Foodways and folklore: a handbook

Foodways and Folklore

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Recent Titles in Greenwood Folklore Handbooks Proverbs: A Handbook Wolfgang Mieder Myth: A Handbook William G. Doty Fairy Lore: A Handbook D.L. Ashliman South Asian Folklore: A Handbook Frank J. Korom Story: A Handbook Jacqueline S. Thursby Chicano Folklore: A Handbook María Herrera-Sobek German Folklore: A Handbook James R. Dow Greek and Roman Folklore: A Handbook Graham Anderson The Pied Piper: A Handbook Wolfgang Mieder Slavic Folklore: A Handbook Natalie Kononenko Arab Folklore: A Handbook Dwight F. Reynolds Caribbean Folklore: A Handbook Donald R. Hill

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Foodways and Folklore

Q A Handbook

Jacqueline S. Thursby

Greenwood Folklore Handbooks

GREENWOOD PRESS Westport, Connecticut • London iii

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Thursby, Jacqueline S., 1940– Foodways and folklore : a handbook / Jacqueline S. Thursby. p. cm. — (Greenwood folklore handbooks, ISSN 1549–733X) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN: 978–0–313–34173–1 (alk. paper) 1. Food habits—Handbooks, manuals, etc. 2. Folklore—Handbooks, manuals, etc. I. Title. GT2850.T48 2008 394.1'2—dc22 2008002107 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data is available. Copyright © 2008 by Jacqueline S. Thursby All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, by any process or technique, without the express written consent of the publisher. Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2008002107 ISBN: 978–0–313–34173–1 ISSN: 1549–733X First published in 2008 Greenwood Press, 88 Post Road West, Westport, CT 06881 An imprint of Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc. www.greenwood.com Printed in the United States of America

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Contents Preface

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One

Introduction

Two

Definitions and Classifications

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Three

Examples and Texts

59

Four

Scholarship and Approaches

121

Five

Contexts

155

Glossary

175

Bibliography

179

Index

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repared or arranged foods are material folklore (things people make with their hands), and the folkloric study of foods is called foodways. This terminology applies to folkloric study of foods in all cultures across time and place. The focus of this text is primarily the discussion of foodways in the United States, but because many U.S. foods originated in other countries, background information is also included. In addition to historical information, old and new literary examples and contexts concerning foods and foodways are used to help with the discussion. Vernacular or verbal elements of folklore play a large part in the discussion of foodways; people consistently transmit oral information about foods to one another. Written cookbooks, often including valuable commentary, are also an excellent source of foodways information; subsequently, many cookbooks, old and new, are quoted in the text. As stated previously, material folklore represents things people make with their hands. Recipe making and the dishes produced certainly fit the material category. Customs and traditions, another category in folklore, make up a large part of why people eat the foods they do. Last, the folkloric element of belief also applies to foods because folk medicines, folk superstitions, and even folk religions often use foods as elements of their belief systems and practices. A U.S. food writer, Jeffrey Steingarten, wrote the foreword to a book called Best Food Writing 2004 and stated: “Ask most people why they become food writers (or chefs or farmers) and they’ll answer with a story—a narrative full of foreshadowing and surprises, a series of random events woven into an inescapable and exorable [persuasive] narrative” (Steingarten 2004, ix). Heston Blumenthal, the proprietor and chef of a world-famous gourmet restaurant in England called The Fat Duck, said that one of his earliest questions about cooking came in regard to the word-of-mouth tradition about putting salt in the cooking water of

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green beans to help maintain the color of the beans. He wanted to determine the purpose of the salt for himself. He investigated the practice scientifically through replicated tests and found there was no difference in the beans, with or without salt; the practice was simply a popular folkloric practice (Lister and Blumenthal 2005, 2). For him, a cooking career was born, and he continues to investigate and experiment and produce internationally acclaimed, award-winning cuisine. Because food is an imperative element of human survival, and because there has never been any other satisfactory human body fuel that could replace it, abundant lore about food has appeared throughout human society and culture through all time and place. From evidence in ancient (and modern) burial grounds to classical and contemporary literature, from verbal tradition to recorded histories, from ballads to poetry, and from stories about food practices and their numerous meanings, foodways have been present wherever people are gathered. Though cooking, sharing, and eating food with family and friends (or sometimes alone) are matters of physical survival as well as personal and community identity, foods are sometimes abstracted to carry other meanings. “Double, double, toil and trouble; Fire burn, and caldron bubble,” chanted the three witches in Shakespeare’s Macbeth while concocting a sinister “gruel thick and slab.” Into the giant caldron went poisoned entrails and a toad, “eye of newt and toe of frog, wool of bat and tongue of dog, adder’s fork and blindworm’s sting, a lizard’s leg and owlet’s wing. . . . Like a hell-broth boil and bubble” (Shakespeare 1998, 60–61). In ancient days, among the Druids and high kings of Celtic Ireland, as well in Asia, Europe, and Nordic countries, fine bronze caldrons were used to prepare food. Meat, vegetables, herbs, and spices were tossed in and simmered until edible. Carbon testing dates some of the caldrons found from that period as early as the seventh and eighth centuries b.c.e. (Bailey, Gordon, and Lynch 1998, 65). The caldron motif and folk stories about it as a giver of life appear frequently in folklore, ancient mythologies, belief systems, and various other literatures of the world. It is represented as a source of endless food supplies and as a means of restoring life to dead warriors, as in The Mabinogion story of “Branwen Daughter of Llyr” (Jones and Jones 1998, 24–31). It has served as a source of incantation and information about the future in Shakespeare and even contemporary fantasy stories such as The Black Caldron (Alexander 1990, 15). Stories from Turkey, Arabia, Palestine, China, and other countries discussed in later chapters of this book use the motif of the cooking caldron in many ways. In act 1, scene 1 of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, the witches used the symbol of the caldron and witches’ brew to foreshadow dark things to come: “Fair is foul, and foul is fair: Hover through the fog and filthy air” (Shakespeare 1998, 3). Though their gruel with its peculiar ingredients was one of prophecy, various concoctions cooked over roaring fires have continued to sustain life throughout the world for thousands of years. Caldrons, cooking pots, stone vessels, and other containers are frequently found in ancient burial sites, indicating both the constant human

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need for warm nourishment in this world as well as the belief that the practice will be continued in the afterlife. Shakespeare and thousands of other writers through time and space have represented foods, their preparation, and their description to create understanding, context, and cultural practices of the people represented in their literature. At the core of the study of foodways is the specific relationship between people and their food practices. Food carries many different meanings for people, and though some of those meanings are almost universal, some are peculiar and obscure. Golden stalks of wheat, for instance, in nearly every culture around the globe represent the harvest, a time of plenty, and there are endless ways of preparing this ubiquitous human staple. In Chinese latitudes where rice cannot be grown, wheat may serve as a well-known and well-loved staple. It seems to come as a surprise to some people, for instance, that all people in China do not consider rice to be their main food. Further, noodles are also a popular staple in China and are often made from wheat, rice, or soy. Many foods represent religious and folkloric traditions, suggesting that they carry both overt and covert meaning for a group. The deep-red-dyed egg given to friends and family at Easter time by many Christian Greeks represents an ancient, apocryphal story. It is said that Mary Magdalene, after seeing the risen Christ, went to Pilate to tell him of the resurrection. Pilate said that he would believe a story like that when the egg in Mary’s hand turned blood red. The legend is that the egg did turn red immediately, and so a tradition was born.

Medieval Caldron. Caldrons similar to this have been found in both ancient and contemporary use throughout the world. 123RF.com/Chantal Heulin.

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Cultures, clans, families, and the identity of some individuals are shaped by the foods they select and the ways they prepare and serve them. Further, the foods they select are often determined by the region in which they live. Edible foodstuffs found in the far northern Scandinavian countries differ remarkably from edibles found in the South Seas islands; thus, the people have established differing beliefs and foodways about the foods available to them regionally. Recipes, which usually include instructions for ingredients, preparation, and the number of servings, range from those passed on by vernacular transmission, to thousands of written collections of ethnic and generic cookbooks. One of the oldest cookbooks still in existence was handwritten in Italy between the first and third centuries c.e. It was abridged and handwritten again in the fourth century and printed for the first time at the end of the fifteenth century (Revel 1982, 41). Sometimes recipes have been briefly scrawled on scraps of paper or index cards and slipped between the pages of printed cookbooks. Well-used cookbooks often have copious marginalia, or brief tips for the preparation of favorite dishes written in the margins. These well-used cookbooks with their loose papers and notes often become material or tangible elements in traditional family folklore. In today’s world, Internet search engines can help find just about any food an individual might like to prepare. No matter the occasion, ethnicity, or mood, people can usually find a recipe to satisfy their need. Anyone can experiment with recipes and add, increase, decrease, or omit various ingredients. Foodways are present in every culture over time and space. Foods can evoke nostalgia for past times, and sustaining memories can be as nourishing to our spirits as a warm cup of hot chocolate on a blustery winter night. Looking at the influences that foods from the deep past continue to have on today’s lore and foodways will help us better understand how food has shaped the cultural identity of individuals in groups, regions, and nations. We associate curried dishes with India, saffroned rice tossed with seafood (paella) with Spain, and fine chocolate with Belgium and Switzerland, do we not? Food obviously sustains life, but beyond survival the creative relationships established between people and food carry metaphoric and symbolic meanings. Ethnic cuisines bear traditions and important cultural markers, and yet both the foods and their meanings evolve to include different ingredients and varied implications over time. Food is related to cultural identity, continuity, security, validation, economics, and social control, and for many it serves as a comforting escape. Revealing foodways have been represented by commonly expressed cultural arts, including music and finely rendered paintings, mosaics, frescoes, and sculpture from every age. Serious scholars have examined the history, deep cultural implications, and evolving trends in food practices. One scholarly example, Mary Douglas’s famous essay “Deciphering a Meal” (1997), demonstrates how codes and systems of symbolic foods can provide insight into social relations.

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Food use and behaviors related to foods may have embedded meanings of social status, inclusion and exclusion, boundaries, and negotiations of boundaries. Until the last century or so, with the exception of salt, spices, dried foods, and other creatively preserved substances (such as fish preserved in vinegar rice in China), most foods prepared and used were locally grown, hooked, trapped, or hunted. In our modern world, the production and gathering, transportation, and safe handling of fragile items like seafood, vegetables, and various fruits have reached a level of distribution and access unknown at any other time in history. To enjoy fresh squid in the high country of Idaho, or an U.S.-produced frankfurter in Moscow, is no longer unusual. So-called fast foods have created a certain homogeneity of some food items in far-flung parts of the world. This is called globalization, meaning that the world may be becoming a single community by the effects of mass media, including Internet advertising and McDonald’s U.S.-style Big Macs and French fries being available from Missouri to India. To attract and entice regional customers throughout the world, McDonald’s often adds cultural amenities of locally popular food items to the standardized menu. In Lucerne, Switzerland, for instance, fine pastries have been added to the menu, and in Japan, McDonald’s offers fresh sushi. The appearance, shape, and size of McDonald’s hamburgers are consistent, and this popular fast-food chain has established familiarity throughout the worldwide market. Cultural food traditions in the world range from generic U.S. hamburgers, to Spain’s traditional chorizo (a spicy sausage), to England’s ubiquitous beef roast and Yorkshire pudding (a flour-and-egg mixture baked in the roast drippings), to the simple, popular island foods of Polynesia, like breadfruit—a food that can be prepared in a variety of ways and is now available seasonally at local U.S. grocery stores—along with mangoes, papayas, and other less common fruits formerly unavailable in local markets. Food tastes evolve according to availability and ease of preparation, and because of convenient accessibility in today’s world, it is not unusual to have a papaya salad in December or stuffed grape leaves in January. Ethnic or specific cultural recipes can be created throughout the year, but they are often missing an important part; that is, the traditional stories and lore they carry. It would be helpful if food manufacturers and retailers supplied some of the lore on the label along with the ingredient and nutrition lists; some have begun that practice. This handbook focuses on the evolving cultural and social meanings of food from many traditions, both English and non-English speaking. Foodways are often passed from country to country, generation to generation, mother to daughter, and friend to friend. Our current early twenty-first century is a time of feast and famine in the world, and for many fortunate people, trends toward culinary artistry and inventiveness have become popular pastimes. In the United

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States, Europe, and throughout Asia, farmers’ markets, television cooking shows, a plethora of cookbooks, newspaper food sections, cooking classes, and ethnic festivals offer samples of many kinds of foods. Some culinary scientists, such as Blumenthal, intrigued and engrossed in the fairly recent field of molecular gastronomy, are looking for new and unusual food combinations based on the similarity of molecular components. Talking about food, reading cookbooks, sharing stories, entertaining guests, and even day-to-day cooking for the family have become avocations for many, and much of this is encompassed in the following chapters: a discussion of folklore through the medium of foods. The first chapter, an introduction, will provide a general history of the topic and the significance of past influences on today’s food lore and food practices. Explicating or explaining the influence food use and interpretations from the past have had on the present, the chapter will discuss an overview of a variety of staple foods, their origins, influence, and lore over time and space. Using myriad examples, it will explain how food has shaped cultures, impacted religion, driven commerce, and maintained national identities, and it will demonstrate that many contemporary foodways have been born of centuries-old food traditions. Chapter 2, “Definitions and Classifications,” will identify and describe some of the most significant types of related folklore and traditions concerning foods in the United States. Different categories of foods will be discussed and explained, moving from grand cuisine (or haute cuisine), to home cooking (called bourgeois by some food writers), to regional and ethnic traditions in foodways. In addition to various ethnic traditions (from both Native American and throughout the world), nature, landscape, and regional issues all play a part in the lore of food. Differences in geographic locations and accessibility obviously influence attitudes toward and the use of varied ingredients. One who lives near or on the seaside in the Northeast and who may commonly serve and eat lobster would probably place much less value on this often expensive crustacean than one who lives in a land-bound region like Missouri, Kansas, or Utah. Regional food topics discussed will range from traditional poi found in Hawaiian culture, to salmon and seal in Alaska, to the popular crawfish and alligator in Louisiana and other southern costal states. From certain common food ingredients like salt, to less common ingredients like oysters, wild fruits, and rare seasonings, the pursuit of food and then the preparation, serving, and attached meanings often define regional and local identity. Another important aspect of definition and classification in chapter 2 will provide a window on the way foods are used and misused in contemporary culture. Overeating, undereating, and other eating disorders have become serious threats to the health of people of both genders and all ages in the United States. Food-related diseases, such as diabetes, heart disease, circulatory problems, and even skin disorders, can often be controlled by learning and practicing optimal eating behaviors.

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The underlying causes, and some simple remedial measures, will be included to enhance understanding of commonly distorted uses and meanings of foods. Chapter 3, “Examples and Texts”: Stories, folklore, maxims, and proverbs grow up around familiar foods, and varied human responses create widespread anecdotal and traditional understandings and practices. This chapter will look at folkloric stories and elements about foods, and it will present examples and texts from both the English-speaking and the non-English-speaking world. Stories appear and reappear in various places; for instance, there is an old story about a family recipe for beef roast that is often shared in folklore classes. It seems that part of the preparation required cutting away a portion from each end of the roast. The method supposedly continued for generations until someone finally questioned the purpose. One of the elderly members of the family, when finally asked, explained that the cutting away started when one of the greatgreat-grandmothers did not have a pan large enough for a family-size beef roast. When she wrote the recipe down, she included the instruction to cut part of the meat away. The practice continued, so the story goes, until someone finally questioned it. Though the text will focus on foods in the Americas (mainly the United States), many dishes enjoyed in the contemporary United States originated elsewhere (with the exception of Native American food legacies, of course). The stories and discussion will range from the Finnish myth about the “Sampo” (a salt maker akin to Aladdin’s lamp or Solomon’s magic carpet) and Swedish, Norwegian, and other Finnish food traditions still practiced in the northern states, to Native American beliefs, practices, and stories about corn. African food methods, traditions, and stories that migrated to the United States with the slave trade strongly influenced many foodways of the South. There are countless stories about foods in every culture, and excerpts from literature used in the chapter will be carefully retold. Chapter 4, “Scholarship and Approaches,” will summarize the work of various scholars and their methods of studying the foodways discussed in the book, and it will give examples of various folkloric and anthropological scholars working in the areas of food lore and foodways in the distant past as well as in our contemporary world. Food writers and critics, often very fine cooks or even chefs themselves, have been generous in sharing the history and contexts of foods, their own experiences with various foods as well as restaurants, and tips for ingredients, preparation, and presentation. Cookbooks written by professionals and talented amateurs are also often excellent sources for interesting foodways and folklore about foods. Chapter 5 will discuss contexts; that is, how the folklore of foods appears in literature, drama, art, and other cultural contexts, including music, film, and television. The first part of the chapter will look at the folklore of food in literature,

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and the second will look at foodways as it is used in the media of contemporary U.S. culture. Examples of food contexts are ubiquitous, and care will be taken to present the contexts that secondary students, undergraduates, and general readers would find most interesting and useful. Films with strongly food-centered themes have become more popular in recent years, and there are writers who delight in including food descriptions, menus, and even recipes in contemporary fiction. From stage plays to paintings and sculpture and even artful jewelry, food continues to be a favorite subject. Included in this chapter will be some discussion of the challenge with overeating and, subsequently, overweight, particularly in teens. Books and films like Fast Food Nation and Supersize Me have helped educate the public, just as Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle, first published in 1906, educated the public about the unsanitary practices in the meatpacking industry. This chapter will also describe some of the ethnographic research that students may undertake, topics they may choose to pursue, and it will include some direction for interviews they may need to conduct their studies. Folklorists collect, classify, analyze, and discuss, through presentations and publications, the folkloric stories, practices, and material evidence they find. Students can learn these scholarly approaches and enhance their own experience as better informed members of U.S. culture. This volume will also supply a glossary and index to aid readers in understanding and navigating the text. The glossary is followed by an extensive bibliography and list of Web resources for further research.

WORKS CITED Alexander, Lloyd. 1990. The Black Caldron. New York: Bantam Doubleday Dell. Bailey, Ronald H., Dónal Keven Gordon, and James Michael Lynch. 1998. What Life Was Like among Druids and High Kings: Celtic Ireland AD 400–1200. Richmond, Va.: Time-Life Books. Douglas, Mary. 1997. “Deciphering a Meal.” 36–54. In Food and Culture: A Reader, ed. Carole Counihan and Penny Van Esterik. New York: Routledge. Jones, Gwyn, and Thomas Jones, trans. 1993. The Mabinogion. New rev. ed. London: J. M. Dent. Lister, Ted, and Heston Blumenthal. 2005. Kitchen Chemistry. London: Royal Society of Chemistry. Revel, Jean-François. 1982. Culture and Cuisine: A Journey through the History of Food. New York: Da Capo Press. Shakespeare, William. 1998. The Tragedy of Macbeth. Ed. Sylvan Barnet. New York: Signet/New American Library. Sinclair, Upton. 2003. The Jungle. Tucson, Ariz.: See Sharp Press. Steingarten, Jeffrey. 2004. “Foreword.” ix–xii. In Best Food Writing 2004, ed. Holly Hughes. New York: Marlow.

Q One

Introduction

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o you remember as a child being told to eat everything on your plate at dinner because there were people starving in China (or Ethiopia, Africa, Tasmania, India, Cambodia, or Armenia) or some other place far from you? In the popular film A Christmas Story, the mother reminds the younger brother, “Benny, will you eat? There are starving people in China” (Shepherd, Brown, and Clark 1983). Benny groans at the reminder. The curious element about that common parental command is that it is basically true; great famines have occurred in many parts of the world, but the concept probably did not have much meaning for you (or Benny) just out of your infancy when you were being trained. One of my students told me that when her mother gave her that order, she retorted, “Then give it to them!” These predictable verbal exchanges are common in many households in the United States and can be called verbal or oral folklore. It takes years of learning about what foods really can do for many of us before basic eating for survival really becomes a matter of dining for taste, identity, focused and deliberate nourishment, and pleasure. For many, foods carry elements of meaning, including memories and nostalgia. Foods laden with significance can even provide a sense of psychological well-being and harmony. For instance, because of wide advertising, the perceived benefits of chocolate in contemporary U.S. culture and society have become immense. Chocolate manufacturers make promises that range from improved health (dark chocolate) to blissful happiness (smooth milk chocolate). Many kinds of verbal folklore refer to foods, including food jokes, food motifs and edible elements in fairy tales, mythology, proverbs, and even slogans.

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In the ancient myth of Demeter, her daughter Persephone was unable to leave the underworld permanently because she ate pomegranate seeds there; Snow White took a bite of the poisoned apple given to her by the witch queen and fell into a deep sleep; Alice in Wonderland bit one side of a mushroom and then grew larger; when she took a bite from the other side, she became smaller. These many concepts influence our choices sometimes without our really realizing what is happening. Frequently repeated words created by advertisement agencies sometimes enter our everyday language through the media as well as by person to person. McDonald’s and the Walt Disney Company joined forces and advertised with now familiar conceptual slogans like “Only McDonald’s makes it easy to get a bit of Disney Magic” (Schlosser 2002, 50). Advertisements such as this, directed toward the U.S. public, particularly “‘minivan parents’[,] . . . carry an unspoken message about taking your children to McDonald’s: ‘It’s an easy way to feel like a good parent’” (Schlosser 2002, 50). Jingles and words such as this enter our everyday lived experience; we repeat them to one another now and then. They become a folklore element; essentially, an expressed verbal nugget of information in our culture. The essence of those ads was to establish the image of McDonald’s as a good family friend, a trusted friend, and as most children in the United States know, Ronald McDonald is a friend they like to visit often. Ronald, with his frequent media messages and recognizable material image offering the hamburgers and fries that have made the company famous, has become a folk figure in the United States. At this time in contemporary culture, he may be more recognizable to young children than classic folk figures like Paul Bunyan or Pecos Bill. Material folklore is another category that folklorists and students study, and material folklore refers to things people make with their hands. Rugs, pottery, basketry, and foods (plus innumerable other items) fall into this category. Traditional recipes, from tortillas to Christmas cookies to King’s Cake served in New Orleans during the carnival season, represent the material foodways of various groups of people. The foods are often markers or symbols of a culture, and their presence is expected at various occasions. My mother taught our family that pickled herring, eaten on New Year’s Eve, would bring good fortune through the coming year. She was of generic U.S. descent, but she seemed to believe that custom. I still include it in our family New Year’s celebration foods; for us, it is a family tradition. Crisp fried chicken is often associated with the southeastern region of the United States along with pecan pie and praline candy (a sweet pecan confection). Mexican or Tex-Mex foods in the southwestern states would include chilies, beans, and tomato-flavored rice. The northeastern coastal states are well known for their abundant lobster, crab, and oysters. Church suppers with their hearty casseroles, chocolate cakes, and fruit pies are found in many places, but they are particularly common in the Midwestern states. Regional foods are often ethnic

Beautiful Persephone. In ancient Greek mythology, Persephone ate a bite of a pomegranate and became the bride of Pluto, god of the underworld, forever. Proserpina, 1871 (colored chalk on paper), Rossetti, Dante Charles Gabriel (1828–1882)/© Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford, U.K., / The Bridgeman Art Library International

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Ronald McDonald. A Ronald McDonald character poses at the world’s oldest operating McDonald’s restaurant with the original golden arch architecture, as it draws a crowd on its 50th anniversary in Downey, California, on August 18, 2003. To commemorate the anniversary, prices were rolled back to those charged in 1953. The Downey McDonald’s is one of three built by the company’s founders, Richard and Maurice McDonald, who originally named it “Speedee.” © Reuters/CORBIS

or cultural markers, and there will be more examples and discussion of them and some of their meanings in later chapters. Customary lore, things people do, includes traditional banquets, festivals, and celebrations at which certain foods and behaviors are expected. A familiar example is the old tradition of throwing uncooked rice at a new bride and groom as they leave for their honeymoon. In recent decades, the tradition of throwing

Introduction

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uncooked rice has been questioned by some animal protection groups because raw rice is not digestible by birds, so items from birdseed to Cheerios cereal to tiny white candies have been substituted. A familiar food custom throughout the United States is the Thanksgiving dinner. It would be hard to imagine a November Thanksgiving dinner without a turkey and the traditional trimmings of stuffing, gravy, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, green vegetables, cranberry sauce, rolls, and pumpkin pie, though there are exceptions in many households. Beginning in 1846, Sarah Josepha Hale, a cookbook author and editor, “led a relentless campaign to make Thanksgiving a national holiday of food and family values” (Schenone 2003, 118). For 17 years, she crusaded to establish this celebration as a unifying national tradition. She thought that it might even bring the North and South closer together, and it was Hale who published recipes for turkeys, pumpkin pies, and visual images of families happily celebrating Thanksgiving. “In 1863, amidst the Civil War, Lincoln proclaimed a national Thanksgiving Day” (Schenone 2003, 119). In a related discussion, one of my folklore students from Maine informed our class that his family has always feasted on lobster and steak for Thanksgiving. He seemed surprised that everyone else in the classroom expected turkey, and most of the students in the class acted a bit shocked at his family choices. The folklore of belief represents various traditions that people practice and often hold sacred. Belief customs are often intertwined with the other basic folkloric categories (verbal, material, and customary as mentioned previously). Folk medicine, categorized under folk belief, includes suggested cures that use animal and insect sources, various natural food ingredients, plants, various herbs, and even clay. Some rather unexpected ingredients are used in folk cures. The Navajos, for instance, have a traditional cure used for relief of toothache and sore gums: a juice extracted from black stinkbugs (Yazzi 1997, 27). Symbolic food practices, taboos, and superstitions are common among many people and have been believed and passed along for centuries as elements of religious beliefs. Lenten practices among many devout Christians impose strict dietary restrictions for 40 days before Easter Sunday. Some religions forbid pork, and other cultural and religious groups would not consider a large gathering complete without certain foods and beverages, perhaps fried chicken and lemonade. These repeated practices have sometimes become identity markers over time, and members of various cultural and ethnic groups maintain cohesive group integrity by way of certain foods, specific ways of preparation, and prescribed ways of serving and eating. As an example of table behavior, it is considered poor manners in many Asian traditions, for some even a bad omen, to use a knife at the dining table. The folklore of foods can be found in the verbal, material, customary, and belief systems of people all over the world. In the following chapters, the reader will find a range of examples of traditions and food history that covers thousands of years and encircles the globe. Food and the quest for enough food influenced

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the development of humans long before formally recorded history, and the evidence of these efforts lives on by reconstruction of the remnants of the past. Ancient graves, tools, grinding stones, and even the occasional discovery of anciently cultivated fields reveal the efforts humans made to gain control over their food sources. When people in the distant past learned to produce and harvest more food than necessary to sustain their society, the excess was sold, and that was the beginning of economic commerce and trade. World history courses often begin with the development of civilization and commerce in the Middle East; this text will also begin the history there.

A BRIEF FOOD HISTORY 9500 B.C.E.–500 C.E. To date, one of the earliest civilizations to be discovered is Çatalhöyük, a well-preserved 9,500-year-old village in Turkey that may be the largest Neolithic settlement ever unearthed. It is possibly the first civilization to establish a community and an agrarian way of life. Archeological evidence has revealed that this village had “its own blend of friendships, rivalries, traditions, and rituals” (Balter 2005, 4). Though much is yet to be discovered, evidence has been found of ritual burial, tools and figurines, murals, wooden and clay implements, and storage bins that were probably used for wheat, lentils, and barley. Concerning the people of this time, Barbara Bender wrote: “Most likely they lived in bands of tribes and engaged in long-distance trade of valued items, such as obsidian and mollusk shells, which are found at both Upper Paleolithic and Natufian sites across the Near East” (Bender 1978, 204–22). More than 5,000 years ago, much of the early commerce was centered in the region between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers (Roberts 1998, 72), but scholarship has also noted very early, well-developed civilizations established in China and India. As early as 4000 b.c.e., “distant ancestors [of the Chinese] built dwellings along the fertile banks of the Yellow River in central China and south in the great delta of the Yangtzi [Yangtze River]. They grew millet and soya, and by around 4000 b.c. they had domesticated wild rice” (Allan 1999, 8). Around 2500 b.c.e., another advanced civilization emerged in the Indus River valley, a region now called Pakistan. This civilization eventually covered more than a 620,000 square miles, and “There is evidence that these people traded with the great powers of Egypt and Sumeria” (Gould 1988, 8). Both the people of India and China came to establish traditional views that food and drink were closely related, not only to the physical health of the body but also to the health of the mind (psychological aspects) and the soul (spiritual aspects). Knowledge and practice of these concepts in Chinese and Indian tradition is important.

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It is interesting to note that many of these food-oriented psychological and spiritual traditions have continued through time in Asia, whereas in the Western world the psychological and spiritual aspects of food, until recently, have carried considerably less recognized value. Because of increased education and world travel, however, Western understanding of these ancient cultures and traditions has increased, and adaptations of Asian foods, their meanings, and their traditional uses have established a much stronger presence in mainstream European and U.S. culture. As stated previously, many food traditions are bound to religion. Indo-Indians often follow various practices of the ancient Hindu belief system, and they have strong taboos against killing cattle for food. “Hindus venerate cows because cows are the symbol of everything that is alive. As Mary is to Christians the mother of God, the cow to Hindus is the mother of life. So, there is no greater sacrilege for a Hindu than killing a cow” (Harris 1989, 12). On the other hand, “Since Moslems spurn pork but eat beef, many Hindus consider them to be cow killers” (Harris 1989, 13). Where did these constructed beliefs originate, and why they have lasted for thousands of years? There are explanations, religious dictums, and lore, and in the following pages many of them will be presented for your information and reflection. Civilizations and foodways developed together over time.

A map of the Tigris and Euphrates region, often called the cradle of civilization. Michelle Pierce

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A map of the agriculturally fertile Yangtze River Delta in China. Michelle Pierce

For thousands of years, ancient trade routes across the Middle East and Asia carried carefully dried and preserved foods, spices, and treasures from Cairo to Peking. There were countless paths and roads running in myriad directions, and camel trains and people on foot made their way slowly along a variety of roads rather than just one thoroughfare. These many trails or roads came to be collectively known as the Silk Road, and merchants traversed “across deserts surrounded by snow-capped mountains, through oasis towns with bustling markets thronged with exotic inhabitants and travelers from all over northern Asia, buying and selling grapes, raisins, Hami melons, fat-tailed sheep, and tough little horses” (Wood 2002, 9). Very early missionaries traveled these ancient roads, and “from the nineteenth century they [the travelers] included explorers, geographers, and archeologists” (Wood 2002, 9). These merchants and travelers learned traditions about the foods they encountered, and they carried those ideas and lore along with them as they moved from region to region. The eastern boundary of the Silk Road was China, an ancient and deeply traditional culture. Chinese cuisine is based on aesthetic experience reflecting ancient dictums and discoveries. Thousand-year-old food-related behaviors and guidelines continue to this day to celebrate the highest level of preparation and appreciation of fine cuisine. From antiquity, combinations of contrasting fragrances, flavors, colors, and textures have been a part of the Chinese style of

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food preparation, cooking, and eating. Confucius (551–479? b.c.e.) respected the ancient traditions and arts of food preparation and dining, and he believed strongly that food was to be enjoyed. He established both culinary standards and proper table etiquette that continue to be quoted even in the contemporary world. Three of the many quotes referring to food and credited to Confucius include: “The way you cut your meat reflects the way you live,” “The honorable and upright man keeps well away from both the slaughterhouse and the kitchen. And he allows no knives on his table,” and “[T]he path to your friend’s heart and love goes from your cooking” (Chinese Food Quotations and Proverbs 2006). “China . . . is perhaps the only country in the world in which scholars, moralists, political thinkers, and poets have written treatises on food and put together collections of recipes” (Revel 1982, 108). Chinese cooking methods have been codified into approximately 8,000 recipes, and the scarcity of cooking fuel in China led Chinese cooks to learn to prepare foods quickly and efficiently. Carefully chopping and cutting vegetables and precious meat or fish into small shapes and combining them by very specific proportions and combinations continue to be efficient and creative methods for cooking with a minimum of fuel and time. Further, cutting the foods into bite-size pieces before cooking is a uniquely Chinese tradition. The use of knives at the table, as Confucius noted, is considered to be in very poor taste. Under the culture of Confucianism, the Chinese people were taught to consider the knife and fork as weapons of violence. Alternately, chopsticks symbolize peace, well-being, and kindness. There are many superstitions associated with chopsticks, and they will be discussed in chapter 3. Another unique tradition, called the Way of Tea, has ancient origins in Chinese Taoism but has developed over eons to its culmination in the Zen discipline known as the Japanese tea ceremony. This practice symbolizes the wisdom, beauty, and elegant simplicity of the Japanese culture, and the delightful and refreshing practice, which brings together such arts as architecture, pottery, and flower arranging, will be described further in chapter 3. It is both a tangible and spiritual sensory experience that soothes deep emotions. A constructed separation and framing of ancient tradition, it is a calming and refreshing time-out-of-time practice that continues today. In India and the surrounding northeastern and northwestern lands, the tradition and practice of vegetarianism grew out of religious ethos. For some of the sects, retreat, celibacy, poverty, and vegetarianism are believed to be essential elements of reaching fulfillment and holiness. There is a great effort to harm no living animal or insect of any kind because of the belief in Samsara, or progressive reincarnation. The Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain religions predominate in much of the Indian subcontinent, though there are also Muslims, Jews, and Christians.

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The Jains, a sect of the Hindu belief system, are strict vegetarians and practice careful traditions in order not to harm any living organism. In 1993, I was invited to attend a Jain religious service at a Hindu temple on King’s Street in Toledo, Ohio. The primary participants in the ceremonies wore silk scarves wrapped around their mouths and noses to prevent breathing in and harming even the tiniest insect or living organism. The meal afterward was served in three courses: a sweet, cool, milk-based soup that was eaten with a small spoon; a plate of rice surrounded with a variety of mild to very spicy curries accompanied by a flat bread rather than eating utensils; and a finale of sweetmeats of dried fruits rolled in seeds, ground nuts, or sugar. It was a colorful meal, entirely vegetarian, substantial, and delicious. Muslims, who emerged originally in the Middle Eastern region, followed the teachings of the Qur’an, as revealed by Muhammad (570–632 c.e.), the prophet who received the Qur’an and established the religion of Islam. The followers were warned in formulaic fashion from their scriptures that certain foods were taboo to them for all time. Alan Dundes, who wrote the text Fables of the Ancients? Folklore in the Qur’an (2003), quoted those scriptures in regard to food: He has forbidden you carrion, blood, and the flesh of swine; also any flesh that is consecrated to gods other than Allah (2:173, 5:3, 6:145, 16:115), some of which echoes passages in Leviticus (3;17, 11:7–8, 32). If, however, anyone is forced by necessity, for example, the threat of starvation, to eat any of these substances, so long as he doesn’t actually crave them or doesn’t willfully intend to disobey the taboo, he is deemed not guilty of any sin by a forgiving Allah: “Whoso is constrained, not desiring nor transgressing, no sin shall be upon him” (2:173, 6:145, 16:115). (Dundes 2003, 41)

In these scriptures, as well as in the Bible, the Hindu Upanishads and Bhagavad Gita, works of Confucius, and other ancient creeds, we find food dictums, foodways, that were undoubtedly passed along by word of mouth for eons before they were written. Folklore, information passed by word of mouth (or vernacular transmission), was the foundation for the moral guidance that these works gave those who believed and followed them. And for many, the moral practices were directly related to the foods that were allowed or not allowed. In the highly civilized ancient cultures of classical Greece and Rome, there were guest-host customs practiced for thousands of years. Nomad chiefs followed the traditions of welcoming and feeding their guests, and the meal provided by Achilles in honor of Odysseus as told in the Iliad may have been the same as had been served for millennia before and after: So brilliant Achilleus spoke, and guided them forward, and caused them to sit down on couches with purple coverlets and at once called over to Patroklos who was not far from him: “Son of Menoitios, set up a mixing-bowl that is bigger, and mix us stronger drink,

Introduction

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and make ready a cup for each man, since these who have come beneath my roof are the men that I love best.” So he spoke, and Patroklos obeyed his beloved companion, and tossed down a great chopping-block into the firelight, and laid upon it the back of a sheep, and one of a fat goat, with the chine of a fatted pig edged thick with lard, and for him Automedon held the meats, and brilliant Achilleus carved them, and cut it well into pieces and spitted them, as meanwhile Menoitios’ son, a man like a god, made the fire blaze greatly. But when the fire had burned itself out, and the flames had died down, he scattered the embers apart, and extended the spits across them lifting them to the andirons, and sprinkled the meats with divine salt. Then when he had roasted all, and spread the food on the platters, Patroklos took the bread and set it out on the table in fair baskets, while Achilleus [the host] served the meats. Thereafter he himself sat over against the godlike Odysseus. (Homer 1961, 203–4)

As time moved forward, the diets of the Greeks and then the Romans included more variety. Olives and olive oil became common elements, along with garlic, many varieties of fowl, cheeses, and assorted foods from the sea. In Greek culture, peasants, both in Athens and in the countryside, often suffered from inadequate diets. As the later Roman civilization and culture flourished, provisions were made for the poor. It is unclear if this practice emerged abstractly from the guest-host tradition, but “The annona [the distribution of free bread] originated [in Rome] as an official attempt to relieve poverty, but soon grew into a huge public subsidy that distorted the whole economic and social structure of the state” (Cowell 1962, 96–97, qtd. in Tannahill 1988, 71). “It took 14 million bushels of wheat a year to feed the people of Rome in Augustus’s time [27 b.c.e.–14 c.e.], representing the produce of hundreds of square miles of wheat fields” (Carcopino 1967, 28–29, qtd. in Tannahill 1988, 72). As time passed, the Roman government provided other food items and wine for the population, and at the height of “Rome’s imperial heyday one in three of the population was on the dole” (Carcopino 1967, 29, qtd. in Tannahill 1988, 71). The great Roman Empire eventually collapsed under attacks from outside forces, but the generous food distribution (done in part to escape heavy taxes on food products, olive oil, and wine) contributed substantially to the general weakening of the economy and the downfall of the Roman Empire. Today’s so-called Mediterranean diet, popularized as the Sonoma Diet, is a well-known and widely advertised health food and weight-loss guide in the United States. Because high cholesterol, high blood pressure, diabetes, and cancer are claimed to be significantly lower in Mediterranean countries than in the United States (Knoops and Esposito 2004, 14) and fewer people are overweight there, the guidelines for this diet include many of the same foods used for thousands of years in Greece and Italy. Although there are regional variations, the primary foods are whole grains, vegetables, fish, poultry, nuts, cheeses, and meat. In a 2005 edition of The Sonoma Diet, by Connie Guttersen, the inside cover

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depicts an illustration of “The Sonoma Diet Power Foods”: almonds, whole grains, olive oil, broccoli, blueberries, grapes, strawberries, spinach, bell peppers, and tomatoes. With the exception of bell peppers and tomatoes, which did not reach Europe until after the Columbus era, these illustrated foods are among the very foods that Homer and Ovid probably had on their tables. One of the earliest European poems known to the Western world is the great epic narrative Beowulf. Composed orally sometime before 750 c.e., it was probably written before the end of the tenth century in the Northumbrian region of England. The story, however, is actually set in Scandinavia in the region of southern Sweden. A rousing epic, the story evokes vivid pictures of great halls and banquets. The banquets, pictured in Beowulf and present in many representations of the period in Europe between 450 c.e. and 1500 c.e., were important feasts presented for a variety of purposes. Rich and poor, religious and secular, winter, summer, or harvest, the feasts and banquets celebrated the solstice and the equinox and many traditions in-between.

500 C.E.–1500 C.E. The so-called Dark Ages, or Medieval period of European history, began soon after the fall of Rome. On September 4, 476 c.e., Odoacer, a German (often called Goth) commander of a wing of the Roman army, deposed the last emperor, Romulus Augustus. Most people returned to the countryside, deserting the dangerous urban areas, and human fortunes were both made and lost during the subsequent period of about 1,000 years. There were many varieties of human suffering that ranged from disease to starvation. During the loosely defined practice of feudalism and a long period of warrior nobility in Europe, people were commonly classified as lords, vassals, and peasants. The land was divided into parcels called fiefs, and in feudal society the lord was the owner of the land. The vassal was a person to whom land was given by the lord, and the heritable land was called a fief. The lord would buy the military service of the vassal by providing him permanently with a fief. Monasteries also dotted Europe by the ninth century, and they were often well endowed financially, having been founded by the land-rich feudal lords. The monasteries were frequently directed by sons and daughters of those same feudal lords; therefore, some monasteries were extremely wealthy and had huge stores of foods and wine. In spite of donated funds, life in the monasteries was generally austere, with a multitude of rules and regulations. It would be typical in cold weather to have only one meal a day; in summer when the days were longer, the one meal was supplemented by a light supper. In an affluent monastery or abbey, such as some of the Benedictine congregations, there might be “ale or wine, sometimes spiced with herbs, . . . bread, cheese, porridge, and deliciously seasoned dishes of fish,

Introduction

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A medieval village celebration. Woodcut by Nicholaus Meldemann. The Granger Collection, New York

vegetables, and eggs. Although meat was forbidden under the Benedictine Rule, ailing monks were exempt, and in some religious houses it was said that half the monks would report sick to enjoy a feast of meat in the infirmary” (Dersin 1997, 21). In some orders, mealtime was to be conducted in silence, and a folkloric sign language (meaning informally passed along), with as many as a hundred signals, was developed among the monks. For fish, for instance, a monk “made swimming motions with his hands; for cheese, he would press his palms together. To indicate the word ‘hot,’ he held the side of his right forefinger to his closed mouth” (Dersin 1997, 21). Other orders, such as the Cistercians founded by Bernard, son of a Burgundian nobleman, were less wealthy and even more austere. The most typical fare in most monasteries and abbeys of any order was one meal a day consisting of bread and two warm accompaniments, like fish, eggs, cheese, or vegetables, and then a cold snack in the evening. The very poor peasants and workers of Europe, both agricultural and domestic, subsisted mainly on what they could grow. Peasants worked the land often under less than reasonable conditions, and they were required to give the finest of their products to the ruling lords and ladies. They had the barest means in terms of food, clothing, and shelter to sustain life, but they served as tailors, bakers,

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barbers, cooks, and in other arduous labors. Even so, all levels of society and religious orders enjoyed celebrations and feasts at times. At Canterbury, Thomas Becket had a reputation for lavish hospitality and served sumptuous meals of great variety to the people, both rich and poor, including generous varieties of meats. Vegetables were considered a food of the poor, and raw fruits were thought to be health threatening, so a meal with the lord might be limited in variety but served in a spectacular way. “On any night Becket’s table might feature a roasted peacock with its tail feathers in full display, or a cooked swan gliding across a pond of green pastry, or a meat pie that released a cloud of small birds when cut open—providing target practice for the nobles’ falcons” (Dersin 1997, 59). The food would have been prepared by the very cooks who had barely enough for themselves to eat.

Medieval Banquet. A medieval dining hall with the lord of the manor at one table, guests at a lower table, and a bard entertaining them all. The Granger Collection, New York

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Wealthier classes took part in the revival of merchant trade and increased the variety and quality of their cuisine. The peasants lived on bread, dairy products, and cheap cuts of meat the lords and vassals did not want, but sometimes they were able to obtain preserved fish. We learn from ancient monastery records, bits and pieces of literature, and eventually written history that the life span was short and the quality of life was precarious and often threatened by disease or violence. What today may seem like a minor illness or injury would at that time often mean almost certain death. Skipping forward to the late fourteenth century, recall that Christopher Columbus was searching for an ocean path to India and the spices of the Asian world when he happened upon a rather large body of land and many islands. Searching for exotic spices and varied treasures of the Orient, those same items that were carried along the Silk Road, Columbus accidentally encountered the islands and continents of North and South America. There is evidence that earlier explorers from the Nordic countries and even the Basques from northern Spain

The Pilgrims at Table. Woodcut from William Caxton’s second edition of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, circa 1484. The Granger Collection, New York

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may have set foot on the Western continents centuries before Columbus and his fleet of ships, but while searching for a shortcut to the markets of Asia, Columbus is commonly credited with discovering America. The desire for exotic flavors, valuable black pepper, silks, porcelains, and various other artifacts was strong in Europe, and Isabella and Ferdinand of Spain financed Columbus in hopes of finding new sources of revenue for their country. Rather than Oriental treasure, the treasure that came to them was in the form of gold sacrificed at a great cost to the American natives. But there were culinary treasures introduced to Europe because of the Columbian expedition. The Spanish dreams of long-term European trade and commerce with the Orient were never fulfilled, but Columbus and other Spanish sailors and explorers introduced many valuable new foods from America to Europe, including the capsicum pepper and potatoes. Columbus’s failure to carry the desirable black pepper back to Spain from China was initially a disappointment, but capsicum, a genus of plants of many species, served the same seasoning purpose. Peppers (mild and hot), pimento, and many varieties of chilies were interesting new flavors found in use by the islanders who lived near the southern coast of North America, and these new ingredients were well received in Spain. The first tomatoes and potatoes, also native American foods, were not as readily accepted in Spain or in most of Europe. Many centuries passed before tomatoes and potatoes were really accepted because the deadly nightshade plant and the poisonous mandrake both belong to the same family of plants, and many people believed and feared that potatoes and tomatoes would cause either deathly illnesses or death itself According to The Oxford Companion to Food, tomatoes remained an object of suspicion in Britain until the end of the nineteenth century (Davidson 1999, 800). Besides the belief that they were poisonous, there was lore born earlier in Europe that the tomato might also have chemical qualities that would cause one who ate it to become more amorous. It was thought that links to the mandrake, a suspected aphrodisiac, might cause the tomato to have the same effect on people. Englishwoman Flora Thompson, in the novel Lark Rise to Candleford (1945), wrote: At first sight, the basket of red and yellow fruit attracted Laura’s colour-loving eye. “What are those?” she asked old Jerry. “Love-apples, me dear. Love-apples, they be; though some hignorant folks be a callin’ ’em tommytoes. But you don’t want any o’ they—nasty sour things, they be, as only gentry can eat. You have a nice sweet orange wi’ your penny.” But Laura felt she must taste the love-apples and insisted upon having one. Such daring created quite a sensation among the onlookers. “Don’t ’ee go tryin’ to eat it, now,” one woman urged. “It’ll only make ’ee sick. I know because I had one of the nasty horrid things at our Minnie’s.” (Thompson 1945)

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In the last 200 years, the tomato, no longer nicknamed the love apple, has become one of the most commonly used plant foods in the world. From Italy’s early and broad cultivation of tomatoes and the development Italian tomato pastes and sauces to U.S. ketchup (probably invented in the early nineteenth century), tomatoes are a healthful and tasty addition to the world’s kitchens. It is hard to believe that for centuries they were held in such suspicion, and these days, tomato-drenched spaghetti and various versions of pizza are available throughout the world.

1500–1900 Throughout most of the world, including Europe, Scandinavia, the Americas, and Asia, the 400-year period between 1500 and 1900 was a time of discovery and invention. For many countries, it was a time for the establishment of a

Pizza and Tomatoes. The tomato, which originated in the Americas, is now found and enjoyed throughout the world. iStockPhoto.com / Pierangelo Rendina

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national identity, complex change, and progress. The Renaissance (1500–1660), the neoclassical period (1660–1798), and the romantic period (1798–1870) were each unique in their philosophical understandings, perceptions, and objectives, and these differences influenced interpretations and meanings given to food production, preparation, and table behaviors. In countries from Africa to the Middle East, the Oceanic islands, the continent of Australia, and the islands of New Zealand, cultures and foodways were also changing because of increased merchant trade and colonization.

