From The New York Times…
Harlem Journal
The Good Old Red, White and Barbecue
By Christine Haughney
Limited space has long forced New Yorkers to celebrate Fourth of July rituals differently. As the rest of the country has backyard barbecues and pool parties, city dwellers cook lunches in tiny kitchens and carry them up to rooftops, or, if they can get a spot, they spread blankets in the parks.
In Harlem, Dorothy Davis celebrates with a front-stoop cookout.
Ms. Davis, 54, a full-time baby sitter with an encyclopedic knowledge of the comings and goings of her West 119th Street block, starts shopping weeks ahead for a communal feast. In a decade of yearly cookouts on the sidewalk in front of her building, Ms. Davis — known to neighbors as Dot or Auntie — has come to feed at least 50 relatives and neighbors.
“I don’t mind sharing my blessings,” she said, sitting in her living room near a tall stack of take-home containers. “I’m a people person.”
Part of the reason her cookout is so popular is her reputation for generous portions. Anthony Burrell, an Alvin Ailey dancer whose 3-year-old daughter, Sifare, is under Ms. Davis’s care, described the dinners she cooks for him on Friday nights.
“You could feed the whole block off one plate,” he said, recalling fried white fish, rice, collard greens and macaroni and cheese.
For her family, Ms. Davis’s efforts have made the Fourth of July into one of the biggest holidays her family celebrates, but the observance has taken on added significance since her Aunt Lillian, who loved the holiday, died two years ago.
This year, about 30 relatives drove in from Texas, Virginia, Rhode Island and South Carolina. Weeks in advance, Ms. Davis invited her building superintendent, a neighboring landlord and retired police officers from the local precinct.
“The neighbors come; she doesn’t have to invite them,” said one of her aunts, Lena Perryman, who stops by the cookout each year, even though she dislikes crowds. “She doesn’t turn anybody away.”
Ms. Davis, who says she has been cooking since she was 10, usually prepares collard greens, green beans, barbecue chicken, potato and macaroni salads. (She did not have time to bake this year, but she hinted that there might be a Costco cake for an uncle whose birthday is coming up.)
In an effort to cut costs, she is serving lemonade instead of cans of soda — though at some point, Ms. Davis may retreat to her apartment for her favorite Cognac.
The way Ms. Davis sees it, food is not just a source of sustenance. When guests are well fed, she said, there is “no fussing.”
“Usually at a cookout, there’s somebody who wants to fight,” she said. “We never had no arguments.”
In the weeks leading up to the cookout, Ms. Davis tries to squeeze in shopping around baby-sitting for eight children. Last weekend, she headed to two Western Beef stores in the Bronx to buy $400 of ribs, chicken and hamburgers, which she stored in a deep freezer in a bedroom. By Monday, she had already decided to set up the grill in a vacant lot next to her building. She was still sorting out what kind of pork to use in the collard greens.
On Thursday, she headed back to Western Beef to pick up hamburgers. As she shucked corn and soaked chicken, her sister Deborah picked up plates, and her daughter, Dequasha, headed to a party shop to make a deposit for 30 balloons.
By Friday, her entire family had started to pitch in with last-minute shopping and preparations. A goddaughter, Denise, was expected to arrive from Providence, R.I., to make the fruit salad. Aunts, brothers, daughters and nieces helped with peeling potatoes, spicing chicken and preparing ribs.
Her friend Tina is bringing a macaroni salad. One aunt who does not like to cook will bring a tossed salad. Setup is to begin as early as 6:30 on Saturday.
By late afternoon, her brother Marshall will start to grill. She will seat her relatives and neighbors on a half-dozen tables set up on the sidewalk. As the aroma of grilled chicken and ribs wafts down 119th Street, neighbors will start to appear.
In the end, she makes sure that no leftovers come home with her. One year she cooked so much, she had to hand out trays of food to relatives, neighbors — even strangers — to get rid of it all. While she estimates the cookout will cost $600, she does not keep track. Her concern is that people leave well fed.
“I spend, and I cry the next day when I’m broke,” she jokes. “It’s always better to have enough than not enough.”
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