Juneteenth in Brooklyn: Red Velvet Cake served with a touch of history

People lined up all afternoon for Shelly Flash’s specials: jerk cheese nachos and jerk chicken dinner tacos — that’s chicken, coconut rice, black beans, sweet plantains, pickled slaw, chipotle aioli, and jerk sour cream in a soft tortilla.

They were not disappointed.

The Jamaican taco business, 2 girls and a cook shop, is owned by Mrs. Flash, 40, and her daughter, Jataun. Their fans (some of whom know Ms. Flash from the TV show “MasterChef”) find out where they will be selling her food on Instagram and by word of mouth, since the Flash family does not yet own a restaurant of their own. Ms Flash was a teacher before the pandemic but decided last year to make food a full-time gig, she said. “I was like, ‘What would it look like if I gave me a chance?'”

Ms. Flash and 27 other black food vendors were actively nurturing the community during the weekend’s Juneteenth Food Festival at Brooklyn’s Weeksville Heritage Center at a time when many black families have left the city, drawn to regions where the cost of livelihoods are not so high. high and housing is more affordable. The city’s black population has declined by nearly 200,000 people over the past two decades.

“I’ve lived in Brooklyn for 17 years now and it’s changed so much,” says DJ Monday Blue, who played a mix of house music, disco, afrobeats and soul. Yet she saw so much positivity and hope in the meeting. “I like this organization, which focuses on the businesses and the black people who are here and say, ‘Hey, we’re still here.'”

The food festival was organized by Black-owned Brooklyn, an online publication that documents Black Brooklyn, and the vendors and customers were clearly passionate about delicious food. But they all also greatly appreciated the greater sense of belonging – both with their neighbors and with their history.

Throughout the green space, framed by flowers and trees, friends and generations of families gathered together to taste different cuisines: cornbread, lobster rolls and burgers, food from the Caribbean and Ethiopia, red food and drink to specially mark the holiday.

Nicole Kidd, 36, sat on the grass under a shade tree with her 8-year-old daughter, Miela Jones, and her mother-in-law, Patricia Jones. She had bought lunch at the Greedy vegan stall and ate the dessert first: banana pudding.

Born and raised in Brooklyn, Mrs. Kidd didn’t know much about Juneteenth and its origins in Texas to mark the emancipation of enslaved African Americans. But, she said, “I’m excited that it’s being recognized now and excited that it’s being celebrated.”

In addition, there was a sense of reverence for Weeksville, a town of free black people founded shortly after New York abolished slavery in 1827.

Weeksville was once home to about 700 families. There was a school, a church and a newspaper. Only three of the town’s houses, known as the Hunterfly Road Houses, still stand on the site. They are now city landmarks and have been added to the National Register of Historic Places.

It wasn’t Nkenge Walcott’s first time in Weeksville – she used to work at the nearby school. “We often brought the kids here — they didn’t realize how much history there was in their own backyard,” she said.

Ms Walcott, 28, was accompanied by her 16-year-old niece, Isis Hughes, who wanted Ethiopian food. They went looking together Makina Cafes bright yellow truck and ordered sambusa, a thin, flaky pastry filled with lentils, and tikel gomen, cabbage with carrots and potato in turmeric ginger sauce. Then Mrs. Walcott went to GG’s Fish and Chips with soul for golden brown strips of fried catfish and washed it all down with a drink of red hibiscus. “I support my Spelman sister who owns it Brooklyn tea‘ said Mrs Walcott. “It’s really, really, really great iced tea.”

As the day progressed, visitors searched for sweets and lined up for mango popsicles Island Pops and Caribbean vanilla ice cream from Cream and Cocoa Creamery.

But the real staple of Juneteenth is red velvet cake.

Red food, from strawberry soda to watermelonare common on Juneteenth, and Carmella Charrington, who is the Doc’s Cake Shop tent, was busy selling pieces of red velvet cake, strawberry cake and a special green, black and red Juneteenth cake.

Although Ms. Charrington, 52, had grown up in Brooklyn, it was her first time in Weeksville and she was impressed by the location.

“I had to walk through it and just thank my ancestors,” she said. “We have to enjoy it because that’s what they would want us to do.”