Renaissance (1500–1660) Jean-François Revel wrote, “In the course of history there has been a peasant (or seafarer’s) cuisine and a court cuisine; a plebeian cuisine and a family cuisine prepared by the mother (or the humble family cook); and a cuisine of professionals that only chefs fanatically devoted to their art have the time and knowledge to practice” (Revel 1982, 19). This is true in today’s world as well as in the changing world of the Renaissance. The Renaissance itself cannot be crisply defined in terms of time or place, but there are accounts and records of many events and practices from that period. It was a time during which individualism and personal freedom began be recognized and come into play. It was a time, according the historian Revel, that the medieval era of highly seasoned stews had ended and the age of tasty sweetmeats had arrived (Revel 1982, 141). Martin Luther had led many to reject much of the dogma of the powerful Roman Catholic Church in favor of a more independent and personal relationship with God and the scriptures. There was also a general movement toward more empirical or scientific examination of issues and happenings, rather than attributing so many unexplained occurrences to the occult. These attitudes blossomed a little later during the Enlightenment, but the roots of scientific thinking came from the Renaissance period. This was a period of curiosity and investigation; for instance, Leonardo da Vinci “opined that fossils were not, as widely supposed, placed in the rock by the devil but were formed by trapped plants and animals metamorphosing in the soil” (Kurlansky 2003, 310). Facts like that may seem ordinary and even mundane to today’s reader, but at that time many of the natural processes of the world were shrouded in mystery and superstition. That includes many examples, practices, and beliefs about foodways. The Renaissance was still a period of contrasts between feast and famine. The great merchants, landowners, and aristocracy had plenty, and descriptions of their elaborate feasts suggest that nothing was spared and much food was wasted. Various fowl and animals, even goats, were cooked and arranged for display with feathers, fur, and sometimes antlers or horns in place. There were scant fresh

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vegetables and fruit because most people in Europe still did not understand the need for fresh, uncooked foods. It is interesting to note that decomposition of many of the meat displays began even before the impressive, restructured fowl, goats, and occasional deer were impressively displayed on the huge banquet tables. Because of the odor of decomposition, aromatic fumigations were necessary in the banquet hall. Revel’s history states: “Such excessive use was made of these aromatic burners set about in the room and sometimes under the table that cases are cited in which several guests nearly died of asphyxiation from the fumes” (Revel 1982, 132). On the other hand, famine and destitution were common, and throughout Europe thousands of homeless people wandered from place to place resorting to begging and stealing to survive. England during the Elizabethan era (Elizabeth I, born in 1533, reigned from 1558 to 1603) was also the time of the great playwright William Shakespeare (1564–1616). There are many myths and tales about both of these figures. One apocryphal story about Shakespeare concerning game poaching intimates supposed reasons for his leaving Stratford-upon-Avon, which was his birthplace and the home of his family. Shakespeare’s family was financially secure, and typical meals for his family and throughout most of the English countryside and the rest of Europe at this time for middle-class farmers and landowners would be preserved fruit or fruit pies; game or occasionally domestically bred poultry, ham, mutton or beef; bread; cheese and butter; onions; and cabbage. Because of the financial security of the family, it is likely that the poaching story about a youthful Shakespeare is untrue, but for the less financially secure, starvation was a very real possibility, and poaching held the promise of survival. Poaching, or stealing game from private property, was common throughout Europe because people needed food. It was illegal and was practiced out of necessity; however, some youths participated in the practice more for sport than need. No one knows if Shakespeare really participated in poaching in his youth, but Sir Thomas Lucy of Charlecote, an important landowner and justice of the peace in the Stratford region, had a coney warren (rabbit breeding area), and his rabbits were stolen now and then. The enmity between Shakespeare and Lucy “began, so it is said, with William poaching Lucy’s deer and rabbits for which he was beaten and thrown into prison. To get his own back [retribution], Shakespeare penned a bitter satirical ballad full of personal insults, which he stuck up on Lucy’s front gate. That was the final straw and William was forced to leave town” (Wood 2003, 99). That is the lore, but as usual, there is more to the story. Lucy, a Puritan and local enforcer of the law for Queen Elizabeth, had sentenced Edward Arden, a member of the old landed gentry, an outspoken Roman Catholic, and a kin of Shakespeare’s, to be hung (Wood 2003, 20, 99). That may have been the trigger for Shakespeare’s exit from Stratford, rather than the accusation of poaching. The

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point here is that poaching game and even stealing garden vegetables and fruit were necessary parts of survival for many centuries in Europe. Recall the episode in the Grimm’s fairy tale of “Rapunzel”: One day the woman [who was expecting a child] was standing by this window and looking down into the garden when she saw a bed which was planted with the most beautiful rampion (rapunzel), and it looked so fresh and green that she longed for it, and had the greatest desire to eat some. (Grimm 1972, 73)

Many of the old folk and fairy tales carried elements of lived human behavior. The punishment in the tale (giving up the child to the witch whose garden it was) was severe as was punishment in the Elizabethan era. To starve, at that time, was more honorable than to steal.

Neoclassical Period (1660–1798) In the last 40 years of the 1600s, there began an intense movement of religious, political, and personal experimentation, and during the 1700s, there were nearly a hundred years of intellectual enlightenment and science. Though the Enlightenment was a philosophical movement that emerged in France, the ideas spread over most of Europe and across the ocean to the Americas. It was a time when people thought of the possibilities of somehow perfecting and improving themselves and their nations. It was a time of revolution in many ways, culminating in the violent American and French Revolutions. In this age of discovery and experimentation, even the eating habits changed. A taste for sweet desserts and new flavors emerged. As the seventeenth century grew to a close, people in England and on the European continent who could afford the service of trained cooks frequently enjoyed ices and sherbets. These had originated in Spain and Sicily and were usually served “with tea from China, coffee from Arabia, and chocolate from America” (Revel 1982, 165). This was an era of the “classical ideals of taste, polish, commonsense, and reason,” for these ideals were considered “more important than emotion and imagination” (Harmon and Holman 2006, 347). Turkey from North America became more popular, and vegetables such as green peas, asparagus, cauliflower, and broccoli were widely accepted. The development of the cork enabled successful shipping of bottles of wine, which had also become more and more popular. Instead of sealing bottles of wine with a layer of oil, as had been done since the Greco-Roman period, corks sealed the bottles efficiently and safely. In the countryside of Great Britain, dishes with charming names and still served today began to emerge. Clootie dumpling, for instance, is a Scottish steamed fruit pudding that would have been cooked traditionally in a clout, or piece of cloth, and so it was called Clootie dumpling (Salmon n.d.b., 8).

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Shropshire fidget pie was so called because it was originally fitched, or five sided in shape; Durham pikelet is a regional name for a crumpet (a biscuitlike pastry to be eaten with lots of butter); and Gosforth Gridies or Northumbrian girdle cakes, again similar to biscuits, emerged in the northeastern part of England, near Newcastle, and are still served there today (Salmon n.d.a., 39, 38, 11). During the 1700s, cooking also became more scientific. For those with the time, money, and interest, cookbooks were more widely available for common use. Even so, careful attention was needed in order to produce many of the complex dishes. Early cookbooks were often a combination of folkloric tips for maintaining health, medicinal uses of foods, and the prevention of disease, but they slowly became guides to food preparation with emphasis on the foods themselves rather than their effects on the health of the body. Unlike today’s cookbooks, ingredients and methods were not listed separately, and without coaching from an experienced cook, they were nearly impossible to follow. It was during the 1700s that baba au rhum (a sweet cake with rum created first in Poland), mayonnaise, sauces, and other dishes still on tables today were invented. Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, an epicurean, politician, and man of letters during the revolutionary eras of America and France, quoted Henrion de Pensey, who wrote: “I hold the discovery of a new dish, which sustains our appetite and prolongs our sense of pleasure, to be a far more interesting even than the discovery of a star; of stars we see enough already” (Brillat-Savarin 2002, 320). Many of those new dishes remain today’s standards. Personal cleanliness and etiquette at the table also gained importance among many on the Continent during this time. For centuries, the habit of throwing bones and other waste from the meal beneath the table was an acceptable practice. Recognizing the need for cleanliness, the use of tile or mosaics beneath the table for easy cleaning was first established in Italy, and the fork, enabling more gracious eating, was introduced there also. In other places, the changes toward tidier dining came more slowly. For instance, “In England . . . the floor of the great hall in many houses was still covered with rushes; a fresh layer of rushes and fragrant herbs was added from time to time to counter the stench from the lower layers” (Winks 1996, 233). Symbols of gentility increased as time passed, and with the close of the eighteenth century, people began to turn away from the constraints of the past decades and gradually to turn to the enjoyment of everyday life. Characteristics such as the love of nature, more freedom of imagination, less scientific rigidity, more genuine interest in human rights, and even developing sentimentality emerged. The elaborate foods of the aristocracy, prepared by trained cooks in private kitchens, became more available to the public through a metamorphosis of public eating places. After the French Revolution, the National Assembly banished food-monopolizing guilds, and the result was the emergence of restaurants with their own in-house kitchens. Because of French

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governmental regulations prior to the uprising, proprietors of taverns and inns during the 1700s had to purchase their foodstuffs from various shops: caterers, pastry makers, butchers, and rôtisseurs (meat cooks). Coffeehouses were popular in cities throughout Europe, particularly in France and Italy, but democratic change occurred in France, and the concept of public restaurants emerged. A full range of foods and services was offered to the public, and, at last, anyone who could afford it was welcome to enjoy the convenience of restaurant cuisine.

Romantic Period (1798–1870) During this loosely bounded period, philosophical perspectives of optimism, greed, capitalistic acquisition, as well as romantic notions of nature, naturalism, and freedom seemed to swirl together with skepticism, cynicism, and the impulse to revolution and reform. The discussion of foodways during this period becomes particularly interesting and gracefully leads us into the next chapter of definitions and classifications because that is what occurred with the birth of the restaurant industry. Revel, in his text Culture and Cuisine: A Journey through the History of Food (1982), discussed the cuisines of the various centuries, and when approaching the discussion of the nineteenth century, keep in mind the categories he identified: haute or grand cuisine, bourgeois cuisine, and regional cuisine (Revel 1982, 224). Those classic categories will be broken down further in the next chapter, but they are particularly important to the understanding of varied foodway perspectives. For centuries, grand cuisine was limited to the palates of the wealthy. These were the educated upper-class and often powerful people who could afford to hire talented cooks, pay for exotic ingredients, and maintain staff to serve their private households. Bourgeois cuisine was the daily or special-occasion food prepared by middle-class women in their own homes with an occasional maid or helper. The women and their helpers could read both simple and complex recipes in cookbooks representing the grand cuisine and adapt them for their own use, often using simplified methods and regional ingredients to create their dishes. Regional cuisine, often based in ethnic or cultural tradition and locally available ingredients, created another identifying framework. Methods for cooking, specific combinations of spices, herbs, and elements familiar to the home cook, influenced by the sometimes extraordinary dishes suggested in the cookbooks, allowed the home cook to build a repertoire of broader, more experimental fare. Restaurants, thriving on public admiration and acclaim, became and continue to remain centers for experimentation and often expensive gastronomical pleasure. As the restaurant industry progressed, the kitchens in restaurants ranged from simple and basic, not much more than a home kitchen, to incredibly elaborate. According to the size of the dining room and the number of people served

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on a regular basis, the restaurant kitchen might have one cook or many, who range from highly trained, creative chefs to apprentices and assistants to kitchen hands who fetch, chop, stir, and wash. Restaurant slang among employees is common, and much of it has roots that wind back in time. Front house [means the] area of restaurant open to customers, including the floor, the register and waiting area, and the customer restrooms. The back house consists of all areas to which the public does not have access, including the kitchen, dishroom, manager’s office, stockroom, main waitresses’ station, and employees break room and restrooms. . . . The line: area in which cooks prepare orders. Generally speaking, a long, narrow, and compact kitchen, partitioned off from the rest of the back house. (Paules 1991, 192–93, 196)

The industrial age, with its roots in the romantic period, brought incredible change and progress to the world at large. Various civilizations, past and present, have had both common and different interests in certain foods, and the customs, taboos, and lore surrounding their uses and interpretations are complex and multilayered. Because of the scope of this study, many discussions will necessarily be compressed and even generalized, and there will be information omitted simply because the topic is vast. The following chapters will provide a broad international overview of foods, foodways, diet, cookery, and their ongoing legacies over time and place. This is an international study because of the nature of foodways in the United States. The discussion will include the Victorian period (1833–1901), the modern period (1901–1945), and the contemporary period (1945 to present day). Provided also are resources for further study.

WORKS CITED Allan, Tony. 1999. “The First Chinese.” In Land of the Dragon: Chinese Myth. London: Time Life Books/Duncan Baird. Balter, Michael. 2005. The Goddess and the Bull: Çatalhöyük: An Archeological Journey to the Dawn of Civilization. New York: Free Press. Bender, Barbara. 1978. “Gatherer-Hunter to Farmer: A Social Perspective.” World Ar– chaeology 10 (2): 204–22. Brillat-Savarin, Jean Anthelme. 2002. The Physiology of Taste. Mineola, NY: Dover. Carcopino, Jerome. 1967. Daily Life in Ancient Rome: The People and the City at the Height of the Empire. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press. Quoted in Food in History, by Reay Tannahill. New York: Crown, 1988. Chinese Food Quotations and Proverbs. 2006. Chinese Food-Recipes.com. Available at: http://www.chinesefood-recipes.com/food_articles/food_quotations.php. Accessed April 27, 2007. Cowell, F. R. 1962. The Revolutions of Ancient Rome. Quoted in Food in History by Reay Tannahill. New York: Crown, 1988.

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Davidson, Alan. 1999. The Oxford Companion to Food. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Dersin, Denise. 1997. What Life Was Like in the Age of Chivalry. Richmond, Va.: Time-Life Books. Dundes, Alan. 2003. Fables of the Ancients? Folklore in the Qur’an. Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Littlefield. Gould, David. 1998. “A Sacred History.” In The Eternal Cycle: Indian Myth. London: Time Life Books/Duncan Baird. Grimm, Wilhelm, and Jacob Grimm. 1972. “Rapunzel.” 73–77. In The Complete Grimm’s Fairy Tales. New York: Pantheon Books. Guttersen, Connie. 2005. The Sonoma Diet: Trimmer Waist, Better Health in Just 10 Days! Des Moines, Iowa: Meredith Books. Harmon, William, and Hugh Holman. 2006. A Handbook to Literature. 10th ed. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Pearson, Prentice Hall. Harris, Marvin. 1989. Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches: The Riddles of Culture. New York: Vintage Books. Homer. 1961. The Iliad of Homer. Trans. Richmond Lattimore. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Knoops, K., and K. Esposito. 2004. “The Mediterranean Diet.” Journal of the American Medical Association 292: 14. Kurlansky, Mark. 2003. Salt: A World History. New York: Penguin Books. Paules, Greta Foff. 1991. Dishing It Out: Power and Resistance among Waitresses in a New Jersey Restaurant. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. Revel, Jean-François. 1982. Culture and Cuisine: A Journey through the History of Food. New York: De Capo Press. Roberts, J. M. 1998. The Illustrated History of the World: Prehistory and the First Civilizations. London: Time Life Books/Duncan Baird. Salmon, J. n.d.a. Favorite English Recipes: Traditional Fare from around the Counties. Sevenoaks, U.K.: J. Salmon. ———. n.d.b. More Favorite British Pudding Recipes: Traditional Baked, Boiled and Steamed Desserts. Sevenoaks, U.K.: J. Salmon. Schenone, Laura. 2003. A Thousand Years over a Hot Stove. New York: W. W. Norton. Schlosser, Eric. 2002. Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal. New York: Houghton Mifflin. Shepherd, Jean, Leigh Brown, and Bob Clark. 1983. A Christmas Story (screenplay). Hollywood, Calif.: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Turner Entertainment Company and Time Warner. Thompson, Flora. 1945. Lark Rise to Candleford. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Winks, Robin W., Crane Brinton, John B. Christopher, and Robert Lee Wolff. 1996. A History of Civilization: Prehistory to 1715. Vol. 1. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Prentice Hall. Wood, Frances. 2002. The Silk Road. London: Folio Society. Wood, Michael. 2003. Shakespeare. New York: Basic Books/Perseus Books Group. Yazzi, Sheryl Marietta. 1997. Folk Remedies among Lamanites. Provo, Utah: William B. Wilson Folklore Archives.

Q Two

Definitions and Classifications

THE GRAND OR HAUTE CUISINE To take a glimpse at private dining habits, customs, and lore in wealthy British homes in the early part of the nineteenth century is not difficult if we turn to the literary pages of Jane Austen, Anthony Trollope, and Charles Dickens. All three writers reveal the foodways and cultural context of Continental influence as well as the folkways of varying British economic and social classes. Part of the cultural practice in both rural and urban homes of the genteel and wealthy British involved dressing properly. “You needed a breakfast outfit, something fancier for lunch, followed by the tea gown, and then the heavy artillery for dinner that night” (Pool 1993, 83). The foods were prepared by cooks and servants in these private homes, and the grand or haute cuisine, learned from continental cooks and cookbooks from France and Italy, was served elaborately and as carefully as circumstances would allow. British cooking has been more imitative than inventive, but food preparation in the United Kingdom has always been valued, and the elaborate Victorian age, which began around 1833, brought restraints in etiquette but unleashed, in contrast, physical luxury and visual opulence, including extravagantly prepared and presented foods to enhance the lives of those who could afford it. For centuries in the city, breakfast for the well-to-do had been a light meal of toast or some typed of cooked cereal, but with the Victorian age it became a heavy meal of rolls, preserves, sausages, ham, eggs, and sometimes tomatoes, potatoes, and other cooked vegetables. At a typical country estate, breakfast was usually casual, and both the master and mistress, and their guests, could come and go and sit where they liked. For some of the cared-for elderly, breakfast was

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served in bed, but for most the first meal of the day was served buffet style from a sideboard in a light, pleasant room. A variety of foods were made available, and the author Daniel Pool suggests that the selection would likely include “a hearty mixture of ham, eggs, pheasant, and other substantial fare necessary to fuel the guests for their day’s activities out in the field” (Pool 1993, 82–83). Another aspect of breakfast in the British tradition in the 1800s was the wedding breakfast. Weddings were legislated, by law, to be held in the mornings until the late 1880s, and that is why “marriages were customarily celebrated with a ‘wedding breakfast’” (Pool 1993, 184). In Dickens’s Great Expectations, Pool reminds us that the folk custom of the wedding breakfast accounts for the hour in which Miss Havisham stopped all of the clocks. “As Herbert Pocket tells Pip, she received a letter breaking off her marriage the day of her wedding ‘When she was dressing for her marriage?’ Pip asks. ‘At twenty minutes to nine,’ Herbert assents” (Pool 1993, 184). Lunch was the next meal of the day in the homes of the well-to-do nineteenthcentury British, though lunch as it is known today evolved in a slow process that settled into the eating pattern that much of the Western world follows, more or less, today; that is, breakfast, lunch, tea or snack, and dinner. As society passed into the industrial age, Sherrie McMillan, a writer for the History Magazine, wrote that people were not sleeping as late in the morning, and: Some upper-class individuals did get up earlier, children for instance, and sometimes their mothers. By 1800 the dinner hour had been moved to six or seven. For early risers, this meant a very long wait until dinner. Even those who arose at ten a.m. or noon had a wait of anywhere from six to nine hours. Ladies, tired of the wait, had established luncheon as a regular meal, not an occasional one, by about 1810. It was a light meal, of dainty sandwiches and cakes, held at noon or one or even later, but always between breakfast and dinner. And it was definitely a ladies’ meal; when the Prince of Wales established a habit of lunching with ladies, he was ridiculed for his effeminate ways, as well as his large appetite. Real men didn’t do lunch, at least not until the Victorian era. Since the middle classes were still eating dinner in midday for the most part, they had no room for luncheon in their day. But that was changing. (McMillan 2001, 3)

The next period set aside for refreshment in the British culture, and much of Continental culture as well, was tea. The British teatime, called either tea or high tea, has many variations and a long heritage, but it was preceded by other cultures centuries earlier. The practice of taking tea as an artful pause in the day originated long, long ago in Asia and is now often referred to as the Japanese tea ceremony. Kakuzō Okakura (1862–1913), once a curator of East Asian art at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, wrote: Tea began as a medicine and grew into a beverage. In China, in the eighth century, it entered the realm of poetry as one of the polite amusements. The fifteenth century saw

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Japanese Tea Ceremony. A young woman pours water with a ladle during a tea ceremony at the Togo Jinja shrine in Tokyo. © Peter M. Wilson/CORBIS

Japan ennoble it into a religion of aestheticism—teaism. Teaism is a cult founded on the adoration of the beautiful among the sordid facts of everyday existence. It inculcates purity and harmony, the mystery of mutual charity, the romanticism of the social order. It is essentially a worship of the imperfect, as it is a tender attempt to accomplish something possible in this impossible thing we know as life. (Okakura 1993, 1)

Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, mentioned earlier as a food critic and man of letters during the revolutionary eras in America and France, once remarked that afternoon tea was “an extraordinary form of entertainment—offered to people who have already dined well and therefore feel neither thirst or hunger, so that its purpose is solely of passing the time and its foundation is no more than a display of dainties” (Brillat-Savarin 2002). Though for centuries the French have commonly served tea after dinner, and contemporary Spaniards and Italians particularly enjoy very strong coffee (often decaffeinated) after a meal, the British established their well-known afternoon tea before the last meal of the day in the early 1800s, and it has continued into the present. As indoor gas or oil lighting made possible a well-lighted dinner at a later hour in the evening, the stretch between lunch and the final meal of the day may have been as much as eight hours. Two popular ideas from the 1700s and the early 1800s seemed to blend and resulted in the British afternoon tea. In the 1700s,

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Victorian Teatime. Women and children enjoy a teatime snack in the late afternoon. Clipart. com

the earl of Sandwich had the idea of putting a filling between two slices of bread. A little later, “Anna, 7th Duchess of Bedford [in England], is reputed to have originated the idea of afternoon tea around four or five o’clock in the afternoon to ward off hunger pangs between lunch and dinner” (Enjoy England 2007, 1). Coffee breaks and cocktail parties in our contemporary world have diminished the practice of afternoon tea both in the United Kingdom and in North America, but in many homes, inns, hotels, and restaurants in both countries, teatime is still considered a rejuvenating event. The essence of the formal afternoon tea has not changed much over the years. Tea, milk, and sugar, small sandwiches, assorted cookies (or biscuits as they are called in England), petit fours (small cakes), glazed fresh fruit, and nuts presented on the best china and silver are arranged and served in a relaxed atmosphere. The tea break can be informal as well, with the refreshment being as simple as a cup of tea and a cookie or piece of fruit. It is not unusual for wine or a liquor to be served at teatime as well. Between 1741 and 1820 [in England] industrialists, landowners and clerics tried to put a stop to the tea break, maintaining that tea drinking and rest made working people slothful. Modern thinking couldn’t be further away from this—regular tea breaks are

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a vital part of the day and help to maintain a positive balance and good health. (Enjoy England 2007, 2)

On the other hand, Brillat-Savarin wrote in 1825: “Bodily toil provokes thirst; for this reason employers of labour never fail to recruit the strength of those in their employment with drinks; hence the saying that he gets the best price for wine who gives it to his employees” (Brillat-Savarin 2002, 97). As stated previously, teatime has many variations. High tea may include heavier foods such as meat, cheese, bread, and cakes as well as tea, a late afternoon practice common among laborers and farmers in the United Kingdom, and it may serve as the last meal of the day. The evening meal in the homes of the wealthy during the Victorian period and into the twentieth century, both in Britain and the United States, was often prepared in the manner of the grand cuisine. The word dinner comes from the Middle English diner and the Old French disner. The name refers to the chief meal of the day, whether eaten at noon or in the evening. By the early part of the nineteenth century, wealthy households had moved the meal from around noon to between 7:00 and 8:30 p.m. “From this hour, those who did not have to get up for work the next morning pushed dinner ever later, as a sign of leisure” (Flanders 2003, 267). This was the meal at which the finest foods were prepared by skilled cooks and served by careful servants bounded by customs, manners, and station (in both the United States and in England). The table was to be dressed beautifully every day with floral arrangements or a plant in a fine ceramic pot. Typical evening meals began with soup, followed by roast, fowl, or fish. There were assorted vegetables, puddings and sweet desserts, and cheese, last of all, sometimes served with a crisp vegetable such as celery. For dinner parties in the nineteenth century, both in England and the United States, an elaborate grand cuisine meal was often catered or at least prepared by additional cooks who knew the delicacy and care necessary for success with the sometimes very complex recipes. A sumptuous dinner party menu for eight might include: “artichoke soup; fillets of salmon; leg of lamb, salad, new potatoes, stewed celery; wild duck, watercress; Aldershot pudding, plum pudding; soft roe of herring; and biscuits” (Flanders 2003, 288). London writer Judith Flanders also described another meal for 12 men, a “gentlemen only” dinner: caviar; clear soup, cold salmon, pigeons, tomato salad; roast lamb, peas; haricots verts; roast chicken, salad, Russian salad; jelly, macedoine of fruit; anchovy savory, cream cheese; ices—pineapple cream, raspberry water (that is, pineapple ice cream and raspberry sorbet); grapes, cherries, greengage plums” (Flanders 2003, 288–89). In addition to this, the diners consumed 37 bottles of assorted wines (Flanders 2003, 289). After dinner, the women usually left the dining room and went to the parlor, where they visited until the men joined them. There was often entertainment in the form of instrumental or vocal music, and sometimes the group played

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table games or even charades. Rarely heavy cakes, cookies, punch, or wines were served, but usually a light selection of cookies and tea were offered to the guests, host, and hostess. It was not unusual for other invited guests, individuals who were not present at the earlier dinner party, to arrive at this time of the evening to enjoy visiting, light refreshments, and the entertainment. The party nearly always ended before 11:00 p.m. This discussion has focused primarily on the grand cuisine of the wealthy in the Victorian period from about 1830 to 1900. In the following discussion, the bourgeois cuisine, or middle-class cuisine, will be discussed. Focusing mainly on foodways in the United States during the middle of the nineteenth and on through the twentieth century, it will be made clear that over time, the loss of household help for the middle and upper economic classes influenced the cuisine and attitudes toward it. As Jean-François Revel stated: “Bourgeois cuisine . . . finds its place between the international cuisine of the professionals and the countless varieties of regional cuisine” (Revel 1982, 224).

BOURGEOIS CUISINE Brillat-Savarin, our often quoted French culinary observer, stated: “The pleasures of the table are of all times and all ages, of every country and every day; they go hand in hand with all our other pleasures, outlast them, and in the end console us for their loss” (Brillat-Savarin 2002, 3). He also said, “A man becomes a cook: but he is born a roaster of flesh” (4). Claude Lévi-Strauss, the famous structural anthropologist, suggested that early humans first roasted food over an open fire and then boiled it in a container with a barrier of water between the food and the fire. Theorizing that there are messages in food preparation, LéviStrauss wrote: The boiled [food] can most often be ascribed to what might be called an “endocuisine,” prepared for domestic use, destined to a small closed group, while the roasted belongs to “exo-cuisine,” that which one offers to guests. Formerly in France, boiled chicken was for the family meal, whole roasted meat was for the banquet. (Lévi-Strauss 1966, 589)

Nonprofessional home cooks, by necessity, learn basic foodways from the cooks who have gone before them. They often learn from their mothers, perhaps a hired cook, their neighbors, their friends, by visiting fine restaurants, and by enjoying gourmet hotel cuisine. Some have the opportunity to observe ethnic cooks or attend cooking classes. Heston Blumenthal, the chef and molecular gastronomist (scientific chef ) mentioned in the preface, said that the seed of his award-winning culinary career was planted when he wondered why so many home cooks told him to salt the green beans. Cooking is an art, and it is

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learned primarily by vernacular exchange, by tradition, and by experience and experimentation.

Foodways in the United States: 1815–1840 As the newly formed United States found its national identity during this critical and formative early antebellum period, the identity created was the result of several prior centuries of impact of one culture on another. European, African, Native American, and Asian cultures intermingled, and the culinary aromas, tastes, and textures overlapped. Good-tasting, nourishing food has always been the goal of cooks, as far as it has been understood, and European influence on the refinement of food preparation and presentation was not lost on the early Americans. Once past the bare survival centuries, the culinary refinements of France and Italy and other countries of origin were adapted and used. From 1660 to 1750, a flood of English immigrants, as well as German, Irish, Scottish, Dutch, and French, arrived and settled on the Atlantic seaboard. They brought with them foodways that ranged from simple, country fare to the grand cuisine. By 1815, American-born individuals were exploring and settling the country from East to West, and food habits and tastes were carried from New England and the southern costal cities to San Diego, Los Angeles, and many points in between. In today’s world, cooking food over an open campfire or in an outdoor hearth made of bricks or stone is a popular diversion for many Americans. In the early years of the nineteenth century, that way of cooking was necessary, as it had been for centuries. Hot food was prepared in an open hearth with the use of equipment like trammels, lug poles, long-handled forks for sticking, prongs for turning, and andirons to hold the burning wood in place. This was the same method for cooking hot foods that had been worked out in Europe centuries before. Though the cast-iron cooking stove was invented in the sixteenth century, it was not available in the United States until the1830s, so the laborious hearth method of preparing food continued to dominate in U.S. kitchens. Over the next three decades, the availability of the cast-iron cookstove increased, and by end of the Civil War, the big, black stove was sitting in the middle of kitchens all over the country. During the period from 1815 to 1840, however, cooking was performed primarily indoors at the hearth, and bread was prepared outdoors in a brick oven. During the pre–Civil War period, cookery had a lot to do with connectedness. Throughout the eastern part of the country and the developing western territories, many people lived in isolation or in small villages, and connecting with one another was important for both mental and physical survival. Annual events like hog butchering, for instance, took place in autumn, the harvest season, and families gathered to prepare and store important meats and sausage in preparation for the coming winter months. William Woys Weaver, a

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twentieth-century food historian, described typical foodways information that women of that generation would need to know. The folkloric information, more than likely, was transmitted woman to woman and mother to daughter in this fragile, early-American period. Connectedness also meant a direct tie to one’s natural surroundings: the woods, the pastures, the streams. Each of these had a particular sanctity, but none was more important than the kitchen garden. The cook, who stood among her cabbages in her bare feet, was mistress of her own food supply. She watched her corn as it grew; she helped the milch cow when it was in labor. She knew the right time to pick peaches so that they would caramelize in the fullness of their own natural sugar when she fried them up in a skillet. Or, with a lap churn in hand, she knew when to sing a little melody to help the butter come. She knew the weather—she felt it. She knew which hillsides had the best mountain blueberries and which pastures had the best morels each spring. (Weaver 1989, 5)

In the eastern cities during this period from 1815 to 1840, there was great disparity between the rich and the poor. “In New York, half the city’s wealthy families lived on only eight streets, and they belonged to the same clubs. . . . At the opposite end of the social ladder were the poor. By today’s standards, most antebellum Americans were poor; they lived at the edge of destitution” (Boyer et al. 1995, 198). The wealthy often lived in imitation of high European standards, and they dined on the finest interpretations of European cuisine their restaurants and hired, trained cooks were able to produce. Delmonico’s Restaurant, for instance, established in New York City in 1827, served the grand cuisine and allowed customers to order from a menu instead of serving every customer the same meal. People with the financial means could enjoy well-prepared steaks and finely prepared dishes either invented there or borrowed from the high cuisine traditions of Europe. The poor in the city, on the other hand, subsisted on simple foods, often potatoes, cabbage, and buns, as they could afford them. In New England, a typical country dinner would consist of plainly cooked foods, perhaps four vegetables and three meat dishes. In an article about the benefits of the country as compared to the city, Lewis Mumford, a social commentator, wrote: “New England cooking, it is true, like its prototype across the ocean, is a kind of cooking which relies far more upon content than upon a subtle technique” (Mumford 1928). The variety of recipes and cooking methods increased in the United States throughout the mid-nineteenth century by way of newspapers, magazines, and cookbooks. Increased availability of fresh ingredients other than those grown in one’s own garden became possible because of rapid industrial and technological progress. The laying of rails and the arrival of the train system throughout much

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of North America by 1869 made possible the delivery of fresh seafood and ingredients even to the central states. U.S. cultural historian Leo Marx named his book about the technological impact of the railroad and industrial age The Machine in the Garden (1967) because the advent of industrial and technological inventions changed Americans both in thought and in experience. From perceptions of a quiet, pastoral continent, the culture became more interconnected, news traveled more quickly over the telegraph and the rails, and an era of unprecedented growth was underway. Eating wholesome, well-prepared food is an absolute necessity to health, and by the mid-1800s, the U.S. national, democratic character had been well established. Food was plentiful in most settled places, and Americans, individualists and capitalists by nature, enjoyed the dynamic synergism of European, Asian, and American flavors and dining. Enterprising U.S. merchants were building food and medicinal supply networks and businesses with countries throughout the world. From imported French wines and Italian olive oil to Asian herbs, including ginseng root, food merchandising became a lucrative business for many. Ingredients for dishes served in the finest hotels and restaurants were increasingly available to people in many parts (but not all) of the country, and fine home cooking, often by servants but usually by the woman of the house, became increasingly popular. Another aspect to preparing and serving foods took place among enslaved African Americans who were forced to live in the southern states. The slave cooks invented an authentic grand cuisine of their own based on interpretations of what was served in the southern big house, or plantation house, coupled with the knowledge and memories of African or Caribbean foods. Because slavery was mostly nonexistent in the northern part of the country by the 1820s, there was some economic opportunity for slaves and free blacks in the urban areas, but not much. Recalling his youth as a free black in Rhode Island, William J. Brown wrote, “To drive carriages, carry a market basket after the boss, and brush his boots, or saw wood and run errands was as high as a colored man could rise” (Boyer et al. 1995, 199). Black women in the northern states often hired themselves out as domestic servants, and some with access to kitchens vended their foods on the streets of the city. African American writer Octavia E. Butler, describes a nineteenth-century southern cookhouse in the novel Kindred (1988), which gives a little insight into the crude kitchen of the slave cook: Outside was a cookhouse, a little white frame cottage not far behind the main house. . . . [T]he cookhouse looked like the friendliest place I’d seen since I arrived. There was a stocky middle-aged woman [African American] stirring a kettle that hung over the fire in the fireplace. The fireplace itself filled one whole wall. It was made of brick

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and above it was a huge plank from which hung a few utensils. There were more utensils off to one side hanging from hooks on the wall. . . . She got me a wooden bowl, filled it with something from a pot near the fire, and handed it to me with a wooden spoon. Supper was corn meal mush. (Butler 1988, 72)

The slave period of the United States carried distinct echoes of the European feudal past. Serfs and peasants then and slaves in this antebellum period (and for more than a century before) were given no privileges, no comforts, and little more than leftovers and poor pieces of meat for their tables. They could grow vegetables, and they could raise chickens, which provided fresh eggs as well as meat. When there was time, they could hunt and fish, but there was little time for those activities after meeting assigned responsibilities on the plantation. Regardless, out of this grim situation came savory and delicious original dishes still prepared with almost a sacred respect for the history of the past. Candied yams, black-eyed peas, fried chicken, collard greens, deep apple pie, and peach cobbler are only a few of the foods from the slave days still treasured today. They are often called “soul food” in the vernacular of U.S. ethnic and regional cooking, and they are served by many African American families across the nation as well as in fine restaurants and are available in cookbooks that bring the tastes to anyone who seeks them. As stated previously, many of the foods the slaves prepared were rooted in other cultures and have ancient roots. Cobbler, for instance, was prepared and eaten in Europe since medieval times, but the slaves created their own versions and flavors. One of the books I have used as a resource for this text is The Black Family Reunion Cookbook: Recipes and Food Memories from the National Council of Negro Women (1993). The first paragraph of the introduction states: Through choosing this cookbook, you are embarking on a process that goes beyond the preparation of food. You are partaking in centuries of history, tradition, and culture. You are continuing an important legacy that is central to the fabric of African-American life. Through your participation, you are an advocate of a very simple pleasure in life that cannot be overlooked in its importance. (National Council of Negro Women 1993, iii)

More information about African American foodways can be found in chapter 4. Another segment of the population of the United States in this early nineteenthcentury period included the pioneers. On the overland trails to the west, or living on the Great Plains, a different kind of ingenuity was required for finding and preparing foods that might resemble anything familiar.

Foodways in the United States: 1840–1860 Greatly removed from the elegant grand cuisine, the overland pioneers usually traveled in wagon trains: “[M]en yoked and unyoked the oxen, drove the wagons

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and stock, and hunted. Women packed, cooked, and assisted in childbirths” (Boyer et al. 1995, 276). Teaching one another, giving tips for survival, and sharing the lore of the trail were part of the preparation. Recommended quantities of flour, cornmeal, bacon, sugar, coffee, dried fruit, salt, baking soda, tea, rice, and beans were packed into wagons, and the wagons, after loading, might weigh as much as 2,500 pounds. Some wives added dried pumpkin or other dehydrated vegetables, cheese, vinegar, and pickled vegetables to the recommended stock. Cooking took place over an open fire using wood, if available, or anything else, including buffalo dung. Because of rain or lack of fuel, sometimes there was no fire, but according to the plethora of journals and diaries kept on the overland trail, women did their best to vary the sameness of the daily fare. They experimented, and as Laura Schenone explained: [They tried experiments] such as attaching cream to a wagon by day so the constant jostling of the trail would churn butter by nighttime. They baked pies on hot rocks and breads in ovens they dug under the ground. Risking grizzly bear attack, they gathered berries so they could have pies and preserves. . . . Lucy Cooke described how she managed to roll our pie dough on the wagon seat in the midst of traveling. (Schenone 2003, 165)

Culturally, Schenone reminds us, for pregnant women, or women with young children, the long trail was full of longing for the stability of the eastern part of the country and mothers and sisters left behind and an uncertainty about the future. Frequently reluctant travelers, they were anxious to settle into the stability of their new homes. They tried to maintain their dignity as women, wives, and mothers, and Schenone wrote: “[We] can understand . . . their steadfast determination to wear starched white aprons and dresses of ‘respectable’ women [even on the trail], no matter how cruel the wilderness” (Schenone 2003, 167). During this period in the more settled central, eastern, and southeastern states, the food and type of cookery was much more a symbol of class and economic status than it is in our contemporary world. There was a broad spectrum of economic stratification both in rural and urban settlements. At one end was the world of servants and slaves; in the middle was the world of home cooks, wives and mothers who learned to carefully but laboriously prepare fine foods for the family; and there was the world of poverty in which large families with little income did not always survive. Between the 1830s and 1860s, the great textile mills in Lowell, Massachusetts, launched the U.S. industrial age. Young farm women from the New England countryside lived in company-owned boardinghouses, under strict rules, and they no longer had to prepare their own meals. They were overworked (70-hour weeks) and by most standards underpaid, but they felt they had been emancipated from the drudgery and monotony of farm life and constant cooking. The mills offered the highest wages offered to female employees anywhere in the United

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States (from $1.85 to $3.00 a week). The meals they were served, as recorded by the girls themselves, were hearty. Dinner might include “meat and potatoes, with vegetables, tomatoes and pickles, pudding or pie, with bread butter coffee or tea” (Eisler 1980, 24). Another meal consisted of “tea, flapjacks, and plum-cake for supper. There was also bread, butter, and crackers, upon the table; but I saw no one touch them” (Eisler 1980, 47). Supper, like the British tea, could sometimes serve as the last meal of the day. These working girls did not have to clear the table, do the dishes, or make their beds, all customary expectations in their homes. One girl even remarked, “it seems funny enough to be boarding. I don’t even have my bed to make. Quite a lady, to be sure” (Eisler 1980, 26). Class distinctions in this early part of the nineteenth century were still fairly defined in spite of the new governmental democracy. Cultural knowledge, including fine foods and dress, was bounded by economics and class. These new working girls, though they were readers, were provided with educational lectures and classes, and they even published their own writing in a periodical called The Lowell Offering; however, they were met with disdain when they purchased finer clothing and some jewelry with their newfound wealth. Mrs. Sara Hale, editor of the periodical Godey’s Lady’s Book, wrote: How stands the difference now? Many of the factory girls wear gold watches, and an imitation, at least of all the ornaments which grace the daughters of our most opulent citizens. . . . O the times! O the manners! Alas! how very sadly the world has changed! The time was when the lady could be distinguished from the no-lady by her dress, as far as the eye could reach; but now, you might stand in the same room, and, judging by their outward appearance, you could not tell “which was which.” (Eisler 1980, 184)

We live in a different age now, but class discrimination based on economic status still dictates the behavior of many people. On the little money they earned, the mill girls were able to assist elderly parents, educate younger siblings, and expand their own educational opportunities by meeting lecturers and learning more about the world in which they lived. The periodical Godey’s Lady’s Book was influential for many decades in terms of food preparation and service, dress, customs, etiquette, and acceptable domestic and public behaviors. It strongly influenced the shaping of women’s roles as domestic goddesses (chief cook and bottle washer) through most of the Victorian age (1837–1901). William Weaver tells us that in 1859, Caroline Gilman described the cookery of her mother: Her sausages were pronounced to be the best flavored in the neighborhood; her hog’s cheese (the English brawn) was delicacy itself; her curds, made in a heart-mould, covered with nutmeg and cream, won the hearts of many a guest; her clabber was turned at that precise moment when a slight acidity tempers the insipidity of milk; her wafers bore the

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prettiest devices, or were rolled in the thinnest possible consistency; her shrimps, pickled or fresh, were most carefully prepared; her preserved water-melons were carved with the taste of a sculpture; her hominy looked like plates of gathered snow; corn and rice lent all their nice varieties to her breakfast; and her boiled rice answered Shakespeare’s description, for “each particular grain did stand on end,” or to use a more expressive term, crawled. (Gilman 1859, 24; qtd. in Weaver 1989, 7)

This is a description of fine home cuisine, bourgeois cuisine, as Jean-Francois Revel would call it, but the Civil War disrupted day-to-day life for most of the eastern United States, and after the war, the tremendous influx of immigrants changed the class-stratified culture in ways that changed the dominant culture permanently. Gilman’s mother’s cooking was rooted in Southern culture and lore. Romanticism and nationalism in the Old South was a way of life. Historian Rollin G. Osterweis wrote, “Just as cotton and the plantation system, on the one hand, and the institution of Negro slavery, on the other, were the principal economic and social factors in Southern life, so was romanticism the chief intellectual and emotional factor” (Osterweis 1967, 216). The cult of chivalry, possibly a denial of culpability over slavery, and the cult of womanhood were sustained with little or no variation from 1815, more or less, until 1861, when the Civil War disrupted the way of life. In Richmond, Charleston, New Orleans, and the emerging southwest, the idea of Southern hospitality, the cult of manners, and the maintenance of the dignity of Southern honor that had permeated the culture for decades was deeply disrupted. Osterweis suggested, “Others read the Waverly Novels [Sir Walter Scott, 1814] with enthusiasm but the South sought to live them” (215). The Southern way of life for many white women was built on the backs of slaves and patterned largely after atavistic English styles and manners. It was largely removed from the women’s rights advocates and abolitionists in the North, and many of the genteel plantation wives of the South directed their kitchens from elegant desks in the library. There are accessible records in various Southern university archives of plantation orders for meats, meal, linens, fabrics, and great varieties other, often luxurious, items. Godey’s Lady’s Book, with its recipes, fashion tips, poetry, engravings, articles and stories by Americans, and tips for gracious living, was a popular monthly periodical published in Philadelphia by Louis A. Godey from 1830 to 1878. Along with other periodicals, it influenced women in the North and South. Middle-class women like Gilman’s mother most likely had kitchen help, but they performed much of the household cooking themselves. African American slaves of the South mastered complex cooking methods by cooking for the whites and then reinterpreted and reinvented many of the dishes for their own use. The British mannerisms of the Southern aristocracy were solidly founded because the mercantile relationship between the British textile industry and the cotton tycoons of the Southern states also led to cultural ties. Children of the aristocratic plantation class

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usually received their primary education from tutors at home and then were sent to the United Kingdom or the Continent for their university education. In the homes of the wealthy Southern plantation owners, as well as in restaurants and inns in the larger cities (including the cosmopolitan, sophisticated, and international mercantile center of New Orleans), elegant meals were served using the finest imported china, crystal, and sterling cutlery. Elegant dinner parties were held for friends, acquaintances, and both U.S. and European dignitaries. Seldom was expense spared, and the tables might be enhanced by huge bouquets of fresh flowers. A New Year’s dinner menu, suggested by Godey’s Lady’s Book and served elegantly in the big house, might consist of mock turtle soup, roast turkey with cranberry sauce, stewed celery, pickled beetroot, boiled turkey with celery sauce, winter squash, ham and apples, hot coleslaw, beef tongue, salsify (oyster plant), curry of veal, plum pudding, mince pie, orange jelly, and coffee or tea with cream (Spaulding and Spaulding 1999, 46). The slaves, who had prepared the food, served, and cleaned up the house afterward, usually got the leftovers, but like the many generations of African Americans that had lived and worked in the South before them, they did their best to invent and maintain their own cultural traditions in the midst of a bad situation. The first African slaves arrived in America in 1619 at Jamestown, Virginia. Essentially kidnapped from their homeland in western Africa, they descended from generations of farmers, cattlemen, and fishermen. Among them were males and females who had been royalty, griots (musicians or storytellers), religious leaders, and healers. Children were also taken to America with them. The Africans brought seeds of their native crops to this new land: watermelon, black-eyed peas, okra, and even sweet sorghum. They taught one another to cook the foods available here, and they invented their own cuisine. Leftovers from the big house, a fairly regular occurrence, became more than nourishment, the leftovers became a challenge to reinterpret in their own way. There were no cookbooks available to the slaves, few utensils for use in their own quarters, or any other guides. Further, the slaves were not aloud to read, but out of those early cookhouses came hoecakes and molasses, savory pork, sweet potatoes, hominy, collard greens from kitchen gardens, and spoon bread—foods for the soul. Soul food, so called because it is usually prepared without recipes and was born by word-of-mouth traditions, has become popular far beyond the South in the contemporary world. There are restaurants and cookbooks easily available throughout the United States, plus soul food is prepared in hundreds of thousands of home kitchens, often without printed recipes, throughout the United States.

Foodways in the United States: 1860–1865 The Civil War changed everything. Poor food and little shelter plagued many throughout the mid-Atlantic coastal and Southern states. As the war drew on, supply

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lines for both the North and the South became disrupted, and food for the soldiers and for the citizens became scarce. “In the North, the inevitable profiteers sold the government tainted beef and shoddy blankets that fell apart in the rain” (Conlin 1993a, 370). The science of canning was developed in the early 1800s; “By the 1860s, American canneries were churning out 30 million cans of safe, though dubious-tasting, meat, fish, fruit, and vegetables a year” (Schenone 2003, 191). Schenone also states: “Entrepreneurs worked at a breakneck pace to provide large quantities of cheese, meats, milk, vegetables, and fruits for the soldiers at the front” (189). Van Camp’s pork and beans became a staple for the Union soldiers, and private homes in both the North and the South did without many basic items. As the war came close to its end in autumn 1864, Union Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman was determined to scour Georgia and render it useless to the Confederate cause. Sherman marched his troops through the state and destroyed food supply lines, livestock, the cotton fields, and various other crops. His action was not out of innate cruelty but because of grim necessity. It was reported, “One household, consisting of two white women and their slaves, rose early in the morning to eat what they could scrape up before the Yankees came, which they did every day for two weeks” (Conlin 1993a, 391). “On another plantation, the soldiers discovered that the owner, who had fled, had hidden his valuables in a cabbage patch and had replanted the garden. They admired his cleverness, but took or destroyed everything” (Conlin 1993a, 391). By spring 1865, the nation was once again a united country, but the literal playing out of chivalric romance in imitation of the mythic yesterdays of Waverly was over. Decades would pass before the South would recover, and approximately 620,000 soldiers from the North and the South were dead.

Foodways in the United States: 1865–1877 For decades after the Civil War, African Americans received little aid to help them make their way from slavery to freedom. On January 15, 1865, Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman and Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton met with 20 black community leaders in Savanna, Georgia, and issued Special Field Order #15, which guaranteed each black family 40 acres of land. The land along the coast was rice country, and it had been long occupied by the African Americans. The order specified a 30-mile-wide strip of land along the southern coast of Charleston and the Sea Islands just off the South Carolina coast. It was rumored that each family was to receive a mule as well, and the Army may have given away some of them to the families, but most did not receive a mule. The African Americans had lived in this low country for generations, and because it was coastal, they could live much the same way as their African ancestors. They covered their cabins with sea shells, wore their hair in woven braids, and spoke a pidginized English and African tongue now commonly known as Gullah. “They cooked with roots and herbs and palmetto,

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and wove sweet-grass baskets . . . [and] made ‘saraka cakes’ (based on African rice recipes)” (Schenone 2003, 91, 92). They seined for shrimp and enjoyed oysters and other regional seafood. It was a familiar life and a good one. President Andrew Johnson revoked Special Field Order #15 after Lincoln’s assassination. The land was returned to its former white owners, and the African Americans had to vacate. Sherman and Stanton had tried to help the people, but their plan failed. Most of the African Americans found work as farmhands or domestic workers in the South, though some migrated northward or westward if they could. One African American cook, Abby Fisher, managed to move to the western frontier with her family. The mother of 11 children, born before, during, and after the arduous trip to the West, Abby established herself as a cook in California by setting up a pickle-and-preserve business with her husband. She entered and won cooking contests at local fairs, and before long her talent earned her a reputation as a fine cook of European quality. Again, we see the influence of haute cuisine, or as Revel called it, the grande cuisine. Several white ladies, out of respect and admiration, helped “her publish her cookbook, though she could not read or write sufficiently to do it herself ” (Schenone 2003, 84). The cookbook, What Mrs. Fisher Knows About Old Southern Cooking, Soups, Pickles, Preserves, Etc., is an amazing source of information. The frontispiece notes that the first copyright was 1881, but it also mentions a “Diploma Awarded At Sacramento State Fair, 1879,” and “Awarded Two Medals at the San Francisco Mechanics’ Institute Fair, 1880, for best Pickles and Sauces and the best assortments of Jellies and Preserves.” Abby Fisher was unable to read or write, so the cookbook was an ethnography dictated to the literate friends who helped her. Recipes ranged from egg rolls to plum pudding to international cuisine, from breads to soups, main dishes, salads, and desserts, with clear directions for dishes. Like cookbooks from centuries earlier, Mrs. Fisher also included a few health remedies. Among them were recipes for “Tonic Bitters—a Southern Remedy for Invalids” (Fisher 1881, 67) and a “Pap for Infant Diet” (72). The infant diet includes the following, “When the child has diarrhea, boil a two-inch stick of cinnamon in the pap. I have given birth to eleven children and raised them all, and nursed them with this diet. It is a southern plantation preparation” (72).

