Delicious Foods begins with one of the main protagonists, Eddie, who had recently lost his hands, driving a white Subaru towards Houston, TX. In this prologue, readers learn that Eddie had just left a very abusive place of employment where his mother still resided. After reuniting with his estranged aunt, Bethella, he eventually overcame his disability using a prosthesis and became a successful handy-man, found a wife, and had a child named Nathaniel.

The narrative then shifts between a third person narrator narrating Eddie’s actions after his mother disappears, to Scotty, the personification of crack cocaine (who speaks to the reader in the present but recalls the past). The narrator changes from one to the other various times throughout the novel, with one chapter narrated by Darlene.

First, the reader is told about Darlene's past. She met her husband, Nat, in college, where they had an affair that betrayed Darlene’s best friend. They eventually moved to another town where they opened a general store, and Nat became a political activist. Due to this, Nat was murdered and Darlene blamed herself. Darlene and Eddie dealt poorly with loss, and when the insurance money started to dry up, Darlene first turned to crack cocaine and later prostitution to finance her family and her addiction. Eventually, during a night of street walking, Darlene went missing. Eddie (several years before the prologue) decided to search for her by asking a variety of people including bums, prostitutes, and addicts. During this period, readers learn that Darlene had gotten a ride on a minibus, where inside a woman named Jackie offered her steady employment and access to crack. Darlene and other addicts were taken to a place called Delicious Farm.

It is revealed that Delicious Farm was a brutal place to work. The workers were put into arbitrary debt to the company (through transportation, drug purchases, and demerits), forcing them to stay with the company. Drug use was rampant at the farm. Here, Darlene developed a sexual relationship with another worker named Sirius who eventually escaped. Thanks to a bum named Tuck, Eddie eventually found the minibus, and Eddie and Tuck left for Delicious Farm. Eddie reunited with his mother and began working at the farm, where much of his wages went toward his mother’s crack addiction. Darlene later developed a sexual relationship with the farm’s owner Sextus, and Eddie essentially was promoted to Sextus’ handyman.

Later, two reporters showed up to the farm asking about the farm’s working conditions. Darlene then learned that Sirius successfully escaped and alerted the press. A worker, Michelle, told them to return at roll call. During roll call, the reporters and Sirius arrived in a Subaru, and Sirius stated that no one could leave without Eddie and Darlene. Darlene, Eddie, and a group of workers decided to escape, but after Eddie failed to punish his mother by a supervisor’s orders, he was bound to his workshop. The group was unable to free Eddie with his hands intact, so they cut them off. Eddie, with his hands freshly amputated, escaped by himself in the Subaru, after Sextus was shot and disabled.

The narrative then shifts after the prologue. Eddie and Darlene have had a strained relationship because she refused to leave managing the farm due to the consistent access to crack. After Sextus was sent to prison and Darlene learned that her grandson is named after Nat, she got clean, but later had a heart attack. Eddie then allowed her to visit his family.