Good morning. Hoppin’ John (above) is a dish of the South Carolina low country, peas and rice cooked together and often served on New Year’s Day as a wish for a prosperous, lucky future. (The peas are meant to represent coins. Some cooks throw a dime into the pot or place the coin under one of the bowls on the table.)

But as Toni Tipton-Martin wrote in her brilliant 2019 cookbook, “Jubilee: Two Centuries of African American Cooking,” there are many who eat Hoppin’ John on New Year’s Eve instead, as part of a Watch Night service in which the Christian faithful come together to usher in the new year. The ceremony dates back to “Freedom’s Eve” on Dec. 31, 1862, when enslaved Africans gathered in Southern churches to hear the news that the Emancipation Proclamation had set them free.

Tipton-Martin’s recipe for Hoppin’ John isn’t quite that old. She adapted it from one she discovered in “Aunt Julia’s Cook Book,” a collection of recipes from the coastal South published in the 1930s by the Standard Oil Company. (“For happy eating, use these recipes,” a line on the cover reads, “for happy motoring, buy at the Esso sign.”) She uses bacon to flavor the rice, but if you can lay your hands on some smoked hog jowls to use instead, you won’t be sorry.