Foodways in the United States: 1880–1900 Prior to the 1880s, the large majority of immigrants to the United States came from Great Britain, the Netherlands, Germany, or Scandinavia. Though people from other nations had arrived much earlier, and though these countries still continued to lose hundreds of thousands of citizens to the United States after 1880, the greatest proportion of newcomers during the period from 1880 to 1920 migrated from southern and eastern European nations. They arrived

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from southern Italy and Greece and from eastern Turkey, Poland, and Russia and many countries in between. Also, huge numbers of Chinese from the Canton region were recruited by western railroaders and others to do heavy construction work. “Between 1880 and 1919, about 8.4 million [immigrants from various countries] arrived” (Conlin 1993b, 476). Conlin also quoted an immigrants’ manual of 1891, which stated: “Hold fast, this is most necessary in America. Forget your past, your customs, and your ideals. Select a goal and pursue it with all your might. No matter what happens to you, hold on. You will experience a bad time, but sooner or later you will achieve your goal” (Conlin 1993b, 476). We know that the immigrants did not forget their past, customs, and ideals, but, rather, they brought their heritage, traditions, languages, customs, and food styles with them. Their presence suffused the U.S. atmosphere with new aromas, often pungent and unidentifiable, and though many returned to their countries after accumulating money, most stayed and loaned their energy and talents to the multicultural tapestry of the United States. Because many of the German and Norwegian immigrants had been farmers in the old country, it is not surprising that they moved westward to take advantage of free or cheap land. Many Norwegians settled in Wisconsin and Minnesota, and Missouri and Texas became heavily German-settled areas. Though immigrants from most of the British Isles had little or no trouble settling and assimilating in the United States, the Irish, predominately Roman Catholic, did not find the United States as welcoming; the same was true for the Chinese. Over time, however, the deeply rooted and predominant white, Anglo-Saxon U.S. Protestants learned to live more comfortably with the newcomers. The Jews, a people pushed out of various countries for centuries, found the United States fairly free and hospitable and often found economic security in small business and merchandising. Two other cultural movements were taking place in the United States during this great influx of immigration: the tycoon age of the late nineteenth century and the closing of the American West. Historian Frederick Jackson Turner propounded in 1893 that with the settling of the Oklahoma territory in 1889, the last free land was gone. Businessmen would need to look outside of the United States for their economic enterprises. The 1890s became such a lucrative investment period, with millionaires making money beyond comprehension, that cultural observers, including Samuel Clemens, called it the Gilded Age. The consequential conspicuous consumption by the affluent, as sociologist Thorstein Veblen called it in his book The Theory of the Leisure Class (written in 1899), was described as going well beyond the “minimum [goods] required for subsistence and physical efficiency. . . . [The wealthy] consumes freely and of the best, in food, drink, narcotics, shelter, services, ornaments, apparel, weapons and accouterments, amusements, amulets, and idols or divinities” (Veblen 1979, 72). The primary purpose was to be seen by other wealthy people who played a similar, showy game.

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Ours was a civilization on the move, with huge numbers of new immigrants flooding into the big cities. These new Americans were forced to live in slums and poverty until they could find the means to survive. Capitalist industrialists lived in opulent wealth. In addition, late-nineteenth-century pioneers made their hopeful way to homesteads in the West. Exploitation of the Native Americans and Asians in the West continued with frenzied abuse and destruction. The United States was stratified as it never had been before, and food, a common denominator, ranged from the finest imported products for the wealthy to insipid vegetables and questionable fish and meat sold in stands on city streets for those who could afford no more. In the midst of all of this, a rising middle class fed by many emergent groups created a U.S. consumer economy devoted to progress, convenience, individual self-improvement, and pleasurable leisure activities. Popular mass-culture foods that emerged during this period include the hamburger, hot dog, and the ice cream cone. Though the specific origins may never be known, there have always been many historical (academic) and folk (wordof-mouth) theories about these well-loved staples. The St. Louis world’s fair of 1904, formally known as the Louisiana Purchase Exposition, is often mentioned in food histories in relation to several staples of cuisine américaine, including iced tea, peanut butter, and cotton candy, but there are many other credible stories about the origins of all of these foods. The following describes the possible beginnings of the hamburger, hot dog, and ice cream cone. Alan Davidson discusses all three of these popular items in his text The Oxford Companion to Food. Concerning the origin of the hamburger and its name, Davidson wrote: “[T]he St. Louis World Fair of 1904 was a significant launching pad for the hamburger in a bun as we know it” (Davidson 1999, 369). Though the history of eating round patties of ground meat is probably thousands of years old, the contemporary name may have originated among sailors arriving at the port of Hamburg, in northern Germany, long ago. Concerning the hot dog (or frankfurter), Davidson suggests that it belongs to the Brühwurst family of sausages in Germany and probably originated in the mid-seventeenth century. He also mentioned Charles Feltman, a German butcher on Coney Island, who sold a sausage similar to today’s hot dogs. One of Feltman’s employees, “Nathan Handwerker, . . . popularized them, opening his Nathan’s Hot Dogs stand on Coney Island in 1916 and undercutting his former employer’s prices” (Davidson 1999, 317). Discussion of the hot dog often focuses on who added the bun, and some historians “credit Anton Feuchtwanger, who sold the sausages so quickly at the St. Louis World’s Fair in 1904 that he had to add the roll so that his customers did not burn their hands” (Conlin 1993b, 554). Nathan’s hot dogs will be discussed in chapter 3 in the context of contemporary food-eating contests.

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It could be that the origin of the ice cream cone as we know it today has even more obscure origins than the hamburger and hot dog. John Mariani, author of The Dictionary of American Food and Drink (1994) wrote: The ice cream cone is equally as confusing as to its origins. It seems clear that the cone (a wafer rolled to hold a scoop of ice cream) became popular at the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair, but there are several claims as to just who started hawking it there. Some authorities credit a Syrian immigrant named Ernest A. Hamwi with the invention, which was actually a Persian pastry, zalabia, that Hamwi rolled to hold ice cream when another concessionaire ran out of ice cream dishes. (Mariani 1994, 161)

Davidson, in The Oxford Companion to Food, included a discussion of Italo Marchiony, an Italian immigrant and ice cream vendor in New York City. Marchiony built a business in the city selling ice cream from pushcarts, and in 1903 he obtained a patent for a machine that made edible containers (Davidson 1999, 393). There are multiple theories concerning the origins of these three ubiquitous U.S. foods, and Linda Stradleys’s Internet site, What’s Cooking America (http://whatscookingamerica.net/), is a good informational source for researching these questions and others.

REGIONAL AND ETHNIC CUISINE The last several pages have focused on what Jean-Francois Revel called bourgeois cuisine; that is, food as it was prepared at home or on the trail, and occasionally in restaurants, sometimes by trained cooks, but most often by minimally trained or even untrained home cooks. Certainly that continues, but the massive influx of immigrants into the United States over the twenty years before and after the turn of the nineteenth century brought ingredients, seasonings, many new flavors, combinations, and techniques that influenced U.S. cuisine. Good cooks have always tried to prepare wholesome, nutritious foods with a creative touch, but with the culinary variety brought to the United States by the thousands and thousands of immigrants, U.S. tables changed. Slowly, new markets, restaurants, ingredients, seasonings, and combinations of foods entered the culinary mainstream. Regional foods are often cultural or ethnic in their nature, and throughout the United States, there are so-called ethnic enclaves or regions where one or more particular ethnic or religious group predominates. For instance, there are Greek settlements in parts of Florida, the Portuguese settled many of the port towns in New England, Chinese and Japanese settled in many cities throughout the country but most particularly along the West Coast. Progeny of the Mormon pioneers and their converts from all over the world continue to dominate much of the Intermountain West. Native Americans and

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Mexican Americans are dominant in the Southwest, and African Americans, who live throughout the country, still live in great numbers in the South. New Orleans still carries the influence its French and Creole heritage. This discussion will now turn to an overview of ethnic and regional foods. The early American settlers came from Britain, and then from Northern Europe, are known as the meatand-potatoes folks and are still the dominant group in the United States, but the United States is a country of great diversity. The endless array of foods represents an inventive world tapestry of ingredients and ways to use them. Two examples may help the reader understand how common, even unnoted, so-called ethnic foods are at today’s tables. Some years ago, I interviewed a young Basque man who had been raised in the United States. I asked him if his mother prepared many foods from the homeland in Spain, and he remarked that she was a good cook and prepared so many different kinds of foods that he did not know which was Basque and which was something else. He said that she made great fried chicken, spaghetti, lasagna, and other foods, but he was not sure which were Basque specialties (telephone interview, November 20, 1993). To my knowledge, though these foods may be served and enjoyed by Basques and Basque Americans, and sheepherding was the mainstay of the Basque American people for more than a hundred years, these are not Basque specialties. On another occasion, a young English couple and their son were visiting our family in the United States. Their home was in the Midlands of England, about 85 miles north of London, and our family had known them for many years. After touring the eastern states, they stayed in our home for about 10 days. About halfway through the visit, realizing they had said little about the dinners we had served, my husband and I asked if the food had been agreeable to them. They paused, and then their joint comment was that the food was good, but they had hoped to have “American food” rather than “foreign.” So far, we had unwittingly served lasagna, beef stir-fry with vegetables and sauce, saffron-colored but mildly seasoned paella, and crepes with a creamed chicken filling. For the last few nights of their visit, we had cornbread, crispy fried chicken, beans, hamburgers, hot dogs, chili, and desserts like apple pie and cheesecake. My focus was on serving tasty meals without excessive seasoning, which they had said they did not like, but I did not realize that my foods were all foreign, as they called it.

Foodways in the United States: 1900–1930 Reflecting on the times, and on the 1904 St. Louis world’s fair (Louisiana Purchase Exposition), might aid in understanding the changes happening in the United States toward the end of the 1800s and during the first part of the 1900s. Inventions that would make life safer and more convenient were being developed almost faster than people could adopt them. The Wright brothers had

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successfully flown their plane at Kitty Hawk in 1903; electric lights were still new to most people, but they illuminated the fair grounds; the horse-drawn ice wagon to fill home iceboxes was just becoming familiar and making refrigeration possible at home. Records of the fair suggest that there were nearly 20 million visitors. Think of that and what these millions experienced for the first time. Further, think of the influence what they saw may have had on their understanding of the people of the world and of the changes promised in their lifetime. It was truly an inclusive world fair, with displays of artifacts and foods from Europe, the Middle East, Africa, India, China, Japan, North and South America, Mexico, and island countries around the world. The exotic foods at concession stands introduced visitors to new flavors and combinations; gift booths with items from faraway places brought the mysterious unknown to a wondering crowd. This was called the progressive age, and one huge display was called the Palace of Machinery. Here electric generators and steam boilers provided the power to illuminate the fair, and observers could see the machinery in action. Fine restaurants served thousands ethnic cuisine, including Italian, French, and German. Another restaurant, in what was called the Eastern Pavilion, was called the Model Restaurant. Here, the latest in new technology as it related to cooking was displayed to the visitors. The restaurant seated 1,200 fairgoers, and the foods served ranged from soup, seafood and meat specialties, vegetables, fruits, pastries, puddings, and ices. Mrs. S. T. Rorer, the head cook of the Model Restaurant, published a souvenir cookbook for sale at the fair, and it was reissued in honor of the 100th anniversary. The 1904 World Fair held in St. Louis, Missouri, a central state, was held at a time of optimism and prosperity in that region. On the other hand, concurrent with the fair, new immigrants in St. Louis and other cities throughout the United States were struggling to survive in this land of promise. Further, many African Americans had moved from the South to the Central states in the late 1800s. By 1879, more than 7,000 had moved to Kansas, and others were settling in Missouri, Iowa, and Nebraska, with more to arrive as time passed. Jobs were scarce for them, and so was food. Native Americans were barely surviving on corn, squash, beans, and what game they could find on the reservations of the West; in New York City and Chicago, tenements bulged with people barely able to survive food shortages and oppressive living conditions. Alan Kraut, in The Huddled Masses (1982), wrote: Urban immigrants, staring through smudged windows to the airshaft wall, rarely had a balanced diet, often scarcely any food at all. The newly landed immigrants found American food much too expensive. Their diet was frequently heavy with starches and fats, and low on protein. Italians ate bread, potatoes, some eggs, fish and pasta. Slavs and East European Jews subsisted for days on herring, bread, and tea, with potatoes and cheap meats such as lung among other staples during the week. Only on occasional Sundays did they enjoy the

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luxury of soups or a roast. In The Bitter Cry of the Children (1906), reformer John Spargo observed that, among some immigrants, long periods without nutritious food caused children to develop stomachs “too weak by reason of chronic hunger and malnutrition to stand good and nutritious food.” (Kraut 1982, 73)

Though times were improving for many during this period, the urban population of large cities still suffered. When the United States entered World War I in 1917, a great collective effort began to provide food for the military. So-called Liberty gardens were planted in response to the government’s request for support, and the whole era of home gardening, revived as Victory gardens during World War II, helped many Americans become involved in the war effort. During World War I, the National War Gardens Commission published posters that “encouraged citizens to plant home vegetable gardens, thus freeing commercial producers to concentrate on providing goods for the war effort” (Conlin 1993b, 621). Besides the vernacular folk exchange of how to grow fresh vegetables for the family, lectures, cooking schools, a plethora of magazines, food columns in newspapers, and other sources taught the public. Little booklets like Harris’ Farmer’s Almanac, which claims it has been “Published in the tradition of the respected almanac of the same name first published in 1692,” became popular with urban dwellers. With tips on planting, recipes, household hints, weather, astronomy, and even amusements, the guide became an inexpensive source of entertainment against a backdrop of war during this grim period. Between 1900 and 1920, the United States was in a stage of unprecedented industrial growth. Increasing urbanization meant intense congestion because the cities were not yet developed enough to accommodate the immigrants as well as Americans moving from the countryside into the cities. Economic advancement was possible, but physical discomfort and psychological tension from quick adjustment to unfamiliar living conditions created a jarring reality. The way the new urbanites negotiated this unfamiliarity was to band together in religious or ethnic groups and neighborhoods and quickly establish markets and churches or synagogues where the familiar could be experienced. Nutritional awareness increased as the twentieth century progressed, and by the mid-1920s, flour, bread, shortening, dairy and pork products, breakfast cereals, canned goods, and citrus fruits had become available to most Americans by way of huge industrial complexes, and industry-supported home economists flooded the United States with millions of copies of recipes. There was a certain homogeneous nature to the recipes, sort of a meat-potatoes-vegetable-salad-roll-dessert pattern, but regional and ethnic foods survived the widely advertised and distributed, nutritious, but somewhat repetitive, recipes of U.S. industry. Open-air food markets and small shops throughout the country, owned by people of almost every nationality, provided familiar ingredients as well as meeting places where people could mingle and visit with others in their first

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languages. Food tips and recipes could be exchanged. These shops and stands were often operated by couples. Asians, Jews, Italians, Latinos, and others found the beginning of economic stability usually in less than a generation. From mills and mines to food canneries to stockyards, in agribusiness or working for fishing companies, these new Americans found ways to survive and feed themselves and their families. Laura Schenone wrote: If you were an immigrant and had just a few resources and some ingenuity, however, it was possible to avoid the fate of factory and field work. You could sell food yourself. You could cook for homesick, laboring men who had no wives. You could run a bakery from your house. You could grow vegetables and sell your produce on your front stoop or pushcart. From these beginnings, you might even grow an enterprise. (Schenone 2003, 224)

The Roaring Twenties, as the 1920s are so often called, is perceived as an era of fun. Prohibition, the outlawing of liquor, gave rise to the bootlegging era; there were speakeasies, flappers, and high-living college boys. What did these people like to eat? Less is the best answer to that question. By the 1920s in the United States, the plump profile was definitely no longer a respected symbol of prosperity. The images of massive maidens and wealthy men with pot bellies represented in paintings in centuries past were discarded in exchange for slenderness in both women and men. Form-revealing flapper costumes and the lithe figures of movie stars on the huge silver movie screen inspired a new age of dieting for weight loss among the middle and upper classes. Prohibition, which was in effect from January 1920 until 1933, resulted in the closing of many fine restaurants, which had depended on liquor sales to provide their profit margin. The rich restaurant cuisine was not as readily available, and with a plethora of magazines and free recipes available at the markets, the U.S. diet, over all, became simple and even further standardized.

Foodways in the United States: 1930–1945 The Great Depression of the 1930s created poverty throughout the country. Though some did not suffer because they were either productive farmers or urbanites who were able to hold on to their jobs, many people were compelled to join government-provided breadlines and soup kitchens for their survival. Different parts of the country experienced different deprivations during the 1930s. In most of the rural United States, the poverty stricken were deeply impacted by the lack of fresh fruits and vegetables during late autumn, winter, and early spring. Those with financial means could purchase fresh fruit and vegetables in stores and markets, but the locally grown foods of the poor were available only in the warm months, and many people suffered the consequences of vitamin

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deficiency because of steady diets of cornmeal or flour and very little protein. In an age when awareness of nutritional requirements had grown through the broad dissemination of information by the U.S. food industry, many children and adults suffered illness and even death. There was an abundance of food in some parts of the country, but because of poor distribution methods, it was not made available to all. World War II brought an end to the era of the Great Depression and provided nationwide employment, but feeding the troops and distributing necessary food products to the citizenry became a new challenge. Sugar and meat were in short supply, and rationing was put into effect on a variety of products. Most Americans supported the war effort and in turn, supported rationing. Over all, the U.S. population, of every socioeconomic stratum, learned to eat simple, wholesome, standardized meals. Again, gardens were planted, and many people learned how to preserve their fresh fruits and vegetables through government-sponsored classes. After the war, government subsidies for ranchers and farmers created an abundance of affordable food products, including chicken and beef, and the era of frequent backyard barbeques was born. The Americanization of immigrants began before the turn of the century and continued well into the 1940s. What this meant was that the government, and many others, felt that immigrants should learn to do things the U.S. way, including their diet. Home economics classes taught the standardized U.S. dinner style to all students, and children were made to understand that U.S.-style food was the only acceptable food. The traditional sausage, olives, and coarse roll for lunch were not okay; rather, lunches should be purchased in the school cafeteria or should be, at the very least, sandwiches on white bread. Some ethnic groups, particularly the huge Jewish community in New York City, Italians, Asians, and Basques, resisted this pressure and maintained their important foodways. The consequence was that many regional and ethnic foods survived the long period of attempted homogeneity. Another aspect of U.S. life, beginning before this period from 1930 to 1945, was the ubiquitous presence of the automobile. Made affordable to the masses by Henry Ford’s production line, the automobile impacted U.S. culture and lore perhaps more than any other twentieth-century invention. It even influenced the way people ate, then and now! The first drive-in restaurant opened on the Dallas–Fort Worth highway in September 1921. Called Pig Stand, the service included a drive-up window where the order was taken and money paid, and then the food was handed to the driver. Drive-in restaurants usually had a smiling waitress deliver the food to the customer, who was seated in the comfort of his or her car. Jim Heimann’s book Car Hops and Curb Service (1996) describes the proliferation of these drive-in businesses between 1920 and the 1960s, then the concept of fast-food companies with drive-through service swept the

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country, largely replacing the drive-ins. Personalized service with window trays, hamburgers, soda or milk shakes, and French fries at the drive-in restaurants were a part of U.S. foodways. The car’s mobility meant less physical activity, and the drive-ins meant conveniently available high-fat/high-sugar foods. The Sonic Drive-In chain continues the carhop tradition. The consequence of riding in cars instead of walking and the convenience of fast-food has been a dangerous epidemic of obesity.

Foodways in the United States: 1945–1965 In the affluent postwar period, U.S. foodways took another turn. The U.S. kitchen was furnished with an assortment of electrical appliances: refrigerators, stoves, toasters, mixers, can openers, blenders, and, for those who could afford them, automatic dishwashers. Processed foods, such as TV dinners, instant coffee, and new canned products, added convenience, chemicals, and unwanted calories to the U.S. diet. Americans were moving away from plainer, more wholesome natural foods and moving into an era of convenience foodways that included mysterious (and hard to pronounce) chemical additives, many kinds of fats, and often unwanted calories. Food ingredients treated with pesticides came under scrutiny, and questions were posed about the possible carcinogenic preservatives that were being used. In 1959, two new states were admitted to the United States: Alaska and Hawaii. At that time, the indigenous foods primarily used in those states were natural and without additives. This raised other questions about which foods provided the best quality of life. The regional foodways in these two states differed greatly from the foods in the mainland, and studies of the impact of these foods on the health of the people were surprisingly positive. In Alaska, the Inuit people had survived for centuries on a diet of mainly meat and fat. Game meat, particularly caribou, moose, and polar bear, whales, seal, fish, and berries that thrive in the far north are staples. Pemmican, a dried mixture of meat and berries and sometimes seasoned with salt, is also a diet staple and was adopted by explorers and mountaineers. Davidson’s Oxford Companion suggests that the people are generally healthy on this diet, and he refers the reader to Vilhjalmur Stefansson’s accessible 1946 study of Inuit foodways, Not by Bread Alone. Not unlike the popular diet designed by Dr. Atkins, Stefansson, an Icelandic scholar, suggests that health can thrive for indeterminate lengths of time on a steady diet of meats and water. Most information distributed to the U.S. people disagrees strongly with that view and suggests a diet balanced with proteins, dairy products, fruits, grains, vegetables, and fats. In Hawaii, the regional diet is almost the opposite of the native Inuit. It is high in carbohydrates with minimal protein, and the primary staple is rice. When the first settlers arrived in Hawaii, possibly around the third century c.e., Davidson

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tells us that there was practically nothing edible on the land. Over time, a variety of plants, including taro and the sweet potato, were found to grow well in the islands, and these became the staple foods. Taro roots were baked or boiled and then laboriously pounded into a mass and mixed with water to make the edible paste, which is usually eaten with the fingers alongside meat or fish. These days, the taro root can be purchased in bags at the market, and the process from root to paste, though it involves scraping and adding water, is less labor intensive. “This staple of the Hawaiian diet, often referred to as the ‘staff of life’ there, serves as the first solid food for infants and is recommended for everything from longevity to bee bites” (Mariana 1994, 238). Based upon the thickness of the poi, it may be called “a thin ‘one-finger poi,’ a thicker ‘two-finger poi,’ or a still thicker ‘three-finger poi’” (Mariana 1994, 239). The basic local food, a synthesis of the many ethnic groups now living on the islands, is a combination of foods available at most contemporary restaurants and street stands in Hawaii. It is a dish of rice (Asian influence), meat, macaroni or potato salad, and a lettuce leaf or a spoonful of kimchi (a Korean fermented vegetable and fish relish). Davidson mentions that the meat portion is rather large, and that is influenced by the presence of haoles, the nickname for white people (Davidson 1999, 374). Other formerly ethnic but now considered popular local foods include raw fish, soy sauce, Spam (prepared with soy sauce, sesame oil, and chili peppers), hardtack (hard bread), Okinawan and Portuguese doughnuts, and Asian noodles and represent the dynamics of Hawaiian food. Though Polynesian-style restaurants have been around on the mainland for a long time (Trader Vic’s and Don the Beachcomber were both started in the 1930s), the foods and drinks served there have remained popular, and both of these well-known restaurants are still in business in dozens of locations. Though many of the foods served in these restaurants are influenced by Chinese cuisine, as opposed to Polynesian, Trader Vic’s and Don the Beachcomber continue to serve the public with an island flair. Another influence on Americans’ food and cooking practices came in the form of an amazing and charming woman: Julia Child. In 1962, she appeared on public television to present the book Mastering the Art of French Cooking (1961), which she had authored with colleagues Louisette Bertholle and Simone Beck. The United States was captivated, and that appearance was followed with her famous, long-running cooking show, The French Chef. She unlocked the secrets of haute cuisine or grand cuisine by demonstrating in her relaxed and humorous manner how to make an omelet, quiche, crepe, fondue, and soufflé and other French recipes simply by breaking the process down into easy-to-follow steps. Noel Riley Fitch, in his Appetite for Life: The Biography of Julia Child (1997), stated: “Every class of people loved her, as her mail and the greetings of workmen and tradespeople affirmed” (Fitch 1997, 310). Child became an American icon

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in her apron and with flour smudges on her face, yet she was a quietly radical feminist at a time when women needed a friendly boost toward equity both in the home and in the marketplace. Julia Child helped validate the artful creativity in everyday kitchen performance. Talking about her cooking, she once said, “It’s a shame to be caught up in something that doesn’t absolutely make you tremble with joy” (Epstein 1997, 90). Well-prepared foods for health-conscious Americans have increased in popularity since the 1960s for many reasons. Foods available in markets, as well as in restaurants, have been influenced by the concept of eating foods closer to their natural state or foods that have been carefully prepared in order to maintain their nutritional value. Child’s great contribution to U.S. cuisine was to illuminate the joy and ease of cooking fine French fare. Influences from ethnic groups, including the Hawaiians and the Inuit, and voices from the counterculture of the 1960s and 1970s changed the way many Americans were eating. Commonly available items stocking today’s supermarkets and specialty shops range from croissants, truffles, and baguettes of bread to macadamia nuts, ahi tuna, and mahi mahi from Hawaii. From Alaska, mainlanders now easily find Alaskan king crab, halibut, and Alaskan salmon. Even so, the food revolution in the 1960s and 1970s was strongly influenced by underground columns and energetic, concerned individuals. Alice Waters opened a little restaurant in Berkeley, California, named Chez Panisse in 1971, which will be discussed later in this chapter. Prompted by Adelle Davis’s discomfort and vocal response concerning chemical additives, Rachel Carson’s hard evidence on the insecticide DDT, and the Rodale Press’s widely circulated publications supporting organic farming, a revolution in foods occurred.

Foodways in the United States: 1965–1980 There is hardly space here to tell the whole story of the foods revolution, but the turn was toward whole grains; freshly grown vegetables harvested and prepared quickly for the table; French, Italian, Indian, and other ethic adaptations; and simply learning to cook carefully for the joy and benefits of the process. Warren J. Belasco, author of Appetite for Change: How the Counterculture Took On the Food Industry (1993), stated, “Nutritionists collaborated with food technologists by analyzing foods into molecular components that could be rearranged to suit the processors’ convenience”(Belasco 1993, 47). Radical biochemist Ross Hume Hall, as quoted by Belasco, stated, “Plastic foods were consummately efficient, malleable, convenient—and biochemically ‘adequate’ according to the prevailing nutritional paradigm” (Hall 1976, 190–214, qtd. in Belasco 1993, 47). One of the most popular guides to cooking from this period was Tassajara Cooking: A Vegetarian Cooking Book (1973) by Edward Espe Brown. In the text, Brown wrote, “The way to cook is to cook” (Brown 1973, 1). The concept was

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to take a fresh ingredient and gently make something nutritious, beautiful, and delicious out of it. With respect for all living things, past and present, and with a recognition of the legacies of the past, Brown’s Buddhist philosophy stressed process over product. Much of the countercuisine, as it came to be called, was just that, process over product. This method of preparing food is discussed further in chapter 3. Some of the experimental cooks of this period, undoubtedly influenced by the drug culture, came up with what has been called panethnic combinations. Some unusual combinations were sweet and sour spaghetti sauce (from High Lodge Farm in Oregon), which combines Asian sweet and sour flavor with Italian-style spaghetti; Torgerson’s Mexican-Italian blintzes (Crow Farm, Oregon), the blintz being a traditional Jewish cheese-filled crepe; and Armenian polenta (Morning Star Ranch, California), polenta being a traditional Italian cornmeal side dish (Horton 1972, 15). Alice Waters, dedicated to the use of fresh, organic ingredients for both their human and environmental impact, opened her restaurant, Chez Panisse, in Berkeley, California, in 1971. “Like Julia Child before her, Waters was struck that people in France ‘just cared about food—they cared about the buying of it, no matter whether they ate at home or went to a restaurant” (Kamp 2006, 342). Waters’s ongoing philosophy concerning foods and service to her customers, continuing into the twenty-first century, is based on her belief in the neighborhood bistro, a place where anyone can enter and enjoy a fine culinary experience, from pizza to an elegant meal, and trust that the ingredients will be fresh, organically grown, at their peak, and carefully prepared. Her style revolutionized U.S. eating habits, and the organic movement has continued among many home cooks and chefs. From this promising turn toward healthy production and consumption of foods, however, U.S. capitalists, naturally seeking to serve a fast-paced consumer society and make a fortune doing it, have taken the typical U.S consumer on an unhealthy food fest from which we are only now, in the first decade of the twenty-first century, recovering.

Foodways in the United States: 1980 to Present The Gilded Age of excess in the 1890s, enjoyed by those in the upper-middle and upper classes of the nation, has trickled down to the masses as far as the availability of foods. The fast-food industries of the United States have offered inexpensive, tasty, filling, and excessive food to millions of Americans. Fast food has increased in popularity over several decades as the United States has become more vehicle centered and mobile and more committed to the frenetic, computerized, informational-centered world. The convenience of fast food has been irresistible. Many fast-food chains have spilled over the borders of the United States and

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gone worldwide, and the consequence has been overeating and an epidemic of obesity and type 2 diabetes in adults and children unparalleled in history. A new food revolution is under way, one unmatched since the days of Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle (1906). That book, first a serialized work decrying capitalism, exposed the filthy and dangerous conditions under which meat was processed in Chicago slaughterhouses. The food revolution now is filled with voices decrying the ingredients, propaganda, preparation methods, and the market tactics of fast-food companies. Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation (2002), stated: The competition for young customers has led the fast food chains to form marketing alliances not just with toy companies, but with sports leagues and Hollywood studios. McDonald’s has staged promotions with the National Basketball Association, and the Olympics. Pizza Hut, Taco Bell, and KFC signed a three-year deal with the NCAA. Wendy’s has linked with the National Hockey League. Burger King and Nickelodeon, Denny’s and Major League Baseball, McDonald’s and the Fox Kids Network have all formed partnerships that mix advertisements for fast food with children’s entertainment. McDonald’s now has its own line of children’s videos starring Ronald McDonald. . . . “We see this as a great opportunity,” a McDonald’s executive said in a press release, “to create a more meaningful relationship between Ronald and the Kids.” (Schlosser 2002, 48)

With the majority of women working in the United States, convenience foods have also grown into a huge industry. The boxed, prepackaged, dried, or frozen foods, according to Michael Pollan, author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals (2006), are often advertised as organic products but are often produced by highly industrialized methods and involve (according to an example he used): a choreography of thirty-one [or more] ingredients assembled from far-flung farms, laboratories, and processing plants scattered over a half-dozen states and containing such mysteries of modern food technology as high-oleic safflower oil, guar and xanthan gum, soy lecithin, carrageenan, and “natural grill flavor.” Several of these ingredients are synthetic additives permitted under federal organic rules. So much for “whole” foods. (Pollan 2006, 140)

Frozen dinners and combination entrees, as well as dehydrated side dishes and frozen desserts, often contain high fat and myriad additives, and portions are difficult to control. Every five years, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) is required to update the food pyramid of recommended daily food consumption. In response to the growing health menace of overweight and obesity in the United States, the USDA has designed MyPyramid, an interactive food guidance system. The pyramid document corresponds to the latest scientific research and

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recommends familiar food groups such as grains, vegetables, fruits, milk, meats, and beans. Though updates and clarifications have been made, criticism of the new guide suggests that it recommends too many grains and fairly undefined proteins, recommends too much milk or other dairy products, and is difficult to read and understand. The Harvard School of Public Health created the Healthy Eating Pyramid. It is more specific and recommends daily exercise and weight control as well as multiple vitamins for most individuals. The Web site for this pyramid, http://www. hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/pyramids.html, includes a breakdown of the recommendations. The foundation of this pyramid is based on daily exercise and weight control because these are the two primary factors influencing good health. Neither overweight nor underweight support overall lifetime health and energy, and conventional wisdom in the United States is beginning to reflect this reality. Nearly all fast-food companies now offer low-fat choices, including salads, fresh fruits and juices, whole-grain bread, and low-fat milk.

The United States Department of Agriculture Food Pyramid. Links on http://www.MyPyra mid.gov lead to information about both food and exercise. USDA

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The Harvard Medical Center Food Pyramid. Michelle Pierce

In our contemporary world, various sources provide instructions for preparation of fine European-style dishes, refined home cooking, and regional and ethnic foods. Recipes and instructions are easily available on the Internet and in magazines, newspapers, and television shows. Well-lighted and massive supermarkets, specialty ethnic food shops, as well as in-season farmers’ markets and home gardens have made many fine ingredients available to U.S. consumers. Many Americans are awakening to what they need to do in order to improve the quality of their lives. Foods, both a frustration and blessing to the human family, have story after story attached to them. Story writers and tellers often include food episodes in the folk stories and lore they create and perform. There have ever been feasts and famine, and the quest to appease the stomach has been told in narratives that have taught morality, provided complex and hidden layers of meaning and symbolism, and simply provided entertainment. The next chapter will tour the world over time and space for factual and fictional narratives that may be historical, cultural, vernacular, literary, or all four. The stories will provide insight into the great unifying biological need living creatures have for physical sustenance. Beliefs, superstitions, and both simple and complex tales often carry deeply embedded meanings that impress people and shape their worldview. We, too, carry memories, experiences, teachings, and desires that shape who we are. Our own social and cultural constructions and physicality have been largely shaped by our acculturating folklore and foodways.

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WORKS CITED Belasco, Warren J. 1993. Appetite for Change: How the Counterculture Took On the Food Industry. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. Boyer, Paul S., Clifford E. Clark Jr., Sandra McNair Hawley, Joseph F. Kett, Neal Salisbury, Harvard Sitkoff, and Nancy Woloch. 1995. The Enduring Vision: A History of the American People. Concise 2nd ed. Lexington, Mass.: C. C. Heath. Brillat-Savarin, Jean Anthelme. 2002. The Physiology of Taste. Mineola, N.Y.: Dover. Brown, Edward Espe. 1973. Tassajara Cooking: A Vegetarian Cooking Book. Boulder, Colo.: Shambhala. Butler, Octavia E. 1988. Kindred. Boston: Beacon Press. Child, Julia, Louisette Bertholle, and Simone Beck. 1961. Mastering the Art of French Cooking. New York: Knopf. Conlin, Joseph R. 1993a. The American Past: Part 1. A Survey of American History to 1877. 4th ed. Fort Worth, Tex.: Harcourt Press. ———.1993b. The American Past: Part 2. A Survey of American History Since 1865, 4th ed. Fort Worth, Tex.: Harcourt Press. Davidson, Alan. 1999. The Oxford Companion to Food. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Eisler, Benita, ed. 1980. The Lowell Offering: Writings by New England Mill Women (1840–1845). New York: Harper Torchbooks. Enjoy England. 2007. Tea Drinking Customs. Available at: http://www.enjoyengland. com/ideas/food-and-drink/tea-in-england/tea-drinking-customs.aspx. Accessed December 10, 2007. Epstein, Jason. 1997. “Dishing It Out.” New Yorker, October 13, 86–91. Fisher, Mrs. 1881. What Mrs. Fisher Knows About Old Southern Cooking, Soups, Pickles, Preserves, Etc.: In Facsimile, with Historical Notes by Karen Hess. Bedford, Mass.: Applewood Books. Fitch, Noel Riley. 1997. Appetite for Life: The Biography of Julia Child. New York: Random House. Flanders, Judith. 2003. Inside the Victorian Home: A Portrait of Domestic Life in Victorian England. New York: W. W. Norton. Gilman, Caroline. 1859. Recollections of a Southern Matron. Philadelphia. Quoted in William Woys Weaver, America Eats: Forms of Edible Folk Art. New York: Harper and Row, 1989. Hall, Ross Hume. 1976. Food for Nought: The Decline of Nutrition. New York: Vintage Books. Heimann, Jim. 1996. Car Hops and Curb Service. San Francisco: Chronicle Books. Horton, Lucy. 1972. Country Commune Cooking. New York: Coward, McCann, and Geoghegan. Kamp, David. 2006. “Cooking up a Storm.” In The United States of Arugula: How We Became a Gourmet Nation. New York: Broadway Books. Excerpted in Vanity Fair, October 2006, 310–47. Kraut, Alan M. 1982. The Huddled Masses: The Immigrant in American Society, 1880– 1921. Arlington Heights, Ill.: Harlan Davidson.

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Lévi-Strauss, Claude. 1966. The Savage Mind. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Mariani, John F. 1994. The Dictionary of American Food and Drink. New York: William Marrow. Marx, Leo. 1967. The Machine in the Garden: Technology and the Pastoral Ideal in America. Oxford: Oxford University Press. McMillan, Sherrie. 2001. “What Time Is Dinner?” History Magazine, October/November. Available at: http://www.history-magazine.com/dinner2.html. Accessed December 10, 2007. Mumford, Lewis. 1928. “Back to the Table.” The New Republic, August 15. National Council of Negro Women. 1993. The Black Family Reunion Cookbook: Recipes and Food Memories from the National Council of Negro Women. New York: Fireside, Simon and Schuster. Okakura, Kakuzo. 1993. The Book of Tea. Boston: Shambhala. Osterweis, Rollin G. 1967. Romanticism and Nationalism in the Old South. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press. Pollan, Michael. 2006. The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. New York: Penguin. Pool, Daniel. 1993. What Jane Austen Ate and Charles Dickens Knew: From Fox Hunting to Whist—The Facts of Daily Life in 19th Century England. New York: Touchstone Rockefeller Center. Revel, Jean-François. 1982. Culture and Cuisine: A Journey through the History of Food. New York: De Capo Press. Rorer, Mrs. S. T. 1904. St. Louis World’s Fair Souvenir Cook Book. Ed. Don G. and Lin V. Uetrect. St. Louis, Mo.: Independent. Schenone, Laura. 2003. A Thousand Years Over a Hot Stove: A History of American Women Told through Food, Recipes, and Remembrances. New York: W. W. Norton. Schlosser, Eric. 2002. Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal. New York: Houghton Mifflin. Spaulding, Lily May, and John Spaulding, eds. 1999. Civil War Recipes: Receipts from the Pages of Godey’s Lady’s Book. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky. Stefansson, Vilhjalmur. 1946. Not by Bread Alone. New York: Macmillan. Veblen, Thorstein. 1979. The Theory of the Leisure Class. New York: Penguin Books. Orig. pub. 1899. Weaver, William Woys. 1989. American Eats: Forms of Edible Folk Art. New York: Harper and Row.

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his chapter will look at foodways elements, examples, and texts from both the English-speaking and the non-English-speaking world. The focus will be more on ethnic and regional foods (mainly in the United States) than the haute or grand cuisine because the origin of many culinary items enjoyed in the contemporary United States was the consequence of home cooks throughout the world, including our own Native American food legacies. Folktales, customs, regional availability, mock recipes, food events, and various community events tell us about ourselves and how we have became such a food-centered nation. The chapter discussion begins with items from the history and foodways of Native Americans throughout the Western Hemisphere who made great contributions to the foodways of the world. The discussion continues the suggestion that long before Columbus, fishermen from Europe found great schools of cod off the coast of the Americas and left their mark upon the land. In 1619, the first Africans were brought to America, and their culinary contributions from Africa and the West Indies continue to enrich our cuisine today. The discussion then moves to history and culinary narratives that represent several of the many countries and foodways represented currently in the United States. Today’s U.S. food is a diverse sampler that represents the culinary artistry of many nations and of enterprising Americans: There are favorite home foods seasoned with narratives brought from the Old Country; church suppers and fund-raisers with varied dishes according to religion, ethnicity, and region; fish fries, game fests, crawfish suppers, and clam bakes; funeral banquets; school lunches, generic fast food, organic foods; vegan diets; supermarket frozen gourmet dinners; restaurant takeout; home experiments with grand cuisine; and happy,

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natural-feeling cooking without any recipes. A plethora of stories, examples, and texts about the foods is found in every one of these categories, so the next pages will carry us through many topics. There is more information to share in every category than can be included here. The narratives (and a few recipes) discussed here demonstrate that the foods we chose from this caldron of plenty determine much about who we are, how we choose to live, and what we like to eat.

NATIVE AMERICAN EXAMPLES AND TEXTS The indigenous natives of North, Central, and South America have a long, rich history of foraging for the foods of their region and eventually cultivating the foods most important to them, including corn, potatoes, tomatoes, and in regions where it would grow, cacao (from which we get chocolate). The Spanish and other colonists transported this plethora of new foods to Europe. Besides those listed previously, avocados, pineapples, kidney and butter beans, lima beans, scarlet runners (a climbing bean plant), peanuts, vanilla, red and green peppers, tapioca, turkeys, tobacco, chewing gum, and quinine are still only a partial accounting of the new items found in the Western Hemisphere that made their way to Europe. The natives developed languages to name the objects in their worlds. They also had numerous action words for their varied behaviors. It is true that the Navajo language, for instance, has many more action words than nouns. Foods were named, but the actions related to the foods had interesting complexity in some of the Native American language constructions. The ancient language of the Mayans, an early indigenous group that inhabited southeastern Mexico and part of Central America (the Yucatán), has some interesting verbal constructions. Their verb to eat was not used as an action verb as we use it in English, but rather it was used only when asking a question: What are you eating? [In the Mayan language] . . . the verb differs according to the substance being eaten. One verb is used for things that are chewed and the pulp spat out, as is done with sugar cane and maize stalks. Another verb is used for things that melt in the mouth, like candy. Still another verb is used when bread, in the broad sense, is being eaten, and yet another for the consumption of meat, mushrooms, and chilli. (Davidson 1999, 267)

It was a question used to define a substance, and that question implies that there was great variety in the foods eaten by the Mayans at that time. Perhaps they knew a greater variety of foods than we know today. A favorite of the Mayan people was chocolate, which may have originated with the Olmec culture and then spread to other groups in the region by the Izapan civilization. Linguists found the word ka-ka-wa [chocolate] on burial implements, and the identification of

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that word “was a breakthrough in the decipherment of Maya phonetic writing” (Davidson 1999, 176). We know that the staple food of the Mayans was corn, but they were familiar with the animals of their region and used them in their diet. To mention only a few, commonly found animals were turkey, iguana, armadillo, tapir, monkey, and various edible insects. Also, fish and other seafood were plentiful for those who lived near the coast. The animals and birds were also a part of the Mayan religious belief system; there are many stories about the jaguar gods, the rabbit and the moon, and birds that were also used as symbols for naming and years on the Mayan calendar. One of the stories of the rabbit and the moon tells how the rabbit tricked the jaguar. Called, “The Smiling Rabbit,” the story tells the tale of an old couple that had used up their last corn, and all they had left to eat were a rabbit and a jaguar. So they heated a caldron of water in order to boil the rabbit. The jaguar warned the rabbit, but the rabbit was sure that the water was to make their morning chocolate. The jaguar wanted to eat the rabbit, too, but the wily rabbit tricked him several times. At last, the jaguar tricked the rabbit and sent him flying high into the sky until the rabbit landed on the moon. The rabbit had tricked the jaguar, and he was doubled over with laughter. “This story is from the state of Yucatán, one of the places inhabited by the Mayan Indians. To this day, Mexican children see the rabbit in the moon, though children of other cultures believe there is a man there, or that the moon is made of cheese” (CONAFE 2003). Farther south, civilizations of many kinds developed in South America. As we have seen before, the food people used to survive was determined by what would grow in the region. For thousands of years in the rainforest, people survived in small groups and lived on gathered fruit and hunted game. There were no large animals in the rain forest, but in the mountains to the west of the rainforest natives had the advantage of the llama, the alpaca, the vicuña, and the guanaco (like a llama) for carrying heavy loads and to supply many of their needs. The llama was not only a hardy pack animal. Its wool was used to make warm clothing, candles could be made from its fat, and leather shoes could be made from its skin. The flesh provided food, and because of the many sustaining elements of the llama it was a greatly respected. There was also a belief that some souls of the dead were reincarnated as llamas and that llamas could foresee the future. One traditional foretelling by the llamas was the story of a great deluge about to happen; it was similar to flood narratives still told in cultures throughout the world. In that story, a shepherd had taken his llamas to a pasture, but they would not eat. He asked what the matter was, and the animals told him that there would be a flood over the earth for five days. They advised him to gather food enough for five days and then take them to the top of a great mountain called Villacota.

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He did as they instructed, and when they arrived he discovered that he was the only human being among many animals gathered there. The water began to rise immediately from the ocean, and one of the animals, the fox, forgot to move his tail so it got wet. The story tells that his tail was stained black, and it has been black ever since! After five days, the waters receded, and the man took his llamas home. As it turned out, he was the only human survivor and thus he became the father of all the human races in the world. In some versions of this creation myth, the shepherd took six sons and six wives up the mountain before the flood, and it is told that from them came the repopulation of the world (Phillips 1998, 41). There are many rivers in the Peruvian mountains that flow from winter runoffs, and in this fertile region the Incan civilization emerged. The Incas learned irrigation methods and land management thousands of years ago, and they cultivated the ricelike quinoa, a popular grain today, along with maize (corn), which became the mainstay of their diet. The potato tubers grew underground in this mountainous region of the Andes, and they were protected by the earth from frost, hail, rainstorms, and other threats of weather. As long as 3,500 years ago, the potato was cultivated as a food by the Incan civilization. Though they were originally bitter, the natives developed the starchy roots into potato types that we would recognize today. There are many varieties today, but they started here in these fertile hills. Corn was mentioned as one of the staple foods of the Inca people. Called zea mays, a cultivated American cereal, it is really a grass with a pod of seeds enclosed in a husk. Throughout Central and South America, as well as in North America, corn has sacred meaning to the native people. Over millennia, they learned to grow, dry, store, and grind it to various textures for varied uses. They have many methods for cooking it and many forms of praise for it. Europeans generally think of corn as simply a food for animals, but Native Americans have constructed a far different symbology for this sustaining food: Corn is to the Indian what bread and wine are to the Christian: an incarnation of body and blood, flesh and spirit. . . . [T]he Indian world is still centered on the cycles of nature, on the annual sprouting, ripening, harvesting, and burial of seed. . . . To understand . . . you must become intimate with Indian corn. . . . [That is] why Aztec girls who once danced before the Goddess of Green Corn, Xilomen, let down their hair so that the green corn would let down its silk. . . . [Why] Zuni makers of piki bread would talk to the piki stone and ask it “to not be lazy and to work well.” . . . [Why] Indians talk to their budding corn as if to their own children and think good thoughts in order to help both children grow. You have to follow each corn transformation from green youth to parched age, aided by man’s preserving, processing, milling, and cooking arts. (Fussell 1986, 13)

Corn probably reached the Midwestern states about the time of Christ, but it took nearly 1,000 years for a variety to develop that would survive the northern

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climate. “‘Northern Flint’ corn eventually reached Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky, and West Virginia” (Schenone 2003, 12), and it became the beloved staple of most of the Native American tribes. Other grains were also very important. In the Great Lakes region, farther north, a staple called manoomin, called “the good grain” by the Ojibwa people (the Anishinaabe) was the primary staple. It is a black grain somewhat like rice, often called wild rice, and it remains an important part of the Ojibwa culture. In the lore of these people, Nanaboozhoo, a hunter, found the grain one evening after returning home hungry. As the story goes, a duck dropped some of the grains into his kettle of boiling water, and it made the best soup he had ever tasted. He followed the duck and found the ricelike grain floating on the surface of a nearby lake. Even today, the Ojibwa people harvest the so-called wild rice in canoes in autumn. The poler pushes the canoe through the stands of grasses, and the knocker hits the stalks and knocks the grains into the canoe (Hanks 2007). These were ancient practices, and factual origins were obscured by time. The ancient patterns and knowledge of the Native Americans, called the First People in Canada and Indians by most of the other early colonists, helped the early Spanish and British settlers survive in spite of serious misunderstandings between the cultures. The first European colonial settlement in what is now the United States was established by the French at Fort Caroline in 1564. It was at the mouth of the St. John’s River in what is now Florida. The next was the fortified city of St. Augustine in Florida in 1565; it was a small and lonely fort established by Spain’s King Philip. In 1584, John White set up the first British settlement in Roanoke, North Carolina, and in 1586, Sir Francis Drake visited the Roanoke colony just after he and his 23 ships had sacked St. Augustine and had also claimed California (1579) for the British throne. Most of the Roanoke colonists returned to England with Drake’s fleet. Later, no traces of the Roanoke settlers left behind were found. It is surmised that the colonists, realizing that they would perish without help, joined company with the benign Lumbee Indians of Croatoan Island. Legend has it that in the late 1600s it was observed that some of the members of the Lumbee tribe were “fair-skinned and blue-eyed people, with a number of English words in their language” (Conlin 1993a, 25). The next settlements were by the Virginia Company of London in Jamestown, Virginia (1606), and in what is now Massachusetts (November 1620). The Massachusetts Puritans established their first crude settlement at Plymouth, and there is no question about the aid given by the Native Americans in the early years of both settlements. Exportable agricultural and drug products were found near Jamestown, including ginseng, sassafras, sweet potatoes, and Virginia potatoes, later better known as Irish potatoes. In the north, the Native Americans taught the

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Pilgrims how to plant corn and how to make maple sugar. Without the aid of the friendly natives, it is likely that the northern colonists would have perished; their first crop of corn undoubtedly saved the Plymouth colonists from starving. In Jamestown, there was a quick recognition of the possibilities of tobacco as another important export crop, and in 1619 the first Africans were imported, with England’s approval, to provide cheap labor. The slave market was already established and thriving in the West Indies, and this was a continuation of that practice. Perhaps the Africans were meant to serve as indentured servants, as many British whites were, but as history shows, this was the beginning of a neverending ordeal for these captured Africans. Most school-children in the United States, particularly in the eastern states, learn Native American food lore about the three sisters: corn, beans, and squash. These were staple foods for the colonists as well as the Native Americans, but we must understand that there were many other foods as well. The women of the various tribes had been feeding their people for thousands of years, and their resourcefulness in finding and preparing wholesome foods was limitless. Wild fruits and berries, succotash (beans and corn), cornpone (a corn pancake), turkey (the natives called it furkee), clams (and how to prepare a clambake), deer and other wild game, and fish were familiar to the Native American cooks, and the knowledge was shared freely with the colonists (Tannahill 1988, 222–23). Moving forward in time, in February 1676, after more than a year of fighting between the Algonquin tribes of southern New England and the settlers, Indian raiding parties started destroying small frontier communities, killing people, and taking others captive. Though the causes of the conflicts were not clearly defined, it was no doubt stimulated by Native American resentment of their lands being taken, disdainful treatment of their tribal members, and ongoing conflicts of authority. A group of well-armed Narragansetts invaded Lancaster, Massachusetts, a frontier town of about fifty families, and left many dead or injured. They captured 24 of the settlers and took them away with them, including a wounded woman named Mary Rowlandson, wife of a pastor, and her mortally wounded six-year-old child. Rowlandson did not lag behind the natives along the trail or complain, but for the nine days her child lived, she had nothing to eat and only a little cold water to drink. Deeply religious, Mary Rowlandson kept her prayers and thoughts to herself and said little or nothing. When the child died, the natives respectfully buried the child on a hill, and Rowlandson was expected to carry on with them (Rowlandson 1981, 33–75). On their journey through the forest, Rowlandson saw two of her other captured children. She was not allowed to linger with them but told to move on. The group of captives was divided among the natives, and Mary’s group consisted of 10 English captives: 2 women and 8 children. Mary was held in captivity for 11 weeks and, considering the circumstances, was respected and treated fairly well.

