It's a pig-eat-pig world — especially in the South — and nobody does a better job of burrowing into its greasy nooks than Oxford American.

The quarterly mag's Southern Foods issue, guest edited by John T. Edge, recently hit the stands. A masterpiece of carefully curated minutiae and eccentric trend pieces, it's some of the best food writing currently in print.

Highlights:

–Eating dirt — literally.

–Emile DeFelice's Caw Caw Creek Pastured Pork.

–Has success spoiled chicken-on-a-stick?

–Elusive chef Peter Chang (if the New Yorker profile wasn't enough).

–Searching for the native Arkansas cuisine.

–L.A.'s Southern-y food trucks: Mattie's Southern Kitchen and now defunct Willoughby Road and Asian Soul Kitchen.

–PI 601236 01, reviving a rare sesame seed.

–From plow to pint at Fullsteam Brewery.

–Writing African-Americans back into the origin myth of Creole cuisine.

Read it from cover to cover — if you can get your hands on a copy. Most L.A. bookstores don't carry of Oxford American. A friend brought me a copy from New York.

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