Caribbean and Southern: Cousins, Not Strangers
Jollof, jambalaya and red rice are the same dish separated by ocean and time.
Put Senegalese thieboudienne, Nigerian jollof, Charleston red rice and Louisiana jambalaya on one table and the family resemblance is undeniable: rice cooked in a seasoned tomato and pepper base, one pot, protein folded in.
That is not convergence. It is descent.
The Wolof of Senegambia cooked rice in tomato and fish long before the Atlantic trade. The dish moved with people. In Jamaica the same instinct produced rice and peas with coconut milk and thyme. In Charleston, where Senegambian rice growers were concentrated by design, it produced red rice. In New Orleans, where French and Spanish techniques met the same African cooks, it produced jambalaya.
Callaloo and collards are another pair. Ackee and saltfish and Lowcountry perlo share a preservation logic. Jerk and barbecue both descend from slow smoking over indigenous wood — Taíno barbacoa and Maroon pimento pits.
Once you see the lineage, Caribbean and Southern Black cooking stop looking like two cuisines. They look like two branches of one tree that was cut and replanted in different soil.