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The food she mentioned was scant and plain, but she remarked that no matter how persecuted and deprived the Indians may have been, she never did see one starve (Rowlandson 1981, 33–75). They ate what they found, mostly groundnuts (like peanuts). If they found old bones, they would boil them, drink the broth, and then pound the bones until they were tender enough to eat. They would eat anything edible, from animals to the bark of trees. Rowlandson wrote that she ate parched meal made from groundnuts or corn, a bit of corn cake, some broth made by boiling an old horse’s leg, an uncooked ear of corn now and then, a small piece of partially cooked horse’s liver, a corn pancake, a piece of bear meat and some peas that she boiled together, occasional groundnuts (peanuts?), a few acorns and two chestnuts, some broth thickened with cooked meal from the bark of a tree, corn mush and broth flavored with horses’ hooves, and a little roasted intestine. Philip, the Wampanoag chief Metacomet, saw that she got a mess of beans, meat, and a little groundnut cake. Somehow, she survived. After being returned to her husband, Rowlandson recovered from the ordeal entirely, went on with her family life and responsibilities, and wrote the story of her 1676 captivity experience in 1682 (Rowlandson 1981, 33–75). Native Americans in the Great Plains and in the Southwest adapted to an entirely different environment than those in the Northeast. For these groups, animals meant survival, and the animals played vital roles, both physical and spiritual. The Native Americans felt connected to the animals in complex relationships, and many myths, legends, songs, rituals, and protocols grew out of this sacred dependence. For the Apache, who inhabited the Southwest of what is now the United States and Northern Mexico, the buffalo was as an important part of their survival as it was for Indians of the plains (Sioux, Cheyenne, Crow, and others). Before a buffalo hunt, the Apache would practice complex spiritual rituals, and then they would follow very careful hunting and butchering techniques (Lowenstein 1997, 95). Gathered together, the hunters would share a sacred pipe and summon the animals with a wish. They might say, “There will be many. There will be much meat. We will camp among them” (Lowenstein 1997, 95). They would sing and dance in honor of the buffalo, and they would pray as their holy men (shaman) would sing. After the hunt, there were specific, traditional ways to butcher the animal so its spirit would not be offended and take revenge on hunters in the future. “First, the hide was cut along the right shoulder. The foreleg and shoulder were then severed. A slice of fatty meat was cut from the back and thrown towards the east as an offering to the animal’s spirit. The remainder of the animal was turned into food and clothing” (Lowenstein 1997, 95). Every part of the carcass was treated with respect, even the feet, “for fear of incurring the wrath of the spirit and being trampled by the herd’s hooves on the next hunt” (Lowenstein 1997, 95). The gardening traditions of the Plains Indians are not

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generally recognized, but an ethnography of a Hidatasa woman born about 1839, named Buffalo Bird Woman, reveals her expert gardening methods. Some of her centuries-old traditions are discussed in chapter 4. The Pueblo natives of the Southwest, made up of many tribes (Hopi, Zuni, Tewa) and later the Navajo and Apache, all practice belief systems that link the connectedness between the land, plants, and animals. Maize, or corn as the EuroAmericans call it, is a dominant symbol in their religious life. The Hopi say, “Corn is life” (Sullivan 1989, 57): Two perfect ears of white maize are given to a newborn child as its “mothers”; when a person dies, ears of blue maize similarly accompany him on his journey beyond life. Maize seeds, ears, tassels, milk, pollen, and meal all serve as sacramental elements in differing contexts. Moreover, other important symbols are related to the maize cycle. Clouds, rains, lightening, feathered serpents, and various species associated with water, such as frogs, ducks, reeds, and so forth, all underline a paramount interest in securing water for maize. (Sullivan 1989, 57)

The Navajo tribes, Athabascans from the Northwest who arrived in the Southwest centuries after the Pueblos, learned many ways to survive from the earlier native settlers. Rivalry occurred also, and because of tensions the Navajo named the very life supporting food that they also considered holy, the maize itself, “enemy food” or naadáá ( Toelken 2003, 42). The corn pollen was and is considered a sacred representation of life by the Navajo, and to this day, in order to acknowledge the reciprocal relationship between animals and humans, the Navajo continue to use corn pollen in many sacred ways. For instance, “The deer whose hide is to be used [for moccasins or other clothing] is caught, embraced by the hunter, and translated–so to speak–into a sacred animal by the corn pollen” (Toelken 2003, 47). Corn is considered the sustainer of life for the Navajo, and the pollen is used in ceremonies as a blessing and a prayer from infancy to death. Corn dishes that range from bread to mush to steamed or roasted ears remain central to the food traditions of these, the Diné (their preferred name), people. Because of the importance of corn to most of the Native American tribes in North, Central, and South America, many stories have emerged with corn as an element or motif. An old North American Indian legend from the Isleta Pueblo in the United States is called “The Man Who Married the Moon,” and it is presented here in my own shortened version. Long ago, even before the moon had risen in the sky, there was a handsome young medicine man of the Isleta Pueblo tribe named Nah-chu-rú-chu. He was yet unmarried, and the girls of his village, including two called the Yellow-CornMaidens who were evil witches, plied him with customary gifts, handmade of white buckskin, to try to attract his attention. He tired of their attentions, and so he issued a challenge.

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Hanging by his door was a magic water dipper made of highly polished pearl. He announced that four days hence, the maiden who could grind corn so finely that it would adhere to the dipper would be his bride. A beautiful and gentle maiden named Moon was visiting her father’s ranch in another village and did not know of the announcement until her return on the fourth day. The girls of the village were grinding and grinding the corn using a hand stone (mano) and grinding it against a sloping stone metate. The two Yellow-Corn-Maidens reluctantly told Moon what was happening, and she quickly prepared fine meal for the competition. One by one, the village girls, including the Yellow-Corn-Maidens, tossed the meal at the shiny dipper, but it always fell to the ground. When Moon tossed hers, it stuck fast and not a grain was lost. Nah-chu-rú-chu welcomed her as his beloved wife and promised always to cherish and protect her. The Yellow-CornMaidens were jealous of Moon and determined to get rid of her. They invited her to accompany them on a search for ammole, a soap root. Innocently, she accompanied them. On their journey, Moon noticed her beautiful reflection in a pool (as the moon often does). She stopped to look, and the sisters pushed her in and held her under the water until she was drowned. They then filled the pool with sand and soil to bury her and went on about their business as if they knew nothing of her. Nah-chu-rú-chu asked if they knew where Moon was, but they feigned ignorance. Because he was a powerful magic man, when he fell into deep mourning, the entire region fell into a drought and crops were dying. Elders of the tribe engaged many animals, including Turkey, to find Moon. At last, Turkey found her burial place, and Nah-chu-rú-chu restored her to life with a ceremony. The two Yellow-Corn-Maidens were transformed into snakes that, to this day, live on a rocky mountain where they cause no harm to anyone. Now and then they are caught by villagers to catch mice in the village, but they never injure any human being (Smith 1994, 59–73). Besides the continuing importance of corn in the diets of all Native American ethnic heritages, what we commonly call trail mix, or even versions of preserved fruit from fruit leather to dried fruit mixes, may have stemmed from the ancient Native American tradition of pemmican. The word pemikân, from pimiy, meaning “grease,” was a nutritious but rather unappealing food to many of the early American pioneers. The word pemmican comes from the Cree language, and the basic ingredient of the foodstuff was buffalo, deer, or other game meat, dried, ground into a powder, and then mixed with melted animal fat, berries, and sometimes bone marrow. It was a nutritious food, and it was quickly recognized as an excellent survival food. Information about the usefulness of this food quickly passed by word of mouth from person to person (vernacular folklore), and pemmican was adapted

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for use by early explorers, hunters, and fur traders. As early as 1820, Sir John Richardson, an Arctic explorer, “used the malting equipment of a brewery to make pemmican. The meat was dried in the malting kiln and ground in the malt mill. It was mixed with rendered suet, currents, and sugar, and packed in tin canisters” (Davidson 1999, 593). Today, trail mix, beef jerky, fruit leather, and other fruit-nut combinations are popular snack foods for Americans of all ages, whether they hike or not. It continues to be a nutritious, energy-boosting snack, and methods for creating home versions are found in most U.S. cookbooks.

EARLY EUROPEAN EXAMPLES AND TEXTS U.S. cuisine is made up of elements from Native American legacies and from cultures all over the world. Myths and stories concerning food origins and traditions abound in every culture, and in this next section, the discussion will consider food contributions and traditions stemming from European explorers who came to America in ancient times as well as after the British colonists had established themselves in the New World. From north and south, east and west, the United States has been a gathering place of people, languages, stories, and foods that have blended and mixed in countless ways. Long ago, before Columbus and the subsequent explorers from Spain, France, and the United Kingdom began to colonize the American continent, Vikings and, several centuries later, Basque fishermen found their way to America’s northeastern coast. “The remains of a Viking camp have been found in Newfoundland” (Kurlansky 1997, 20). Their purposes varied, but the food that sustained them more than any other was cod. The Vikings dried it, and with just a little more knowledge, the Basques salted and then dried it, which made it last a little longer. There were so many codfish that in 1602, Bartholomew Gosnold, an English adventurer, “named the arm of land in the waters [south of Nova Scotia] ‘Cape Cod,’ later a center of the New England fishing industry” (Mariani 1994, 86). Fried cod, still a New England breakfast favorite, has fed Americans from the earliest explorers and fishermen to the mill girls in Lowell, Massachusetts, in the 1840s to people in today’s home kitchens and restaurants throughout the United States. The folklore about codfish is fascinating, and some of it was eloquently captured in Mark Kurlansky’s book Cod (1997). Kurlansky shared many stories from varying cultures, including a comment written in 1851 by Henry David Thoreau in his 1865 text called Cape Cod: The Bad News at Walden Pond It is rumored that in the fall the cows here are sometimes fed cod’s-head! The godlike part of the cod, which, like the human head, is curiously and wonderfully made, forsooth has

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but little less brain in it,—coming to such an end! To be craunched be cows! I felt my own skull crack with sympathy. What if the heads of men were to be cut off to feed the cows of a superior order of beings who inhabit the islands in the ether? Away goes your fine brain, the house of thought and instinct, to swell the cud of a ruminant animal!—However, an inhabitant assured me that they did not make a practice of feeding cows on cod-heads; the cows merely would eat them sometimes. (Thoreau 1987, qtd. in Kurlansky 1997, 241–42)

Americans have always been inventive when considering mercantile adventures. Besides farming, fishing, and other endeavors, some Americans experimented with the international market. Ginseng, a root that is often shaped like a human, became a mercantile enterprise for U.S. merchants in the early 1800s and continues today as a popular health improvement aid. The herb’s botanical name, panax, is derived from the Greek word pan, which means “all.” When combined with the Greek word akos (ills), it takes on a meaning of a plant that cures all illnesses. “The species name, ‘Ginseng,’ is Chinese for ‘man plant,’ which is attributed to the shape of the root that resembles man” (Ritchason 1995, 101). Sometimes called “the root of life,” it is believed to invigorate, rejuvenate, and revitalize the human body. Some say that extremely old roots glow in the dark and give off a certain illumination. It is held by many, that the Manchurian Ginseng from the mountains of China is the best Ginseng and some old roots have been known to sell for as much as $20,000.00. In 1976, a four hundred year old root from this particular variety was found on an island off the shores of Korea. It was reported to have been sold for an incredible $10,000.00 per ounce. Its total weight was fourteen and a half lbs., which meant that its total value was no less than $1,320,000.00! This would make the sale of Ginseng in Korea as being the most expensive transaction of this root in modern history and probably in all times. (Ritchason 1995, 101)

Ginseng is available in U.S. markets today, and it is grown here and shipped all over the world. In a reversal, Ritchason tells us, “American Ginseng is preferred by the majority of the common people in both China and Japan, while the Korean and Chinese variety is preferred in the United States (Ritchason 1995, 102). Ginseng is still recommended by herbalists for many physical uses, including lowering blood sugar in diabetics and for use in the breast-feeding of newborns. In many ways, African Americans, who arrived in America in 1619, brought with them knowledge of roots, herbs, and food styles unknown on this continent. They came from Africa and the West Indies, and, as forced colonists, they created their own synthesized culture. However reluctantly at first, African Americans had a strong, influential hand in helping build early America beyond their working in the tobacco and rice fields; in fact, the United States was industrialized by the forced labor of African Americans in the cotton fields of the South.

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AFRICAN AMERICAN EXAMPLES AND TEXTS Early African food methods, traditions, and stories came to the United States by way of Africa and the West Indies. This diffusion of African American foods occurred partly because of northern and western migrations of the African American people and because of the distinct style of the food and its unique, incomparable flavor. Sidney W. Mintz, a professor of anthropology at Johns Hopkins University and author of many works, including his well-known social histories of the growth and use of sugar, wrote about the background of African Americans to emphasize the establishment of their own, unique culture and identity: In spite of the near-industrial character of the plantation, the slaves did create for themselves distinctive ways of life, drawing on their own traditions, and on the new settings offered them. These new cultures are usually described in somewhat misleading fashion as “mixed” or “blended.” They are, in fact, sui generis–neither African nor European, but Afro-American. Their accurate characterization must take many different factors into account, to escape from literal, mechanical, two-plus-two or coffee-and-cream analogies. Even a brief look at the development by enslaved Africans of a distinctive Caribbean cuisine reveals a variety of factors to be considered. (Mintz 1996, 38)

To help with understanding, Mintz reminds his readers of the importance of bricolage: “In this as in much else, a kind of bricolage—a French word for ‘patching together’ made famous by the French anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss— occurred” (Mintz 1996, 40). Though there is a vast history and many records from the past tell countless narratives of African Americans in the United States, in the Benjamin Quarles text, The Negro in the Making of America (1996), a paragraph sums up the coming of the blacks to Jamestown and their subsequent fate: For the first twenty-five years after the coming of Negroes to Jamestown in 1619, their status remained that of indentured servant. But it was not many years before it became common practice to hold a black servant after his term had expired. By 1640 Negro slavery had gained a foothold, as the John Punch case indicated. Punch, a Negro, was one of three servants caught in the act of running away. As punishment the two white servants had four years added to their periods of service, but the court ordered that Punch “serve his master or his assigns for the time of his natural Life here or elsewhere.” Thus by 1640 a Negro servant who ran afoul of the law found that his period of service was likely to be extended indefinitely, taking on the hallmark of slavery–perpetual servitude. (Quarles 1996, 45)

Most of the black Americans lived in the shadow of the big house on the plantation. And though some served as domestic servants, most worked as field hands

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performing heavy labor from sunrise to sunset. The slaves raised corn, vegetables, and hogs for the owners as well as for their own tables. Many raised chicken as well, and most Americans have become familiar with what is now called soul food, mentioned earlier, which emerged from the slave kitchens of the South. John Mariani, in The Dictionary of American Food and Drink (1994), states that the term soul food is “of rather recent vintage, circa the mid-1960s, when it became associated with the growth of ethnic pride in African American culture, of which food was a significant part” (Mariani 1994, 295). Mariani also quotes Bob Jeffries, who wrote the Soul Food Cookbook (1970): “While all soul food is southern food, not all southern food is soul” (Jeffries, qtd. in Mariani 1994, 295). In the foreword to the novel Soul Food (LaJoyce Brookshire 1997), George Tillman Jr., writer and director of the film version of the novel, wrote that he recalled “special dishes like dressing, candied yams, black-eyed peas, tea cakes, fried chicken, dumplings, egg pie, and sock-it-to-me cake” (Tillman 1997). The famous Tuskegee Institute, founded by former slave Booker T. Washington in 1881, well after the Civil War, has been a center for progressive education for more than a hundred years. In 1996, Carolyn Quick Tillery published The African American Heritage Cookbook: Traditional Recipes and Fond Remembrances from Alabama’s Renowned Tuskegee Institute. The recipes are contextualized with history and interesting cultural tidbits. For instance, included in the collection is Dr. George Washington Carver’s recipe for peanut cake with molasses. In Up from Slavery, Washington wrote that as a child in slavery the regular diet was cornbread and pork. His mother would be given molasses for her children on Sunday morning: I would get my tin plate and hold it up for the sweet morsel, but I would always shut my eyes while the molasses was being poured in my plate, with the hope that when I opened them I would be surprised to see how much I had got. When I opened my eyes I would tip the plate first in one direction and another, so as to make the molasses spread all over it, in the full belief that there would be more of it and that it would last longer if I spread it out this way. So strong are my childish impressions of those Sunday morning feasts that it would be pretty hard for anyone to convince me that there is not more molasses on a plate when it is spread all over the plate than when it occupies just one corner. . . . My share of the syrup was about two tablespoons, and those two spoonfuls of molasses were much more enjoyable to me than is a fourteen course dinner after which I am to speak. (Washington 1993, quoted in Tillery 1996, 188)

Alice Walker’s novel The Color Purple (1982), which recounts the story of a black family in the first decades of the twentieth century, gives an account of food preparation that reflects the loving care put into a family meal: She got up early in the morning and go to market. Buy only stuff that’s fresh. Then she come home and sit on the back step humming and shelling peas or cleaning collards or

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fish or whatever she bought. Then she git all her pots going at once and turn on the radio. By one o’clock everything ready and she call us to the table. Ham and greens and chicken and cornbread. Chitlins and blackeyed peas and souse. Pickled okra and watermelon rind. Caramel cake and blackberry pie. Us eat and eat, and drink a little sweet wine and beer too. (Walker 1982, 178)

In seven cities across the United States every summer, the Black Family Reunion Celebrations, organized by the National Council of Negro Women, are held to celebrate and help preserve the traditions, values, and strength of African American families. Cookbooks, created by contributions from African American home cooks from all over the country, represent dishes for every taste and occasion. In The Black Family Reunion Cookbook (National Council of Negro Women, Inc. 1993), dedicated to Mary McLeod Bethune, founder of Bethune-Cookman College and organizer of the National Council of Negro Women, narratives and recipes combine to represent the local, national, and international heritage of the black community. A sidebar by Mayme L. Brown of Williamsburg, Virginia, is situated next to a recipe for Emancipation Proclamation Breakfast Cake, a delicious-sounding butter cake flavored with cinnamon, blueberries, orange, and lemon. The sidebar, titled “Basket Dinners,” expresses warm memories and celebration: As a small child growing up in the South, my fondest memories are of the basket dinners served at our church. Each family prepared food and brought it to the meetings on a designated Sunday, usually in June, July, or August. The food was delicious, usually fried chicken, barbecued pork and goat, and all kinds of desserts, including homemade ice cream. It was a delight for us kids to turn the handle of the ice cream freezer because it meant we would get the dasher to lick from after the cream was frozen. In my home state we have commemorated the Emancipation Proclamation on the 8th of August, or the closest weekend to that date, with basket dinners. Former slaves and descendants of slaves would come from around the country for this grand day of celebration. (Brown 1993, 67)

In a discussion of the “History of Soul Food” in another cookbook published by the National Council of Negro Women, Inc., The Black Family Dinner Quilt Cookbook (1994), a realistic view of today’s needs for less caloric and higher fiber menus steers readers in the right direction: “Today’s sedentary jobs require fewer calories,” (National Council of Negro Women, Inc. 1994, 203), and the text explains that “Obesity . . . can trigger diabetes. . . . Heart and blood vessel diseases . . . and colon-rectal cancer associated with high-fat, low-fiber diets, have all taken a serious toll on the quality of African-American health” (203, 204). These consequences are not limited to African Americans, but this cookbook offers the traditional, soul food-type, down-home recipes prepared with less fat, salt, and sugar.

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One of the well-known dishes of the South is the soup or stew known as gumbo. The name came originally from the African Bantu word gombo (meaning “okra”). It is popular throughout the United States, but travelers often drive well out of their way to enjoy a steaming bowl or plate of genuine gumbo prepared in the Deep South, particularly in New Orleans, Louisiana. It always has a variety of vegetables (tomatoes, onion, celery, green peppers, okra, garlic, and sometimes zucchini or corn) simmered long and slow in a rich broth and flavored with bay leaves, thyme, parsley, salt and pepper, and sometimes garlic powder and hot pepper sauce. Some gumbo recipes, claiming to be versions of nineteenth-century variants, may include filé powder (ground sassafras leaves) for thickening, extra flavor, and a tantalizing aroma. The meat may be shrimp, cod, chicken, crab, crawfish, sausage, ham, or a combination of any of these. Poured or ladled over steaming rice, it is a fragrant taste of the South. Simmering caldrons of rich, steaming gumbo restore vitality and nourish the body and soul of those who enjoy this substantial food and the hearty socializing that often accompanies it. Earlier in this book, the concept of the caldron was discussed as a literary metaphor with many meanings and as a literal cooking utensil for survival around the world. It has served as a symbol for metamorphosis or change, abundance, rejuvenation, and resurrection. Caldrons have been familiar vessels to the human family from the ancient days of scriptural stories (“St. John the Evangelist, who is said to have emerged rejuvenated [from a vat of boiling oil]”) (Tressider 2005, 91) to Mediterranean myth (Medea advised the daughters of King Pelias of Iolcus to chop him up and throw the pieces into a caldron in the hope of rejuvenation) (Tressider 2005, 91) to the never-emptied, life-giving caldron of the Celts’ myth cycles (Jones and Jones 1993, 24). In Africa, huge caldrons made of cast iron and modeled in the ancient style, called potjiis, are still made, sold, and used. Macbeth’s witches appeared with their great caldron, concocting their evil brew, including “eye of newt and toe of frog” (Shakespeare 1998, 60–61). Most of us would not be particularly interested in sampling their stew, but Shakespeare knew that using the image of a steaming caldron would have meaning for his audience. We know, historically, that sustaining soups and stews, with literally thousands of varieties, provided food for generation after generation. With a little imagination, old sayings and proverbs were born out of the familiarity with the huge copper, steel, or even clay cauldrons. One phrase, “stirring the pot,” might mean many things, but it is most often used to describe someone or something that is contributing to an ongoing, deliberate provocation. A similar proverb is “to keep the fires burning,” which also can have positive and negative connotations. In ancient days, the fire was not allowed to burn out. A well-tended fire meant a well-tended meal and warm place to sleep. To keep the fires burning might also imply not letting some negative

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Macbeth’s Witches. The witches in Shakespeare’s Macbeth brew a prophecy of toil and trouble. Photos.com

issue die away. These folkloric quips and adages, probably from thousands of years ago, are still present in the language. These are oral, or vernacular, examples of folklore. Since before the days of Columbus, America has been a teeming caldron of many nations. There are still more than five hundred registered Native American tribes just in the territory of the United States, and their ancient history reflects varied origins, continued exploration, various conflagrations and competition for land, and constant movement. People have arrived from every nation on earth. From the beginning, it has been a land of immigrants who crossed the Bering

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Straits, who traveled across the oceans on various vessels, and who now arrive by airplane and automobile. Along with them came food traditions ranging from the chorizo sausage that may have sustained Basque sheepherders on the long train ride from New York to the Intermountain West or the Mexican boy who arrived on this side of the border with pockets full of tortillas, dried chilies, and a handful of beans. Again, reaching into the history of the past, the discussion will include texts and examples of foodways of the past that continue to influence our food choices today.

ENGLISH AMERICAN EXAMPLES AND TEXTS There is certainly no doubt about the English influence on U.S. foodways. The typical, traditional meat-and-potatoes meal of English natives, accompanied by a simple salad and perhaps custard, pudding, or cake for dessert, is quintessentially English. Further, U.S. periodicals, perused by home cooks for more than a century, emphasized variations on the basic meat-and-potatoes meal. I mentioned our guests from England in chapter 2 and their concern that we were serving foreign food rather than common, U.S. foods. After a few dinners of hamburgers, fried chicken, and hot dogs, I reassessed to see if our guests were more satisfied with the cuisine. The husband laughed and said that he thought I would be unable to make a good beef roast, fresh peas, and boiled potatoes without any seasoning. Of course I prepared it the next evening, and he remarked, “Now, that is real food!” Milk and dairy products have also enjoyed sustained popularity in English cooking, Laura Schenone reminds us that Europeans introduced cows to the New World. Early housewives in New England and the southern colonies, accustomed to preparing oat porridge in the morning for their families but having no oats available to them, served a dish called samp, a breakfast dish made with ground corn and served with milk. The milk was as important as the porridge itself, and English housewives, particularly country housewives, knew how to make many dairy products from milk. “One respected husbandry writer of the 1600s believed dairying knowledge so universal that he omitted it from his guide writing, ‘I shall not mention anything about the making of Butter and Cheese, because most good Housewives are acquainted with the way of doing it’” (Schenone 2003, 37, 38). The knowledge of cheese making, butter churning, and preservation of dairy products, again, was passed from generation to generation by way of oral transmission or vernacular folklore. A traditional necessity, it was a skill that helped sustain early Americans and remains an industry in England. Imported Stilton and other English cheeses like Cheshire, Wensleydale, and Cheddar, the most common in the United States, remain an important part of U.S. cuisine. Cheddar

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and other cheeses imitative of the English originals are available in U.S. markets, but the distinctive, original flavors of the British products are well worth exploring. They are becoming more available in the United States in specialty food markets. English cooking includes many, many types of puddings, prepared with or without milk, and just a glance at food shelves in the United States reveals that Americans still enjoy a variety of puddings and pudding-like desserts. Most large markets even carry Bird’s Custard Powder, which is an import from England. Laura Mason and Catherine Brown, English food writers, published Traditional Foods of Britain: An Inventory (1999), and they suggested that though baked goods and cheeses are important in the English diet, puddings are the most common and popular food. Yorkshire pudding, an egg, flour, and milk mixture cooked in the sizzling fat of a roast and commonly served as a side dish throughout Britain, has not had wide circulation in the United States, as far as I know. But there is a breakfast food called by a variety of names that is similar. In the Intermountain West it is called a pioneer pancake, and the batter is poured into hot, melted butter or margarine in an oblong pan and baked at a high temperature. The batter swells and puffs and is served with fruit and syrup or whipped cream. English food influences in the United States continue to include certain favorites. A text called The Prawn Cocktail Years (1997), published in England by Simon Hopkinson and Lindsey Bareham, states that over several decades, three items have remained distinct favorites for dining out in Britain (not just England): prawn (shrimp) cocktail, steak garni (beef accompanied by vegetables and potatoes), and black forest gateau (a rich chocolate cake with cherries and whipped cream). These are also favorites among many restaurant patrons in the United States, and shrimp cocktail usually appears on steak house menus along with varied steamed vegetables and potatoes. Many bakeries throughout the United States make the cake, and I know of at least one bakery in St. Louis County, Missouri, named Black Forest Bakery, which makes a delicious version of the delicacy. Another English dessert, trifle, which is a layer of sponge cake topped with fruit, custard, and then whipped cream and sometimes further enhanced with fruit-flavored liquor, is called by different names in the United States. Sometimes called pudding cake or layered cake, recipes similar to trifle are common, and desserts similar to the English version can be found in many restaurants and even U.S. cafeterias. Like the United States, England has become a nation of many immigrants. New citizens from Asia and the Caribbean have influenced contemporary cooking and have also provided a much wider range of restaurant fare, just as they have in the United States. The English, immigrants and natives alike, according to Alan Davidson, are resistant to being defined by their food choices and what

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they should or should not eat. Davidson wrote, rather tongue in cheek, “Some controversies of this nature have even threatened to provoke lawlessness on the part of a traditionally law-abiding nation” (Davidson 1999, 275).

IRISH AMERICAN EXAMPLES AND TEXTS Anyone who has lived in the United States for a few years has heard of St. Patrick’s Day, March 17, and shamrocks, leprechauns, Irish beer, Irish stew, and Irish soda bread. Grocery stores carry cookies, layer cakes, and cupcakes spread with green frosting, fresh breads tinted green, corned beef brisket and fresh cabbage, and shamrock plants as well. Someone said that there are two kinds of people in this world: those who are Irish and those who want to be. Maybe it is the Irish who make sure this news is in the air in March, but with pinches freely given to those who fail to wear green on this day of days, one wonders. The Irish have been present in the United States for centuries, but during the building of the Erie Canal in the early 1800s, the United States imported around 3,000 Irishmen to “dig the ditch” (Conlin 1993a, 224). Called the “canal boys,” they were a rough lot who eventually settled in towns and cities built close to the locks and the canal where their work camps had been. The movement of Irish to the United States began as a trickle before the time of the second tragic potato famine in the 1840s (the first was in 1822). Catholics in southern Ireland did not support King Henry VIII when he broke with the Roman Catholic Church in the 1500s, and because of that, the majority of the Irish, deeply Roman Catholic, were increasingly persecuted over time. They lost their land; it was confiscated and given to English landlords who rarely lived there. The Irish could not use the foods they had always grown and used for their nourishment. The corn and dairy products they produced were sent to England to feed the rising numbers of workers involved in the industries, and in time, the Irish owned only about 5 percent of their land. By the mid-1700s, potatoes had become the staple food, along with homeproduced beer, ale, and whisky, but a devastating black fungus (Phytophthora infestans) destroyed the Irish potato crop in 1845, and millions of people starved to death. Those who could find means to make the passage to the United States did so, and many of the Irish immigrants in the mid-1800s were women. They had learned of the domestic servant shortage in the United States, and though they knew little about U.S. middle-class habits and foodways, they demanded high wages and learned on the job. Schenone states, “In the kitchens of American households, Irish women built a foundation for themselves to rise in American life” (Schenone 2003, 209). Hasia R. Diner, in her text Hungering for America: Italian, Irish, and Jewish Foodways in the Age of Migration (2002), states: “This enculturation into American

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domestic life, its food in particular, did not take place without deep conflict between employers and the women who cooked for them” (Diner 2002, 116). Because the great majority of the southern Irish were oppressed Roman Catholics and had survived for so long on oats, potatoes, an occasional cabbage, and perhaps a meager amount of salt back, they had not developed culinary artistry. These were foods that could be prepared in a caldron or pot over a hearth fire, and they just barely met the need for human survival. Food, what little there was of it, was meant to assuage hunger; there was no tradition or identity connected to food as it was in most cultures. Rather, the tradition was to share the pain of hunger communally and abate the worst of it with boiled potatoes; there were no ingredients to permit real culinary innovation. Because of this, the majority of the young women of Ireland did not know how to cook. Further, living in poverty with none of the frills disposable income might provide, they knew little or nothing about keeping house in a middle-class world. The consequence of this was that the young, uninformed Irish house workers were made the victims of jokes in periodicals and by word of mouth for several decades. The foods usually served on or around St. Patrick’s Day in the present time have little to do with what the Irish actually ate for the centuries of their poverty. In the years after the potato famine, when times were better, tea and white bread became very popular as a token of improved times, but the little home baking that had been done previously was performed less, and foods and food preparation remained very simple. There is no distinctive, original Irish food in the United States, as Diner wrote: “Part of their identity was forever fused with memories of hunger. By giving up those memories, they would have given up much of what they constructed as authentically and profoundly Irish” (Diner 2002, 145). Diner also quoted Marion Casey’s PhD dissertation on the Irish image in the United States: In the 1920s corned beef and cabbage came to have some association with Irish American cooking. In 1935 Dinty Moore stew, based on the character by that name from the cartoon strip “Bringing Up Father,” was frequently eaten in working-class homes. It associated a hearty, inexpensive food with an Irish-sounding name. (Casey 1998, 215, qtd. in Diner 2002, 132)

On the other hand, the tradition of Irish saloons and pubs, mostly pleasant gathering places for men to socialize, exchange information, relax, and simply to drink, has continued both in the United States and in Ireland. Drinking has been a part of Irish foodways for centuries, and in the early days of immigration and hard labor to survive, the worker’s lunch pail, or growler, was often carried to the local Irish tavern to be filled with beer or ale. It was said that “Neither corn, meat, nor bread could cheer a man worn out from hard work. Only the liquid in the pail could do that” (Diner 2002, 109).

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In Irish taverns and pubs, the custom has been to provide foods along with the alcoholic beverages. Sometimes, in times of poverty, boiled potatoes may have been the only food available, but many foods typically have been served in pubs over time, including shepherd’s pie, fish and chips, Irish apple tart, boxty (a pan-fried potato pancake originally from County Leitrim) with smoked salmon, and lamb stew that contains various vegetables, including the ubiquitous boiled potatoes. Irish soda bread with slabs of cheese and fresh butter is popular pub food as well, and there are also puddings made with soda bread. Larry Doyle’s Irish Pub Cooking (2006) states that the emphasis in the pubs, both in the United States and Ireland, has shifted from drink “toward all of the other aspects that make up the pub experience,” including foods (Doyle 2006, 1). He suggests that this may be because of the severe drinking and driving laws, and “Irish pub goers are demanding reasonably priced wholesome, freshly and simply prepared comfort food to accompany their favorite beverage” (1). Doyle suggests that the easy-to-follow suggestions in his little cookbook will allow readers “to prepare wholesome Irish ‘soul’ food with relative ease” (1). Irish Americans have been a political force in the United States since before the Civil War. Boston and New York, with large Irish populations, became cities politicians courted from the early 1800s because the Irish almost always voted unanimously, and with their cohesiveness and natural talent for oratory, they became deeply involved in urban politics not only in the East but also in the Midwest and parts of California. In 1835, Bishop John England of Charleston, South Carolina, provided his interpretation and explanation of why the Irish were so successful in politics: “The Irish are largely amalgamated with the Americans, their dispositions, their politics, their notions of government; their language and their appearance become American very quickly, and they praise and prefer America to their oppressors at home” (Conlin 1993b, 481). It has been written in many places that President John F. Kennedy’s favorite food was New England clam chowder. He also particularly enjoyed mashed potatoes and lamb chops. Whether these preferences stemmed from his Irish heritage or were simply foods he discovered and enjoyed is beyond the scope of my research, but like many of Irish heritage, he was a person who “often had to be reminded that it was dinner time . . . politics always took preference over food” (“Favorite Foods” 2007). Food, for many of the Irish, was perceived as a means to keep the body comfortable more than a tool of identity or cultural definition. This is not true of the next ethnic group that will be discussed, the German immigrants.

GERMAN AMERICAN EXAMPLES AND TEXTS The first German immigrants to North America settled in Jamestown in 1608. Other Germans made the voyage looking for religious freedom, and,

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invited by William Penn, the German Mennonites established Germantown, six miles north of Philadelphia, in 1683. Over time, German immigrants and their descendants moved in many directions throughout the land, and according to the Bureau of the Census in 1990, 58 million Americans claim to be either entirely or partially of German descent. Foods in the German homeland differ according to region, and the German immigrants brought many food traditions with them. The northern part of Germany is on the sea, the central area is forest and rich farmland, and the southern part of the country lies nearer to Austria, Italy, and Switzerland. The foods from the north were influenced by the abundant seafoods from the North and Baltic Seas and by the region’s proximity to Denmark and other Scandinavian countries. The central region, with its forests, hills, and farmland, lent itself to game hunting, and the rich farmland produced wheat, rye, barley, and rich dairy products. From that region came a hearty regional cuisine of well-seasoned meats, fine breads, and rich, creamy desserts and pastries. The southern region, Bavaria and points south, was influenced by the lighter cuisines of the neighboring countries. The German influence on U.S. cuisine, from beer to sauerkraut to pumpernickel bread, from pretzels to frankfurters, and from bratwurst to strudel, has been tremendous. During the anti-German hysteria of World War I, many German names of towns, foods, and even diseases (the childhood disease German measles became “patriotic measles”) in the United States were changed. Conlin’s history survey states: “Restaurants revised their menus so that sauerkraut became ‘liberty cabbage,’ hamburgers became ‘Salisbury steaks’ (after a British lord), and frankfurters and wiener sausages, named after German and Austrian cities, became widely known as ‘hot dogs’” (Conlin 1993b, 627). It is interesting to note, as John Mariani did in his book The Dictionary of American Food and Drink (1994), that German’s Sweet Chocolate cake does not have a German origin as many people seem to assume. It originated in Texas, became very popular, and subsequently spread, by way of General Foods, holder of the Baker’s Chocolate trademark, throughout the United States. He explains: But in fact the name of the chocolate derives from Dr. James Baker, who in 1780 financed the first chocolate factory in America. His descendant, Walter Baker, hired an employee named Samuel German, who developed a “sweet chocolate,” which was added to the Baker’s line under German’s name. (Mariani 1994, 135)

Germans generally seem to love sweets and good breads, and many of the holiday traditions and foods we enjoy in the United States had their origins in Germany. The Easter bunny, for instance, was first mentioned in German writings as early as the 1500s, and the Germans were the first to hard-boil and paint eggs. Further, they were the first to make candy Easter bunnies. The story of Hansel and Gretel, with the quaint and charming gingerbread house they find deep in

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the woods, decorated with candies, sweet fruits, and sugar, appeared among the Grimm brothers’ collection of tales. Folklorists have suggested multiple meanings for the tale, including the triumph and ingenuity of children when faced with frightening circumstances. The death of the witch by burning has also been “read as a portent of the horrors of the Third Reich. . . . In her last rewriting of ‘Hansel and Gretel,’ the poet Anne Sexton refers to the abandonment of the children as a ‘final solution’” (Tartar 2004, 84). Max Lüthi, in his discussion of Hansel and Gretel in Once upon a Time: On the Nature of Fairy Tales (1976), suggested, “Evil consumes itself ” (Lüthi 1976, 64), and he suggested that that message is embedded in many fairy tales. Another group of immigrants to the United States that came in part from Germany and Western Europe but mostly from Eastern Europe are the Jews. Since the 1650s (or maybe even before), they have come to America. The first real Jewish community in the Western Hemisphere was New Amsterdam, founded by Sephardic Jews from Portugal in 1654, and that city was later renamed New York. Many cities throughout the United States have Jewish citizens, and often, if you are lucky, you may be able to find a genuine deli. Additionally, the Jewish synagogues are usually open to visitors, and having been fortunate enough to take university students to synagogues in Ohio and Idaho for special celebrations (including a Russian Jewish Bar Mitzvah for a 13-year-old boy), we were welcomed and even given delicious food to enjoy. In my experience, there have been light salads and breads available after regular worship services in synagogues I have visited. Simon Bronner explained that the meal is called Oneg Shabbat, meaning “the pleasure of Shabbat.” It is a simple meal meant to be a time for socializing after the service and usually is sponsored by someone in honor of some occasion (e-mail from Simon Bronner, June 27, 2007).

JEWISH EXAMPLES AND TEXTS My Southern Baptist grandmother lived in a Jewish neighborhood, and almost every Friday afternoon of my childhood, and usually for several weeks in the summer, I was taken to her big house. Upon arrival, I was admitted to what I still remember as a little corner of paradise. After she was widowed, Grandmother was hired as a private nurse for a wealthy non-Jewish family to care for their elderly grandfather, formerly a physician, who had severe dementia. What the family discovered in a very short while was that my grandmother was a talented cook. The elderly gentleman lived for more than a decade under my grandmother’s care, and during that time she became a member of their family. When he died, she was invited to stay and was told to consider the home her own. She lived there with the doctor’s family until she died, and many, many years later they attended my wedding!

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The paradise part began with the aroma that greeted everyone who entered the foyer. Grandmother baked—rye bread, cloverleaf rolls, golden braided loaves, every cookie imaginable, cakes, pies, cream puffs, napoleons (the French call this mille-feuille, a multilayered puff pastry filled with apricot jam and a rich pastry cream), and other nameless dainties. Grandmother was given carte blanche with the menus for the family, and she ordered foods from Straub’s, one of St. Louis’s finest food markets, with no budgetary limitation. The boxes of food were usually delivered the same day if she ordered in the morning, or the next day if she ordered later. It was magical to me, and I loved being there. The neighborhood shops were closed on Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath, but on other days Grandmother took me to her favorite deli, just a few blocks from her house, where I could see and smell a wonderful array of foods unfamiliar to me. Delicacies ranged from huge, kosher pickles to bagels to bakery goods (even challah, or the braided egg bread my grandmother learned to prepare), cheese blintzes, matzo ball soup, corned beef, knishes, and potato pancakes, all several decades before bagels and cream cheese became common in every supermarket. I still remember the shop as being light and clean with smells of vinegar and spices coupled with the sweet fragrance of fresh baked goods. I was young, but I remember huge, chilled, glass-fronted cases containing pastrami, turkey, tongue, sausages, salads, and other food mixtures that I could not identify. There were cheesecakes and fresh dairy products in another case, including buttermilk (my favorite), cream cheese, and cottage cheese. There were trays of fresh pastries, cookies, and breads piled high on shelves and tables, jars of pickles and crackers, and long aisles of boxes and canned goods. I can remember, too, being told not to touch, but I could look at everything, and I did. The writing on the products was often in Hebrew, and the packages were colorful. The shopkeeper would greet us warmly each time we visited and offer a slice of this or that. To me, it was a friendly, foreign world—a rich, authentic, ethnic experience for a young child—and it triggered a lifelong affection for Jewish foods and culture. In Joel Denker’s The World on a Plate: A Tour through the History of America’s Ethnic Cuisine (2003), his chapter on Jewish food in the United States begins by stating: The immigrant women “jabbered,” “jostled,” and “haggled,” a reporter observed, amid the pushcarts and market stalls of the Hester Street market on New York’s lower East Side in the late nineteenth century. In this crucible of early Jewish immigrant culture, vendors peddled hot knishes, bagels, hot arbes (chickpeas), and horseradish. The eastern European newcomers, 1.6 million of whom poured into America between 1881 and 1910, avidly pursued food as a source of spiritual sustenance and reassuring nourishment. . . . [T]o cater to their distinctive tastes and religions strictures, [by] 1899 [there were] 36 bakeries, 131 butcher shops, and 15 grape wine dealers [in the district’s Tenth Ward]. (Denker 2003, 65)

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Common threads wind their way through Jewish cuisine, sometimes strong and visible, sometimes practically invisible, and anything between. These are the ancient biblical dietary injunctions and the shared history and traditions of the people. In the United States, there are three general categories of Jewish practice: Orthodox, Conservative, and Reform. Though there are always exceptions, in general, Orthodox Jews carefully follow the ancient dietary directives; the Conservative Jews may follow some of the laws, but they interpret them liberally; and the Reform Jews follow few dietary restrictions. Alan Davidson, in The Oxford Companion to Food, suggests that “many of them follow at least those rules which are actually stated in the Torah” (Davidson 1999, 420). The Jewish people, hounded and persecuted since the time of Christ, came to the United States, like others, with the hope of religious freedom. Within the Jewish population, there are many countries of origin, but they share values beyond the food traditions; the Jews value good education, good business practices, the arts, and social service to the less fortunate. These are values central to closely knit Jewish families, and it is the very reason that there are so many Jewish doctors, lawyers, professors, teachers, actors, artists, musicians, and business owners among their group. Early in the nineteenth century, U.S. nutritionists were concerned about the Jewish diet prepared and fed to individuals at various Jewish “old age homes, orphanages, day nurseries, hospitals, camps, and other institutions” (Diner 2002, 214). Some Jews were strong proponents of vegetarianism, others were not. S. Etta Sadow, a member of Boston’s Federated Jewish Charities and one who believed the Jewish cuisine may have been problematic, presented the following information to members of the Massachusetts Dietetic Association in 1928: Polish and Russian Jews emphasize lokshen (noodles), gefillte fish, and kashe, a cereal made of barley or grits and generally eaten with meat instead of a vegetable. Borsht, a soup of beets or cabbage, is a favorite. Galicians and Lithuanians share in a great many of these characteristic foods and add carrots, potatoes and prunes—a sort of compote, cooked with meat, to the list. The taste for herring, pickles and cucumbers comes from Holland, while a fondness for oil as a frying medium comes from Spain and Portugal and the Orient. The sweet and sour stewing of vegetables and meat comes from Germany. (Diner 2002, 214)

Though subject to criticism, the varied diet of the Jewish Diaspora was rich and satisfying. It carried with it nostalgia and sweet memories of the homeland even if the nutritionists felt strongly that it was too rich in meats and dairy foods and short on fresh vegetables and fruit. Elizabeth Ehrlich wrote a memoir called Miriam’s Kitchen (1997), in which she honors and emulates the women in her family who were born before her. Ehrlich wrote fondly of her mother-in-law, Miriam, who was: . . . born in a small village in Jewish Poland, survived the Holocaust. A keeper of rituals and recipes, and of stories, she cooks to recreate a lost world, and to prove that

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unimaginable loss is not the end of everything. She is motivated by duty to ancestors and descendants, by memory and obligation and an impossible wish to make the world whole. (Ehrlich 1997, xii)

In this text, Ehrlich expresses her own religious stirrings and memories of the past while enjoying life in the present. Ehrlich stated: It is a many-colored history, and it is one small strand in an intricate old ever-changing tapestry of migrations, extremes, accommodations, observances, contradictions. . . . And at a distance, the grandmothers in their kitchens, [preserve] complicated rites in adopted cities, not only for the sake of the past. . . . The result is a collage, but also a way of life. That collage is my religion, and it is what I am passing on. (Ehrlich 1997, xiii)

Popular beliefs, again foodways, surround the famous chicken soup served in many Jewish homes. Chicken soup has become well known as a cure for what ails you in the United States and in everyday talk of folk cures. It has been linked with Jewish food traditions and attentive Jewish mothers. According to some researchers and scientists, the chicken broth contains a substance called cysteine (an amino acid) that may be able to thin mucus. If that is true, then it may help clear stuffy heads and chests, but too few studies have been conducted to provide proof. Chicken soup and chicken prepared with rice are traditional dishes not only in Jewish kitchens but also among groups around the world who have settled in the United States. Chicken with rice may be served curried by IndoIndian Americans, with sour cream and paprika by Eastern European Americans, with tomatoes and garlic by Italian and Spanish Americans, and with a salsa of choice by Mexican Americans.

