When I asked my daughter to look for recipes for red-velvet cake for Juneteenth, she hesitated. It's not that she's not into red velvet. It's that, though not yet 13, she is aware of the dangers of cultural appropriation. I pushed back: yes, this holiday that marks the freeing of the enslaved people of Galveston, Texas -- the last in the United States -- has also been thought of as African-American independence day and until now observed mostly in black communities. But the end of slavery is something every one of us must celebrate -- and reckon with. I reminded her of a car-conversation months ago about the most important event in American history. I'd said the Emancipation Proclamation -- without which we probably wouldn't have a country, and certainly not one we'd want to live in. Part of what's so powerful about Juneteenth is that it marks not the day of the proclamation's signing but the day two years later when it was finally put into effect -- a hint at the complexity of the reckoning still playing out 155 years later. Mostly convinced, she then wanted to know, why red velvet? As the chef and food historian Michael W. Twitty explained in an interview we published this week, the cake is among the traditional red foods for Juneteenth because red "symbolizes perseverance." Red is "the color of creativity, the color of fire, the color of war, the color of resistance," he added. "When red shows up, you know it's a most spiritual moment." Twitty is one of nine Black Jews whose reflections on Juneteenth are in this week's roundup, which you can also download or print via the blue button below.
