Southern Food & Beverage Museum

The Southern Food and Beverage Museum is a nonprofit living history organization dedicated to the discovery, understanding and celebration of the food, drink and the related culture of the South. We opened our doors on June 7, 2008 at the Riverwalk Marketplace in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Our first exhibit on the history and influence of New Orleans beverages opened in June 2004 at a temporary location in New Orleans. Our goal in opening the temporary space was to give the public a taste of what we hoped to create as we built support and solicited donations for a permanent home. While based in New Orleans, the Museum examines and celebrates all the cultures that have come together through the centuries to create the South’s unique culinary heritage. It brings all races and ethnicities to the table to tell the tale, from the farmer and the homemaker to the line cook and the celebrity chef. The Southern Food and Beverage Museum celebrates, interprets, investigates, entertains and preserves. A collaboration of many, the Museum allows food lovers of all stripes – Southerners and non-Southerners, locals and tourists, academics and food industry insiders — to pull up their chairs and dig into the food and drink of the South. And although we are based in New Orleans, we are bringing our message about the entire South to the world through exhibits, collection of oral histories and videos, and other research. We examine:

The food and drink of the South in all its aspects;
The many ethnicities – African-American and Caribbean, French and German, etc. — that have combined to create unique Southern food and drink traditions;
The farmers, fishermen, and hunters and gatherers who have produced the food;
The processors, inventors, chefs and business people who run the restaurants and stock our stores with Southern products, and the home cooks and families who have passed down recipes and food traditions for generations.

We host special exhibits, demonstrations, lectures and tastings that showcase the food and drink of the South. We cooperate with the many fine local and regional museums, restaurants, theaters, academic institutions and artists to present richly-textured experiences in multiple venues.