MEXICAN AMERICAN EXAMPLES AND TEXTS Many Americans of all origins and nationalities enjoy pungent, steaming bowls of chili con carne. A mixture of beans spiced with various seasonings, chilies, tomatoes, garlic, pepper, and meat, chili is originally a Mexican food with obscure origins. Joel Denker wrote that the Mexican chili came to San Antonio’s Military Plaza during the last decade of the 1800s. He stated: At dusk, pots of chili were wheeled in wagons to the square. The gaily dressed ladies served up pungent chili con carne brewing in caldrons heated over mesquite or charcoal fires. Aromas of oregano and cumin wafted over the grounds. They also sold tortillas, tamales, coffee, and cinnamon-scented atole, a Mexican drink. The price for chili, a side of frijoles (beans), and a tortilla—a dime. (Denker 2003, 135)

Foods that many Americans north of the border classify as Mexican, like fajitas, burritos, nachos, taco salads, and commercial salsas, are really Mexican

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American dishes. There are Mexican fast-food restaurants in nearly every city in the United States, from Miami to Duluth, but the foods sold there, though good tasting and filling, are not the nuanced foods of traditional Mexican cooking. Genuine Mexican cuisine is often mildly seasoned and varies with the different regions of Mexico. Another whole dimension of foods perceived to be Chicano or Mexican are the Tex-Mex dishes. “Tex-Mex [is] a term which first became current in the late 1940s, [and] refers to certain Mexican dishes as they are made in Texas. . . . [They make] use of chili pepper, as in chili con carne. Standard items of this hybrid cuisine include corn breads, enchiladas, nachos, tacos, tamales, and tortillas” (Davidson 1999, 791). Classic and regional Mexican cuisines, and first-class Mexican kitchens in the United States, both private and public, turn out dishes like moles (a sauce for meat made of chilies, Mexican chocolate, cinnamon, a little sugar, and other seasoning), seviches (lime-marinated seafood), adobos (a meat sauce made from ancho chilies, garlic, oregano, cumin, cloves, vinegar, and salt and pepper), and barbacoas (meat slowly cooked in a pit). These are authentic foods and are not found in taco drive-ins. Recipes for salsa, guacamole, enchiladas, refried beans, and tacos appear in many Tex-Mex cookbooks, even Mexican cabrito (leg of lamb), but the tastes of regional and traditional Mexican south-of-the-border dishes Chicanos bring to the United States are not easy to find outside of their kitchens. In Laura Esquirel’s charming and romantic book Like Water for Chocolate (1992), Tita, the main character, is a gifted Mexican cook. Her dishes often carry a spiritual dimension. Longing for her true love, whom she had lost to a sister, Tita, who continued to prepare meals for the family, was frustrated and trying hard to please her lost love with her cooking. “Her finest recipes date from this period of suffering. Just as a poet plays with words, Tita juggled ingredients and quantities at will, obtaining phenomenal results” (Esquirel 1992, 69). Foods do evoke nostalgia and sometimes deep emotion. A food-centered novel such as Like Water for Chocolate weaves the folkways of behavior with emotional response. Folklore itself helps establish patterns of behavior in families and society, but sometimes foods evoke almost transcendent responses, as are described again and again in Esquirel’s novel. We use all five senses when we eat, and Alice Waters wrote: “for such sensations as the visual ravishment of the blush on a peach, the aural thrill of a crackling fire behind a turning spit, and the tactile shock in the mouth when the delicate crunch of a deep fried zucchini flower gives way to the creamy melting cheese inside. Only food blazes so many trails into our minds at the same time” (Waters 2000, xi). The Mexican culture, with its ancient history and deep sense of identity, has been misunderstood and largely mistreated in many ways over time by outsiders. After 300 years of Spanish rule, the United States bought land from Mexico that

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is now a part of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, and California. The price was $15 million in 1848, and the document was called the Treaty of Guadalupe Hildago. Because of taxes and misunderstandings about filing title claims, the Mexican people, many of whom owned huge ranches in that region, lost most of it. The Mexican ranchers helped train American cowboys after the Civil War, and it may be that chuck-wagon cooks were the first to introduce to the gringos the dish we today call chili. Another Mexican food-related celebration, the Day of the Dead, takes place in November. All Souls’ Day is on the first. Like family tamale making, this celebration is also rooted in the distant past, and though it occurs the day after Halloween, it is a happy day for traditional Mexicans. Though this celebration is uniquely Mexican, different forms of it are celebrated throughout the world because is it a Roman Catholic saint’s day. Because so many Chicanos have migrated to the United States, it is also celebrated in many communities here. Last year, for instance, the grocers and markets in the region where I live, not predominantly Mexican American, had cakes, candies, and cookies with skulls, a traditional food of El Día de los Muertos. This holiday honors the dead with joy and remembrance. The concept is that these loved ones have happily moved on to their next stage of life, and the days are often filled with cemetery cleaning, meals shared on the grave of the deceased, prayers, and remembrance. It is not unusual for favorite foods of the deceased to make up part of the meal, and that may include their favorite liquor as well. A Gift for Abuelita: Celebrating the Day of the Dead (1998), by Nancy Luenn, describes a granddaughter’s preparation for a visit to her recently deceased grandmother’s grave on the Day of the Dead. When she visits the grave, she closes her eyes and begins to feel a warmth, almost as if she is safely enclosed in her grandmother’s arms. She thinks she feels something like soft wings brushing her face almost like a tender kiss (Luenn 1998, 24). Celebrations of the Day of the Dead, usually associated with favorite foods, help hold the families close even after members have passed away. Typical foods served in many Mexican families are blue corn chips, tamales, rich moles served over various foods, sopaipillas (deep-fried dough drizzled with honey or sugar and cinnamon), chalupas (corn tortillas topped with refried beans, meat, lettuce, tomato, cheese, and guacamole), possibly candied pumpkin or pumpkin pastries, flans, custards, and other delicious foods. Different foods come from varied regions of the country, but these regional specialties are well worth searching for in fine Mexican restaurants. During the Christmas holidays, many Mexican families make tamales together; it is an important part of the holiday tradition. This happy occasion is anticipated all year by some family members, and the group may make as many as 200 to 300 tamales. The tamales are made of masa flour, various meats and seasonings, oil, and a corn husk for

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wrapping. The history of the tamale ingredients has roots in antiquity with the Mayans, Aztecs, and Incas. Corn was considered a holy substance. The Spanish introduced pork, beef, and chicken to the people hundreds of years ago. The tamales are served at midnight on Christmas Eve along with many other traditional foods.

SCANDINAVIAN AMERICAN EXAMPLES AND TEXTS Many of our northern states—Massachusetts, Minnesota, Michigan, Wisconsin, North and South Dakota, and Iowa—and farther west—particularly Washington State—were populated early by immigrants from northern Germany and the Scandinavian countries. These were ironworkers, miners, quarry workers, and farmers. The farmers headed to the upper Midwestern states, and they found the climate and growing seasons much to their liking because they were similar to what they had known in the Old Country. Good grazing for cattle made these regions natural places for dairy farming. The Scandinavians particularly enjoy rich creamed sauces, cheeses, berries, and venison, and these items were easily available to dairy farmers and those who lived near the deeply wooded areas of the northern states. Rich and flavorful rye bread, stout, barley-flavored beer, and salted herring are particular favorites of the Scandinavians, particularly the Finns, and are foods especially missed by those who enjoyed them in the Old Country. In Finnish folkloric tradition, the gods were natural phenomena and were considered living nature itself. The people respected nature, and nature (the gods) respected the people. There was Tapio, the god of the forest, and Ahti, the god of lakes and waterways. One of the oldest gods was named Väinämöinen, and he is the god of the sea. There were gods of the wind and even gods of the vapors, still enjoyed in the popular saunas of today both in the United States and in Finland. Another great god, Ilmarinen, was a blacksmith. As The Kalevala, a Finnish epic, unfolds, Ilmarinen laboriously forged a grinder called a Sampo, which was said to be a great source of grain, salt, gold, and silver. The Sampo was eventually fought over between good and evil characters, and in the conflagration it was smashed and lost at sea. When I was a child, my mother told a tale about the Sampo. She said that the Sampo still grinds beneath the sea, and that is the reason the sea is salty. The name of that tale is lost to my memory, but the tales of The Kalevala are cherished by many Finnish Americans. Among traditional Swedish and Norwegian American home cooks, the holiday food tradition of lutefisk remains a dependable presence. Madison, Wisconsin, claims to be the lutefisk capital of the United States, and though the popularity of this dish seemed to be waning (both in the Old Country and in the United States), vigorous public relations efforts and campaigns (including bumper stickers) restored its use (Riddervold 1990). Though most people buy it ready-made,

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it is usually cod first soaked in lye, which is followed by rinsing and then long boiling. The result is a glutinous mass served with melted butter and pepper. Typical side dishes are boiled potatoes and a flatbread like Wasa found now in most U.S. food markets. Swedish and Norwegian dishes such as poached salmon, pickled herring, creamed fish, Swedish meatballs, pancakes with lingonberry preserves, or even Norwegian rommegrout (a thick, rich, sour cream pudding served with melted butter, sugar, and cinnamon) might be found at a kalas or Swedish buffet in regions of the United States where these groups are dominant. Americans call many buffets smorgasbords (from the Swedish word smörgåsbord, in which smörgås means “butter” and bord means “table”), but an authentic kalas is a buffet with tables of both hot and cold fish, meats, cheese, various breads, and a bountiful array of desserts.

ITALIAN AMERICAN EXAMPLES AND TEXTS The Italians are another populous ethnic group in the United States that poured into Ellis Island in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Trapped under an oppressive class system in Italy with no foreseeable future other than poverty, Italians in the United States gained freedom to enter whatever business they wanted to. Perhaps even more important, they could eat all kinds of foods in the United States that in the Old Country were the private privilege of the rich. Italians are still immigrating to the United States, and according to census data from 1981 to 1998, 51,400 came to stay in the late twentieth century (Banks 2003, 236). Food is an important and integral part of the social system in Italian families, and there are ancient guest-host traditions. This is a culture that continues to welcome family, friends, and even strangers to their homes, restaurants, picnics, and even funerals. An ancient Roman myth expresses a precedent and example for the food generosity that is still practiced among Italians today. This representative story of the host-guest relationship is told in the poet Ovid’s Metamorphoses, a Roman work written about the time of Christ. The narrative also informs us a little about common foods that the poor may have eaten. The meal was generous and served innocently to strangers who came to the door of Philemon and Baucis, but the strangers turned out to be gods. The story begins with an elderly couple living in a thatched-roof hut who have loved each other since their youth and accept their poverty with grace and composure. The gods paid an unannounced visit, as the ancient story goes, and the old couple gave them their best. They provided comfortable seating, bathed the traveler’s tired feet, and served them berries, cherry pickles with endives, radishes, fresh cheese, and roasted eggs. They gave their best wine and water, nuts and

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fruits (figs, dates, plums, grapes, and sweet apples), and placed a heavily laden honeycomb in the middle of the table. This generous pair even tried to catch their only goose to serve to the visitors, but the goose escaped and would not be caught. In the end, the gods rewarded the couple with riches and granted their wish that they would die in the same hour when the time came (Ovid 2004, 291–92). For countless generations, the Italians have been dedicated gardeners, having learned to successfully grow fruits and vegetables in their homeland. It was logical that they should continue to do the same thing in the United States. Joel Denker, who wrote The World on a Plate: A Tour through the History of America’s Ethnic Cuisine (2003), stated, “Fig trees and grapevines grew in the backyards of many an Italian immigrant. Italians clung tenaciously to their eating habits, persisting even in the face of the suspicious attitude of locals” (Denker 2003, 5). Italians in the United States were prompt to enter the food marketing industry from coast to coast, and before long there were Italian enclaves in most of the large cities. In St. Louis, Missouri, there is an Italian settlement called the Hill. It is near the highest point in the city and was so nicknamed. Italians from northern Italy began to settle the area in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Neat, well-tended homes and shops line the streets of the Hill, and the population is still 75 percent Italian. In order to protect the ethnic flavor, homes are seldom listed on the open market. The Hill has changed little over the years. St. Ambrose Catholic Church still serves as the community center, and in this region of the city there are still many Italian food bakeries, trattorias (restaurants), and import markets that carry cheeses, seasonings, and myriad Italian food specialties. There are shops that offer fresh fish and favorite cuts of meat, and on today’s Hill there continues to be a serious consciousness to preserve a way of life too valuable to let go. This neighborhood is the original home of Yogi Berra, manager and catcher for the New York Yankees; Joe Garagiola, famous catcher for the St. Louis Cardinals; and Jack Buck, a well-known U.S. sports announcer. These three men grew up near one another on Elizabeth Avenue, and their proud Italian families, friends, admirers, and supporters will keep their memories alive as long as the Hill remains the Italian center for St. Louis. At Rigattzi’s restaurant on the Hill, there are signed photos and trophies from Berra and Garagiola and other local Italian heroes as well as signatures of famous visitors from the worlds of politics and show business. There is a spirit of Italian tradition in the restaurants there that is fun for the whole family—good food and excellent service. One more thing of particular foodways interest concerning the Italian Hill in St. Louis is a favorite local dish called toasted ravioli: St. Louisans may take Toasted Ravioli for granted, but it is actually a strictly St. Louis phenomenon. Out-of-towners have never head of Toasted Ravioli. There are several versions of the origin of the dish. Here’s one from local newspaper files.

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Mickey Garagiola, of Ruggeri’s on the Hill . . . , claims to have been present the night Toasted Ravioli was born. The event wasn’t at Ruggeri’s, but down the street at a longgone restaurant called Oldani’s, which was one of four Italian restaurants on the Hill in the late 1930s. Louie Oldani employed a German cook named Fritz who was, according to the story, “feeling a bit under the weather” and accidentally dropped a boiled ravioli into hot grease. When the dumpling came to the top, he dropped in a few more, then sent a plateful to the bar. The customers loved them and asked for another order. The Toasted Ravioli was born. (Ostmann 1984, 11)

MIDDLE EASTERN AMERICAN EXAMPLES AND TEXTS Some stories are meant to be didactic. That is, they teach a moral or principle that is not clearly spelled out. The reader or listener comes to a conclusion and a lesson is learned if he or she understands. The ancient cultures in the Middle East, educationally sophisticated for thousands of years, have many such stories that have been told over and over through the millennia. Further, the Middle East, like the United States, is made up of great mixtures of ethnic heritages and religions, particularly Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. This region has served as a crossroads between East and West, and stories that are found there came from many other parts of the world. One old tale is about a caldron. The narrative appears in many cultures and was probably carried from place to place by travelers or merchants, perhaps along the Silk Road, and it emerges in story collections from the Middle East, Turkey, Persia, Palestine, and China, possibly other places, too. The essence of the story is that one neighbor borrows a fine, valuable caldron from another. When he returns it, he tells the owner that the caldron has given birth to another smaller caldron, and the owner should keep the small one, too, because mothers and children should not be separated. The owner concludes that his neighbor is probably crazy and is happy to keep both pots. A little time passes, and the neighbor asks to borrow the caldron again. The owner loans it to him, thinking that maybe two pots will come back to him like the last time. This time, the neighbor never returns the caldron. Upon inquiry, the owner is told that the big pot had died and was buried. In some versions, the neighbor has sold the pot; other versions do not explain what happened to it. Upon pressing for an explanation, the neighbor suggests that if the lender could believe a pot could have a child, then it should not be too hard to believe that the pot could die! The purpose of the tale is to expose stinginess or selfishness on the part of the lender (Hanauer 1907, 66–67; Mardrus 1964, 296, 299; McCullagh 1914; “Uigher People, Vernacular Tale” 1957, 141–44). The story also reminds us of the importance of the caldron in these cultures as well as in the ongoing foodways of Middle Easterners in the United States. In one U.S. cookbook I checked for Middle Eastern cookery, The Frugal Gourmet

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on Our Immigrant Ancestors, the first thing listed in the first recipe was a six-quart kettle (Smith 1990, 474)! Another excellent cookbook and discussion of Middle Eastern foods, The New Book of Middle Eastern Food (2001), was written by Claudia Rodin, and it includes a treasure trove of folklore and foodways along with hundreds of delicious tips and recipes. In a passage about soup, often called shorba, Rodin stated: Soup is eaten for breakfast, lunch, or supper and also represents a meal in itself, accompanied by bread. Venders sell soups from great caldrons in the street in the very early hours on winter mornings to catch those who want to fill themselves up before getting to work. Some play a part in the rituals of religious festivals, and are known as festive or wedding soups, and there are famous Ramadan specials prepared during the Muslim fasting month. (Rodin 2001, 142)

From lemon and egg varieties to heavy meat soups, almost like stew, Middle Easterners from Lebanon to Egypt enjoy good soup. Rodin writes in her text, “With the exception of sweets, every kind of food was cooked in broth. Besides the meat used for consumption, meat for broth was provided in every palace and konak (a large and luxurious mansion). . . . No one would have dreamt of cooking with plain water” (Rodin 2001, 159). Foods like yogurt, pita bread, and hummus have become everyday staples for many Americans, but there was time, not really very long ago, when most Americans did not use these foods. Joel Denker, in his chapter in The World on a Plate (2003) called “From the Fertile Crescent: Yogurt Peddlers and Falafel Kings,” describes the efforts of an Armenian couple and their sons in the 1950s, Rose, Sarkis, Bob, and John Colombosian, who hoped to expand their yogurt market beyond the Middle Eastern community where they had been selling the product to customers long fond of this product. The word yogurt, Denker explains, came from the Turkish word meaning “to thicken.” In the Old Country, nomadic herdsmen found that fermented milk was much more easily transported and lasted longer than fresh milk. The Colombosians were dairy farmers in Massachusetts, and when they realized they were producing more milk then they could use or sell, they decided to make yogurt for the Syrians, Lebanese, Greeks, and Armenians who were on their dairy route. Slowly, their product began to be marketed by ethnic food shops, and a breakthrough came when yogurt became known nationally as a health food. Soon, health food shops picked up the product as well as other yogurt derivatives. In a short time, Colombo Yogurt (the name shortened to make it easier to pronounce) was found in supermarkets. After their father’s death, Bob and John took over the business, and catering to U.S. tastes for sweet foods, they added fruit preserves to the bottom of their individual cartons and a little sweetener to the top. In 1993, General Mills acquired their firm. As you can imagine,

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“Bob Colombosian marvels at the changes in yogurt he has seen” (Denker 2003, 36–37). One of my American friends, Mike Hatch, presently of Logan, Utah, told me about his first encounter with yogurt. It was 1957, and his brother had just returned to Idaho (their home state) from a 30-month mission in Holland (the Netherlands). Mike’s brother said that he had learned to love a wonderful dairy product called yogurt while he was in Europe, and he wanted to share his discovery with Mike. The two brothers searched the southern Idaho region where they lived and finally found it in a small food shop. Mike said that he hated his first taste, finding it sharp and bitter. His brother was pleased to have found it, liked it just the way it was sold, and admitted that it was an acquired taste (interview, July 4, 2007). The other food Denker discusses in this chapter is falafel, or ta’amia. Rodin mentions it also and suggests that “The Christian Copts [in Egypt], who are said to be pure descendants of the Ancient Egyptians, claim this dish as their own” (Rodin 2001, 61). During Lent, when meat dishes are forbidden, the Coptic families make falafel as a substitute. In Egypt, it is a patty or roll made from spiced fava beans and deep-fried in oil, but there are variations among different ethnic groups. Denker describes the process used by George Rababy, a Lebanese owner of an eatery in Washington, DC’s Georgetown neighborhood, who uses both fava beans and chickpeas. Rababy calls himself the “king of falafel” and described his process: A stickler for tradition, George makes his falafel from scratch. He is contemptuous of the powdered mixtures other restaurants use. The main ingredients, two-thirds fava beans and one-third chickpeas, soak in water for two days. George grinds the beans into a paste and seasons them with cumin, red pepper, and garlic. True falafel, he points out, has a bite. “If it’s not hot, don’t eat it.” (Denker 2003, 41)

One more foodways story from Rodin will close this section. In the Middle East, there has been an ancient belief in jinnis (or djinns), supernatural beings in Muslim folklore that can take human or animal form and influence human affairs. Her story is about vegetable jinnis: There was in the past—and in some places there still is today—a belief in the existence of numerous spirits or djinns who inhabit both things and people. Folktales give a fascinating picture of foods inhabited by djinns—vegetable djinns, rice djinns, meat djinns, chickpea djinns. These spirits are seasoned and spiced, and given piquant, naughty, or gentle personalities. (Rodin 2001, 307)

Vegetables are a food staple in the Middle East. Many poor people could not afford meat, so vegetables became symbolic of dignified survival. Christians in many of these countries observed Lenten and saint’s day fasts, and even if they

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could afford meat, it was forbidden by their religious beliefs during times of fasting. The tradition of serving fresh vegetables, including chunks of sweet onion, tomato, and cucumber, as an appetizer with hummus before the entrée is popular in various Middle Eastern restaurants in the United States.

SOUTH ASIAN INDIAN AMERICAN EXAMPLES AND TEXTS Between 1981 and 1998, 573,000 South Asian Indians immigrated to the United States (Banks 2003, 409). Less than a quarter of that number of South Asian Indians had come to the United States between 1820 and 1970. Most of the earlier immigrants had made their homes in the northeastern states and California; some settled in the central states. These early immigrants worked as professionals, adventurers, merchants, and monks (Jensen 1980, qtd. in Banks 2003, 410). Because of the current lack of professional job opportunities in India and the need for highly skilled workers in the United States, the current Indian immigrants have included large numbers of engineers, scientists, physicians, dentists, and other highly educated, English-speaking men and women. Predominately following various sects of Hinduism, the South Asian Indians brought with them their complex religious ceremonies, beautiful and colorful Indian silks, leather and intricate woodwork, jewelry, and their savory foods. Ornate Hindu temples have been built in many parts of the United States, and though they are centers of Hindu worship, they are also places of frequent festival celebrations open to the public. There, all can enjoy South Asian dancing and drama and delicious vegetarian foods. The festivals celebrate various gods, days of symbolic significance, and are feasts for the eyes as well as the palate. The more than 3,000 members of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness eat a strict vegetarian diet, though that is not true of all people whose roots are in India. It is also interesting to note that there are many types of vegetarian traditions within Indian cuisine. There are 17 states in India, and the foods in the different regions vary greatly. The northeastern border of India is shared with China, and the cuisines of the two countries have influenced each other; however, distinctions of origin are sometimes noted by marking some of the cuisine imported into India with Chinese roots with the prefix chini. It is very cold in the north of India, which is located partly in the frigid Himalayas, whereas the southern part is tropical, with wild fruit and coconut palms. There are many regions and climates in between, which account for the huge variety of foods. Further, the caste system, outlawed but still rooted in much of the culture, complicates the use of food because of strict guidelines and rules attached to preparation, serving, and partaking of foods. Regardless, Asian Indians enjoy their food, and there are thousands of narratives that give examples and evidence for the Indians’ sacred appreciation of good nourishment.

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Indian Temple. One of the many Indian temples situated in the region of Goa. iStockPhoto. com/Michael Price

The Rig-Veda, a collection of 1,028 hymns composed by different authors at different times and compiled around 1400 b.c.e., yields a lot of information about their foodways. The Rig-Veda, Book I, contains a hymn in praise of food that reminds the people that food gives health and that food is a dear, guileless friend. There are reminders in Hymn 117 to share food liberally with the needy, how uncertain life may be, and that compassion, order, and truth negate chaos. Some consider it the earliest source of truth, and it describes a world in which the forces of nature are both benevolent and threatening. There are many other literary works that have influenced the beliefs and practices of the Hindu people, including the Mahabharata, composed between 200 b.c.e. and 200 c.e. and generally thought to be the world’s longest epic. Its episodes have been told to villagers by Indian storytellers for generations. Another well-loved book is the Panchatantra, a collection of instructive fables featuring animals as the characters. It was written between 200 b.c.e. and 500 c.e. Because of the uncertainty of life, the quest for wisdom and knowledge are pursued by varying philosophies and Hindu sects throughout India, as well as Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, and other belief systems. There are general commonalities in the Indo-Indian food practices that have been brought to the United

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States. Grains make up a large portion of the diet, including rice, wheat, barley, and others, which are served with lentils or various legumes (peas and beans) accompanied by vegetables. Multiple spices and milk products are important, and the use of a flat bread called naan, which is often folded around various foods, is common. Naan is traditionally prepared by shaping dough into a pancake. Then it is slapped onto the inside wall of a very hot oven until it puffs. It is removed with a hooked, metal cooking tool and served hot. I watched this process in an Indian bakery once, and it was a foodways art. The baker was slender and graceful, and watching the process was almost like watching a ballet. Food is generally served with a main platter of rice or bread surrounded by various containers of side dishes. Though Muslims do not eat pork, and there are various other taboos in the Indian belief systems, many people do eat a variety of meat and fish. Though fruit and nuts are common, sweet desserts are less common and often reserved for festival meals. When they are served, it is at the end of the meal. The sweets are often milk-based and prepared with liberal amounts of sugar. I was served a vegetarian meal after a Jain religious service in Toledo, Ohio, and the meal began with a cold almond soup. It was followed with grains and a variety of vegetables. The only eating utensil was a spoon for the soup, so the rest of the meal was eaten with the help of the naan and fingers. It was delicious, and though I could not identify all of the flavors, it was beautiful and savory, and the dishes ranged from very spicy to very mild. Shahnaz Mehta and Joan Bravo Korenblit, authors of Good Cooking from India (1981), described a basic philosophy of the Indians that reflects the ethos of many of their individualized sects: One . . . bond is the attitude all Indians have toward food. Our sages stated simply: Annam Brahma, “Food is God.” This philosophy gives rise to a deep regard for hospitality, a word known in its truest sense by all Indians. We consider it a privilege and sacred duty to give shelter to any guest, to give alms, and to offer food to household deities. (Mehta and Korenblit 1981, 1)

CHINESE AMERICAN EXAMPLES AND TEXTS Regional climatic variations influenced Chinese cuisine, and in general wheatbased foods are found in the north and rice and rice products are common accompaniments in the south. The dishes are lighter in the south, and in the southwestern part of China (Szechuan), dishes are sometimes so highly spiced and hot (the ingredient is a red-hot chili pepper oil) that the uninitiated may not be able to eat them. In Culture and Cuisine: A Journey through the History of Food, Jean-François Revel reminded his readers, “The basic unit in gastronomy is the region, not the nation” (Revel 1982, 215), and China’s culinary regions are no exception to that truth. There are four schools of Chinese cuisine (Lu, Chuan,

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Yang, and Yue) and eight great traditions (Anhui, Guangdong or Canton, Fujian, Hunan, Jiangsu, Shandong, Szechuan, and Zhejiang), each with its own lore, traditions, and regional idiosyncrasies. Sensory aesthetics and folkloric traditions in China, such as combining three to five colors in a dish, providing compatible aromas, and contrasting textures, are expected elements throughout all authentic traditions of Chinese cuisine. Light green, dark green, yellow, red, white, and black are used in various combinations to present visually appealing dishes; creamy and crisp foods are served at the same meal for contrast; and seasonings and sauces, ranging from scallions, ginger root, and garlic to cinnamon, pepper, and sesame oil, are used in countless combinations. Soy sauce, vinegars, and sugar add richness to dishes without overwhelming the basic flavors of the ingredients. Five flavors (sweet, sour, bitter, piquant, and salty) used in prescribed proportions in meat and vegetable dishes are thought to have medicinal power, and the rules and customs are often strict and inflexible. These well-understood folkloric guidelines are followed throughout the Chinese culinary world and in many homes and restaurants outside of China: For example, meals must be taken while seated; there is a set order of who may be seated first among men, women, old and young; and the main courses must be arranged on a per table basis, with each table usually seating ten to twelve persons. A typical banquet consists of four appetizer dishes, such as cold cut platters of hot hors d’oeuvres; six to eight main courses; then one savory snack-type fish and a dessert. The methods of preparation include stir-frying, stewing, steaming, deep-frying, pan-frying, and so forth. A dish may be savory, sweet, tart, or plain. . . . Food garnishes, such as cut or sculptured tomatoes, Chinese white radishes, cucumbers, and so forth, may be used to add to the visual appeal of a dish. All of these elements contribute to making Chinese food a true feast for the eyes and nostrils as well as the taste buds. (“Chinese Cooking” 2007)

Tradition at a Chinese multicourse meal, unlike the way it is served in the United States, calls for saving the rice or even congee (a light rice porridge) until the end of the meal. In the United States, Chinese cooks have adapted their customs to suit U.S. tastes, and the most common way of serving a Chinese restaurant meal is with many dishes nearly always accompanied by white or fried rice and tea, often at a round table with a revolving tray (or lazy Susan) in the center. Many of the first Chinese immigrants to the United States, or “Golden Mountain,” as it was called, came from the southeastern part of the country, the Toishan district in Guangdong (or Kwangtung or Canton), in the mid-1800s. Hearing of the gold discoveries in California, many young men abandoned the doctrines of Confucius, which regarded family as the highest of importance, and turned toward the United States. The voyage was very difficult, and the families

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were left behind. Cantonese-style foods were the earliest found in the Chinatowns that began to form and were the primary Chinese-style food available in the United States throughout nearly two-thirds of the twentieth century. In the 1970s and 1980, with the influx of large numbers of Chinese to the United States from Hong Kong and Taiwan, additional styles of Chinese foods arrived: Shanghai, Hunan, and Szechuan. Take-out food became more and more popular, and though there are innumerable Chinese restaurants in the United States at the present time, it is still impossible to gain a true perspective of the rich and multiple Chinese cooking styles.

Confucius (551–479? b.c.e.), a famous Chinese philosopher, teacher, and epicure. Photos.com

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Many Americans have learned to imitate the Asian style of eating using chopsticks. Practice leads to mastery, but for many the chopstick skill is not easily learned. The problem is usually that the chopsticks are held too tightly, and that quickly causes muscle tension. Practice speeds up the skill, and in a short while their use becomes almost automatic. Chopsticks are nicknamed “quick little boy” in China, and it is true that they are an efficient and quick way to pick up small morsels of food once the utensils are mastered. As with many things in mainland China, there are ancient roots to the use of chopsticks. Under the tenets of Confucianism, the knife and fork are considered to bear violence, whereas chopsticks reflect the main teachings of Confucius: gentleness and benevolence. Types of chopsticks: Most chopsticks are 10 to 12 inches long, and about the thickness of a pencil. (Those for children can be as short as 5 inches; those for the host and hostess—to pass special delicacies to their guests—as long as 20 inches.) The top half is square (to be held in the hand); the bottom half round (to pick up the food). Chopsticks are made of various materials: bamboo, wood, plastic, coral, jade, silver or ivory. Those made of ivory are to the Chinese what sterling silver flatware is to Westerners. (Expensive chopsticks are often linked together at the top by a silver chain to keep them from being separated or lost.) (Miller 1984, 802, 803)

There are curious superstitions attached to chopsticks. If your chopsticks happen to be different lengths, that may mean that you are going to miss a boat, plane, or train. Dropping chopsticks indicates bad luck, and you are never to tap your bowl with chopsticks, because that is an insult to the chef or to your host or hostess. It is bad luck to turn your fish over and debone it yourself. This is usually done by the host or the waiter because, if the taboo is broken, it may send a bad omen to a fishing boat and make it capsize! Traditionally, a deceased person’s personal chopsticks are placed upright in a bowl of rice as a token of honor at a small shrine in the family home or at the funeral parlor. Therefore, it is considered extremely impolite to a host or to elderly people who may be present at the table to stick your own chopsticks upright in a bowl of rice. One of the popular parts of a Chinese American meal in the United States is the fortune cookie. Cookies for each diner are often presented with the check, but extra cookies are easily ordered. There is no such tradition in Chinese foodways practices, and it was not until 1993 that they were even available there. The Wonton Food Company, based in New York, began selling the fortune cookies in China and, ironically, named them Genuine American Fortune Cookies (“Fortune Cookies” 2007). There are several versions of how the fortune cookie came to be invented. The earliest version suggests that mooncakes, a pastry with a message, may have been a precursor to today’s fortune cookies. In the fourteenth century, China

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was under siege by the Mongols, and some of the Chinese patriots came up with the idea of gaining permission from the Mongol leaders to honor their longevity by giving small gifts to family and friends. The permission was granted, and the gifts were small, round mooncakes with a message enclosed. A mooncake is a ball-shape pastry, sometimes rolled in nuts or fruit, with a filling of lotus seed paste. The trick of the patriots was that the enclosed message said “Revolt on the fifteenth of the eighth moon.” The subsequent successful uprising begat the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644 c.e.), the last dynasty ruled by the ethnic Hans. It is still a Chinese custom to send birth announcements rolled in small cakes. The origins of the American Chinese fortune cookie are various. David Jung and Makoto Hagiwara each claim to be the original inventor. Jung, a Chinese immigrant who founded the Hong Kong Noodle Company, claims to have invented the fortune cookie in 1918. Makoto Hagiwara, actually a Japanese immigrant, adapted a Japanese treat called Tsujiura sembei into a message-carrying cookie. Hagiwara was a landscape designer and created the Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park. He claimed to have sweetened the recipe for U.S. tastes and enclosed thank-you notes in the confection. He served them to his guests with tea in 1907 or 1914 (Kissell 2004, 1). So, no one knows for sure how they came into being as we know them today, but most Americans seem to enjoy them, and they are available at supermarkets throughout the country. A traditional story attached to the mooncakes, and still told in China, concerns the Chinese goddess Chang’e Mooncakes are made with egg yolks, and the number of egg yolks used is symbolic of the meaning the cake carries. One yolk represents loneliness, and it is said that Chang’e, in order to escape an oppressive husband, escaped to the moon and lives there in everlasting loneliness. The Golden Gate Fortune Cookie Factory, in San Francisco, produces thousands of fortune cookies of all shapes and sizes. Located in Ross Alley in San Francisco’s Chinatown, the bakery’s aroma fills the area. The presses are set up so that customers can watch the thin, round cookies being pulled off the mold. Then a paper fortune is quickly put in place, and the soft, piping-hot dough is shaped over a rod into the familiar shape we all know. These cookies have become a part of Chinese American foodways, but, remarkably, they were only recently introduced to China! Tea drinking in Asia has obscure origins. Some have theorized that it emerged from China’s western provinces of Szechuan and Yunnan, but no one knows for certain. One of the legends states that the god of agriculture personally tasted hundreds of herbs and was poisoned; fortunately he discovered the tea shrub, and the tea leaves neutralized the poison. Perhaps at some point, people simply realized that boiled water was healthier for them than unheated water and that adding leaves to the hot water made it more appealing visually and in flavor.

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In today’s Chinese American restaurants, green tea is served more often than other teas, but upon request, the restaurants usually offer a variety. Tea can be included in take-out packages if requested, and along with appetizers like ribs or egg rolls, egg-drop or hot-and-sour soup, a variety of main dishes served with rice (chow mein, chop suey, lo mein, egg foo yong, mu shu, and sweet-and-sour pork), vegetables, and possibly tofu. Patrons can call in, wait a short time, and then pick up the food to be eaten at home (or wherever). The restaurant will even supply chopsticks if requested. In contrast to this very casual meal, the ancient tea ceremonies of China, Japan, Korea, and other Asian countries continue, and they, too, have been artfully reproduced in some museums, schools, and restaurants in the United States.

JAPANESE AMERICAN EXAMPLES AND TEXTS As travel in Asia became more prevalent, the ancient customs and folkways of China have been interpreted in different ways by different people. The Ch’a su, the Chinese art of tea, was developed during the Tang (618–907 c.e.) and Sung (960–1279 c.e.) Dynasties, and it gained great social prominence. Buddhist monks traveled throughout Asia, and tradition credits the monk Eichu with carrying the tradition of drinking tea to Japan. From these simple beginnings, the Japanese began to cultivate tea locally, and out of that grew the complex Japanese tea ceremony. Kakuzo Okakura, past curator of East Asian art at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, wrote a graceful little book called The Book of Tea (1993). Mastery of the complex ceremony may take a lifetime, but Okakura verbally painted a picture of the process, and the following passage describes the appropriate behavior of the guests upon arrival: [T]he guests one by one will enter noiselessly and take their seats, first making obeisance to the picture or flower arrangement on the tokonoma [alcove for scrolls, flowers, or other artful objects]. The host will not enter the room until all the guests have seated themselves and quiet reigns with nothing to break the silence save the note of the boiling water in the iron kettle. The kettle sings well, for pieces of iron are so arranged in the bottom as to produce a peculiar melody in which one may hear the echoes of a cataract muffled by clouds, of a distant sea breaking among the rocks, a rainstorm sweeping through a bamboo forest, or of the soughing of pines on some faraway hill. (Okakura 1993, 65)

The simple architecture of the tea house is complemented by the types of tea, a carefully designed flower arrangement, a scroll of fine art, incense, and fine ceramics. Some of the bowls used may be hundreds of years old, and thus they are handled with great care. Fine cloths, a ladle, certain wooden shelves, tea bowls, tea caddies, tea scoops, and bamboo whisks, all immaculate and handled

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reverently, make up the basic equipment. The host or hostess wears a kimono, and the tea ceremony may be performed indoors or out. A few places in the United States have Japanese societies that teach and practice the tea ceremony. From Philadelphia (at the Urasenke/La Salle tea group, a branch of the Kyoto-based Urasenke tea school located at La Salle University in Philadelphia) to the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, Americans can watch and learn about the Japanese way of tea. The tearoom at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco was designed and constructed in Kyoto under the supervision of architect Osamu Sato and then taken apart and shipped to the San Francisco location and reconstructed under his masterful supervision. In the last few years, most urban Americans have become accustomed to the presence of Japanese sushi at fast-food stops, the supermarket deli, and gourmet restaurants. Basically, it is a rice roll, flavored with rice vinegar, and rolled in a seaweed sheet (nori). The California Rice Commission (CRC) reported, “Much to our surprise, the story led us to Los Angeles in the early 1960s. A handful of inventive chefs and entrepreneurial business people opened the first Edomae-style sushi bars in Little Tokyo. Four decades later, sushi has almost become the definition of ‘California food’” (Quinones-Murphy 2005, 1). The first sushi bar, Kawafuku Restaurant, is gone now. The next to open in Little Tokyo were three restaurants that have been continuously owned and operated since the 1960s. Founded and owned by the Morishita family, they are Egiku (now Club Havana), Sushi Go 55, and Izakaya Haru Ulala. The next restaurant to open was Tokyo Kaikay, and the California Rice Commission reports that the first so-called California roll (unimaki) was invented here. Unfortunately, the restaurant is gone and its history is lost (Horan 2005, 2). Sushi prepared with a small slice of raw fish and rolled in vinegar-flavored rice originated in Japan several centuries ago as a method of preserving fresh fish. By fermenting the fish in boiled rice, bacteria were eliminated. In his book The Dynamics of Folklore (1996), Barre Toelken describes how sushi is made: Sushi uses gohan (short grained rice) as its primary ingredient, but it stands in Japanese American folk tradition as a separate category because of the distinctive way in which rice is mixed with other items. One of the most popular forms of sushi is norimaki. Nori is a kind of paper made from dried sea algae; vinegar-soaked rice is laid out across the sheet in a small mound, other colored ingredients are added (usually in uneven numbers), and the whole item is rolled into a cylinder about one and one-half or two inches in diameter [using a small bamboo sushi mat for the rolling process]. The roll is cut into cross sections about one inch thick, which are then stacked on a plate. Looking at the cross section of norimaki, one sees first the dark green “seaweed” sheet on the outside, then a white circular rice filling in the middle of which are usually three or five colored ingredients. Another kind of sushi features a small, hand-sized pocket of fried bean curd (age) into which the rice has been packed. (Toelken 1996, 81)

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Americans often like to explore a broad range of customs, cultures, and foods, and Lucy Long called this “culinary tourism” (Long 2004). One more item that bears a brief mention here is Japanese Kobe beef. The Wagyu cattle in Japan are fed organic grains, Japanese beer, and even sake, a Japanese rice wine. Some farmers claim to brush the animals with sake to enhance their tenderness and flavor, though that may be more lore than fact. The animals are treated with great care and respect. A fine Kobe roast, two pounds or so, may cost nearly $300.00, and it can be ordered through the mail in the United States. It is the epitome of luxury, and though you may see the Kobe name in a U.S. market, its authenticity is doubtful. Sometimes, in a fine Japanese American restaurant, Kobe may appear on the menu.

GENERIC U.S. FOODWAYS AND TEXTS In the United States, gatherings to share food, from potluck church suppers to crab fests on the beach, are events with a long history. From the mythic descriptions of the first Thanksgiving to last week’s fund-raiser at a Roman Catholic or Lutheran church for their school, church suppers are a place for people to gather, sometimes to donate funds and foods, but always to simply enjoy the camaraderie of friends and family. In Rupert, Idaho, the Catholic church holds an annual Basque American dinner with traditional foods, dance, and an auction. Members of the church donate lambs and willingly labor long hours the day of the dinner. They carefully roast the savory, garlic-studded lamb and potatoes. They slice the bread and decorate the hall. Donations to be auctioned, from lambs (represented by photos) to Pendleton blankets to berets to bota bags (leather wine carriers) to sheepherders’ bread (large round, golden loaves baked in cast-iron pots) and other handmade craft items, are carefully displayed on a long table. Women of the congregation donate salads and desserts, and the same volunteers serve the hundreds of plates to family, friends, and guests who attend in order to help support the school. These foodways include all of the elements of folklore. Oral transmission of stories, jokes, songs, and personal experiences are shared. Material elements are represented by the traditional foods themselves as well as the other material artifacts representing cultural folkways displayed on the table and ready to be auctioned. The dinner itself is a customary food event, and dancing the lively Basque jota, singing, and sharing the familiar surroundings are a yearly event the community looks forward to. The shared belief of most of the people there, basically a belief in the support of one another and one another’s children and in shared hospitality, helps bind the group in an important celebration of both folkways and foodways. Similar church suppers occur throughout the United States, and they continue to be an important part of ongoing community interaction, lore, and bonding.

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FUNERAL BANQUETS The collective meal after a funeral or memorial service is another shared U.S. tradition. The roots of the funeral banquet, though it may not be appropriate to always call it a banquet, are ancient and have occurred in cultures all over the world. It is a time for family, friends, and other associates to gather to share memories of the deceased and to sometimes create new or renew associations with one another. These banquets are often held in a church hall, but they are also commonly held in restaurants. In a recent book I wrote, Funeral Festivals in America: Rituals for the Living (2006), I included a passage about local customs in Utah, the state where I live. Utah is well-known for its so-called Mormon culture (the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints), but the state is surprisingly diverse with cultural groups from all over the world. Even so, Mormons, or LDS as they are commonly called, have their own cultural traditions: For instance, in the Utah County region, south of Salt Lake City in northern Utah, the tradition of serving a potato-cheese casserole at post-funeral dinners has become a symbol and folkloric practice in the last decade or so. Nicknamed “funeral potatoes,” the dish has become an expectation at the funeral meals in this region. That is not to say that it doesn’t appear in other parts of the country. I have seen a recipe book from a woman’s Methodist Church group in Michigan that has a similar scalloped potato recipe likewise named “cheesy funeral potatoes.” The dish is so well known in Utah that the 2002 Olympic souvenirs included a cloisonné charm with funeral potatoes pictured on it. (There was another enameled souvenir charm that featured a likeness of Utah’s popular green Jell-O.) Several articles have been written about the potatoes in local newspapers and magazines, and many Utah cooks have a variety of different recipes for this expected, traditional dish. Because they are a filling and mild food, at least one large LDS (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) family has begun a tradition of including the cheesy potato recipe at all family baptisms. (Children in the LDS faith are usually baptized by immersion when they are eight.) Accordingly, this family has renamed the potatoes “baptism potatoes” (Young, personal interview, January 24, 2003). The dish has become a tradition for the living, and many people just smile when funeral potatoes are mentioned. (Thursby 2006, 81)

The after-service dinner ranges in style and content from culture to culture, but it is nearly always a representation of cultural values and tradition. Many Native American groups do not have a large funeral banquet after the funeral or memorial service. If a meal is held, it is subdued, and the most common food, at least among intermountain Native American groups, is fry bread, a simple wheat bread shaped like a pancake and folded to enclose some filling. This is not to say that all Native American groups are as minimal in their postfuneral practices. Some use local mortuary services and follow the service with a meal in a church, home, or restaurant.

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Quiet, traditional Jewish and Islamic mourning continues for several days after the burial. In today’s world, the length of time varies, but it may be as long as a week or, particularly for Muslims, three days. For Muslims, foods such as fruit platters, fine bakery items, and simple meals that require only heating are provided for the healthful sustenance for the days of mourning. For grieving Jews, the custom called shivah is traditionally observed for seven days after the death, and round foods such as eggs and breads representing the wheel of life and ever-revolving change are provided by friends. Simple dishes of nourishing foods, easy to prepare and serve, are generously provided. From the lively American Irish, Italian, Mexican, and African postfuneral meals to the large family gatherings of many other American groups—Greek Orthodox, Episcopal, Presbyterian, Methodist, Southern Baptist, Lutheran, and Mormon—the family feasts are times of both sorrow and joy. Restaurants, church banquets, or even home buffets may include ham, breads, and potato salads for the Irish; lasagna and stuffed pastas, veal, and fish with many sides of salads and vegetables for the Italians; south-of-the-border foods from complex mole sauces to chili-flavored foods wrapped in corn tortillas and vanilla custard for Mexican Americans; covered dishes, salads, pies, and cakes for many Protestant groups, and varied regional foods for Mormons; and the foods served are usually familiar and comforting. Mourning for absent loved ones is a time for respect and renewal with the living, and the grieving is softened by loving family, friends, and sustaining, well-loved foods.

FISH FRIES AT THE VFW AND OTHER FRATERNAL ORGANIZATIONS Another community practice throughout the United States is the Friday night fish fry. These are usually fund-raisers, though sometimes enterprising entrepreneurs “operate small family-run weekend fish stands that do a landslide business, especially during warm weather, where you can eat on picnic tables in outdoor beer gardens attached to the stands. Carry outs are popular” (Ostmann and Baker 1984, 46). The food is served on paper plates, and drinks are usually beer and soft drinks. The standard fare includes the deep-fried fish served on bread (rye or white) with a paper cup of tartar sauce on the side. Coleslaw and French fries are usually served, and sometimes corn on the cob dripping with butter. I grew up in eastern Missouri, and it was common during the summer months for my parents to take me to dinner outdoors now and then at the local fish fries. There were many available, and I can still see the men in their white aprons and paper caps, faces red and glistening over the steaming pits where the fish was cooking. It was common to have catfish and hush puppies (deep-fried cornbread balls) in those days, along with coleslaw. The hush puppies have a little lore

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attached to them. The 75th anniversary edition of Joy of Cooking (Rombauer, Becker, and Becker 2006, 633), it states: “Fishermen used to cook these fingershaped concoctions on the riverbank, along with their catch. Rumor has it that they threw a large number to their clamorous dogs with the admonition, ‘Hush, puppies!’”

GAME FESTS There are various kinds of sport hunting and fishing in the United States, ranging from big-game hunting, such as moose, elk, deer, and bear, to various bird hunting, including, seasonally, duck, goose, turkey, quail, grouse, and many others. Fishermen cast for trout, walleye, bass, bluegill, salmon, and too many others to name. Some hunters enjoy gathering eggs and even wild berries and mushrooms. Though many families camp together and cook the game the hunters find, their menu is often supplemented with salads, desserts, breads, and other domestic foodstuffs from the local market. Family game fests are as much or more about being together and reaffirming family ties as they are about a successful hunt. One of the women I talked to said that her family takes horses to the annual hunting and game fest they have in Scofield, Utah, but she reported that some years the hunters ride horses with the kids and do not go hunting at all. Game fests held in Utah and Idaho can be community affairs with guests as well. In Bancroft, Idaho, there is a traditional game fest each autumn. Some of the hunters may be from the East, Midwest, or West Coast; these are men (and sometimes women) who have hired guides to assist them to meet their game quota. A typical game fest menu may include roasts and other pieces from a variety of animals, ranging from bear to elk, deer, moose, and rabbit. Salads, breads, and desserts are furnished by the wives and other women. The meat is cooked underground in Dutch ovens for many hours, and when it is served it is hot, tender, and largely unidentified unless the pots have been carefully and indelibly marked. I attended a game fest in Bancroft where, when removing the Dutch ovens from the deep, smoking pit, one of the cooks remarked (for my benefit) that there were thirteen pots to remove instead of the twelve they had placed in the hot coals hours before. Someone else said simply not to say anything about it, because no one would know the difference. Fortunately, they were joking. They had been nursing beers all day as they watched the pit smolder, and they were in high spirits! The last time I attended a game fest in Idaho (in 2000), the cooks had added a deep-fried turkey to the collection of meats. This has become more common in the last decade, and though the turkey prepared in Bancroft is domesticated, there are many states where the deep-fried turkey served would have been in the

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wild just days before. Because a sense of humor is essential at these gatherings, funny things really do happen now and then. One year, two engineers from a local chemical company were invited to the game fest and told it was okay if they did not have any game to donate to the feast. Rather than arrive empty-handed, the two of them walked in carrying plastic flamingos under their arms. It would be hard to say where they found them, but it was one of the fun moments of a traditional evening.

