Claude Booker Banks on Foods That Reflect Black Heritage
(Cleveland Plain Dealer) — Claude Booker had succeeded in placing his southern-style dishes in hundreds of grocery stores across America before he walked into the Dave’s supermarket on Harvard Avenue last week and felt, suddenly, like a prophet with honor in his hometown. There in the dairy case was his macaroni and cheese and black-eyed peas. The entrepreneurial Booker, a transplant from Atlanta, started Simply Southern Sides three years ago in his Northfield home. He packaged side dishes he had popularized at his former restaurant in Randall Park Mall, boil-in-a-bag portions of creamed corn, turnip greens and okra and tomatoes.
