Hi KB! Well, let me think -- there are lots and lots of casseroles around here Usually involving rice and chicken, or pasta and chicken, or chicken and chicken

Rice is a major crop in Arkansas, and Tyson Chicken Corporation is a major employer all over the state. So rice and chicken are "big" here.

I honestly can't name even a single "local specialty" because Arkansas is sort of a "backwoods" sort of place that doesn't really have it's own culture. There's a "hillbilly" stereotype that was strictly a Hollywood and tourist-board marketing thing for decades -- you know, the Beverly Hillbillies and the Li'l Abner and Dogpatch -- and i think it's really been a damaging thing for the people who live here and grew up here. And then the !~#&*! Clintons ... grrr ... everyone is deeply embarrassed and will never get over it. The Clintons made all Arkansans -- even people like me who just live here and aren't really REAL Arkansans -- the laughing stock of the world and reinforced all the stereotypical images people have of this place.

People here are basically just like people everywhere, except they're "born isolationists" and have a long legacy of pessimism and poverty that began long, long before the Great Depression and continues in so many areas to this day. I don't really know if it's the geography (after all, geography shapes so much of history), or the catastrophic damage caused by the Civil War and the KKK influence, or just what it is.

Well, i'm chattering incessantly as usual, sorry. Mostly i wanted to say, there aren't any Arkansas specialities that i can think of, except that chocolate gravy thing. There's a lot of "imported" cooking -- from the Deep South But nothing that is uniquely Arkansan.

At least, as far as i know. If i come across anything i'll post it.

I miss the food in California! Everything imaginable in the markets, and real spring rolls at the restaurants. *sigh*