CAJUN COOKING: CRAYFISH, OR PAUL PRUDHOMME’S CAJUN POPCORN Approximately 1,500 Acadian settlers arrived in Louisiana through New Orleans between 1765 and 1767, and another 1,600 or so arrived around 1784. The Cajuns, their name a corruption of Acadian, are people who were descended from the original Acadian settlers who were expelled from Nova Scotia in 1755 by the British. Originally from Brittany, they settled in Nova Scotia in the early 1600s. France ceded Nova Scotia to the British in 1718, and after years of political tension and instability the Acadians were expelled from the region. Some went to Catholic Maryland in the United States, some migrated to the French West Indies, and some returned to France. The majority went to Louisiana, and over time their culture intermingled with those of the local Indians, blacks, Mexicans, Europeans, and various Americans. Crawfish have become an icon and symbol of Cajun cooking in Louisiana, and lore abounds about how prolific these “crawdads,” “crawdaddys.” and “Florida lobsters” really are. They are smaller than the lobster, and Betty Fussell wrote: Louisiana mud breeds crawfish the way a Louisiana bayou breeds mosquitoes. After a heavy rain, says Alex Patout, your backyard sprouts mud chimneys six inches high, the breathing holes of a yard full of mud bugs. Louisiana produces 95 percent of America’s crawfish, but it also consumes 95 percent of what it produces says Randy Montegut, the young owner of Bon Creole crawfish processors in New Iberia. (Fussell 1986, 114)

Crawfish do not export easily. There is little meat in the shell, and the fat spoils easily. Because of that, the food has become a Louisiana regional specialty. Though the small crustaceans were considered home food for generations, “‘Cajun popcorn,’ . . . a dish of battered, deep-fried crayfish, [was] popularized by Cajun chef Paul Prudhomme in the 1980s” (Mariani 1994, 102). Prudhomme is the chef-owner of New Orleans’s K-Paul’s Louisiana Kitchen, where: Seated in his armchair throne near the kitchen door in this cafeteria mecca of Cajun cooking, where an average wait on line outside is one and a half hours, Prudhomme, dressed in a

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white hat and denims, and looking as if he has consumed every morsel he has ever cooked, . . . has made chic what was once considered simple folk food. (Nathan 1984, 141)

C. Paige Gutierrez, who wrote an essay called “The Social and Symbolic Uses of Ethnic/Regional Foodways: Cajuns and Crawfish in South Louisiana,” stated: A tourist, stepping off the plane at the New Orleans International Airport, is confronted with an array of commercial products found in no other part of the United States. Airport gift shops sell the city’s heritage in the form of freeze-dried gumbo mix, plastic wrapped pralines, voodoo paraphernalia, Dixieland jazz records, and dark-skinned “quadroon” dolls dressed in ruffled antebellum hoop skirts. . . . A visitor leaving New Orleans and venturing into Cajun country will find even more commercial crawfish iconography: plastic crawfish key chains and combs, real crawfish frozen into clear acrylic paperweights shaped like the state of Louisiana, children’s books featuring anthropomorphized crawfish as main characters, and expensive gold or silver crawfish pendants. (Gutierrez 1997, 169)

From gourmet dishes such as crawfish étouffée (a sautéed dish made with butter, celery, green pepper, onion, parsley, and other seasonings) or crayfish bisque, both available in fine New Orleans restaurants as well as home kitchens, to boiling a 40-pound sack of crawfish and seasoning in a 30-gallon garbage can for a crowd, the crawfish, served on newspaper or papers towels and usually washed down with plenty of cold beer, has become a lasting foodways marker of the Louisiana Cajun community.

CRAB SUPPERS IN SOUTHERN MARYLAND What is a peeler, and what are busters? In “Crabs and Church Suppers in Southern Maryland,” an essay written by Joan Nathan (1984), she explains that a peeler is “the stage of the crab before the buster [when the crabs are] soft inside and hard outside” (Nathan 1984, 164), and “Busters are crabs whose shell has split and are just about to shed. It takes just two hours for a crab to go from a soft-shell to a paper shell” (164). The Native Americans taught the colonists how to harvest and eat soft-shell crabs, and from May to September many people maintain a daily hobby of searching for Chesapeake blue crabs, though there are at least sixty different species of crabs living around the shores of Maryland. In southern Maryland, crab cake church suppers, a folkway that has emerged as a cultural marker because of its frequent repetition, are community functions and mark the spring-to-fall social season. Crab cake suppers, at which the crab cakes are served with stuffed ham, oysters, coleslaw, homemade breads, and pastries, are events catered by enthusiastic volunteers. These suppers bring in thousands of dollars for the congregations, and as one minister, Reverend Martin Townsend, rector of Trinity (Episcopal) Church remarked, “Our church dinners

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would be worth doing even if we didn’t make a nickel. People just have so much fun working on them. When you’ve got forty or fifty people working very hard together for three or four days, it creates a lively spirit. They’re dog-tired but know they’ve done a good thing” (Nathan 1984, 167). A quick search on the Internet revealed Maryland church suppers sponsored by Roman Catholic, Episcopal, Methodist, and Baptist congregations (and probably many others), with dishes ranging from crab cakes to roast turkey and chicken salad. Most of the listings on the Internet offered carry-out service as well, and many listed 11:00 a.m. or noon to 4:30 or 5:00 p.m. as hours; a few advertised the time from 11:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. Volunteer cooks begin baking breads, rolls, and pastries several weeks before the events. They pay for the ingredients themselves and consider that cost to be a donation, along with their labor, to the church cause. In the past, the dinners included varied recipes featuring crab (from crab quiche to deviled crab), but because the crabs are less plentiful than before, other main dishes are offered. Far from Maryland, the Kodiak Crab Festival, held every Memorial Day weekend since 1958, takes place on Kodiak Island in Alaska to celebrate the end of the crabbing season there. Needless to say, how the year has gone for the crabbers determines how the festival goes for everyone (usually, just great, thanks). Aside from the typical games, parades, balls, and rides on the fairway that accompany such festivals, there are contests galore. And though the food at the booths is varied and international, those booths that feature crab dishes are the real draw. Alaskan waters are known for three kinds of crabs: Dungeness, snow, and king. For the most part, Alaskan crabs are interchangeable. The king crab legs, tinged with red, are probably the most recognizable. The snow crab is usually sold in crab meat form. The Dungeness, highly regarded for its flavor, is usually sold whole. (Schulz 1994, 62–63)

These crab dinners and fests continue to be popular regional folkway celebrations of foodways. Humans learn to prepare and enjoy the foods of their ancestors (or predecessors) according to what is found regionally, and some of the creations and invented recipes become well-known folkloric markers (such as Maryland crab cakes available frozen at most local supermarkets throughout the United States). On the other hand, some foodways cross regional, ethnic, and traditional boundaries and become, in a sense, world generic. McDonald’s Corporation is one of those, and as mentioned earlier, McDonald’s has incorporated regional foods into its menu throughout the world.

GOLDEN ARCHES AND FASTFOOD NATIONS McDonald’s is the company that seems to come to mind when worldwide commercialized U.S. hamburgers are mentioned, but it is important to include KFC

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(Kentucky Fried Chicken), Wendy’s, Burger King, and Carl’s Jr. McDonald’s “earns the majority of its profits outside the United States, as does KFC. McDonald’s now ranks as the most widely recognized brand in the world, more familiar than CocaCola” (Schlosser 2002, 229). Worldwide franchising outlets have become common, and the fast-food companies have become familiar Americana around the world. From Beijing to Kuwait to Mecca in Saudi Arabia to Tahiti, McDonald’s has become, as the anthropologist Yunziang Yan noted, “Americana and the promise of modernization” (Schlosser 2002, 230). The genuinely upside to these many franchising outlets is employment where often there was none before. “In Brazil, McDonald’s has become the nation’s largest private employer” (Schlosser 2002, 230). New managers and often employees may be sent to study at McDonald’s Hamburger University in Oak Brook, Illinois, and the gigantic beef, chicken, and potato industries that furnish the ingredients employ millions more. There is a flip side to the fast-food industry, of course, and that is the impact it has on health if it is not consumed in moderation. A diet high in fat, sodium, carbohydrates, and additives can cause serious physical disabilities, as pointed out in Eric Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal (2002) and films such as Morgan Spurlock’s SuperSize Me (2004). Public response to the candid information published in these and other sources has brought about beneficial changes in the menus, and now it is possible to purchase fresh fruit, yogurt, various salads, and even spring water from most of these outlets. The presence of fast-food chains is likely to continue for many generations to come, and the golden arches have become a part of the common international visual plain. It was amusing to me to see a figure of Ronald McDonald at the end of a winding medieval street in Tallinn, Estonia, recently. A little jarring, yes, but still friendly, amusing, and so American.

FOODWAYS COMPETITIONS Americans enjoy competition, and there are a variety of food-related events throughout the United States during the warm months. These competitions are a bit of a twist on foodways, but they are food-centered activities. An event described in our local paper recently described a yearly cherry-pit spitting contest that is held in Eau Claire, Michigan. I do not know how many cherry-pit spitting contests there are in the United States, but in this one, the winner was a 58-year-old man named Rick “Pellet Gun” Krause. Krause “repeated as winner of the International Cherry Spitting Championship, held Saturday at the Tree-Mendus Fruit cherry orchard in Michigan with a spit of 58 feet, 1½ inches” (“Dynasty at Cherry-Pit Spitting Contest” 2007). Apparently the all-time record is held by Krause’s son, Brian “Young Gun” Krause, who holds the Guinness World Record after spitting a pit 93 feet, 6½ inches (“Dynasty at Cherry-Pit Spitting Contest” 2007).

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Competitive eating contests range from Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest (a Fourth of July event held at Coney Island regularly since 1916) to the Vidalia Onion Eating Contest held each year in Vidalia, Georgia. There are cheese eating contests in New York City, chicken wing eating contests every Labor Day in Buffalo, New York, the International Rice Festival and Rice Eating Contest held every October in Crowley, Louisiana, and the Tamale Eating Contest in November in Los Angeles, California. Other food-eating contests range from more ordinary pie, watermelon, and hamburger eating contests. Cooking competitions also abound throughout the United States and feature a variety of ingredients, from chili cook-offs in Texas to garlic recipe competitions in Gilroy, California, at the annual Gilroy Garlic Festival. There are baking competitions that range in style from gourmet chocolate soufflés to country fair triple-decker chocolate cakes. Throughout the United States, the original, largely rural population continues to have state and local fairs with competitions in just about every food group from fruits and vegetables to dairy to meats and poultry to grains. Flower arranging contests, table decor, displays of old and new farming equipment, and even art and photography competitions assure the ongoing celebration of U.S. foodways and folkways of the farm. Turning to a serious topic for Americans, the next discussion covers school lunches. In an era of affluence and, for most in the United States, too much food and the disabling consequences, the consideration of what we choose to feed our children is of great importance.

SCHOOL LUNCHES From peanut butter and jelly sandwiches packed by moms in the morning to state and federally funded free lunches (and breakfasts) to high school cafeterias with franchise eateries ranging from Subway to Kentucky Fried Chicken, U.S. public school children do not go hungry unless they choose to do so. Foodways in the United States include feeding the children. Some schools provide salad bars that include a variety of ingredients, including fruit, but considering the soda and snack foods in machines lining the hallways of most of our public schools, it is tempting for our students to choose junk food over more nutritional choices. Political leaders, including former President Bill Clinton, are making efforts to improve the choices available for foods eaten during the school day. In some schools sugary drinks have been made less available, and there are healthier choices in the food machines, including fruits and high-fiber trail mix and various kinds of nuts. Most Americans are familiar with the standard, starchy cafeteria school lunches sold from coast to coast (lots of chili, macaroni and cheese, burned pizza, dry hamburgers, and breaded, tasteless fish).

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Perhaps it is time to borrow a few lunch ideas from other cultures and make them available in our school cafeterias. The Japanese, for instance, have various boxed lunches that have been made for decades. At many train stations throughout Japan, for instance, the traveler can purchase a Japanese box lunch called an ekiben. Inside are carefully arranged regional foods, fresh and delicious. Another type is the home-packed bento box. These are carefully packed lunch boxes, mainly prepared by mothers for students, that carry within them a tightly packed, balanced (and beautiful) meal.

COUNTERCULTURE INFLUENCE AND FOODS When obtaining food becomes more a choice than a matter of survival because of easy availability, conflict and passionate argument attempting to define optimum human foods seem to emerge. Because our bodies consist primarily of water, there is no argument about the necessity of a generous fluid intake on a daily basis. The remainder of our bodies is made up of protein, fat, and carbohydrates, each performing in its proper sphere and providing energy through myriad complex functions, and that reality begs the question of how to properly maintain these functions so the maximum years of quality life can be reached. There have been times in the United States when fresh vegetables and fruit were held suspect and meat was the recommended food of choice—lots of meat. Pros and cons abound about processed foods and preservatives, and in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the ecology movement emphasized the concept of organic foods. We are presently in an era of epidemic obesity in the United States in spite of the lessons learned about healthy eating in the last forty or fifty years. In 1962, Euell Gibbons published a book called Stalking the Wild Asparagus. Food critics and nutritional educators such as Adelle Davis, DDT opponent Rachel Carson, and Frances Moore Lappé’s Diet for a Small Planet (1982), became household names, and with the greening of the counterculture in California (Berkeley’s People Park), the health food underground was acknowledged and emulated. As noted earlier, yogurt entered the mainstream food vocabulary as well as sprouted wheat, knowledge and use of legumes (split peas and dried beans) increased, and herbs and spices to increase both the taste and nutritional level of foods were rediscovered. Slowly, health food stores began to appear in most towns of any size, and people became more aware of the genuine dangers of excessive additives, pesticides, and too much of any one food. Food manufacturers came under suspicion of not having the public’s health and best consumer interests in mind, and an era of suspicion continues today, reinforced by recalled foods, tainted spinach, and the constant caution concerning salmonella-tainted eggs. In California, Alice Walker founded the restaurant Chez Panisse in Berkeley in 1971, and through its popularity U.S. cooking was revolutionized in terms of

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using fresh, organic ingredients with informed understanding. The late Richard Olney, one of the first food writers to teach Americans about fresh French country cooking (along with Julia Child), praised Walker’s food values by remarking about her chef: “Paul Bertolli’s cuisine is what ‘health food’ should be and never is: a celebration of purity. The food is imaginative but never complicated; it is art” (Olney 1994). Chez Panisse continues to represent the blend of environment and consumer and continues to use fresh, organic ingredients. The stimulus that Walker’s style has had on U.S. home cooks is represented by the bags of fresh, organic produce available in most chain supermarkets today. In Appetite for Change: How the Counterculture Took On the Food Industry (1993), Warren J. Belasco, quoting food writers Molly O’Neill, Alix Freedman, and Jay Letto and the Food Marketing Institute, stated in closing: [T]he majority of adults remain largely indifferent to even the mildest reforms. Over three-quarters of American adults fail to eat five or more servings of fruits and vegetables a day (and a serving can be as little as a small cup of juice). Consumer surveys consistently confirm the same old demographic constraints of gender, class, race, and region. Trendy low-fat, high virtue styles like Mediterranean, Pacific Rim, and Progressive American (a successor to California Cuisine) are still found mainly in gourmet ghettoes. So, too, the ecologically righteous wares of Smith and Hawken, the Body Shop, and Seventh Generation come with hefty price tags; indeed there are all too many parallels between the green marketing of the 1990s and the brown marketing (natural, organic) of twenty years before: premium prices, extravagant hyperbole, unverifiable claims, inevitable deception. (Belasco 1993, 248)

As the next few pages of this book will demonstrate, there are many Americans who continue to experiment with food production and preparation, ever seeking an understanding of what works best for them as individuals and often seeking converts to their way of thinking about it. The counterculture of the 1960s and 1970s awakened many Americans to a healthier view of nutrition, but in the fastpaced twenty-first century, with easily available processed, frozen, and fast foods, the literal bulk of U.S. citizens demonstrates that many are simply not paying attention to healthy foodways.

COOKING WITHOUT RECIPES TASSAJARA During the counterculture/countercuisine climate in the 1960s and 1970s, the process of growing and preparing food was more emphasized than the product. Foods and flavoring ingredients from around the world were grown and experimented with, and though some combinations were not considered particularly edible, the discoveries made were well worth the exploration. Often calling mainstream U.S. foods plastic because of the additives and the way they were

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handled, the countercuisine prided itself on natural, organic foods, and many people became vegetarians. Further, many young people converted to Buddhism, which seemed to meet their needs spiritually and physically. The Buddhist religion emerged in India about six hundred years before the birth of Christ. It is philosophically related to Hinduism, and the belief in reincarnation is strong. It is believed that the human soul may have inhabited the body of an animal either in the past or may do so in the future, and because of that Buddhists do not kill or injure any living creatures. Though vegetarianism is a logical consequence of the Buddhist belief system, and monks and devout adherents abstain from meat, not all Buddhists are vegetarians. If someone other than a Buddhist has killed an animal, or if an animal met its death accidentally, there is no taboo concerning eating the flesh. Further, fish are not considered having been killed when they are caught. Rather, they are observed as simply out of the water, and it is considered all right to eat them. In 1970, Edward Espe Brown published the Tassajara Bread Book which sold more than 400,000 copies. That success was followed in 1973 with the Tassajara Cooking: A Vegetarian Cooking Book. Brown suggested that people just begin cooking. He wrote: The way to be a cook is to cook. The results don’t have to be just right, measuring up to some imagined or ingrained taste. Our cooking doesn’t have to prove how wonderful or talented we are. Our original worth is not something which can be measured, increased or decreased. Just feed, satisfy, nourish. Enter each activity thoroughly, freshly, vitally. Splash! There is completely no secret: just plunging in, allowing time, making space, giving energy, tending each situation with warm-hearted effort. The spoon, the knife, the food, the hunger; broken plates and broken plans. Play, don’t work. Work it out. (Brown 1973, 1)

Brown’s cookbooks reflect more than cooking; they reflect a Zen philosophy of learning, creation, invention, and testing. Zentatsu Baker-Roshi wrote the introduction to Brown’s book and stated: Food is our common property, the body of the world, our eating of the world. . . . It is the essence of Buddha’s mind and practice, the unfathomable effort of all beings who have brought to this time to eat from most ancient times, from every world, past and present. (Baker-Roshi 1973, n.p.)

The book is still in print, and it reflects an ongoing Buddhist attitude of acceptance and response to the present (sort of a living-in-the-now philosophy). There are many people throughout the United States who continue to use the Tassajara food preparation guidelines, and having been privileged to attend a Buddhist wedding reception a little more than a year ago at which foods

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cooked in the Tassajara style were served (the poem at the beginning of the first book was read at the reception), I can say from experience that the dishes are delicious.

ORGANIC FOODS Because of the objection of millions of Americans, not necessarily vegetarians, to the plethora of pesticides, preservatives, and additives used in U.S. food production, the organic foods and marketing industry has become an important part of U.S. foodways. From Wal-Mart to Target to other big-box stores, consumers may purchase organically produced foods in every food group. Rumors of steroids being feed to cattle, hogs, and sheep, which can cause premature puberty in humans, growth spurts, and perhaps even breast cancer, have jolted many parents into taking homegrown and organic foods more seriously; however, to date, there are no persuasive, controlled studies that affirm that the danger is real. The Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine cited studies concerning premature puberty conducted in Puerto Rico in the early 1980s by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The specific question was, “Can steroid hormones in meat affect the age of puberty for girls?” The study raised some slight concern, but the studies could not be verified by other laboratories. Another study in Italy concerning suspicion of steroid hormones present in beef and poultry causing breast enlargement in very young girls and boys failed because the suspect beef and poultry were not available to test. To the question, “Can eating meat from hormone-treated animals affect breast cancer risk?” Cornell’s answer is, “Evidence does not exist to answer this question” (Gandhi and Snedeker 2000, 3). In researching this information, I asked my own physician, who is an internist, professor of medicine, scholar, and published writer. His reply was, “It is important that the public be given notice about the possibility of adverse responses to various additives to our foods, but there are no controlled studies, to date, to prove that there is any real danger to humans from steroid hormones given to animals” (personal interview with an anonymous physician, July 10, 2007).

VEGETARIAN DIETS There are literally millions of people in the United States who prefer to eat a vegetarian or almost-vegetarian diet. Religion, ecological concerns, philosophy, health, or even weight control may be the determining factor. There are many reasons for choosing to become a vegetarian, and as there are many choices, there are many styles of vegetarianism. A vegan is an individual who chooses to use no

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animal products at all; another vegetarian may eliminate only red meat or may choose to use dairy products but no chicken, fish, or beef. The primary foods used by vegetarians are vegetables, fruits, whole grains, nuts and seeds, and beans. For a completely balanced diet, however, it is imperative that vegetarians find a source of vitamin B12, such as tofu, enriched and fortified soy milk, or simply a B12 vitamin. In many parts of the world, there is a scarcity of protein, so vegetarianism in many locations is not as much a choice as an essentiality. In China and Japan, tofu, a soybean product processed somewhat like cheese, has been a source of protein for more than two millennia. Tofu has become ubiquitous in the United States, and it is a popular ingredient in many Asian dishes, though it is not hard to find recipes that use it in well-known dishes from appetizers to side and main dishes to desserts. Tofu fruit shakes are one of the most popular ways to start the day in many U.S. homes. Actually, tofu is one of the world’s least expensive, most beneficial foods. Besides being an excellent source of protein, it is lactose and cholesterol free, and it is rich in natural vitamins. Another high-protein product made in the United States, textured vegetable protein (TVP), usually sold by the pound in a flour form, has many uses. It can be used alone and seasoned like a meat product, or it can be used in just about any recipe in which ground beef is used. Wheat gluten, also called seitan, is a product produced by making a dough of high-protein wheat flour and then rinsing and kneading the dough to eliminate the bran and starch. It can be flavored like a meat and used as a meat substitute. Making wheat gluten is a timeintensive process. I have made it, and it is not as unpalatable as one might think, but it takes hours to produce. After it is seasoned and cooked, it tastes much like a hamburger steak when served with vegetables and a gravy or sauce.

SUPERMARKET FROZEN GOURMET DINNERS About a year ago, my husband and I traveled to Europe and took several tours to sights and restaurants. Among the members of our tour group was a newly married young couple on their honeymoon. They were both professionals, certified public accountants, and they were clearly enjoying sampling the various foods we were served. One evening in Paris, the young couple happened to be seated across from us at the dinner table. We enjoyed the fine French food that began with escargot (snails), continued with a light soup, perfectly prepared vegetables and beef, and a small salad, and ended with a light dessert assortment of fresh fruit and custard tarts. During the course of the evening, the conversation turned to foods and what we particularly liked and did not like. I asked if they liked to cook because they seemed knowledgeable about ingredients and recipes. They looked at each other, laughed, and said neither of them

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knew how to cook. They were accountants, they said, and they were not planning to learn to master the kitchen arts. They liked to read about foods, but their food came from the supermarket freezer cases or restaurant takeout. They said that after shopping, all that is left to do is add a salad and loaf of bread, and voilà, dinner is served! I was curious about what they managed to find ready-made, and they assured me that they could find anything they wanted from quiche (a custard dish with various fillings baked in a pie crust) to the boeuf bourguignon (French beef stew). After we returned home, I checked the frozen foods section of several local grocery stories, and I learned that the young couple was absolutely correct. I do not know where their home in the United States is, but there is nearly every ethnic group represented in the frozen or canned sections in the markets of the midsize city where I live, and further, most restaurants provide take-out service. The call-in and pick-up method in Provo, Utah, can supply foods from barbequed spareribs to pizza to Chinese, Japanese, Italian, Thai, or Indian foods to a freshly prepared lobster with side dishes of choice. There are also companies here that will provide a day’s, week’s, or month’s supply of meals of choice, packaged and frozen, with directions for their quick preparation. These services are more expensive than preparing the foods in one’s own kitchen, but it is a matter of choice and convenience. Foodways operate in different ways in different times and places in the world. The contrast in availability is remarkable, and there are people from Africa to Provo-Orem, Utah, to Australia who are simply not getting enough to eat. The number of food scholars and serious food writers has multiplied in the last 25 years. Worldwide contrasts between a dearth and plethora of foods are of serious concern, but at the same time, food experimentation has reached an all-time high. Food channels, the Internet, books, magazines, flyers, and other sources entice and encourage Americans to eat fruits and vegetables prepared this way or that, to go easy on the grains, increase exercise, and build a meal around vegetables instead of around meat or fish as the largest portion. Because of almost instant satellite communication, the world seems to have taken on a quality of being a very small planet, but even so, there are millions of people undernourished or starving and even more placidly stuffed and overweight. The reality is that we live on a huge planet with myriad people, continents, and islands, and exploration coupled with a more educated world populace than ever before have exposed webs of connectedness, but the distribution of food, and often medical care, is still inadequate. The next chapter will examine scholarship and approaches to the study of foodways by scholars and food writers, both U.S. and from other countries, and it will include some approaches by these writers about what might be done to more successfully address world hunger.

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at: http://envirocancer.cornell.edu/Factsheet/Diet/fs37.hormones.cfm. Accessed July 10, 2007. Gutierrez, C. Paige. 1997. “The Social and Symbolic Uses of Ethnic/Regional Foodways: Cajuns and Crawfish in South Louisiana.” In Ethnic and Regional Foodways in the United States: The Performance of Group Identity, ed. Linda Keller Brown and Kay Mussel. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press. Hanauer, J. E. 1907. Folk-Lore of the Holy Land: Moslem, Christian, and Jewish. London: Sheldon Press. Hanks, Andrea. 2007. “Anishinaabeg Manoomin.” Slow Food Foundation for Biodiversity. Available at: http:/www.slowfoodfoundation.com/eng/presidi/dettaglio.lasso?cod=268. Accessed May 30, 2007. Hopkinson, Simon, and Lindsey Bareham. 1997. The Prawn Cocktail Years. London: Macmillan. Horan, Elizabeth. 2005. “Tracing the History of Sushi in the United States.” Sushi Masters. Available at: http://www.sushimasters.com/pdf/History-NR.pdf. Accessed December 14, 2007. Jeffries, Bob. 1970. Soul Food Cookbook. Indianapolis, Ind.: Bobbs-Merrill. Jensen, R. 1980. “East Indians.” In Harvard Encyclopedia of American Ethnic Groups, ed. S. Thernstrom, A. Orlov, and O. Handlin, 296–301. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Jones, Gwyn and Thomas Jones, translators. 1993. “Branwen Daughter of Llyr.” 21–34. In The Mabinogion. Rutland, VT: Charles E. Tuttle Co. Inc. Kissell, Joe. 2004. “Fortune Cookies: The Authentic Japanese-American Chinese Treat.” Interesting Thing of the Day. Available at: http://itotd.com/articles/326/fortunecookies. Accessed July 5, 2006. Kurlansky, Mark. 1997. Cod: A Biography of the Fish that Changed the World. New York: Penguin Books. Lappé, Frances Moore. 1982. Diet for a Small Planet. 3rd ed. New York: Ballantine Books. Letto, Jay. 1991. “Madison Avenue Goes Green.” Buzzworm (September/October): 30–35. Long, Lucy M. 2004. Culinary Tourism. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky. Lowenstein, Tom. 1997. “Keepers of Order.” In Myth and Mankind: Mother Earth, Father Sky: Native American Myth. London: Duncan Baird. Luenn, Nancy. 1998. A Gift for Abuelita: Celebrating the Day of the Dead. Flagstaff, Ariz.: Northland. Lüthi, Max. 1976. Once upon a Time: On the Nature of Fairy Tales. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Mardrus, J. C. 1964. The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, trans. Powys Mathers. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Mariani, John F. 1994. The Dictionary of American Food and Drink. New York: Hearst Books. Mason, Laura, and Catherine Brown. 1999. Traditional Foods of Britain: An Inventory. Totnes, U.K.: Prospect Books.

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McCullagh, Francis. 1914. Tales from Turkey. London: Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, and Kent. Mehta, Shahnaz, and Joan Bravo Korenblit. 1981. Good Cooking from India. New York: Grammercy. Miller, Gloria Bley. 1984. The Thousand Recipe Chinese Cookbook. New York: Fireside, Simon and Schuster. Mintz, Sidney W. 1996. Tasting Food, Tasting Freedom. Boston: Beacon Press. Nathan, Joan. 1984. An American Folklife Cookbook. New York: Schocken Books. National Council of Negro Women, Inc. 1993. The Black Family Reunion Cookbook: Recipes and Food Memories from the National Council of Negro Women, Inc. New York: Fireside, Simon and Schuster. National Council of Negro Women, Inc. 1994. The Black Family Dinner Quilt Cookbook: Health Conscious Recipes and Food Memories. New York: Fireside, Simon and Schuster. Okakura, Kakuzo. 1993. The Book of Tea. Boston: Shambhala. Olney, Richard. 1994. Cover flap endorsement. In Chez Panisse Cooking, Paul Bertolli with Alice Waters. New York: Random House. Ostmann, Barbara Gibbs. 1984. “Toasted Ravioli.” In Food Editors’ Hometown Favorites Cookbook: American Regional and Local Specialties, ed. Barbara Gibbs Ostmann and Jane Baker. Maplewood, N.J.: Hammond World Atlas. Ostmann, Barbara Gibbs, and Jane Baker, eds. 1984. Food Editors’ Hometown Favorites Cookbook: American Regional and Local Specialties. Maplewood, N.J.: Hammond World Atlas. Ovid. 2004. Metamorphosis, trans. Charles Martin. New York: W. W. Norton. Phillips, Charles. 1998. “In the Shadow of the Gods.” In Lost Realms of Gold: South American Myths. London: Duncan Baird. Quarles, Benjamin. 1996. The Negro in the Making of America. New York: Touchstone, Macmillan. Quinones-Murphy, Laura. 2004. “Tracing the History of Sushi in the United States,” Elizabeth Horan. Available at: http://www.sushimasters.com/pdf/History-NR.pdf. Accessed December 15, 2007. Revel, Jean-François. 1982. Culture and Cuisine: A Journey through the History of Food. New York: De Capo Press. Riddervold, Astri. 1990. Lutefisk, Rakefish, and Herring in Norwegian Tradition. Oslo: Novus. Ritchason, Jack. 1995. The Little Herb Encyclopedia: The Handbook of Nature’s Remedies for a Healthier Life. 3rd ed. Pleasant Grove, Utah: Woodland Health Books. Rodin, Claudia. 2001. The New Book of Middle Eastern Food. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. Rombauer, Irma S., Marion Rombauer Becker, and Ethan Becker. 2006. Joy of Cooking. New York: Scribner. Rowlandson, Mary. 1981. “The Sovereignty and Goodness of God.” In Puritans among the Indians: Accounts of Captivity and Redemption 1676–1724, ed. Alden T. Vaughan and Edward W. Clark. Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press, Harvard University Press.

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Schenone, Laura. 2003. A Thousand Years Over a Hot Stove: A History of American Women Told through Food, Recipes, and Remembrances. New York: W. W. Norton. Schlosser, Eric. 2002. Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal. New York: Houghton Mifflin. Schulz, Phillip Stephen. 1994. Celebrating America: A Cookbook. New York: Simon and Schuster. Shakespeare, William. 1998. The Tragedy of Macbeth, ed. Syvan Barnet. New York: Signet/ New American Library. Smith, Jeff. 1990. The Frugal Gourmet on Our Immigrant Ancestors. New York: Avon Books. Smith, Philip, ed. 1994. Favorite North American Indian Legends. Toronto: General. Sullivan, Lawrence E., ed. 1989. Native American Religions: North America. New York: Macmillan. Tannahill, Reay. 1988. Food in History. New, fully rev., and updated ed. New York: Crown. Tartar, Maria, ed. 2004. The Annotated Brothers Grimm. New York: W. W. Norton. Thoreau, Henry David. 1987. Cape Cod. New York: Penguin. Orig. pub. 1865. Thursby, Jacqueline. 2006. Funeral Festivals in America: Rituals for the Living. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky. Tillery, Carolyn Quick. 1996. The African-American Heritage Cookbook: Traditional Recipes and Fond Remembrances from Alabama’s Renowned Tuskegee Institute. New York: Citadel Press/Kensington. Tillman, George Jr. 1997. “Foreword.” In Soul Food, LaJoyce Brookshire. New York: HarperPaperbacks. Toelken, Barre. 1996. The Dynamics of Folklore. Rev. and exp. ed. Logan: Utah State University Press. ———. 2003. The Anguish of Snails: Native American Folklore in the West. Logan: Utah State University Press. Tressider, Jack, gen. ed. 2005. The Complete Dictionary of Symbols. San Francisco: Chronicle Books. “Uigher People, Vernacular Tale.” 1957. In Folk Tales from China. Peking: Foreign Languages Press. Walker, Alice. 1982. The Color Purple. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. Washington, Booker T. 1993. Up from Slavery. New York: University Books. Orig. pub. 1905. Waters, Alice. 2000. “Foreword.” In Best Food Writing 2000, ed. Holly Hughes. New York: Marlowe and Balliett and Fitzgerald.

Q Four

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xplorative food scholarship and writing about foodways have become a popular academic, literary, scientific, and entertainment genre in the United States. Since the 1970s, the examination of foodways has increased as a common topic of discussion and a focus of entertainment, and many scholars, professional cooks, and home cooks have developed serious interests in reading about, analyzing, preparing, and eating a broader, more experimental, more diverse menu in addition to investigating ethnic and regional food traditions at every level of preparation, from home kitchens to gourmet preparations. In the introduction to Charles Camp’s informative text, American Foodways: What, When, Why, and How We Eat in America (1989), W. K. McNeil gives an excellent overview of contemporary work in U.S. foodways up to that point, and he gives much of the credit for opening the field to folklorist Don Yoder. McNeil wrote, “An important date in the history of American foodways studies is 1970, for in that year Don Yoder, who would become the most influential folklorist involved with this area of study, attended the first International Symposium on Ethnological Food Research held in Lund, Sweden” (McNeil 1989, 13). Yoder was influential in subsequent research, “and none outlined the possibilities for research that he did” (McNeil 1989, 14). Richard Dorson included Yoder’s article “Folk Cookery” in his textbook Folklore and Folklife: An Introduction (1972), and that context gave Yoder’s article wide circulation. McNeil then named four subsequent works that reaffirmed the importance of the study of foodways: “Foodways and Eating Habits: Directions for Research” (edited by Michael Owen Jones, Bruce Giuliano, and Roberta Krell 1983), which was published as a special issue of Western Folklore, which presented “thirteen

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papers by folklorists, historians, experimental psychologists, and consumer research specialists” (McNeil 1989, 15). The next important text McNeil named was Foodways in the Northeast (1984) by Peter Benes, which included nine articles about late seventeenth- to early nineteenth-century food practices. That was followed by Ethnic and Regional Foodways in the United States: The Performance of Group Identity (1984), edited by Linda Keller Brown and Kay Mussell, which included articles from 12 contributors of varying discipline: folklore, anthropology, nutrition, popular culture, public health, and American studies. The fourth book McNeil named was We Gather Together: Food and Festival in American Life (1988) by Theodore C. Humphrey and Lin T. Humphrey. Camp’s American Foodways shares a wide spectrum of folkloric information and ranges from tales and beliefs to food events, to how food moves “From Field to Table,” and how food events function in community cycles. His work is considered an important source of data and knowledge about foodways in the United States. The American Folklore Society has an active foodways section, and the society publishes a periodical called Digest: An Interdisciplinary Study of Food and Foodways. There are many texts now available written by folklorists, anthropologists, scientists, food historians, chefs, amateur cooks, and professional food writers. In this chapter, the discussion will turn toward contemporary foodways scholars and writers as well as food writers and cultural observers from antiquity because of the influence ancient foodways continue to have had on popular U.S. cuisine of today. Professional food writing has become an important literary genre. Folkloric information is often embedded in foodways writing, and since 2000 editor Holly Hughes has published annual editions of chapters, essays, and magazine articles called Best Food Writing. In her introduction to the 2006 issue, she wrote: “One day I might come across a dreamy essay on the joys of cooking soup, the next I’m swept up in a dramatic narrative, complete with dialogue, about a night at a restaurant. An intensively researched article about the economics of our food supply system crops up one morning; a colorful travelogue describing exotic cuisine arrives on my desk later that afternoon” (Hughes 2006, ix). Articles that Hughes includes in her collections have many folkloric dimensions and are delightfully laced with foodways behaviors and descriptions. For instance: “As I turn to leave the Macelleria, paper bag shifting in my arms, Franco the Butcher raises a bloody, tight-fingered hand into the air and, smiling his biggest smile of the day, dangles another slice of tripe into the light” (Frank 2006, 67). Backing up a few decades, M.F.K. Fisher was considered one of the finest food writers of the twentieth century, but other talented researchers and writers also emerged. The late Julia Child taught through writing and television not to be intimidated by French cooking. She became a cultural icon for foodways in the United States, and her home kitchen is enshrined at the Smithsonian Institution

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in Washington, DC. Though little noted, Richard Olney, mentioned in chapter 3 and author of The French Menu Cookbook (originally published in 1970) and Simple French Food (originally published in 1970), was also one of the first food writers to introduce the delight of French provincial cooking to Americans. Alice Waters, the strong proponent of fresh foods prepared carefully, and Irma S. Rombauer and Marion Rombauer Becker, authors of many editions and variants of the Joy of Cooking (2006), are popular and respected by both professional food scholars and cooks of varying levels of expertise. Foodways and food lore in the United States continue to be studied from many different perspectives, and because foodways and food preparation are most often taught and passed from person to person by vernacular transmission, much remains folkloric. Ancient writings on foodways from around the world are still extant, though none of them are as complete as scholars today would like them to be. Still, they offer insights concerning attitudes, preferences, and preparation of food from ages passed. Some food concerns of the ancient world having to do with good food choices and health are very similar to worries today. Most of the cooking records from early periods of Europe include suggestions for health, including tips for weight control and various herbs and medicinal elements to improve various functions of the body. Serious food studies in our contemporary world range from medical concerns to experiments with molecular gastronomy to learn which foods chemically complement one another. We are living in an age of epidemic obesity and physical complications consequent to that condition. Persuasive advertising has led to a plethora of popular diets and supposedly quick weight-loss diets. Folklore abounds about huge weight loss on these miracle food plans. Knowing and understanding the different kinds of foodways and food choices in the United States and understanding the simple reminder that healthy foods and moderate portions coupled with exercise lead to improved health, will, hopefully, help readers improve both their knowledge of healthy foods and their own eating habits.

ANCIENT SCHOLARSHIP AND APPROACHES: FOODWAYS IN EAST ASIA Ancient voices in China exchanged food lore and wrote words of wisdom and tradition for more than a thousand years before the birth of Christ. Fu Xi and Shen Nong are legendary rulers of great antiquity who are credited with teaching humans the arts of hunting, fishing, and the domestication of animals and then “taught people to plough the land and harvest crops during [what was called] the Ninth Epoch” (Phillips 1999, 36). Fu Xi, as the giver of fire, resembled the Greek god Prometheus in his gifts to mankind. Fu Xi, some believe, taught the people how to cook their food using fire, but the Yellow Emperor, Huang Di, is also

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credited with giving humans that skill. Even today, a yearly fete is held to worship Fu Xi from February 2 to March 3 of the lunar calendar in Huaiyan County in central China’s Henan Province. The art of living—that is, the art of Chinese cooking—was developed and refined over many centuries. There are two dominant philosophies of Chinese culture, Confucianism and Taoism, and each has had strong influence on the course of Chinese history and the culinary arts. Taoism, a spiritual religion, placed its emphasis on the properties and life-giving attributes of various foods, and Confucianism placed emphasis on the social enjoyment of life and developed culinary expertise to an art form. Both are still important to the culture, and both perspectives have made their way to the United States. The ancient Taoist philosopher, Lao-tzu, considered father of Taoist philosophy, concerned himself with a spiritual level of living in regard to all of life. He lived, according to legend, in the province of Henan in the sixth century b.c.e. and was a keeper of the archives at the imperial court. As legend has it, he was persuaded to write down his teaching for posterity just before he rode off into

Lao-tzu (6th century b.c.e.), a philosopher and reputed founder of Taoism. Clipart.com

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the desert to die. To simply define the Taoist perspective would be impossible, but it is in part understanding and accepting the present, sort of being in the now, as we sometimes hear from our contemporary media. One of Lao-tzu’s brief chapters states: Sixty Ruling the country is like cooking a small fish. Approach the universe with Tao, And evil will have no power. Not that evil is not powerful, But its power will not be used to harm others. Not only will it do no harm to others, But the sage himself will also be protected. They do not hurt each other. And the Virtue in each one refreshes both. (Lao Tzu 1972)

The Taoist philosophy is intertwined with nature. People who lived this philosophy wanted to live long lives, and pursuits concerning foods were mingled with a full range of attitudes concerning a peaceful, accepting life. The 81 chapters in Lao-tzu’s Tao Te Ching are ancient, but they are also immediately applicable. The essence of it is to accept what is happening naturally without wanting to change things or desire things to be other than they are. As nature presents itself to all people without discrimination, one of the ideas of the Taoist philosophy is to accept all people as equals no matter who they are or what their choices may be. Their study of food was to learn what the finest foods were and then prepare them to their peak of flavor and nourishment. Confucius, also called K’ung Ch’iu, was born in 551 b.c.e. and died around 479 b.c.e. in Tsou, a small town in the state of Lu in Shandong Province. It was during the Chou Dynasty (around 1122 b.c.e.–220 b.c.e.) that cooking was raised to an art form, and Confucius was extraordinarily influential both then and now because he established culinary standards and etiquette for the people of China that are still followed today. Confucius was a conservative teacher, social philosopher, and thinker respected by both the court and the people. He taught that order would overcome confusion and chaos, and his focus was on the social word (the interaction of people) rather than the spiritual or metaphysical. His teachings were organized into the Analects by his followers centuries after his death, and they represent a complex and elaborate set of rules and practices. Confucius is quoted as saying, “[D]o not do unto others as you would not have done unto you” (Confucius 1999). Confucius is often quoted in Chinese books, particularly cookbooks; here is another saying that reflects both virtue and a meal: “The superior man does not, even for the space of a single meal, act contrary to virtue” (Chinese Food 2007, 1).

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Chinese Landscape. Detail from A City of Cathay, Ching Dynasty painting, 1736. The Granger Collection, New York

Later in this chapter, contemporary scholarship in Asian foodways and food studies, as well as Mediterranean and others, will be discussed. But before leaping into the twentieth and twenty-first centuries and contemporary studies, our window on ancient scholarship will continue with culinary studies that emerged from classical Greece. It might help to understand the chronology of these thinkers by suggesting that Lao-tzu and the Greek epic poet Homer were probably living at approximately the same time period, around the sixth century b.c.e.

ANCIENT SCHOLARSHIP AND APPROACHES: FOODWAYS IN CLASSICAL GREECE Ancient Greek discussions of food preferences and preparation were passed along and noted at the dawn of recorded history. Whether early humans roasted or boiled meat is discussed in Claude Lévi-Strauss’s important essay “The Culinary Triangle” (1997). In the essay, Lévi-Strauss quotes a text by Aristotle, “cited by Salomon Renach (Cults, Mythes, Religions V, p. 63), [which] indicates that the Greeks also thought that ‘in ancient times, men roasted everything’” (Lévi-Strauss 1997, 29). He states further: On two grounds, then, one can say that the roasted is on the side of nature, the boiled on the side of culture: literally, because boiling requires the use of a receptacle, a cultural object; symbolically, in as much as a culture is a mediation of the relations between man and the world, and boiling demands a mediation (by water) of the relation between food and fire which is absent in roasting. (Lévi-Strauss 1997, 29)

Earlier in this book, there was an extended description of the famous banquet Achilles prepared for Odysseus outside the walls of Ilium. As Homer described

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it, it consisted of roast meat, bread, and wine. Homer spun the tales of the Iliad and the Odyssey (scholars think) by threading together pieces of sagas from a time long before his. There was a time in early Greece when wild boar was plentiful and roasting food was common, but as time passed a larger population developed in this region of long valleys and narrow plains. The wild boar became less and less plentiful, and there was little space for raising cattle. In time, “the farmer and his family lived off the land in modest comfort. They grew a little wheat or barley, tended their fig and olive trees and a few vines, reared pigs, and kept a goat to provide milk and cheese” (Tannahill 1988, 61). Then, as more and more people populated the region, Tannahill suggests, both grain and meat became scarce. The ground had been stripped of timber for housing and furniture, and it had been depleted by overuse. The primary crops, grown for local use and export, were olive oil and wine, though the exported wines of Greece were soon marginalized by the more popular and more available wines of Italy (Tannahill 1988, 63–64). Food was simply not plentiful. The most common food, according to Pliny the Elder (Gaius Plinius Secundus, 23–79 c.e.), was an oily, highly seasoned paste called maza. The method used to make maza was so well known that Pliny did not list proportions when explaining the substance, but he began by explaining that after soaking barley in water, the Greeks dried it by a fire and then ground it. After that, they mixed it with flax seeds, coriander seeds (both previously roasted), and added salt, and it was served as a paste. It was the mainstay for both the rich and the poor, along with olives, figs, water, and goat’s milk (Pliny 1950, xiv–xv, qtd. in Tannahill 1988, 67). Various ancient Greek food records have survived, but none are complete discussions of the cuisine. In the third century c.e., an Egyptian compiler named Athenaeus, born at Naucratis, wrote a work entitled The Deipnosophists, which Jean-François Revel translated as “The Dinner of the Savants.” This text was an anthology or collection of quotations from nearly eight hundred writers and cooks. In the book, he mentions earlier Greek cooks and their specialties: “Archytas, Erasistratus, the specialist in fish, Hegisippus of Tarentum, the two Heraclides, both from Syracuse, Nereus of Chios, who could cook conger eel in fish stock so elegantly it was fit to be presented to the gods, Lamprias, the first to conceive of blood stew, and Aphtonitas, the inventor of blood sausage” (Revel 1982, 29). In his anthology, Athenaeus included Telecleides, a fifth-century b.c.e. dramatist and poet of old comedy, who wrote a passage in one of his few surviving manuscripts (The Amphictyons) about available foods in the earlier, mythic Golden Age of plenty: I will, then, tell of the life of old which provided for mortals. First, there was peace over all, like water over hands. The earth produced no terror and no disease; on the other hand,

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things needful came of their own accord. Every torrent flowed with wine, barley-cakes strove with wheat loaves for men lips, beseeching that they be swallowed if men loved the whitest. Fishes would come to the house and bake themselves, then serve themselves on the tables. A river of broth, whirling hot slices of meat, would flow by the couches; conduits full of piquant sauces for the meat were close at hand for the asking, so that there was plenty for moistening a mouthful and swallowing it tender. On dishes there would be honey-cakes all sprinkled with spices, and roast thrushes served up with milk-cakes were flying into the gullet. The flat-cakes jostled each other at the jaws and set up a racket, the slaves would shoot dice with slices of paunch and tid-bits. Men were fat in those days and every bit mighty giants. (Athenaeus of Naucratis 1927, 6:268)

Another aspect of the Greek food tradition that Athenaeus included in his collection was the meager and distasteful food of the warrior Spartans. One observer, a citizen of Sybaris, according to Athenaeus, reported, “[A]ny man in his senses would rather die ten thousand times over than live as miserably as this” (Athenaeus of Naucratis 1927, 4:138, 12:518). Their deprivations in training were well known to the Greeks, and the food was supposedly intentionally inadequate. Boys were tested by difficult exercises: “One required them to run a gauntlet to snatch as many cheeses as they could from the steps of an altar to Artemis. Another sent them out alone into the countryside to live by their wit and to kill helots [slaves]” (Dersin 1997, 123). Tannahill suggests that a black broth made of pork stock, vinegar, and salt was a mainstay of the Spartans (Tannahill 1988, 67). Though the Greek civilization continued long after the birth of Christ, it was in decline. Greece was losing power because of internal strife and outside invasions, and Rome became the imperial state of the Mediterranean. One of the important Roman foodstuffs, garum or garon, was an indispensable fish sauce, but it had such a foul odor while fermenting that factories were often banned from local villages to the seaside or faraway countries, including Spain, France, Italy, and along the coast of the Black Sea (Tannahill 1988, 83).

