing more than that red foil wrapper, but was relatively unscathed. Despite a little slip of cardboard, many of our Valomilk test samples were leaking marshmallow goo. And the Valomilk is tricky to open. [Editor's note: Packages of Valomilk at the store were intact; only those that arrived at the NewsPlink laboratory via a third party were damaged.]
Winner: Rocky Road

Round 3 – Sex Appeal

Does it look good enough to eat?

Summary: In perfect condition, both candies look mighty fine. Especially with the choco scent wafting towards the nostrils.
Winner: Draw

A substantial dose. Trickier to open, trickier to eat.

Round 4 – Mouth experience

Taste and texture both count, especially if you’re not keen on candy that sticks to your teeth.

Summary: Both have that moment of fabulousness that comes when the chocolate shell snaps apart under gentle pressure from your teeth. Valomilk’s marshmallow insides run over the tongue immediately. By contrast, the heft of the Rocky Road’s fluff allow the teeth the joy of punching through the pillowy filling.

While this is a highly personal and intimate decision, we feel that the semi-liquid marshmallow “milk” in the Valomilk creates the sense of just a bit too much sweetness. The air-filled Rocky Road doesn’t scorch the tongue with sugariness.
Winner: Rocky Road

Russell Sifers runs and owns the company. He answers the phone, too.

Round 5 – Extra credits

To Rocky Road, for saving other little-known candy bars from extinction, like the Big Hunk, Look!, and Abba-Zaba.

To Valomilk, for the charm of its owner, Russell Sifers, 61, who sits behind the desk and answers the phone himself. “They tell me I make the pitchman for Motel 6 sound frantic,” he chuckles. “And being portly—I corrected my teenaged granddaughter, who called me ‘fat’—is one of the occupational hazards of the business. What can you do? But if the president of a candy company is skinny, you figure there’s probably something wrong.” He limits himself to no more than one Valomilk cup a day, and to two on Friday.

To Rocky Road, for removing the preservatives from one of their candy bars, and admitting that Rocky Road does have some hydrogenated fats.

To Valomilk, for using the same basic ingredients. We start to worry when the semi-liquid marshmallow hardens slightly on the plate, but hey, we’re talking real egg whites here.

To Rocky Road, for being run by the third generation of the founding family, with a potential for a fourth. And for gallantly calling Valomilk a “friendly competitor.”

To Valomilk, for being in the fifth generation of family. And calling Susan Karl of Annabelle “a good friend.”

Winner: Draw

Final conclusion?
Buy ‘em both when, and if, you see them. We’ll try for a more dramatic smackdown next time.

Rocky Road is made by Annabelle Candy, Co., Inc. in Hayward, California. The company was founded in San Francisco in 1950.

Photography by Andrew McDonald, except for Sifers Company photos, which are provided by the Russell Sifers Candy Company.

A WiFi Café: Apart, together. Or together, apart.

Across town is the neighborhood of North Beach, traditionally the center of Italian-American life here, beloved by locals and popular with tourists who seek the Beat generation haunts of Kerouac, Ginsberg, and Ferlinghetti.

Historic and energetic: San Francisco's North Beach.

But this area is more than just a collection of memories past. Despite gentrification and a growing Asian influence, it continues to be one of the more exciting and energetic parts of the city, full of trattorias and pastry shops. The coffee houses, opened by Italian immigrants, remain historic and authentically Italian.

Even though the tide of WiFi cafés is rising, these old-style cafés keep their vitality and loyal clientele by encouraging participation in the tactile world: the smells of roasting coffee, the sounds of cappuccino milk being foamed, the taste of focaccia, the feel of a newspaper.

Caffé Puccini's Graziano Lucchese -- in person.

A customer might hear live music, or strike up a conversation with the owner. That’s not possible at a modern coffee chain. The CEOs of those companies can’t compete with the independent characters and personalities behind the following cafés. (All but one are on Columbus Avenue.)

Caffé Puccini – The legendary composer Giacomo Puccini was born in Lucca. So was Graziano Lucchese, the owner of Caffé Puccini, who has devoted the interior to his homeboy and favorite composer. A portrait of the Maestro and posters from Puccini’s operas are on display.

Lucchese's musical recommendations for customers, right here.

