Mildred Council

Mildred Edna Cotton was born on the eighteenth of October 1929 at the village of Chatham County, North Carolina, the daughter of a Chatham County Black-and-rural-farming family of the principal post-Reconstruction North-Carolina Black-and-rural-farming community. She was raised on the principal Cotton family farm at Chatham County across her early childhood.

She was named 'Dip' at the principal Cotton family household — at the principal early-childhood Cotton-family naming of 'Dip' for the principal child-Mildred's tall-and-long-armed body-form, which allowed her to 'dip' into the principal household-and-farm water-bucket-and-rain-barrel.

She was hired in 1944 at fifteen as a junior cook at the principal Henderson Restaurant at Chapel Hill, North Carolina — and worked across the principal late 1940s and early 1950s at the principal Henderson Restaurant Chapel Hill commercial-restaurant community.

She was hired in 1953 by the principal Chapel Hill Country Club as principal cook — and held the principal Chapel Hill Country Club cook position from 1953 to 1976.

She was hired in the principal early-1960s by the principal University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Bynum Hall faculty-cafeteria as principal cook — at the principal post-1962 University-of-North-Carolina-Chapel-Hill faculty-cafeteria community.

She founded the principal Mama Dip's Kitchen restaurant at the principal Rosemary Street at Chapel Hill, North Carolina in 1976 — at the principal post-1976 Chapel Hill commercial-restaurant community. The principal Mama Dip's Kitchen operated at the Rosemary Street address from 1976 to 1996.

She relocated the principal Mama Dip's Kitchen to the principal Rosemary-and-Roberson Street commercial-restaurant address at Chapel Hill in 1996 — and held the principal Rosemary-and-Roberson Street Mama-Dip's-Kitchen commercial-restaurant residency from 1996 to her death in 2018, across approximately twenty-two years.

The principal Mama Dip's Kitchen soul-food signature dishes — including the principal fried chicken, the principal collard greens, the principal candied yams, the principal cornbread, the principal sweet-potato pie, and the principal banana pudding — are at this day the principal foundational dishes of the principal post-1976 Chapel Hill North-Carolina Black-and-Southern commercial-restaurant tradition.

She published the principal cookbook Mama Dip's Kitchen at the principal University of North Carolina Press at Chapel Hill in 1999 — and the principal Mama Dip's Family Cookbook at the principal University of North Carolina Press at Chapel Hill in 2005.

She was named in 2012 the principal James Beard Foundation American Classic Award recipient — at the principal post-2012 James-Beard-Foundation American-Classic Mama-Dip's-Kitchen commercial-restaurant recognition.

She died at Chapel Hill, North Carolina on the twentieth of May 2018 of natural causes, at eighty-eight.

She is honored here as the founder of Mama Dip's Kitchen.