ANCIENT SCHOLARSHIP AND APPROACHES: FOODWAYS IN IMPERIAL ROME Garum was one of the primary ingredients of Apicus, the Roman cook culinary historians credit with writing the first genuine cookbook. His book was probably first written between 100 and 300 c.e., though no one can be sure all of the recipes were his, and the book was copied and passed along through the centuries until it was finally printed in Venice at the end of the fifteenth century. Many of his recipes reflect a broad use of spices and herbs in addition to the ubiquitous use of garum, and the research of various scholars suggests that garum, the fermented fish sauce, was used like salt throughout much of the

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Mediterranean world. A short recipe example is Apicus’s method for preparing a thrush: “Thrushes good for the health: grind pepper, silphium [now an unknown herb], and bayberries with garum made with cumin. Stuff the thrushes through the neck and sew them up again. Then cook them with oil, salts, water, dill, an heads of leeks” (Revel 1982, 49). The garum was made by allowing fish to ferment, and Mark Kurlansky’s book Salt: A World History (2002) suggests that there may be no precise recipes for the fish sauce remaining from the ancient world. He wrote that it was generally made simply: “To make the sauce, the fish scraps were put in earthen jars with alternating layers of salt and weighted on the top to keep them submerged in the pickle that developed as salt drew moisture out of the fish” (Kurlansky 2002, 70). The Western world’s use of Worcestershire sauce, though it has many historical versions, may be as close as our common food comes to garum. I recently came across the ingredients for a home version of classic Worcestershire sauce, and it included anchovies and vinegar as well as many other ingredients (olive oil, onions, tamarind paste, garlic, and more). There is no way to really determine the quantities of flavorings used in the ancient food preparations, neither can the strength of their imported herbs and spices be determined. Further, animals may have been more or less fat, and certainly foods risked being on the edge of spoiled much of the time because of the lack of preservation methods. At their peak, the Romans had subdued many of the tribes of southern Europe. Though the Romans were known to be tolerant of varied cultural and religious views, and though they were aggressive and militant themselves, they abhorred needless slaughter and pagan sacrifice. It was for this reason they drove the Celts, who practiced human sacrifice, out of Europe and to the British Isles. Posidonius, a Roman intellectual, lived around 100 b.c.e. He described a violent practice at Celtic feasts: There was a certain custom at Celtic feasts in ancient times, that when the joints were set before the guests the bravest man would take the thigh. If anyone else laid claim to it, then the two rose up to fight till one of them was slain. And other men in the gathering, having received some silver or gold coins, or even a certain number of jars of wine, having taken pledges that the gifts promised would really be given and having distributed them among their friends and relation, would lie down on the boards, face upwards, and allow some bystander to cut their throats with a sword. (O’Brian 1968, 78)

Such behavior, even at a banquet, was intolerable to the Romans, though it must be remembered that there is no way to substantiate Posidonius’s report. Many historical accounts have described the luxuries of the Roman upper class and the poverty of the common people; Ovid (Publius Ovidius Naso, 43 b.c.e.–17 c.e.), Juvenal (Decimus Junius Juvenalis, 55–127 c.e.), and Martial (Marcus Valerius Martialis, 40–102 c.e.) are only a few of the keen and talented

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observers who wrote either literally or satirically about what they saw and lived. Their approaches were cynical and often biting; they scandalized the powerful and amused the less powerful. The streets of Rome became so crowded and dangerous that Juvenal wrote, “You could be considered thoughtless and careless about sudden accidents if you were to go out for dinner without first making a will” (Juvenal 1988, qtd. in Shelton 1988, 70). These writers foresaw the sun setting on imperial Rome, and when Rome was later taken over in the fifth century c.e. by dynamic conqueror tribes from the north and west (Goths, Vandals, Franks, and others), the face of European civilization changed. Many, and perhaps most, people vacated the large cities and what they perceived to be dangerous urban settlements and returned to rural life, where they trapped, hunted, fished, and grew much of their own food, as had hundreds of generations before them.

SCHOLARSHIP AND APPROACHES: FOODWAYS IN THE MEDIEVAL PERIOD Since the mid-1980s or so, there has been a marked increase of scholarship both in Europe and in the United States that investigates the foodways of the medieval period. The centuries between 1200 and 1400 left little in the way of culinary manuscripts, though there are enough to help contemporary scholars understand some of the customs and recipes of the time. Alan Davidson, author of The Oxford Companion to Food (1999), states, “The oldest surviving culinary manuscript from Christian Europe . . . written in Old Danish . . . forms part of a family of four related manuscripts . . . [and] it may well have originated in what is now Provence” (Davidson 1999, 494). He says that following that and before the age of printed cookbooks “are something like 150 other surviving manuscripts in various languages” (494). The following entries are works of scholarship written by professional researchers and academics. Though there are a number of books on the topic of foodways of the Middle Ages, their quality is uneven. Those included here have earned the respect of peers and critics. Constance Hieatt, a professor emerita from the University of Toronto, has written several well-researched cultural and foodways texts. Pleyn Delit: Medieval Cookery for Modern Cooks, second edition (1996), written by Hieatt with Brenda Hosington and Sharon Butler, includes cultural context, information about manners of the times, and recipes that can be successfully reproduced. An Ordinance of Pottage: An Edition of the 15th Century Culinary Recipes in Yale University’s MS Beinecke 163 (1988) is a text by Hieatt on Anthimus, a sixth-century Greek doctor. Anthimus was exiled by an emperor in Constantinople to the Italian court of Theodoric, an Ostrogoth and barbarian. Anthimus wrote a letter to his captor

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explaining what good foods and bad foods were and how to cook and serve them. Hieatt also wrote an interesting article, “Sorting through the Titles of Medieval Dishes: What Is, or Is Not, a ‘Blanc Manger.’” That article is included in Melitta Weiss Adamson’s edited collection called Food in the Middle Ages (1995). Other significant foodways scholarship on the medieval period has been written and published by Melitta Weiss Adamson, including Food in Medieval Times (Food through History) (2004) and Regional Cuisines in Medieval Europe: A Book of Essays (Garland Medieval Casebooks) (2002). Terence Scully has published several texts on the history, foodways, and culture of the Middle Ages: The Art of Cookery in the Middle Ages (1997) includes information about the culture and etiquette of the time as well as seasonal dishes, discussion of the quality of foodstuffs, contemporary medical theories that cooks needed to know, and information about the fasting days of the dominant Roman Catholic Church. Scully also wrote Chiquarts ‘On Cookery’: A Fifteenth Century Savoyard Culinary Treatise (1986) and, with D. Eleanor Scully, Early French Cookery: Sources, History, Original Recipes and Modern Adaptations (2002). Two other scholarly (and entertaining) books that should be included here are The Art of Cooking: The First Modern Cookery Book (2005) by Maestro Martino of Como, edited by Luigi Ballerini and translated by Jeremy Parzen. Martino was a fifteenth-century cook, and it is said that he is the father of modern Italian cooks. The book includes instructions for preparing many foods, including how to prepare a peacock by restoring all of its feathers so that after it is cooked it will look alive and spit fire from its beak. The other text, by Rudolf Grewe and edited by Constance B. Hieatt, is Libellus De Arte Coquinaria: An Early Northern Cookery Book (2001), is a carefully researched cultural and culinary treat. The original text may date back to the twelfth century, and it is a translation of 35 Icelandic, Danish, and Low German recipes, perhaps some of the earliest known recipes of western Europe. There are popular anachronistic groups and celebrations throughout the United States, particularly on university campuses. The Society for Creative Anachronism, Inc., an international organization dedicated to researching the seventeenth-century period (and earlier), is a group that prepares medieval foods, wears clothing of the Middle Ages and Renaissance, and creates events that may feature tournaments, classes, dancing, feasts, and art exhibits. Their Web site (http://www.sca.org/) includes links to many publications, ranging from heraldry to etiquette. Daniel Diehl and Mark Donnelly’s Foodways and Lore, Medieval Celebrations: How to Plan for Holidays, Weddings, and Reenactment with Recipes, Customs, Decorations, Songs, Dances, and Games (2001) informs readers about anachronistic activities as well as how to organize a Christmas madrigal dinner. A madrigal, a secular musical composition of the fourteenth through seventeenth century, is written for four, five, or six voices, and it is a well-loved tradition in many Christian churches

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and is particularly popular in many Christian churches during the Christmas season.

SCHOLARSHIP AND APPROACHES: FOODWAYS IN THE NINETEENTH, TWENTIETH, AND TWENTYFIRSTCENTURY UNITED STATES Though scholarly studies, books, and articles by talented food critics and writers are included in this section, many of the following references about scholarship and approaches in contemporary foodways are actually cookbooks written by informed food scholars, writers, and experienced chefs. The trend in cookbooks in the late twentieth century and early twenty-first has been to create a context for the cuisine along with the ingredient lists and the preparation methods. One writer for The New Yorker suggested that “for every novel that contains a recipe, there is now a recipe book meant to be read as a novel” (Gopnik 2007, 4). This is because, for many U.S. home cooks, food has become more than a quick fix. Because of a more informed populace concerned about healthy foods and their preparation, the public has taken the interest and curiosity about foods to a different level. Searching for nutritious and tasty foods from around the world has created an interest in learning the origin, context, lore, preparation, and serving information related to the ingredients

CHINESE CULINARY STUDIES IN THE UNITED STATES Chinese takeout food has become more and more popular in the United States since the late 1980s because of the many new immigrants from mainland China. As popular as it is, the typical takeout little represents the true cuisine from the Old Country. Su Zheng, who wrote an article about typical foods from Szechuan for the anthology The Ethnomusicologists’ Cookbook (2006), stated: “Yet, unless one spends an extensive amount of time in China, it is impossible to gain a proper sense of the extraordinarily rich and nuanced taste of various Chinese cooking styles” (Zheng 2006, 38). In the United States, natives sometimes have a tendency to generalize naming, and the generic Chinese takeout more accurately could be called American Chinese takeout. In the same text, The Ethnomusicologists’ Cookbook (2006), Mercedes DuJunco reminds us of additional differences between American Chinese restaurants and those in China. She wrote: Many Chaozhou restaurants specialize in fresh seafood and often feature rows of see-through glass tanks containing varieties of live marine animals, both freshwater and seawater, which could rival the marine exhibits in many U.S. city aquariums. . . . There are

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typically no written menus in these restaurants. Instead, one just points to the fish, prawn, crab, lobster, oysters, clams, mollusks, abalone, or sea slugs of choice and discuss the price with the server and how you want it cooked. . . . It is then fished out of the tank, gutted, cleaned, and custom cooked for you in a matter of minutes. (DuJunco 2006, 31)

Discussions in this scholarly text include recipes, history, and, as the title suggests, recommended listening suggestions and references for further reading. Zheng shares that cooking has become a creative process for her, “involving personal choices, improvisation, and some magic inspiration. . . . Therefore in my kitchen, for example, basil, a non-Chinese vegetable, has been added to [the recipe for] Mapo Tofu for its complementary intricate taste, while pork has been eliminated” (Zheng 2006, 38). The mention of the creative process in relation to tofu leads us to “Pass the Tofu, Please: Asian Food for Aging Baby Boomers” (2004), a delightful and scholarly article by Liz Wilson. Baby boomers, born between 1946 and 1964, “comprise the largest generation in American history” (Wilson 2004, n. 2, 263), and she adds, “Where the consumption of meat served as a marker of status for many prewar Americans, the cosmopolitan baby-boom ethos favors plant-based foods as a substitute for or supplement to meats” (245). In this excellent essay on the topic of “current ethnomimetic food-consumption trends among baby boomers,” Wilson presents convincing evidence to support her supposition that with the “gentrification of the Woodstock generation,” our consumer culture has “appropriated the anticapitalistic rhetoric of the ’60s to serve corporate interests” (Wilson 2004, 245). With increased disposable income and children entering adulthood, many baby boomers, and other Americans as well, have begun serious culinary exploration of cultures often unfamiliar to them. Because of this, a plethora of cookbooks have made their appearance in bookstores and on Internet sites, but many of them are far more than lists of ingredients and preparation methods. Many are scholarly works that include historical and cultural information, biographical experiences of the authors concerning their own discoveries in culinary artistry, as well as recipes, glossaries, and often sources for purchasing hard-to-find cooking equipment and ingredients. Chinese cooking is no exception in this plethora of books discussing little-known cuisines. The Breath of a Wok: Unlocking the Spirit of Chinese Wok Cooking through Recipes and Lore (2004), by Grace Young, is a text about the rich, historical cuisine of China in relation to its central cooking tool, the wok. From the actual construction of a wok, including the hammering and shaping told from a blacksmith’s perspective, to the wok’s spiritual place in Chinese cultural history, Young gracefully explicates the meaning and symbolism of the multifaceted cooking utensil. She explains that the wok’s breath is the heat that rises from the vessel when the ingredients of a dish are finished cooking; her text also leads the reader to understand other varied physical and spiritual dimensions of this ancient instrument. Young’s text also includes a helpful glossary.

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Chinese chef and author and Carl Chu has written several books that provide a good overview of various Chinese regional cuisines and where to locate them in cities like Los Angeles, the Bay Area and San Francisco, and New York. His books provide insight into the philosophy and feeling about various foods, including tea: “Tea drinking,” Chu asserts in Chinese Food Finders: Los Angeles and the San Gabriel Valley (2004), “is inseparable from Chinese Culture. It is the mother’s milk that nurtures the civilization” (Chu 2004b, 1). Related to the drinking of strong tea, the intricate and beautiful culinary art of both Chinese and Japanese snack foods in small, bite-size portions had its origin in necessity. Some teas, particularly powdered green teas, were too strong to be digested easily on their own and needed to be accompanied by a small viand. Another aspect of Chinese foodways is the association of foods with both physical health and spiritual harmony through the common study and use of healing herbs. Daniel Reid has written A Handbook of Chinese Healing Herbs (1995) that represents Chinese food and health systems, perhaps the oldest health system in the world. The principles of harmony that run through traditional Chinese arts and sciences include the five elemental energies—fire, wood, earth, water, and metal—and in Reid’s book they are related to various flavors, colors, and organs. He includes what he calls a “kitchen clinic” in which many of the elements for nutritional healing might be found. Reid’s text, like many of the other books on Chinese cuisine and herbal healing, includes a helpful glossary and index.

JAPANESE CULINARY STUDIES IN THE UNITED STATES In 1982, Shizuo Tsuji and Yoshiki Tsuji, chefs and authors, wrote an important text called Japanese Cooking: A Simple Art to inform the U.S. public about the little-known culinary preferences of the Japanese. The foreword was written by Ruth Reichl, a U.S. food scholar and the current editor of Gourmet. The introduction was written by the late M.F.K. Fisher, another internationally known food scholar and writer, who, with Shizuo Tsuji, carefully explained how food and even the motions and physical act of eating differ in Japan. In my opinion, one of the finest paragraphs written by a food scholar and writer is Fisher’s commentary on the Japanese food she and her sister enjoyed while studying fine Japanese cuisine in Osaka, Japan, for a few weeks: At its best, it is inextricably meshed with aesthetics, with religion, with tradition and history. It is evocative of seasonal changes, or of one’s childhood, or of a storm at sea: one thin slice of molded fish purée, shaped like a maple leaf and delicately colored orange and scarlet, to celebrate Autumn; a tiny hut made of carved ice, with a little fish inside made of chestnut paste and a chestnut made of fish paste, to remind an honored guest that he was

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born on a far north island; an artfully stuffed lobster riding an angry sea of curled waves of white radish cut paper thin with occasional small shells of carved shrimp meat tossing helplessly in the troughs. (Fisher 2006, 12)

In 2007, a 25th anniversary edition of this fascinating, illustrated book was released. The book is a primer on Japanese cooking as an art form, and it includes multiple insights into the culture. Part one explains the techniques of Japanese cooking and the basic elements of various dishes. Part two provides recipes and excellent instructions for the preparation; it is also generously illustrated with clearly explained methods. It is a basic text for readers who wish to have an informed understanding of Japanese foodways and culture from the perspective of the traditional cuisine. Elizabeth Andoh, a graduate of the Yanagihara School of Classical Cuisine in Japan, has written a book called Washoku: Recipes from the Japanese Home Kitchen (2005). An expert in Japanese food traditions and Japanese food ethos, in 1975 Andoh was invited by Gourmet magazine to write their remarkable series on traditional Japanese foods. Andoh, who chose to study and live in Japan, has written countless magazine and newspaper articles on the culture and art of Japanese foodways. In this text, Andoh develops the washoku concept by pointing out its principles of five, including color, taste, ways of preparing food, the diner’s sensory perceptions, and an outlook on cooking and dining. Writing with an emic (insider’s) perspective, she gracefully and articulately crafts her discussion of Nipponese nutritional harmony. Two books published both in English and Japanese by Kondansha International Publishing House of Tokyo address the culture and foodways of two fine Japanese restaurants. One is Japan’s Kyoto’s Kikunoi Restaurant and the other, Nobu’s, with 15 locations worldwide, including Tokyo, Hong Kong, Milan, London, and several locations in the United States, including New York, San Diego, Miami Beach, Las Vegas, Aspen, and Dallas. Kaiseki: The Exquisite Cuisine of Kyoto’s Kikunoi Restaurant (2006), is a teaching text. The author, Yoshihiro Murata, explains evolving combinations of foods and their meanings, shares intricate recipes served in the restaurants, and includes a helpful glossary. Nobu West (2007), by chefs Nobu Matsuhisa and Mark Edwards, with a preface by Robert De Niro and an introduction by Martha Stewart, is also a teaching cookbook and includes insights about evolving Japanese foodways. One of the interesting aspects of this scholarly cookbook is learning about obscure Japanese ingredients. Some of these may be difficult to find if the hope is to replicate the recipes, but there is fascinating information here about the existence and use of unusual Japanese food items that may be difficult to find in any other source. Further, the text states that some of the difficult-to-find ingredients may be found on Amazon.com. This text even includes detailed instructions for the

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Japanese bento box, the compact meal to take with you, comparable to the generic brown-bag lunch. For a further discussion of the bento box, a convenient foodways growing in popularity in the United States in part because of its frequent appearance in anime films, Bento Boxes: Japanese Meals on the Go (2001), by Naomi Kijima, contains only recipes but is beautifully illustrated. Though Americanized versions of Japanese foods continue to be popular, increased communication, travel, and immigration have afforded deeper insights and understanding about the complex, spiritual, and deeply meaningful food traditions of Japan. Another common lunch style in Japan is the ekiben (box lunch), mentioned in chapter 3. This inexpensive treat is available at train stations across Japan and features a delicious selection of fresh regional ingredients. Ekiben: The Art of the Japanese Box Lunch (1989), by Gideon Bosker, Junichi Kamekura, and Hiroshi Watanake, describes, through photography and text, the popularity and methods for creating these beautiful boxed treats.

ITALIAN CULINARY STUDIES IN THE UNITED STATES Food traditions can carry many meanings, both public and private, and when family traditions become a commodity, the deeper symbolism and meaning of the food can become ambiguous. In Lucy Long’s Culinary Tourism (2004), she states, “[T]he emotional attachment to that food item or process can be ambiguous: its value is now shaped by an audience’s response to it rather than by the memories it holds” (Long 2004, 9). Quoting Sabina Magliocco’s analysis of an Italian American festival designed by non-Italians as a tourist attraction (Magliocco 1998, 145–62), Long poses the questions, “How has tourism shaped the accepted meanings of particular foods; but also, how has it shaped foodways as a meaningful domain of experience? As foods become a commodity within the tourist marketplace, what happens to the functions and roles they may have had for their original users?” (Long 2004, 9). These are important questions in the study of foods, and Long’s excellent collection of essays delves into them. This is a vital concept when it comes to discussing contemporary scholarship about Italian food. This extraordinarily popular cuisine in the United States today reflects layers of Italian heritage and popular culture. From television shows and movies to budget tours to Tuscany, Italian is in. Since the 1940s and World War II and the return of U.S. soldiers who had learned to enjoy Italian food as they served in Italy, the taste for Italian-style food and things with Italian influence has increased decade by decade in the United States. John Taormina, a member of the family who first prepared and sold Progresso soups, said that Progresso Italian products began to enter U.S. markets in the late 1940s, and Italian food sections, at first featuring only Progresso products, began to show up

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slowly in the Winn-Dixie chain and then other supermarkets (Denker 2003, 25). For traditional Italian American families, authentic food is a centerpiece of their family bonding and continued ethnic maintenance, yet as others sample the food it is important to keep in mind: Mass producers of “Italian” sauces try to convince us that their products are genuine articles identical with the ethnic standard, when in fact there is no single taste, texture, or color uniformity in the sauces real Italian-Americans eat. (Goode, Theophano, and Curtis 1997, 68)

Susan Kalêik, in her essay “Ethnic Foodways in America: Symbol and the Performance of Identity” (1997), wrote, “Because foodways encode so much about social events and actions and the groups involved in them, specific foodways often come to be associated closely with the groups that practice them” (Kalêik 1997, 53). When we reflect on images seen in fiction and films that feature Italian Americans, from mobsters to romances, we realize that food has been a consistent presence. Bread and wine, common to the Italian table as well as to the Roman Catholic Mass, symbolizes unity and harmony with those who share the feast. Catering to Italian Americans with a desire for authentic foods, there is a shop in Providence, Rhode Island, written about by Joan Nathan, called Providence Cheese. One of the many signs posted says: “Welcome to the 19th Century, We Have No Freezer” (Nathan 1984, 280). Nathan describes her own experiences in the Italian food shops of Providence and includes another bit of information posted at Providence Cheese: “The meat products we offer you contain no nitrate, no nitrate, no phosphate; If you are Bolognese we have Bechamel; If you are Sicilian we have Caponata; If you are a Fisherman we have Clam Sauce; If you are red blooded we have meat sauce; If you are Genevese we have Pesto; If you are Neapolitan we have tomato sauce” (Nathan 1984, 280). Nathan’s scholarly book on U.S. folklife includes her research on various ethnic groups in the United States. Though it was first published in 1984, the information is still useful and informative. Another older scholarly foodways book is Elizabeth David Classics: Mediterranean Food, French Country Cooking, Summer Cooking. First published in 1950, it was reissued in 1998. With forewords by Alice Waters and James Beard, this text is, again, far more than a cookbook. It is an informed, scholarly work by Elizabeth David, one of the finest food critics and writers of the twentieth century. In the introduction to the section on Mediterranean foods, David quotes Marcel Boulestin: “It is not really an exaggeration to say that peace and happiness begin, geographically, where garlic is used in cooking” (David 1998, 5). Italian American cooks will nod in assent. Since 2000, Holly Hughes, mentioned earlier in this chapter, has published the Best Food Writing series each year. In every issue, there has been an Italian

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presence among the many well-represented ethnic groups. An early essay, but still amusing and informative, is Alex Witchel’s “Sundays with Ravioli.” In this brief entry, Witchel not only describes her own longing for the meat ravioli of her childhood, but she also offers an overview of ravioli foodways. At last, after scouring the Italian restaurants of Manhattan, she has found a restaurant that overrides her childhood memories of the specific taste and is satisfied (Witchel 2000, 294–300). Each of Hughes’s subsequent texts (2001–2006) is equally informative and entertaining. Another trend in the scholarship about Italian American foodways is the publication of specific neighborhood cookbooks from around the country. The Hill: Its History—Its Recipes (2003), by Eleanore Berra Marfisi, features the history and lore from St. Louis, Missouri’s, Italian neighborhood. To many, the Hill in St. Louis is an Italian neighborhood known for its nationally acclaimed restaurants, specialty grocery stories, “shotgun” style homes, and bakeries specializing in tiramisu and cannolis. Why was it named the Hill? When early Italian immigrants trudged back home from their back breaking jobs, they called the incline “La Montagna (the Mountain).”(Marfisi 2003, cover flap)

Another excellent Italian neighborhood text is The North End Italian Cookbook (2004) by Marguerite DiMino Buonopane, a cooking teacher and writer. With a short but excellent introduction, Buonopane opens the neighborhood doors to the reader, and every recipe included in the book is accompanied by lore. The book is also laced with excellent pictures from the early twentieth century. One more book important in the scholarship of Italian American food is John and Galini Mariani’s The Italian-American Cookbook: A Feast of Food from a Great American Cooking Tradition (2000). This text contains scholarship and lore that helps to understand the new, always dynamic Italian American cuisine. One more text to include in this reading list is The Eve of Seven Fishes: Christmas Cooking in the Peasant Tradition (2005) by Robert A. Germano. In the introduction to the book, Germano writes: The Eve of the Seven Fishes was written and contains cooking instructions generations old going back to the basic and simplistic recipes from the mountains of south central Italy. The Roman Empire, one of the first civilizations who used slaves and peasants to conquer the known world, taught the world how to cook using the simplified methods of peasant food preparation, which brings out the true flavors in Italian cooking. (Germano 2005, 1)

Germano continues his discussion with history, a regional map of Italy, photographs, and lessons in lore and history of Italian food, including proverbs. This is an excellent foodways text.

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FRENCH CULINARY STUDIES IN THE UNITED STATES Patricia B. Mitchell has published possibly the best scholarly foodways history to date about early French American settlers. The text is French Cooking in Early America (1991), and it discusses the cooking techniques and eating behaviors of the Huguenots, Cajuns, Creoles, French Canadians, and others with French ancestry. Mitchell has used primary source materials to review French cuisine in the New World in the 1500s and 1600s and its influence on American cooking. An early book that discusses French influence on U.S. cuisine is La Cuisine Française: French Cooking for Every Home Adapted to American Requirements (1893). The author of the book, François Tanty, was trained in France under the great Careme, probably the most famous nineteenth-century French chef. Tanty visited the United States in the early 1890s to help set up his two sons in business. Because he had served as chef to both Napoleon III and to the czar of Russia, he decided to write the book, with the collaboration of one of his sons, and that son also translated the book into English. The book was so popular that it was reissued in 1896 with a second volume on bread and pastry. Probably the most famous French cookbook in the United States, Mastering the Art of French Cooking was first issued in 1961 by Julia Child, Louisette Bertholle, and Simone Beck. Their book, a teaching text, culinary history, foodways collection, and recipe book, brought simplified French cooking to the U.S. public. Child made it no secret that her inspiration for the book was La Bonne Cuisine de Madame E. Saint-Anges: The Original Companion for French Home Cooking (1927). This was published only in French until 2005, when it was translated by Paul Aratow, and it now available in the United States. It is the French housewife’s equivalent of Fannie Farmer’s The Boston Cooking-School Cookbook (1990) or Irma Rombauer, Marion Rombauer Becker, and Ethan Becker’s Joy of Cooking (2006). Various types of French cooking are described in it, from la haute cuisine (the grand cuisine served in award-winning restaurants), to la cuisine bourgeoise (household cooking), la cuisine regionale (dishes prepared with local ingredients of a particular French province), and la cuisine impromptu (most typical of what Americans find on their dinner tables). The Saint-Anges book is difficult to follow, even in English, but some food writers have suggested that the text Glorious French Food (2002), by James Peterson, read in tandem with La Bonne Cuisine de Madame E. Saint-Anges, demystifies many of the complex French recipes and lore included in Saint-Anges’s text. For those readers particularly interested in Julia Child’s trademark style, the little article “La Belle France” by Julia Child with Alex Prud’homme (her grand-nephew) appeared in Holly Hughes’s Best Food Writing 2006. In it, Child describes a meal in a French restaurant that was what she calls “The most exciting meal of my life!” (Child and Prud’homme 2006, 159).

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In 1968, Time-Life Books published a book called The Cooking of Provincial France by M.F.K. Fisher. This text was published after Child’s famous book, during the period when Americans were waking up to the style and tastes of French cooking at home. The text explicates the different provinces in France and that some of the provincial names clearly relate to the foods that are most available and used there. The book is generously illustrated, shares both folklore and foodways, and includes many recipes as well as a glossary. Though to my knowledge it has not been reissued, it is available to the public through libraries or used-book sellers. In 1950, then in 1966, and again in 1998, Elizabeth David’s important Elizabeth David Classics: Mediterranean Food, French Country Cooking, Summer Cooking, as mentioned in the section on Italian cooking, has been published and reissued. “Elizabeth David’s works,” according to Alice Waters, who wrote the foreword to the new American edition in 1998, “will be indispensable for as long as there are readers who want to learn to cook with that same spirit of profound devotion and serious enjoyment” (David 1998, vii). The 1998 edition includes Mediterranean food, French country cooking, and summer cooking, and with each section and each chapter, David, who is British, contextualizes with food lore, history and amusing stories. In the introduction to the section on French country cooking, David speaks of the food of the French provinces. She wrote: “In such places the most interesting food in France is to be found, naturally, because the shopkeepers, the lawyer, the doctor, the curé, the gendarme and even those stony-faced post-office officials are exceedingly addicted to the pleasures of the table” (David 1998, 7). The book is fascinating and informative. Simple French Food (1992), by Richard Olney, is the last important text to be mentioned in this section, and, again, it is a teaching cookbook with foodways, food lore, context, and direction for home cooks around the world as well as in U.S. kitchens. From Alice Waters to James Beard, and from both professional and home cooks, there is consistent praise for Olney’s approach to French cuisine. His presentation is logical and clearly explained. Olney believed that the use of fine ingredients that are fresh and at their peak, enhanced with fresh herbs, can distinguish an excellent cook from an ordinary one. He explains carefully that dining with culinary understanding is essential to a life in which “sensuous-sensualspiritual elements are . . . intimately interwoven” (Olney 1992, 6). He expresses some disappointment in Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin’s The Physiology of Taste (2002), because it seemed to him to be more about gluttony than simple refinement in cuisine (Olney 1992, 7).

ENGLISH CULINARY STUDIES IN THE UNITED STATES Many books about English culinary history and cuisine are now available in the United States. British food has a reputation of being mainly about beef, bread,

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and dark beer, but, as is so often true, there is much more to English cuisine than the stereotypes. I will mention only four books here, but they are all available in U.S. bookstores, and the information within them paints a clear picture of British foods, scholarship, and approaches of the past and present. First is Isabella Beeton’s Essential Beeton, which was first published in 1859; the book sold 60,000 copies in less than a year. It is one of the most widely read household advice books of the nineteenth century, and it was reissued in 2004. The information in the book ranges from helpful tips on housework, hairdressing, and medical cures to several of Beeton’s own recipes. There is a dictionary of French terms, and the recipes often read more like historical accounts of the nineteenth-century British kitchen. Second, Laura Mason and Catherine Brown put together a book called Traditional Foods of Britain: A Regional Inventory (2004). The back cover of the book has a paragraph describing British foodways that is too rich in lore to omit here: It’s never easy to describe British food (apart from roast beef and sliced bread), but this book provides the building blocks of a portrait of unexpected wealth and character. Fat Rascals, Singin’ Hinnies, Sloke, Lincoln Red cattle, Dorset Horn sheep, Brecon Buff geese and Single Gloucester cheese are just a few of the components—each is given a short history and factual description—then remember those drinks from before the days of Coke and lager: Dandelion and Burdock, Horehound Beer, Vimto, Birch Wine, Black Beer, Ginger Brew and many more. This is the book for all who love British food and want to know more about it. (Mason and Brown 2004, back cover)

Third, Heston Blumenthal’s In Search of Perfection: Reinventing Kitchen Classics (2006) draws on the author’s “interviews with experts and cooks as well as using his own culinary and scientific research” (cover flap) to determine the perfect version of roast chicken and roast potatoes, pizza, steak, spaghetti Bolognese, fish and chips, bangers and mash (pork sausage and potatoes), Black Forest gateau (a cream, chocolate, and cherry cake), and treacle tart and ice cream (treacle is a golden sugar syrup). This is a treatise on ingredients, sources, history, lore, and the intricacies of each dish, and it is profusely illustrated with color photographs. Blumenthal is the chef mentioned at the beginning of this book who was fascinated with the purpose of adding salt to green beans while cooking. His quest has been molecular gastronomy; that is, what foods are so constructed molecularly to complement one another. Blumenthal is the owner of the celebrated English restaurant The Fat Duck, which was voted the world’s best restaurant in 2005 by an international panel of 500 culinary experts. Along with Ted Lister, Blumenthal has published a book with the Royal Society of Chemistry called Kitchen Chemistry (2005). It is a resource book that contains a wide range of activities dealing with the chemistry of food and cooking. Though you may not want to try the experiments, the book offers clear

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explanations about the fact that all of our foods are composed of chemicals of one type or another and that synthetic and natural chemicals are really the same. It is fascinating scholarship that opens understanding of the foods we commonly eat.

AFRICAN AMERICAN CULINARY STUDIES IN THE UNITED STATES The first African American cookbook in the United States was written in 1881 and called What Mrs. Fisher Knows about Old Southern Cooking, by Abby Fisher, and the contents of this text were discussed in chapter 2. Karen Hess, who wrote the afterword (historical notes) to the text, guesses that Fisher was about 33 years old at the end of the Civil War. At the beginning of the text, Fisher acknowledges the women who presumably helped her with recording and publishing her recipes, and she states: I concluded to bring forward a book of my knowledge—based on an experience of upwards of thirty-five years—in the art of cooking Soups, Gumbos, Terrapin Stews, Meat Stews, Baked and Roast Meats, Pastries, Pies and Biscuits, making Jellies, Pickles, Sauces, Ice-Creams and Jams, preserving Fruits, etc. The book will be found a complete instructor, so that a child can understand it and learn the art of cooking. (Fisher 1995, 3)

The text reflects the foodways of the time, most likely learned over many years in the kitchens of her white owners where the intensive labor was preformed by black women cooks (Fisher 1995, 79). It is a fascinating and informative little text only 94 pages long. The African American Heritage Cookbook: Traditional Recipes and Fond Remembrances from Alabama’s Renowned Tuskegee Institute (1996), by Carolyn Quick Tillery, was written in remembrance of Dr. Luther H. Foster, fourth president of Tuskegee Institute. Tillery has written an interesting introduction to the book, and throughout the text are commentaries that reveal the history and lore of the Tuskegee Institute and many of the people who were a part of it. It has photographs, menu suggestions, and many foodways discussions related to the various recipes. The National Council of Negro Women has been active in preserving the history and foodways of African Americans in the United States. One of their first books, published in 1958 and then released again in February 2006, is The Historical Cook Book of the American Negro (Cookery). In it are recipes, historical facts, photographs, and many personal anecdotes. The Black Family Reunion Cookbook: Recipes and Food Memories (1993) carries a comment by Dionne Warwick on its cover: “Strong families and good cooking often go hand-in-hand. This book is a

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celebration of both.” The book is rich with foodways and delightful recipes. The Black Family Dinner Quilt Cookbook: Health Conscious Recipes and Food Memories (1994) was written by Dorothy I. Height and the National Council of Negro Women, Inc. On the back cover of the book, Roland L. Freeman, president of the Group for Cultural Documentation, stated, “Quilts and food—two essential AfricanAmerican traditions that have evolved with our lives! What a delight to see a cookbook of health conscious recipes spiced up with a gallery of quilts.” These books provide an accurate and interesting picture of African American foodways and spirit and are well worth reading. Soul Food: Classic Cuisine from the Deep South (1993), by Sheila Ferguson, is brimming with foodways from cover to cover. Ferguson has included short stories, old expressions, and introductions to the recipes with interesting tidbits. Ferguson lives in England, and she is largely credited with introducing Europe to soul food. Another more recent text, A Taste of Heritage: The New African American Cuisine (2002) by chef Joe Rendall and Toni Tipton, an editor and formerly a member of the food staff of the Los Angeles Times, presents world-class recipes and tips. In this book, readers are encouraged to carefully plan their menus and use less food at meals. Written from experience and magnified by wisdom, this is a book that points to new directions in African American cuisine.

NATIVE AMERICAN CULINARY STUDIES IN THE UNITED STATES Buffalo Bird Woman’s Garden: Agriculture of the Hidatsa Indians (1987) is a remarkably informative text that reveals centuries-old Native American ways of gardening in the early United States. Anthropologist Gilbert L. Wilson transcribed interviews with Buffalo Bird Woman (born in 1839), a Hidatsa farmer-Indian of the Great Plains. The introduction, by anthropologist and ethnobotanist Jeffery R. Hanson, states, “For many white Americans and Europeans, the very idea of farmer-Indians on the Great Plains is unfamiliar. . . . These are the Village Indians of the Great Plains, sedentary farming peoples whose ancient lifeways and contributions to history and civilization have gone largely unsung” (Wilson 1987, xi). From preparing the fields to cooking the harvest, Buffalo Bird Woman shares her preferences as well: The Arikaras on this reservation have a different way of preparing and drying green corn. They make a heap of dried willows, and upon these lay the ears, green and freshly plucked, in the husk. When all is ready, they set fire to the willows, thus roasting the corn; and they often roast a great pile of corn at one time, in this way. The roasted ears are husked and shelled, and the grain dried, for storing. Corn that has been roasted in the Arikara way,

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dries much more quickly than that prepared by boiling. . . . I do not like to eat food made of this dried, roasted corn; it is dirty! (Wilson 1987, 41)

The text reveals the history of these people and many of the challenges they faced. It was an arduous way of life that is little known to most readers, and through the text, many sketches, and photographs, understanding of the lost culture is increased. Explanations of methods include following a year’s cycle; the cultivation of many different types of corn, squash, beans, sunflowers, and tobacco; as well as a chapter titled “Since White Men Came,” which explains changes that were made, including the introduction of potatoes (a native American vegetable) and iron kettles. She also shares stories, songs, and ceremonies that were practiced to ensure a bountiful harvest. This is an unusual and informative picture of ancient food-growing, storing, and cooking methods of a people that, in spite of the odds against them, “continue the struggle to balance traditional culture language, and values with the needs of late twentieth-century life” (Wilson 1987, xxiii). Anthropologist Sophie Coe’s scholarly text America’s First Cuisines (1994) reaches far back to original accounts by Europeans and Native Americans and explores the cuisines of the Aztecs, Mayas, and the Incas. This is the first pre-Columbian Latin American culinary history, and in it Coe discusses basic foodstuffs such as maize, potatoes, peanuts, tomatoes, and beans (and others foods common throughout the world today). She also discusses the preservation and preparation of these foods. Ritual practices, as well as similarities and differences between the cultures of the three early civilizations, are discussed in accessible language. Coe’s approach is cross-disciplinary and includes scholarship and insights from many fields, including archaeology, botany, zoology, medicine, history, sociology, and economics. One paragraph of this rich discussion represents both the scholarship and tone of Coe’s work: Another recourse, especially in the rainy season, was mushrooms. They were boiled, roasted, or cooked in tamales, and as we have seen they were terminologically considered meat. The hallucinogenic mushrooms were added to sacred drinks. Once again we are awed at the extent of the knowledge of their environment that the Maya possessed and the amount of perilous exploration that must have gone into the accumulation of this body of wisdom. (Coe 1994, 165)

Another Sophie Coe text, written with Michael D. Coe, is The True History of Chocolate (2006). Again, the Coe’s have produced a scholarly work that includes the history of Mesoamerica as well as the civilizations that once thrived there. The book traces the Mayan production, the European discovery, the dissemination, the waning, and ultimately the triumph of Mayan culture when

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contemporary chocolate marketeers finally began to recognize, acknowledge, and pay the original harvesters of chocolate, the Mayas. It is a fascinating story, and it reflects long struggle toward recognition and dignity of the Mayan people.

MEXICAN AMERICAN CULINARY STUDIES IN THE UNITED STATES The book Mexico–One Plate at a Time (2000), by Rick Bayless with JeanMarie Brownson and Deann Groen Bayless, is a scholarly view of the ancestral knowledge and ingredients in the regional foodways of Mexico. The book is actually a companion to the 26-part public television series Mexico–One Plate at a Time, which was designed to inform the largely uninformed U.S. public about cooking traditions and lore from the various Mexican states. Throughout the text, Bayless explains the context and use of the dish as well as folklore and customs concerning the recipe. Queso fundido, for instance, is a casserole dish that contains cheese, strips of roasted peppers, and spicy sausage. Bayless writes: Though northern Mexico, the homeland of the most famous queso fundidos, doesn’t exactly have a wintry clime, I think queso fundido is a perfect cold-weather dish. A casserole of queso fundido served before a cookout is a Mexican tradition, but serve only enough to tantalize, not satiate. (Bayless, Brownson, and Bayless 2000, 23)

Bayless has written several other texts with Brownson and Bayless, and they are all scholarly, informative, accessible, and include delicious recipes for the curious to try.

MIDDLE EASTERN AND JEWISH CULINARY STUDIES IN THE UNITED STATES Through most mosques and synagogues or community centers in the United States, individuals may purchase Middle Eastern or Jewish cookbooks that usually contain cultural information as well as recipes that have been put together by the local congregation. There are cookbooks with historical and cultural information available at most bookstores. Two of the finest, most informative, and most usable texts on Middle Eastern food traditions and Jewish American foods that I have found were written by Claudia Rodin. On the cover of Rodin’s The New Book of Middle Eastern Food (2000), it states: “The Classic Cookbook, Expanded and Updated, with New Recipes and Contemporary Variations on Old Themes.” This text is informative, entertaining, and gives a realistic picture of foodways and food heritage that have come to the

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United States from the Middle East. It is a teaching text, and nearly every page has some historical entry concerning food lore and traditions. The spread of Islam was the most important factor in the development of a gastronomy comparable to that of France and China. The death of the Prophet Muhammad in Arabia in the year 632 C.E. was followed by victorious wars waged by the followers of his faith. . . . Wherever they went with their sword, the Arabs brought their tastes and those of the countries they conquered, amalgamating and spreading the foods from one part of the empire to another. (Rodin 2000, 19)

Rodin’s The Book of Jewish Food: An Odyssey from Samarkand to New York (1999) is also fascinating in its range of both entertaining and scholarly information. In the short essay “Bagel: The Bread with the Hole,” Rodin writes: The crusty ring-shaped bagel—the word means “bracelet” in German—which was the everyday bread of the Jews in Eastern Europe, has become the most famous Jewish food in America and a standard American bread. Like hallah, it is of South German origin, but it came into its own and took its definitive form in the Polish shtetl. It was sold on the street by vendors with baskets or hanging on long sticks. Hawkers had to have a license. Illegal selling of bagels by children was common and viewed as respectable, especially by orphans helping their widowed mothers, but if they were caught by a policeman they would be beaten and their baskets, bagels, and linen cover would be taken away. (Rodin 1999, 100)

GENERIC CULINARY STUDIES IN THE UNITED STATES There are many, many food studies, scholarly cookbooks, cooking school guides, and commentaries on U.S. foodways in bookstores and libraries. Jean-François Revel commented that food writing has always been around in one form or another, “But the surest sign of a gastronomic revolution is the appearance of a great many cookbooks, as we shall see was the case during the second half of the seventeenth century and in the nineteenth century” (Revel 1982, 120). There is not room enough in this book for a complete review of scholarly foodways books written in the last twenty years, but there are a few that represent different segments of our generic U.S. demographics that may be helpful to the reader interested in a broad range of contemporary U.S. foodways. First, Michael Pollan’s book The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals (2006) has been a runaway best seller because it makes sense. He asks the fundamental question, “What should you eat?” and then discusses it intelligently with humor and dignity, with concern for both humans and animals. He describes issues relating to industrial, pastoral, and personal situations that

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are the reality of U.S. food production. Quoting Claude Lévi-Strauss’s famous statement that food must be “not only good to eat, but also good to think” (Pollan 2006, 289), Pollan poses the omnivore’s dilemma as a matter of choice. From wild mushrooms to the cereal aisle to weight-loss regimens to McDonald’s to the organic foods/conventional foods argument, he reminds his readers that we must “determine whether or not it is ethically defensible to eat meat—that is, whether meat, or any other of these things, is not only good to eat, but good to think as well” (Pollan 2006, 289). In this book, as in one of his earlier texts, The Botany of Desire: A Plant’s-Eye View of the World (2001), Pollan helps us see not only nature as it is being used and abused but also our own natures as we learn to appropriately respond to and work to preserve the precious natural resources of the earth. In the Botany text, Pollen links sweetness, beauty, intoxication, and control with four plants and develops the argument that both humans and nature should benefit from a mutual association. Both books are particularly fascinating and are also “good to think.” Sort of an applied scholarly approach, with recipes, is the text Farmer John’s Cookbook: The Real Dirt on Vegetables (2006), written by John Peterson and Angelic Organics with Leslie Littlefield Freeman. Angelic Organics is one of the largest community-supported agriculture (CSA) farms in North America. The organization provides more than 1,200 families in the Chicago area with weekly selections of vegetables and herbs. The book provides insights on foodways that include history, stories, recipes, and wholesome, sometimes ironic, humor. Farmer John writes: Electricity is modern and ancient. Physicists study it; so did Vedic seers. It zips about and tingles. Dinosaurs and vast fern forests had to rot and liquefy, then wait until we sucked them back from deep black pools, back to the surface where we pipe their spirits through the incandescent lights and Cuisinarts of the twentieth century. (Peterson, Angelic Organics, and Freeman 2006, 96)

Three more scholarly texts that should be included in this discussion are I Hear America Cooking: A Journey of Discovery from Alaska to Florida—The Cooks, the Recipes, and the Unique Flavors of Our National Cuisine (1986) by Betty Fussell. Again, this is more than a cookbook; it is a text rich with the culinary history and context of many of the foods Americans enjoy. American Eats: Forms of Edible Folk Art (1989), by William Woys Weaver, is a history of U.S. foodways and culture. In this richly illustrated text, Woys takes us on a journey through early America and illustrates it with images of food-related objects from the Museum of American Folk Art. The 1997 book Food and Culture: A Reader, edited by Carole Counihan and Penny Van Esterik, is a classic in food studies. It has been quoted earlier in this text, and the essays range from classic discussions like “Deciphering

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a Meal” by Mary Douglas, to “Beyond the Myths of Hunger” by Frances Moore Lappé and Joseph Collins. It is a handbook of seminal culinary studies. The last few texts to be mentioned here in the generic scholarship section are light and fun, but they also represent a side of U.S. foodways that is important to many citizens. Ernest Matthew Mickler’s White Trash Cooking (1985) and White Trash Cooking II (1988) have drawn friendly comments from some of the best-known food critics, cooks, and writers in the United States. Barbara Kafka, a well-known food writer, stated: “White Trash Cooking is a marvelous and genuine book—not camp—because it sees clearly, without condescension. The food goes from awful with lots of ‘oleo’ to very good. The language sings throughout” (Mickler 1985, inside front cover). These books feature foodways, cultural commentary, and recipes that many Americans have enjoyed at one time or another. The last two, Iowa’s Road Kill Cookbook: A Collection of Spurious Recipes Using Bentre Mongant (French for Belly-Up) Animals One Finds on Iowa Highways (1989), by Bruce Carlson, and Ruby Ann’s Down Home Trailer Park Cookbook (2002), by Ruby Ann Boxcar, are typical of the spirit of fun in relation to various foodways. Carlson’s book has a forward, supposedly written by Inof Splist of Prilspe, Hungary, which states: “Whatever one’s gastronomic ambitions, Iowa’s Road Kill Cookbook provides a delightful evening of reading” (Carlson 1989, 1). And of Trailer Park Cookbook, Ruby Ann Boxcar herself writes in reflection about the recipe for Kitty Chitwood’s Slut Puppies: “Deep-fried and delicious. And the leftovers can be spray-painted for darlin’ Christmas tree ornaments later” (Boxcar 2002, back cover).

CONTEMPORARY NUTRITIONAL GUIDELINES AND SCHOLARSHIP IN THE UNITED STATES At nearly every supermarket checkout lane there are magazines emblazoned with promises for the quintessentially quick weight-loss diet. Just in the last few weeks, I have seen magazine covers that advertised the 40-day weight-loss diet, the revived grapefruit diet, the last diet ever, the Hollywood diet, and countless more. Weight-loss methods have become a popular foodways in the United States (and abroad), and publishing guidelines and creating special diet foods to accompany the plans, as well as weight-loss centers and spas, have become a billion-dollar business. Even so, many Americans are simply overweight. Greg Critser, a journalist and writer, published a book called Fat Land: How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World (2004). It is an informed discussion of the epidemic of overweight and the remarkable number of cases of type 2 diabetes among U.S. children and adults. Critser includes a simple graph in the appendix adapted from the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition that visually plots the increase in availability of candy, snacks, and bakery food in the U.S.