Lucchese has also stocked the famous Puccini jukebox with an eclectic assortment of opera and Italian pop. It is almost impossible to sip a cappuccino here without hearing an aria from “La Boheme” or Modugno’s “Volare,” originally from 1958.

As befits such a cultured café, there is no wi-fi available here.

Mario’s Bohemian Cigar Store – Cigars really were sold here at one time, back when this was a men’s-only establishment in the 1920s. When Mario Crismani, born in Pola (Croatia), came along in 1972, he simply added his name to the sign.

Mario's. Everything but the cigars.

Younger family members have replaced Papa Mario at the reigns of the business but it remains a quirky, triangular spot where focaccia sandwiches are formulated on the spot. Kerri, a waitperson there, says she doesn’t imagine Wi-Fi will be added any time soon.

Caffé Roma – Three generations of the Azzollini family stand behind this neighborhood institution. Papa Sergio opened the first Caffé Roma in 1977, as an immigrant from Molfetta in the Apulia region of Italy. His son, Anthony, was five years old when he arrived in the United States, but returned to Italy to learn the art of coffee roasting.

Roasting coffee at Caffé Roma.

He and his father opened the current Caffé Roma in 1986, where he personally roasts the coffee every week right on the premises. Yes, there’s WiFi here, and even laptops. But customers come for the coffee and the experience.

Caffé Greco- There’s a famous and historic Caffé Greco in Rome, but its red velvet and stuffy interior are far more formal than the Caffé Greco in San Francisco. Tourists and locals come for a cup of Illy coffee, one of the premiere Italian brands.

The unstuffy version of Caffé Greco.

That’s partly why Cristiano, a somewhat regular visitor, says the Greco is like a slice of Italy, minus the long plane trip.

Caffé Trieste – When Giovanni Giotta and his family left their native Rovigno (now Croatia) for San Francisco, they were nostalgic for the coffee houses of Trieste. And so, In 1956, they opened Caffé Trieste. It became a Beatnik hangout, and has attracted poets and artists ever since Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg sipped coffee here, on Vallejo Street at Grant Avenue.

Shades of beatnik coffeehouse culture at Caffé Trieste.

When Papa Gianni was asked how to run a successful café, he answered, “It’s no big deal. You buy the best beans and roast them yourself.” And then he added, “and brew each cup like it’s for you.”

Every Saturday, the Giotta family continues to host a concert for professional and amateur singers alike every Saturday. It’s a peculiar mix of opera, jazz and Italian standards.

Live music with Caffé Trieste's lattes.

Some of these cafés do offer wi-fi service, and some of the customers work on their computers. But one North Beach regular, Mindaugis Bagdon, swears the traditional atmosphere is too firmly established to be threatened. “It’s pretty much business as usual in these places,” he says.

Roberto Soncin Gerometta is an established travel and corporate photographer based in San Francisco.

Playtime for mollusks:
Chef Nils Noren.

For example, a lot of us actually like the fishy taste that the average civilian can’t handle. Chef Nils Noren from The French Culinary Institute understands that. So to get more clam blast, he had clams eating clam chowder. No actual clam meat: he just had the clams absorbing clam juice. It’s what’s called “energizing” the clammy flavor.

It worked so well that Noren tackled oysters next. Like a mad but brilliant scientist, he altered the oysters’ taste: he fed them minuscule particles of mashed-up carrots and cardamom. Sure enough, the oysters took on the flavor of both the herb and the veggie.

Yum. That’s the point—and the fun—of getting stem cell biologists, chefs, food scientists, anthropologists, and other professionals together at last week’s second annual symposium of the Experimental Cuisine Collective at New York University.

Food science can make dining a nutritious game. Noren might serve chorizo, tomato, and cheese on bread, but it won’t be a sandwich, it will be a soup. And if he serves French onion soup, it won’t be a soup, but a dessert of onion ice cream and cheese atop a puff pastry. (Blending the creamed onion in a pressure cooker banishes the onion flavor, leaving a lovely and very edible sweetness.)

Smells wonderful:
Dr. Leslie Vosshall.

And even if you love beer, coffee, arugula, and other bitter foods, the idea of “bitter” has been universally accepted as bad. Dr. Leslie Vosshall from Rockefeller University explains that bitterness can represent toxins. It’s why mice won’t touch your gin and tonic: they avoid even tiny amounts of quinine. Some animals even taste with their genitals!

