Here’s perhaps what makes me the most uncomfortable: Mr. Cathy owns more than 1,500 restaurants and serves up far more fried chicken than I do in my four. But I’ll say this, no matter how big the kitchen or seasoned the chef, hate has no place on America’s plates. Food is meant to be made with love, and that’s something I have understood since before I could reach the stove.
My earliest memories of this quintessential Southern comfort food is of being a young child, watching my African-American nanny, Leila Curry, making her buttermilk fried chicken for us. She taught me not only how to make her chicken, but she also taught me — long before I ever knew I would need to — how to stand up to prejudice. It was the 1960s and racism was rampant in the South. When I saw race riots on the TV and asked her what was going on, she would tell me, “Honey, people just need to love each other.” During those days in the kitchen with her, Leila was the first person in my life who really taught me about the power of love over hate. To me, cooking was love and the kitchen is where I learned about equality.
When I was bullied as a teen, Leila, along with my grandmother and mother, tried to protect me from a world that was unfriendly to gay people. The words of Mr. Cathy remind me of the pain I felt that drove me to escape a small southern town and find a place where I would be welcomed.
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