FULL PLATES, FULL HEARTS

A holiday menu from Mashama Bailey marks the 10th anniversary of her restaurant, The Grey—and honors the woman who inspired her to become a chef.

- CHERYL SLOCUM

I'm sitting across from Mashama Bailey at her restaurant, The Grey, in Savannah, Georgia, in front of what used to be the ticket window of a segregated Greyhound bus station. I can't help but imagine the people who used this space before—and that is intentional. Bailey, with her partner and The Grey co-owner John O. Morisano, restored the 1938 Art Deco building to pay homage to its place in American Civil Rights history and to celebrate the foodways of the region. That was 10 years ago this December—in the past decade, Bailey has taken home two James Beard Awards, and the duo has cowritten a book chronicling their story and started the process of opening another location of The Grey in Paris. The milestone has Bailey musing about how the past informs the present, from the evolution of that ticket window (which she plans to use for raw-bar service) to her own journey as a chef, which began decades ago at her paternal grandmother's table.

"Both of my grandmothers were great cooks, but she did all the holidays," says Bailey, speaking of her paternal grandmother, Margaret Bailey, and her way of sharing her love of food and cooking. "She had the china, she had napkins, she had silverware, the guest list—she would draw us in with that. And she always made sure she cooked a lot of food so people would come over and eat." The intention behind the splendor and pomp, behind the sparkling crystal and fine china, was a wish to share food with friends and family. Bailey evokes this warm and generous hospitality in her own approach to cooking and serving others.