Vosshall has also researched the sense of smell. She’s had no trouble getting subjects for her sniffing studies, even when they had to give blood and sniff vials for three hours. Vosshall says no two people smell things the same way. Some people think cilantro is a horrid scent, or that vanilla has no scent at all. She also learned that some subjects think the scent of men’s underarms is sweet.

Vosshall’s conclusion: that some day restaurants will serve cuisine that’s personalized to a customer’s genetic profile. Until then, she wishes restaurants could do without menus, so diners would be able to leave their biases at the door.

Jeanine Barone is a food and travel journalist who is trained as a scientist: she’s a nutritionist/exercise physiologist/microbiologist. Follow her on Twitter @jcreaturetravel.

Food science enthusiasts at last week's event.

Author-Chef Michael Ruhlman's latest: a thoughtful discussion.

But on Thursday I was ready to challenge myself in the heady intersection of celebrity cooking and chemistry. Michael Ruhlman, who cooks, authors books, and co-writes cookbooks with the top chefs of Le Bernardin and the French Laundry, was speaking at New York University.

More specifically, Ruhlman was the star guest of the Experimental Cuisine Collective, a creation of NYU’s chemistry department plus the nutrition, food studies and public health department together with Chef Will Goldfarb. These are the people who write highly scientific papers on things like molecular gastronomy and stretchy ice cream. Nothing, as yet, on wiener schnitzel.

I was an eager student of Ruhlman’s language and philosophy, though, and listened to him carefully. If I have it right, he’s proposing a platonic ideal of cooking. A sip of carrot soup should bring a sort of enlightenment as you taste it, a revelation that “this is what carrots are all about.”

Of course, there is likely to be an element of surprise involved. Your platonic ideal of carrots might be served to you not in a bowl, but in a concoction made of caviar. Or your spoon might turn out to be made of frozen brisket or something.

One of the cooking luminaries in the audience pointed out that the Japanese have been doing precisely this kind of thing for the last 5,000 years: it’s called “sushi.” Then I got confused, because that would mean that “new-new cooking” is, in fact, old-old cooking.

Despite my premature befuddlement, I found Ruhlman very likeable. Tall, and with sandy hair, he had the kind of easygoing American manner which green-card-holding citizens of the Austrian-Hungarian Empire like myself consider imitating.

His presentation morphed into a thoughtful discussion in a lecture hall brimming with culinary-minded scientists and technically-savvy chefs and authors. He was disarmingly humble, saying he was intimidated by his own audience. Among them were Marion Nestle, the ultimate academic authority on anything food; celebrated food writer Betty Fussell; Rose Levy Beranbaum of Cake Bible fame; Michael Laiskonis, pastry chef of Le Bernardin; and Francis Lam of Gourmet Magazine.

Food stars, chatting like mere mortals: Betty Fussell, Marion Nestle, and Rose Levy Beranbaum with Michael Ruhlman.

Consistency is a big deal, it turns out. Francis Lam made us laugh by commenting that too much xantham gum will turn your creation “into snot.” Ruhlman remarked that he gained much of his knowledge at the CIA, which instantly gave me a much higher opinion of this country’s intelligence community. I’ve since discovered that Ruhlman was actually referring to the Culinary Institute of America. (The romantic in me continues to hope they know how to make a vinaigrette in Langley, Virginia.)

There were chunks of Americana which I found quite intriguing. For instance: is it true that you people by and large don’t have scales in your kitchens? How the hell do you manage? And is it really unusual here to invite friends over to cook together? You Americans are missing so much fun. Trust me about how well food and intimacy go together.

On the positive side, I was stunned to see that Americans who care about food and the quality thereof don’t see themselves as a beleaguered minority. Quite the opposite: they are part of the avant-garde.

In Germany, by contrast, Ruhlman’s lecture-cum-discussion would have descended into a cultural pessimism, reaching agreement that life was better before the Dark Satanic Mills of the Industrial Revolution began poisoning us. In America, when someone complains that children don’t know where their veggies come from, somebody else pipes up that more and more school gardens are being created.

In short, Americans are capable of indulging in ecobabble while remaining quite optimistic about the future. As a German used to ecobabble as a means of predicting nothing but doom, this really is a new language for me. I even have an appetite for carrot soup.

Hannes Stein is a correspondent for Die Welt, the German newspaper.
Photography by Jen Minary.