One pound of fresh okra, two outer ribs of celery with leaves, one bay leaf, one-half pound of cubed ham: This is just a handful of the ingredients listed in a recipe for creole chicken gumbo from “The Black Family Reunion Cookbook,” published in 1991.
It is one of 1,700 cookbooks, many focused on African American cuisine, recently donated to the Washburne Culinary and Hospitality Institute in Englewood by Sandra Rosalie McWorter Marsh, whose collection dates back to the 1930s. McWorter Marsh, 82, is the great-great granddaughter of an enslaved man who negotiated freedom for himself and his family members and established a community for freed slaves near the Mississippi River.
