I’ve lived in Alabama my whole life, and my family has been here for generations. I’m very much rooted in this place. A few years ago, while researching my home state for an article, I discovered North Alabama Chicken Stew for the first time.

My mother’s side of the family is from a town in North Alabama, so I asked her about the dish. It turns out her grandmother made something slightly similar, but it wasn’t quite the same as the traditional version. Since Allrecipes didn’t have a recipe at the time, my mom and I looked at a bunch of recipes and patched together our own. 

It’s not an exaggeration to say it was love at first taste. Once I started researching the history of the stew through old newspaper articles and Emily Blejwas’s phenomenal book The Story of Alabama in Fourteen Foods, my 23andMe results and my mother’s maiden name (Stephenson) suddenly made a lot more sense: It originated with the Scottish-Irish pioneers who settled in the region more than 200 years ago. As my boss said, this stew literally runs through my veins. 

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