Many hungry travelers associate New Orleans with beignets, but they’re not the only French-accented pastry in town. Rum babas, or small cakes doused in rum syrup, have deep roots in and beyond the city. In her new book, Braided Heritage, culinary historian Jessica B. Harris traces their journey from the classic French dessert baba au rhum to 20th-century New Orleans tables, citing their inclusion in The Times-Picayune Creole Cookbook, published in 1900. “In this version, the cake is a very simple, very lean dough; the magic is in the rum syrup that completely soaks them,” Harris writes. Both components are easy to make at home and bring the rich history of American foodways to life. Throughout Braided Heritage, Harris encourages readers to remember “just how magnificently mixed we are on the plate, and have been from the very beginning of our national story.”