In a special roundtable edition of TV One’sSavor The City, Chef Jernard Wells trades his chef’s coat for a seat at the table, joined by four dynamic Black women whose personal stories, cultural roots, and connections to Martha’s Vineyard offer up more than just great conversation.
The group’s gathering is all about soul, storytelling, and a celebration of heritage that ties them all together.
Source: Savor The City
A Toast To Family Recipes & Black Joy
In BOSSIP’s exclusive clip, the energy around the table is rich with warmth as Chef Jernard asks the group a question that always gets people talking: “What is your favorite dish to cook?”
Keisha Lance Bottoms jumps in first, naming baking as her love language, and connecting her passion to the generations before her.
“For me, it’s baking. My grandmother was a big cook. My happiest memories at my grandparents’ house all surrounded food, but the recipe that I just love is actually my husband’s grandmother’s whipping cream pound cake.”
Source: Savor The City
Even outside of Atlanta, she keeps the tradition going strong, especially when she’s on Martha’s Vineyard.
“When I’m on the Vineyard, this is my batch of cakes I baked this week. People just stopped by.”
Michelle Rice chimes in with her own story of culinary inheritance, honoring her great-grandmother’s legacy.
“No one ever learned how to make my great-grandmother made tea cakes.”
Source: Savor The City
That statement leads to a larger reflection on the oral traditions in Black families and the way recipes are passed down, not written.
“Tea cakes, recipes that my grandmother—I had to sit with her and write them down because I was saying, ‘Grandma, how do you make this?’” Rice continues. “It’s a pinch of this… she’s doing something, throwing something on her shoulder and doing—and I’m like, I just have to sit with her and watch.”
Chef Jernard relates deeply, speaking on the way elders of the Black community cook with instinct.
“We see a lot of our elders cooking… they cook based off of the feel, waiting on how it felt in the hands.”
“We Created American Cuisine”
As the conversation turns from tradition to truth, Chef Jernard offers a powerful reminder about the roots of Black food culture in America and how those roots were born from survival, resistance, and brilliance.
“You know, we hear people say, ‘He could be cooking soul food,’ and I always correct them. No, I’m not cooking soul food. We create American cuisine.”
Source: Savor The City
He breaks down the historical connection between African ingredients and how enslaved Africans preserved their culture, even while enduring unimaginable pain.
“So one of the things we know that came with us was, over the overseas, okra is one of the ingredients that is here in America today, that’s indigenous to Africa, because they put the overseas and their brains in the ear, because overseas had protein also—they could eat while they was laying flat on the belly of those ships.”
That legacy, Chef Jernard stresses, didn’t just shape flavor—it shaped the entire American food system.
“We don’t know anything about Western civilization. What we do know is, is our recipes from Africa that are embedded. They didn’t have recipes here for us to follow, so we was cooking off of what we knew. So we invented the cuisine here.”
He closes the moment with a statement of pride and ownership.
“I create American cuisine because my ancestors is who created the cuisine that America eats and thrive off of today.”
A Seat At The Vineyard Table
Whether baking pound cakes, remembering tea cakes, or reclaiming ancestral recipes, every guest at this table offered something deeper than a dish; they offered perspective. These women reflect with Chef J–not only on food, but on what it means to exist, create, and celebrate legacy on their own terms.
Catch the full episode of Savor the City this Thursday at 7:30 PM EST on TV One and streaming on TV One Digital. Same time, same plate.
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