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diet since 1968 with the increase of the body mass index. The information in the graph is remarkable, particularly when most adult Americans know that less food and more exercise simply means a smaller body (Critser 2004, 179). The surmised ideal body images of Hollywood stars, models, athletes, and the rich and famous are so constantly in the media that both teens and adults frequently feel less than okay if their bodies are not slender and toned. Most Americans who are overweight seem to want to lose pounds, but the discipline needed to do so does not seem to match with busy, productive, but often sedentary lifestyles. The simple truth is that, concerning the weight-loss challenge, the concept of instant gratification (as in search engines, cell phones, text messaging, or iPods) just does not work. In the bibliography to this book is a list, by no means exhaustive, of many scholarly and scientific weight-loss and health improvement guidelines.

GOVERNMENT AND UNIVERSITY DIETARY GUIDELINES The guidelines for the United States Department of Agriculture’s food pyramid are located on the agency’s Web site (http://www.mypyramid.gov/). The pyramid plan for recommended daily foods is pictured there with a breakdown of its meaning and how to create a personalized dietary guideline. The Web site for the Harvard School of Public Health (http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nu tritionsource/pyramids.html) offers an alternative pyramid based on research conducted there. The University of Rochester School of Medicine offers a page of links through its University Health Service (http://www.rochester.edu/uhs/ healthto pics/index.html), which provides many sources for guidelines to healthy eating.

WORKS CITED Adamson, Melitta Weiss. 1995. Food in the Middle Ages. New York: Garland. ———. 2002. Regional Cuisines in Medieval Europe: A Book of Essays. Garland Medieval Casebooks. New York: Routledge/Taylor and Francis. ———. 2004. Food in Medieval Times. Food through History. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press. Andoh, Elizabeth. 2005. Washoku: Recipes from the Japanese Home Kitchen. Berkeley, Calif.: Ten Speed Press. Athenaeus of Naucratis. 1927. The Deipnosophists (The Gastronomers), trans. Charles Burton Gulik. London: William Heinemann. Bayless, Rick, JeanMarie Brownson, and Deann Groen Bayless. 2000. Mexico–One Plate at a Time. New York: Scribner. Beeton, Isabella. 2004. Essential Beeton: Recipes and Tips from the Original Domestic Goddess. Chichester, U.S.: Summersdale.

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Benes, Peter. 1984. Foodways in the Northeast. Annual proceedings of the Dublin Seminar for New England Folklife, vol. 17. Boston: Boston University Press. Blumenthal, Heston. 2006. In Search of Perfection: Reinventing Kitchen Classics. New York: Bloomsbury. Bosker, Gideon, Junichi Kamekura, and Hiroshi Watanake. 1989. Ekiben: The Art of the Japanese Box Lunch. San Francisco: Chronicle Books. Boxcar, Ruby Ann. 2002. Ruby Ann’s Down Home Trailer Park Cookbook. New York: Citadel Press. Brillat-Savarin, Jean Anthelme. 2002. The Physiology of Taste. Mineola, N.Y.: Dover. Orig. pub. 1825. Brown, Linda Keller, and Kay Mussell, eds. 1984. Ethnic and Regional Foodways in the United States: The Performance of Group Identity. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press. Buonopane, Marguerite DiMino. 2004. The North End Italian Cookbook: More than 250 Authentic Italian Family Recipes. Guilford, Conn.: Globe Pequot Press. Camp, Charles. 1989. American Foodways: What, When, Why and How We Eat in America. Little Rock, Ark.: August House. Carlson, Bruce. 1989. Iowa’s Road Kill Cookbook: A Collection of Spurious Recipes Using Bentre Mongant (French for Belly-Up) Animals One Finds on Iowa Highways. Sioux City, Iowa: Quixote Press. Child, Julia, Louisette Bertholle, and Simone Beck. 2001. Mastering the Art of French Cooking. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. Orig. pub. 1961. Child, Julia, and Alex Prud’homme. 2006. “La Belle France.” In Best Food Writing 2006, ed. Holly Hughes. New York: Marlow. Chinese Food. 2007. “Food Quotations—Chinese Philosophers/Proverbs.” About.com. Available at: http://chinesefood.about.com/library/blquotationsch.htm. Accessed June 19, 2007. Chu, Carl. 2003. Finding Chinese Food in Los Angeles: A Guide to Regional Chinese Cuisines. Manhattan Beach, Calif.: Crossbridge. ———. 2004a. Chinese Food Finders: The Bay Area and San Francisco. Manhattan Beach, Calif.: Crossbridge. ———. 2004b. Chinese Food Finders: Los Angeles and the San Gabriel Valley. Manhattan Beach, Calif.: Crossbridge. ———. 2004c. Chinese Food Finders: New York. Manhattan Beach, Calif.: Crossbridge. Coe, Sophie D. 1994. America’s First Cuisines. Austin: University of Texas Press. Coe, Sophie D., and Michael D. Coe. 2006. The True History of Chocolate. London: Thames and Hudson. Confucius. 1999. “Analects 12:22, 17:6.” In The Analects of Confucius: A Philosophical Translation. trans. and ed. Roger Ames and Henry Rosemont Jr. New York: Ballantine. Counihan, Carole, and Penny Van Esterik, eds. 1997. Food and Culture: A Reader. New York: Routledge. Critser, Greg. 2004. Fat Land: How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World. Boston: Mariner, Houghton Mifflin. David, Elizabeth. 1998. Elizabeth David Classics: Mediterranean Food, French Country Cooking, Summer Cooking. Newton, Mass.: Biscuit Books. Orig. pub. 1950.

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Davidson, Alan. 1999. The Oxford Companion to Food. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Denker, Joel. 2003. The World on a Plate: A Tour through the History of America’s Ethnic Cuisines. Cambridge, Mass.: Westview Press. Dersin, Denise, ed. 1997. What Life Was Like at the Dawn of Democracy: Classical Athens, 525–322 BC. Richmond, Va.: Time-Life Books. Diehl, Daniel, and Mark Donnelly. 2001. Foodways and Lore, Medieval Celebrations: How to Plan for Holidays, Weddings, and Reenactment with Recipes, Customs, Decorations, Songs, Dances, and Games. Mechanicsburg, Penn.: Stackpole Books. Dorson, Richard. 1972. Folklore and Folklife: An Introduction. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. DuJunco, Mercedes. 2006. “Chaozhou, China.” In The Ethnomusicologists’ Cookbook, ed. Sean Williams. New York: Routledge, Taylor and Francis. Farmer, Fannie Merritt. 1990. The Boston Cooking-School Cookbook. Boston: Little Brown. Orig. pub. 1896. Ferguson, Sheila. 1993. Soul Food: Classic Cuisine from the Deep South. New York: Grove Press. Fisher, Abby. 1995. What Mrs. Fisher Knows about Old Southern Cooking, in facsimile, with historical notes by Karen Hess. Bedford, Mass.: Applewood Books. Orig. pub. 1881. Fisher, M.F.K. 1968. The Cooking of Provincial France. New York: Time-Life Books. ———. 2006. “Introduction.” In Japanese Cooking: A Simple Art, by Shizuo Tsuji and Yoshiki Tsuji. Tokyo: Kodansha International. Orig. pub. 1980. Frank, Matthew Gavin. 2006. “Italian Butcher Shop Blues.” Gastronomica 6 (1): 21–23. Fussell, Betty. 1986. I Hear American Cooking:A Journey of Discovery from Alaska to Florida—The Cooks, the Recipes, and the Unique Flavors of Our National Cuisine. New York: Elizabeth Sifton Books/Viking. Germano, Robert A. 2005. The Eve of Seven Fishes: Christmas Cooking in the Peasant Tradition. New York: iUniverse. Goode, Judith, Janet Theophano, and Karen Curtis. 1997. “A Framework for the Analysis of Continuity and Change in Shared Sociocultural Rules for Food Use: The Italian-American Pattern.” In Ethnic and Regional Foodways in the United States: The Performance of Group Identity, ed. Linda Keller Brown and Kay Mussell. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press. Gopnik, Adam. 2007. “Cooked Books.” The New Yorker (9 April). Available at: http:// www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2007/04/09/070409crbo_books_gopnik. Accessed April 9, 2007. Grewe, Rudolf. 2001. Libellus De Arte Coquinaria: An Early Northern Cookery Book, ed. Constance B. Hieatt. Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies. Tempe: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies. Height, Dorothy I., and the National Council of Negro Women, Inc. 1994. The Black Family Dinner Quilt Cookbook: Health Conscious Recipes and Food Memories. New York: Fireside, Simon and Schuster. Hieatt, Constance. 1988. An Ordinance of Pottage: An Edition of the 15th Century Culinary Recipes in Yale University’s MS Beinecke 163. London: Prospect Books.

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———. 1995. “Sorting through the Titles of Medieval Dishes: What Is, or Is Not, a ‘Blanc Manger.’” In Food in the Middle Ages, ed. Melitta Weiss Adamson. New York: Garland. Hieatt, Constance, Brenda Hosington, and Sharon Butler. 1996. Pleyn Delit: Medieval Cookery for Modern Cooks. 2nd ed. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Hughes, Holly, ed. 2006. Best Food Writing 2006. New York: Marlow. Humphrey, Theodore C., and Lin T. Humphrey, eds. 1988. We Gather Together: Food and Festival in American Life. Ann Arbor, Mich.: UMI Research Press. Jones, Michael Owen, Bruce Giuliano, and Roberta Krell, eds. 1983. “Foodways and Eating Habits: Directions for Research.” Special issue, Western Folklore 40. Juvenal. 1988. “Satires 3.232–248, 254–261, 268–314.” In As the Romans Did, ed. Jo-Ann Shelton. New York: Oxford University Press. Kalik, Susan. 1997. “Ethnic Foodways in America: Symbol and the Performance of Identity.” In Ethnic and Regional Foodways in the United States: The Performance of Group Identity, ed. Linda Keller Brown and Kay Mussell. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press. Kijima, Naomi. 2001. Bento Boxes: Japanese Meals on the Go, trans. Laura Driussi. Tokyo: Japanese Publications Trading Company. Kurlansky, Mark. 2002. Salt: A World History. New York: Penguin Books. Lao Tzu. 1972. Tao Te Ching, trans. Gia-Fu Feng and Jane English. New York: Vintage Books. Lévi-Strauss, Claude. 1997. “The Culinary Triangle.” In Food and Culture: A Reader, ed. Carole Counihan and Penny Van Esterick. 1997. New York: Routledge. Lister, Ted, and Heston Blumenthal. 2005. Kitchen Chemistry. London: Burlington House. Long, Lucy M. 2004. Culinary Tourism. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky. Maestro Martino of Como. 2005. The Art of Cooking: The First Modern Cookery Book, ed. Luigi Ballerini, trans. Jeremy Parzen. California Studies in Food and Culture. Irvine: University of California Press. Magliocco, Sabina. 1998. “Playing with Food: The Negotiation of Identity in the Ethnic Display Event by Italian Americans in Clinton, Indiana.” In The Taste of American Place: A Reader on Regional and Ethnic Foods, ed. Barbara G. Shortridge and James R. Shortridge, 145–61. New York: Rowman and Littlefield. Marfisi, Eleanore Berra. 2003. The Hill: Its History—Its Recipes. St. Louis: G. Bradley. Mariani, John, and Galini Mariani. 2000. The Italian-American Cookbook: A Feast of Food from a Great America Cooking Tradition. Boston: Harvard Common Press. Mason, Laura, and Catherine Brown. 2004. Traditional Foods of Britain: A Regional Inventory. Devon, U.K.: Prospect Books. Matsuhisa, Nobu, and Mark Edwards. 2007. Nobu Now. Tokyo: Kodansha International. McNeil, W. K. 1989. “Introduction.” In American Foodways: What, When, Why, and How We Eat in America, by Charles Camp. Little Rock, Ark.: August House. Mickler, Ernest Matthew. 1985. White Trash Cooking. Berkeley, Calif.: Jargon Society/Ten Speed Press. ———. 1988. White Trash Cooking II: Recipes for Gatherin’s. Berkeley, Calif.: Ten Speed Press.

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Mitchell, Patricia B. 1991. French Cooking in Early America. Chatham, Va.: Mitchell. Murata, Yoshihiro. 2006. Kaiseki: The Exquisite Cuisine of Kyoto’s Kikunoi Restaurant. Tokyo: Kodansha International. Nathan, Joan. 1984. An American Folklife Cookbook. New York: Schocken Books. National Council of Negro Women. 1993. The Black Family Reunion Cookbook: Recipes and Food Memories. New York: Fireside, Simon and Schuster. ———. 2006. The Historical Cook Book of the American Negro (Cookery). Boston: Beacon Press. Orig. pub. 1958. O’Brian, M. A. 1968. “Fled Bricrenn.” In Irish Sagas, ed. Myles Dillon. Cork, Ireland: Mercer. Olney, Richard. 1992. Simple French Food. New York: Collier Books/Macmillan. Orig. pub. 1974. ———. 2002. The French Menu Cookbook. Berkeley: Ten Speed Press. Orig. pub. 1970. Peterson, James. 2002. Glorious French Food. Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley. Peterson, John, Angelic Organics, and Leslie Littlefield Freeman. 2006. Farmer John’s Cookbook: The Real Dirt on Vegetables. Salt Lake City, Utah: Gibbs Smith. Phillips, Charles. 1999. “Questions of Heaven.” In Land of the Dragon: Chinese Myth, ed. Diana Loxley, 28–49. London: Duncan Baird Publishers. Pliny the Elder. 1950. Natural History: Vol. 18. Bread, trans. H. Rackham. London: William Heinemann Ltd. Orig. pub 1945. Pollan, Michael. 2001. The Botany of Desire: A Plant’s-Eye View of the World. New York: Random House. ———. 2006. The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. New York: Penguin Press. Reid, Daniel. 1995. A Handbook of Chinese Healing Herbs. Boulder, Colo.: Shambhala. Rendall, Joe, and Toni Tipton. 2002. A Taste of Heritage: The New African American Cuisine. Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley. Revel, Jean-François. 1982. Culture and Cuisine: A Journey through the History of Food, trans. Helen R. Lane. New York: Da Capo Press. Rodin, Claudia. 1999. The Book of Jewish Food: An Odyssey from Samarkand to New York. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. ———. 2000. The New Book of Middle Eastern Food. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. Rombauer, Irma S., Marion Rombauer Becker, and Ethan Becker. 2006. Joy of Cooking. New York: Scribner. Saint-Anges, Madame E. 2005. Le Bonne Cuisine de Madame E. Saint-Anges: The Original Companion for French Home Cooking, trans. Paul Aratow. Berkeley, Calif.: Ten Speed Press. Orig. pub. 1927. Scully, D. Eleanor, and Terence Scully. 2002. Early French Cookery: Sources, History, Original Recipes and Modern Adaptations. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Scully, Terence, ed. and trans. 1986. Chiquarts ‘On Cookery’: A Fifteenth Century Savoyard Culinary Treatise. New York: Peter Lange. ———. 1997. The Art of Cookery in the Middle Ages. Woodbridge, Suffolk, UK: Boydell Press. Shelton, Jo-Ann. 1988. As the Romans Did. New York: Oxford University Press. Tannahill, Reah. 1988. Food in History. New York. Crown.

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Tanty, François. 1893. La Cuisine Française. French Cooking for Every Home Adapted to American Requirements. Chicago: Baldwin, Ross. Tillery, Carolyn Quick. 1996. The African American Heritage Cookbook: Traditional Recipes and Fond Remembrances from Alabama’s Renowned Tuskegee Institute. New York: Citadel Press. Tsuji, Shizuo, and Yoshiki Tsuji. 2007. Japanese Cooking: A Simple Art. Tokyo: Kodansha International. Weaver, William Woys. 1989. American Eats: Forms of Edible Folk Art. New York: Harper and Row. Wilson, Gilbert L. 1987. Buffalo Bird Woman’s Garden: Agriculture of the Hidatsa Indians. St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press. Orig. pub. 1917. Wilson, Liz. 2004. “Pass the Tofu, Please: Asian Food for Aging Baby Boomers.” In Culinary Tourism,. ed. Lucy M. Long. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky. Witchel, Alex. 2000. “Sundays with Ravioli.” In Best Food Writing 2000, ed. Holly Hughes. New York: Malowe. Yoder, Don. 1972. “Folk Cookery.” In Folklore and Folklife: An Introduction, ed. Richard M. Dorson, 325–50. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Young, Grace. 2004. The Breath of a Wok: Unlocking the Spirit of Chinese Wok Cooking through Recipes and Lore. New York: Simon and Schuster. Zheng, Su. 2006. “Sichuan, China.” In The Ethnomusicologists’ Cookbook, ed. Sean Williams. New York: Routledge, Taylor and Francis.

Q Five

Contexts

T

he symbolic meanings of foods are ubiquitous, and it is understood that for most people, thoughts of food are almost like the invisible spiritual realities of myth. Like myths, our perceptions of foods can almost be a guide for life because food choices often define who we are. Humans have the capacity to remember, and foods, more than any other material item, evoke memories and feelings and identities that are both vast and individual. The discussion in this chapter begins with foodways in Asian literature from the late medieval period. Most novels from any culture or century seem to have some presence of food in them. In order to keep the discussion under control, several references to scholarly surveys of food in literature will be made. Following literature, representative foodways with symbolic meaning in both fine art and folk art will be discussed. Again, because food is such a popular subject and space in this text is limited, only a relative few examples can be given, but they will provide some insight concerning the purpose of artistic representations of foods and foodways. Keep in mind that the visual images of foods are often multilayered, just as literature, and the art from different ages may project many more meanings that we can easily understand. Drama and musical comedy are often rich with foodways examples, metaphors, and analogies. Examples will be given, and then a discussion and presentation of food-centered films will follow. Some of that information will be categorized and presented in list form simply because of the number of foodways films currently available. Finally, it is important to look at foodways in television programming, newspapers, and periodicals.

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The chapter then turns to two other important topics. First, recently published food studies with warnings about food trends and health in the context of the early twenty-first century are discussed briefly, and, finally, suggestions are offered for focused ethnographic fieldwork for students and anyone else who might benefit by tips for ethnographic research. The chapter is followed by extensive text and Web references that will be helpful for further investigation in the field of foodways.

FOODWAYS IN LITERATURE Several books are available that discuss foodways in both classic and modern fiction. These range from books that discuss the symbols and figures associated with food and foodways in ancient mythologies, to discussion of food scenes in various works of classic literature, to analysis of various literary works in terms of psychological characterizations through foods and foodways representations in the text. Though several of these survey-type texts will be briefly described in the discussion, it is important to realize how important food symbolism is in even very ancient stories. One of the most popular books in the history of Asia is Monkey, a folk novel of China by Wu Ch’êng-ên (1500–ca. 1582), translated by Arthur Waley in 1943. This text has been more recently reinterpreted and reproduced in various forms for contemporary culture. In this story, fruit (peaches) are laden with meaning and play an important part in the narrative. Monkey, the protagonist, is a terribly naughty rogue who has encounters with gods, demigods, demons, ogres, monsters, and fairies. One of the central themes in the work is Monkey’s theft of the peaches of immortality that the queen of heaven (Wang Mu), keeper of the peaches, had nurtured for thousands of years. Monkey has already pulled several pranks, and as a punishment he is assigned a minimal task of guarding the Garden of Immortal Peaches. According to the story, these magic peaches take 9,000 years to ripen. The queen had planned a banquet for all the gods in heaven to guarantee their immortality as well as to prevent them from aging. Monkey eats all of the best peaches, ruins the banquet, and then runs away, and the story continues. In Asia, particularly China, there are beliefs and superstitions attached to food, which invest various foods with deep, symbolic meanings. Peaches, for instance, represent longevity and peacefulness and are still given today as presents carrying the metaphorical meaning of peacefulness. This ancient story reveals much about the social hierarchy and structure of the time as well as highlights the symbolic nature of some of the foods. One of the more recent versions, published as a mininovel, is The Monkey King: A Superhero Tale of China (2008), retold by Aaron Shepard.

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A mixture of Monkey and contemporary Chinese American culture, with foodways lacing through the story like a seasoning, is Maxine Hong Kingston’s first novel, Tripmaster Monkey (1990), the story of a young Chinese American named Wittman Ah Sing. Set in the late 1960s, the novel shows Wittman fighting Chinese stereotypes still prevalent in the United States. Foodways are a part of those stereotypes. That Chinese foods are still largely misunderstood in the United States was brought home to one of my folklore classes when a Chinese American student wrote and shared that in his family the children learned early the differences between dumbed-down Americanized Chinese, Japanese, and Mexican food and authentic foods. Chinese food in the United States is generally misidentified and often limited to fried rice, egg rolls, orange or lemon chicken, sweet and sour pork, and fortune cookies. He said that these were not what he and his siblings were given. From our childhood, we attended family banquets where we ate course after course of authentic Chinese food. The soup was egg drop, or West Lake beef, or hot and sour, or dumpling, or even bird’s nest if you were adventurous. The banquet had mostly meat dishes, since the number of meat dishes showed how wealthy you were—just the skin from a Peking roast duck served with buns and plum sauce, the meat from the duck, a braised fish, Peking pork chops, suckling pig, lobster or crab, clams or oysters or abalone soaked in a black bean sauce, steamed scallops, fried or marinated squid and octopus. For noodles, we had a hot pot, or a house chow mein, or a house chow fun, or a house lo mein. And for desserts, hot tapioca pearls, almond jello, and . . . fresh oranges slices. In short, we grew up with a sense of real food and imitation food. (Inouye 2007, 15)

Skipping to another early culture, in the Greek and Roman mythological tradition there were many gods and goddesses associated with foodways. Certainly Demeter (or Ceres, the Roman name) was well known as the goddess of grain. Dionysus (or Bacchus), the god of wine, was also very familiar to the people of that time. The Eleusinian and Bacchic mysteries were held in their honor for perhaps as long as a thousand or more years, and though we know little about them, their legacies to our contemporary world continue. The most common breakfast food in the United States is cereal, a material object, so probably without realizing it most of us have a little encounter with the legacy of Demeter nearly every morning because her Latin name, Ceres, is the root of the word cereal. The fertility god, Dionysus, was worshiped in part because of the philosophy that was attached to his name. Part of his ethos was about individual expression of personal attitudes and desires. Under the perceived influence of Dionysus, countless wine-influenced revels occurred, but they were eventually tamed, and spontaneous self-expression was channeled into theatrical performances. Dramatic performances evoke surrogate emotional responses, and sometimes those are deep, painful, and cathartic. Further, current contact sports such as boxing,

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football, and wrestling permit controlled Dionysian aggression. Not unlike participating in the ancient revelries, observation of competitive sports vicariously alleviates, at least to some extent, assertive, and possibly destructive, impulses. So again, according to how the concepts are constructed, our context still includes ancient Greco-Roman influences. An ancient foodways object with a ubiquitous, symbolic presence in past and present cultural contexts and narratives is the humble apple. When I entered “Apple” on Books/Amazon.com just to see what would happen, 223,462 entries appeared. I scrolled down through several pages, and every listing, from fiction to nonfiction to electronics to women’s self-improvement books, had the word apple in the title. A symbol for love, marriage, springtime, youth, fertility, longevity, and sexual happiness, “Greek, Celtic and Nordic mythology all describe it as the miraculously sustaining fruit of the gods” (Tresidder 2005, 43). Heracles (Hercules) won the golden apple of immortality from the Hesperides; Aphrodite was given a golden apple of judgment by the Trojan prince Paris, and he was rewarded with the fairest mortal woman, Helen of Troy; the apple (though perhaps a fig) determined the fate of Adam of Eve; and in China, the apple is a symbol of peace. As mentioned previously, there are a number of survey texts that discuss the presence of food and foodways in classic and contemporary literature. Sean Brand has recently written and published Literary Feasts: Inspired Eating from Classic Fiction (2006). Represented in this little text are food passages from literature as far ranging in time and space as Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island to James Joyce’s Ulysses to F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. Foodways in novels by P. G. Wodehouse, Charles Dickens, Anton Chekhov, and Mark Twain and even the dinners enjoyed by James Bond are described in savory detail. Brand even includes tips for period dressing to match the meals and for preparation of the foods. Shaunda Kennedy Wenger and Janet Jensen wrote The Book Lovers Cookbook: Recipes Inspired by Celebrated Works of Literature and the Passages that Feature Them (2005). Wenger and Jensen are both chefs and avid readers always on the lookout for foodways in literature and ways to reproduce the foods. In addition to food descriptions from Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women and Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest, they have included many foods and quotations that loan foodways wisdom to their collection. Literary Feasts: Recipes from the Classics of Literature (2004) is a collection of Barbara Scrafford’s essays on food, ranging from Gustave Flaubert’s description of Madam Bovary’s wedding feast of chicken fricassee to Doc’s milkshake described in John Steinbeck’s Cannery Row. She includes foodways episodes from Gabriel García Márquez, D. H. Lawrence, and Virginia Woolf and in each essay defines the role of food in the novel. Some of Scrafford’s analyses focus on psychological implications, some explain choice and character, and others describe the vivid detail in which various foodways passages were written.

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A Feast of Words for Lovers of Food and Fiction (1996), by Ann Shapiro, is another book that is rich with food quotations. Shapiro quotes foodways passages from Barbara Pym, Charles Dickens, Colette, Doris Lessing, Thomas Hardy, and Leo Tolstoy and carefully demonstrates how important such a device is in establishing emotional pathos at particular points in a narrative. Another foodways book that has a rather unusual title is Lobscouse and the Spotted Dog: Which It’s a Gastronomic Companion to the Aubrey/Martin Novels (2000), by Patrick O’Brian. If you are familiar with the film Master and Commander (starring Russell Crowe), from the book by the same title written by O’Brian in 1970, and perhaps other Napoleonic historical novels, then you might enjoy this foodways text. In Lobscouse, O’Brian explains that spotted dog is really a pudding. His various books include mention of such nineteenth-century dishes as drowned baby, soused hog face, and James roly-poly. Fun and very interesting, this opens a window on charming British food naming.

FOODWAYS IN DRAMA Present in drama from Shakespeare to Henrik Ibsen to Tennessee Williams, scenes are often enriched by inclusion of the foodways of the time. In The Importance of Being Earnest (2005), by Oscar Wilde, foods and foodways are mentioned throughout. Act 1 alone includes “cucumber sandwiches” and “champagne” (13); “slight refreshment at five o’clock” (14); “cucumber sandwiches” (15); “a cup of tea,” “cucumber sandwiches,” “some crumpets” (21); “to dine upstairs” (22); “Ignorance is like a delicate exotic fruit; touch it and the bloom is gone” (26); “They dine with us” (27); “dinner” (30); and “A glass of sherry, Lane” (32). The level of society is cast through foodways and food vocabulary, so the audience recognizes the class represented. Musical comedies are another rich source of literary foodways. Think about the scene in Fiddler on the Roof when the parents bless the food and the family at the Friday night Sabbath table. It is a warm, rich scene that evokes not only reverence but also an understanding of the intense and sacred respect Jewish tradition holds for the family, the religious rituals, and the food. Another well-loved musical, Les Misérables, by Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schönberg, includes the song “Master of the House,” sung by the bawdy innkeeper Thénardier, his wife, and his customers. In it he sings quite a song that reveals his control and the layers of questionable quality available in the food and lodgings at his inn. It is great fun and obviously says a lot about the character of the innkeeper (quite a contrast from Tevye, the father in Fiddler on the Roof ). From melodrama to vaudeville, food scenes have played an important part in conveying the humor in thousands of situations. Who has not seen a whipped cream pie thrown at someone’s face, eggs or tomatoes tossed vigorously at some human target, or a mouthful of mashed potatoes squirted out with repugnant

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vigor? There are many more examples because we often see humor in the unexpected and unusual, and foodways, twisted just a little from their normal pattern, seem to trigger laughter in many dramatic and comedic settings. One more example of foodways that can occur in drama is the fictional naming of foods and beverages. The writers of the popular Star Trek saga, who wrote about an imagined future universe, created many interesting liquors. Synthehol, for instance, was a substitute for alcohol with no aftereffects. The potent drink blood wine (best vintage year, 2309) was high in both flavor and power; Romulan ale, another strong alcoholic beverage, was illegal in the mythic Federation.

FOODWAYS IN CULTURAL CELEBRATIONS Slipping back in time, in Alessandro Falassi’s text Time Out of Time: Essays on the Festival (1987), he defined the term festival from its Latin root, festum. There were “two terms for festive events: festum, for ‘public joy, merriment, revelry,’ and feria, meaning ‘abstinence from work in honor of the gods’” (Falassi 1987, 2). The discussion here refers to the second meaning. One of the elements described as being an important part of festival celebration was “Rites of conspicuous consumption [that] usually involve food and drink” (4). For festival celebrations, more food is usually prepared than can be consumed, and Falassi continues to explain, “Traditional meals of blessed foods are one of the most frequent and typical features of a festival, since they are a very eloquent way to represent and enjoy abundance, fertility, and prosperity” (4). Thorstein Veblen’s concept of conspicuous consumption was mentioned earlier in this book, in relation to excessive and showy abundance. In the study of medieval foods, it is clear that those who had the financial means celebrated with elaborate feasts. In Pleyn Delit: Medieval Cookery for Modern Cooks (1997), Constance Hieatt, Brenda Hosington, and Sharon Butler created “A Feast of Dishes Chaucer’s Franklin Might Have Served” (xxiv). They explain that most of these dishes, or their ingredients, were mentioned in The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer (1387), but they were careful to try to include those mentioned “in the descriptions of the Franklin and the Cook in the ‘General Prologue’” (xxv). Because of the current popularity of anachronistic groups who enjoy the lore, ambiance, and foodways of medieval times, the typical menu is included here: a brie tart, mushroom pasties, possibly a second tart of eggs and various spices such as ground saffron and cardamom, a cabbage soup (or fennel or squash soup), various fish (pike, shellfish, and perhaps a fish pudding), roast poultry with a sauce, corned beef with chestnuts, a pork tart, beans, leeks, and herb fritters, and for dessert, apple or custard tarts plain or with other fruits (xxiv). In the U.S. holiday season between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day, three major celebrations are enjoyed by many people: the Christian Christmas, the

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Jewish Hanukkah, and the African American Kwanzaa. Christmas is a celebration in honor of the birth of Jesus Christ, Hanukkah is a celebration of the victory of the Maccabees over Greek oppression thousands of years ago, and Kwanzaa, established in 1966, is an African American celebration of family, community responsibility, commerce, and self-improvement held in addition to traditional Christmas festivities. The foods associated with these celebrations are myriad, but they are traditional and important. Foods vary widely according to the national origin of Christians celebrating the Christmas holidays in the United States. Generic foods include candy canes, a variety of cookies, and eggnog, but there are specific foods anticipated in various ethnic groups. The French might expect a bûche de Noël (Christmas Yule log). It is a log-shaped cake made with sponge cake, chocolate, and butter cream. English Americans may prepare and serve fruitcake, plum pudding, and mincemeat pies, and German Americans enjoy stollens and gingerbread. Mexican Americans might enjoy handmade tamales made earlier in the month and frozen, mole poblano, and brightly colored cookies and candies. There seems to be no end to the variety of rich and diverse holiday foods found in the United States during December. The Jewish Hanukkah, celebrated for eight days beginning the 25th day of Kislev according to the Jewish calendar, celebrates the victory and freedom mentioned previously, but it also celebrates the miracle of an impossibly small amount of oil burning for eight days when the temple was rededicated after the Jewish victory. Using an eight-candle holder called a menorah, the Jewish tradition is to light one candle each night of the celebration. Many of the foodways among the Jews are ancient and traditional. Potato knishes, chicken soup with matzo balls, green salads, varied spinach dishes, potato latkes, a roast brisket with potatoes, noodle kugel, honey cake and honey balls, coconut cupcakes, and an apricot jelly roll are typical, but there are many others. Kwanzaa, with an added a to distinguish it from the Kwanza of the African motherland, is celebrated between December 26 and January 1. It is a dignified celebration, and there are specific topics to be spoken and reflected upon each day. The symbolic colors are green, representing Africa and hope; black, the color of the African race; and red, in honor of the blood shed by African ancestors. Only the finest decorations are used, and fresh fruit and vegetables are a part of the decorative displays. Many vegetable dishes are served throughout the week. There may be black-eyed peas, peanut soup, rice, okra and greens, and sweet potatoes prepared a variety of ways. Fruit salads and coconut are often present, and common beverages are green tea with mint or ginger beer. Like the Christmas and Hanukkah festivities, it is a time for renewal and hope. Throughout the U.S. calendar year, there are holidays that seem to call for various, almost stereotypical, foods: cherry pie for George Washington’s birthday, candy hearts with messages for Valentine’s day, colored eggs and Peeps

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(marshmallow chicks) for Easter (puffed in the microwave by adventuresome eaters), hot dogs on the Fourth of July, soup or stew and roasted pumpkin seeds at Halloween, turkey for Thanksgiving, and the plethora of foodways that appear during the holiday season. Certainly, none of these are by decree, nor or they universal, but they are popular foodways and enjoyed by many Americans.

FOODWAYS IN ART Fine Art In her text Making Sense of Taste: Food and Philosophy (1999), Carolyn Korsmeyer wrote a chapter called “The Visual Appetite: Representing Taste and Food.” In that chapter, Korsmeyer stated: The very shapes and colors of foods have provided decorative motifs in architecture and crafts; both sensuous properties and traditional meanings of foods furnish subject and form in the still life compositions of modern painting. Many of these paintings perpetuate the role of food depictions as decorative, pleasant and enticing; but we shall find as well that food is a powerful vehicle for the expression of that which is dangerous, terrible, and abhorrent. (Korsmeyer 1999, 147)

Visual art employs many metaphors, and these are often difficult to understand. For instance, the bitterness and horror evoked by Francisco Goya’s painting of Satan Devouring One of His Children (1820–1823), which Goya created for his own dining room in his waning years, are easier to understand when we know that he was in opposition to the strutting Napoleonic official painters. His work was often witty and satirical, and he broke with the popular tradition of mythological scenes and scenes of victory in war by depicting misery and bloodshed (Fleming 1986, 366). Nearly seventy years later, Paul Cézanne also turned from the style that was growing popular in his day. Impressionism was received well, and he enjoyed the color palette they were using, but he felt that the beauty of their work was somewhat superficial. He felt that painting should be “not only an act of the eye but also of the mind” (Fleming 1986, 408), and the balance in his painting Basket of Apples (1890–1894), using the primary forms in nature (cylinder, sphere, and cone), and of course the symbolic apple, “may be said to bridge impressionism and modern abstract painting (Fleming 1986, 409). Andy Warhol is a modern artist whose work many of us recognize. His painting of Campbell’s Soup Cans (1962) signaled the recognition that derived expressions from popular culture legitimated specific art forms, and soon pop art was recognized as a major art movement. Like Goya and Cézanne before him, Warhol searched and found his own unique style of self-expression. Warhol, who had been

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a commercial artist, used silk-screen techniques, and he produced many Campbell Soup can–themed works after the first one. The first was displayed in the 1960s, again at a time of countercultures and food revolutions in the United States.

Folk Art Clarifying the difference between fine art and folk art is a discussion that might easily fill several volumes with many perspectives and examples. Reductively, the difference may be explained as fine art usually being produced independently by one highly trained artist, and folk art usually being artistic expression representing a community. Folk art may be produced by an independent artist, but it represents that artist’s context and community. The discussion is well developed in Folk Art and Art Worlds (1992), edited by John Michael Vlach and Simon J. Bronner. There are many representations of food in folk art from around the world. Baskets, pottery, and rugs are utilitarian crafts, but they are often classified as folk art and are frequently enhanced by geometric or organic forms, including foods and animals. In the following discussion, three common items represented in folk art will be briefly discussed: honey and bees, wheat images, and fruit, including the cornucopia.

Honeybees and Folk Art The mystic quality of the bee has fascinated poets and artists since the proverbial Garden of Eden. Honey has been called the food of gods and immortals, and its celestial attributes seem to come from the golden color and the idea that the liquid nectar was gathered by sipping dew from flowers. Honey was the main source of sweetening in the ancient world, it carried medicinal qualities, and it was the basis of mead, which in many cultures was considered the ambrosia of the gods. Images of bees, then and now, symbolize many things: purity, inspiration, eloquence, God’s blessings, and industry. Artistic representations of the bee are almost countless. The honeybee appeared in relief carvings at the temple of the sun during the Fifth Dynasty in Abusir, Egypt; there is an ancient painting of men gathering honey in the Araña Cave in Valencia, Spain; the bee is represented as Vishnu, a blue bee on a lotus flower in India (where the gods Vishnu, Krishna, and Indra were called the nectar-born ones); the Greeks (among other civilizations) produced coins with a bee image; gold jewelry with the bee motif has been found in West Asia and both Western Europe, including Britain, and Eastern Europe, including Finland. Mayan and Aztec hieroglyphs include figures of bees and honey jars; and the Mormons of Utah, then and now, continue to use the bee motif in many ways as representative of productive energy and industry. Hilda M. Ransome’s scholarly text The Sacred Bee: In Ancient Times and Folklore (2004), a fascinating discussion

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Honeybee. A worker bee gathers pollen for honey making. Photos.com

of folklore, ritual, and customs involving the honeybee, also contains several hundred illustrations of honeybee-related folk representations from the ancient past.

WHEAT/CORN AS A COMMON SYMBOL OF PLENTY Grain has been a symbol of the continuity of life for thousands of years. Though grain (mainly wheat, barley, and corn) will not grow in every region of the world, humans have used it, praised it, created iconic symbols of it, created gods in its name, and continue to use it as a blessing in ceremonial rituals. From sheaves of wheat artistically arranged as symbols of the harvest in Northern Europe to wheat or palm-leaf crosses woven during the Lenten season to represent the Resurrection, grain has been the mainstay of most of the human race. “In art, the goddess Ceres (equivalent to Demeter) is crowned with ears of corn and holding a sheaf. A corn sheaf with ploughshare stands for the Age of Silver, a bound sheaf for Concord, corn and grapevines for the Christian Eucharist. Corn can also represent abundance and prosperity. It is food and seed” (Tresidder 2005, 121). The use of corn, wheat, and other grains for materials as well as motifs in folk art has been practiced since ancient times, and the practice circles the globe. In China, for instance, there is a tradition called straw empaistic or wheat-stalk painting. A kind of patchwork, it is an old folk art that emerged during the Sui and T’ang dynasties (between 500 c.e. and 1000 c.e.). The methods have been modernized, and technology has been combined with the shaving, grinding, and searing of the work. Landscapes, flowers, and animals are most commonly pictured in this ancient folk art, but other images also can be produced.

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In Poland, the sheaf of grain (snopek) is the main symbol of the season. Symbolizing food, fortune, and plenty, it primarily reminds the family of departed loved ones. This is an ancient celebration, and the sheaves are placed in the corners of the room used for Christmas Eve dinner. Wheat weaving is a folk art that symbolizes good luck, and it is so common in European cultures that it would be difficult to pinpoint an origin. The lore suggests that the last sheave of grain at harvest was to be replanted in spring; thus ensuring the continuity of the crop. In the Mayan and Aztec cultures, grain was often pictured in relief sculptures, and European settlers in North America used the grain motifs to decorate their homes in quilts, artistically arranged bouquets and wreaths of various grains, and in punched-tin designs often used as insets in furniture. There are many art galleries in the United States that feature folk art from Mexico, Central America, and South America. It is not unusual to see grains, particularly wheat, pictured in colorful paintings, painted boxes and vases, and even used as a material element in collage. Many of the artists represented in these galleries have been self-taught or trained by family and friends, and much of their work represents the colors and styles of their home villages.

FRUITS AND VEGETABLES Fruits and vegetables are other motifs often used in folk art over time and place in the world. Plum blossoms are among the four commonly used motifs in the ancient art of Asian calligraphy (the others are bamboo, orchids, and chrysanthemums). The image of the plum blossom and its fruit has been used to enhance wall hangings, textiles, and ceramics in Asia for thousands of years. The practice of decorating the exterior of homes with stencils and designs of fruits, vegetables, and small animals has been observed in much of Eastern and Northern Europe for hundreds of years, and in Early American styles (and continuing today), fruits and vegetables often appear in handmade quilts, samplers, and simple paintings. The cornucopia, often called the horn of plenty, is another image of fruits and vegetables (and often grains and flowers) that has had a popular presence for thousands of years. It represents abundance and prosperity as well as good luck and spiritual blessings. In the United States, it is particularly present around the Thanksgiving holiday in November, but it, too, has ancient roots in the Western world. Ancient associations between the horn and fertility lie behind the classical story that Zeus (the Roman Jupiter) accidentally broke off a horn of the goat that suckled him. He gave it to his nurse, Amalthea, whereupon it provided inexhaustible food and drink. (Tresidder 2005, 122)

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That little story shares only one of the surmised sources for the cornucopia; it represents, like the Finnish Sampo (chapter 3), an inexhaustible source of nourishment and is a dream, and sometimes represents fulfillment, of all humankind. One more use of fruits and vegetables, very popular in the United States nearly since the founding, is the Della Robbia–style wreaths displayed on doors and inside homes primarily during the winter months. These are varied but usually include an assortment of nourishing-looking fruits and vegetables. Sometimes they are entirely made of plaster and may be painted white, and sometimes they are created on a base of greens with fruits, vegetables, and sometimes nuts and pinecones woven in. The wreaths may be made of artificial or genuine materials, and they, too, like the cornucopia, are a reminder of the harvest and of plenty. The original Della Robbia family lived in Florence, and they were accomplished artisans of the Italian Renaissance. Luca Della Robbia (1400–1481), a well-known sculptor of marble and bronze, invented glazed (therefore durable) terra cotta that was suitable for use on the exterior of buildings. Andrea Della Robbia (1435–1525), Luca’s nephew, was also a sculptor and was prolific in his work and carried on his uncle’s tradition. His son, Giovanni (1469–1529), was also an important pottery artist in Florence, but the talented dynasty ended with him. There were many wealthy patrons in Florence at the time of the Della Robbias, including the Medici family, and they paid handsomely for artists to paint scripturally based church frescoes in the cathedrals there and to embellish the architecture of the city with sculpted decorations, including fruits and vegetables and putti (which are winged babies or cherubs). Their work can be seen in

Cornucopia. In Greek mythology, this shape symbolizes the horn of the goat that suckled Zeus, and it magically becomes full of whatever the possessor desires. In today’s world, it represents a horn of plenty. Clipart.com

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Florence today, and it has been imitated by many cultures, including ours, to the point where their fine art has moved into a folk interpretation. The common folk motifs mentioned in this section, honeybees, grains, fruits and vegetables, the cornucopia, and the natural elements of the popular Della Robbia–style wreaths, barely scratch the surface of foodways representations in folk art, but they are so common as to be found easily and recognized. From texts picturing arts and crafts of the past to the local state fair, foods have been sculpted, painted, etched, arranged, and displayed in thousands of ways.

FOODWAYS IN CONTEMPORARY CULTURE Films with Food Themes There are so many films with foodways themes available for viewing presently that to include an exhaustive list here would be out of the question. There are useful Web sites, however, that lead the researcher to specific categories of available foodways films. Certainly The Nibble (http://www.thenibble.com) is one of the most complete, with a variety of excellent annotated listings. I will include some of those here, but bear in mind that this list is only a sample of what is available on this helpful site. Under the topic of “Lists of Films by Subject,” The Nibble includes Asian Culture (Non-Chinese), Cannibalism (including Alive and The Silence of the Lambs), Chinese Culture (including Eat Drink Man Woman), Chocolate (including both family films and romance), Cooking (including Babette’s Feast, Like Water for Chocolate, Soul Food, The God of Cookery, and Tortilla Soup), Period Pieces (including Fried Green Tomatoes), Restaurants (including Big Night and Supersize Me), Spanish Culture (including Jamón, Jamón), and Wine (including A Walk in the Clouds). There are many viewers who enjoy Italian films, and one of the Italian cookbooks I used for a reference, The Italian-American Cookbook (2001) by John Mariani and Galina Mariani, listed the following: Big Night, Breaking Away, The Godfather, The Godfather: Part II, The Godfather: Part III, Lady and the Tramp, Little Rascals, Moonstruck, and Summertime. Bend It Like Beckham gives a glimpse into Asian Indian perspectives of foodways and mores, and one of the latest films I have seen, Ratatouille, is an animated quasi peek into the kitchen of a Paris bistro.

Music The Ethnomusicologists’ Cookbook (2006), edited by Sean Williams, is a unique collection of international cultural information, personal narrative, recipes with contextual information about ingredients and methods, and music. Williams states: “Who gets to proclaim one musical style or language or political system or foodway as any more authentic than any other?” (Williams 2006, 3). The

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discussion continues, explaining that many of the contributors to the volume had been born in other countries, and they realize, like Williams, that they all share a commonality, “a deep respect for the musicians with whom we work, a recognition that food and music are often conjoined in live context, and an understanding that we have much to learn from food as a signifier of identity” (3). This excellent text is an authentic representative of today’s world of foodways and culture: It is an intelligent collection from scholars who listen, think, and cook. Essays included are from Africa, East Asia, South Asia, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, South and Central America, North America, Oceania, Europe, and more. The closing paragraph from the entry on Estonia says: Estonians will be pleased and surprised that you are interested in trying the traditional dishes. Estonians are economical with their emotions, and you may not recognize from this cool manner that there is sincere appreciation for your interest. Rest assured that we will be impressed if you try blood sausage. (Holmes 2006, 251)

By the way, blood sausage is made with pig blood after the animal has been killed and bled. This is a common food in most of Europe but not in the United States. There is a great amount of blood after a pig is slaughtered, and the blood does not keep long. It is made by mixing onion, fat, seasonings, and sometimes cereal with the liquid and enclosing it in a sausage skin (or sometimes the stomach or intestine) and then roasting it. These keep for a few weeks and are grilled and eaten as a whole sausage, or they can be sliced and fried. They may also be eaten at room temperature or chilled because they are fully cooked.

Television Certainly, foodways appear in the films, situation comedies, and countless commercials on U.S. television, but the Food Network has become a favorite foodways source for many Americans. Many of the viewers do not cook, but the shows are informative and lively, so the shows have large viewing audiences. Programs like Rachel Ray’s Tasty Travels are helpful to vacationers across the nation who need and want informed tips. She also hosts $40 a Day and 30 Minute Meals. Emeril Lagasse, Bobby Flay, and Mario Batali have been with the Food Network since it began in 1993, and they continue to share their skills hosting and appearing on their own programs, but they also have been featured on Chefography. One of the most helpful features about the Food Network is its international flair. Listed are just a few of the programs that have taken Americans for an informed culinary tour: East Meets West and Ming’s Quest, with hostess Ming Tsai; Everyday Italian, hosted by Giada De Laurentiis; Jamie’s Great Italian Escape, with host Jamie Oliver; and Too Hot Tamales, hosted by Susan Feniger and Mary Sue

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Milliken. These shows, plus a lineup of others too long to include here, assure us that foodways continue to be an important topic of conversation in the United States. Cooks on the Food Network are often careful to teach nutritional values as various foods are prepared and presented to the camera. Watching, listening, and learning from highly trained culinary artists are more than simple entertainment; these artists teach an attitude toward food that may be more important than many of us realize.

Appetites, Foodways, and Warnings There are government officials, scientists, nutritionists, doctors, scholars, and even informed food writers who watch the culinary trends in the United States. As has been mentioned in several places throughout this book, many Americans, children and adults, are in trouble because of sedentary lifestyles that have lead to overweight and sometimes weight-related disease, particularly diabetes and heart disease. There is nothing particularly new about being overweight. The fashions of size have literally waxed and waned over the centuries of humankind; however, because of increased knowledge, we know how negative to good health long-term overweight can be. In The Physiology of Taste, written by Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin in 1825 (a writer and text often referred to in contemporary foodways discussions), BrillatSavarin described an encounter with an obese gentleman who approached him for advice about losing weight. Brillat-Savarin suggested that he follow a strict regimen for one month and then report back. The primary points of Brillat-Savarin’s advice were to eat rye bread, clear soup, plain vegetables, salads, meat, and fruit desserts. The inquirer was told to arise early from bed, avoid floury foods and eggs, and drink lots of seltzer water. The gentleman reported back at the end of the month, but though he had lost three pounds, he renounced the necessary sacrifices and decided to resign himself to his fate. Brillat-Savarin stated: After such a declaration, which I heard with sorrow, the end was only what it was bound to be; M. Greffulhe grew more and more corpulent, suffered all the discomforts of extreme obesity, and, at a little more than forty years of age, died from the effects of a suffocating malady to which he had become subject. (Brillat-Savarin 2002, 182)

That is a disturbing story, and it may apply to more of us than we care to admit. In Greg Critser’s Fat Land: How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World (2004), Critser wrote: By the mid-1990s the consequences of boundary-less America were everywhere apparent. Physicians in inner-city hospitals were seeing unprecedented numbers of children with type 2 diabetes. (Until then type 2 had been a disease seen almost exclusively in adults.) In

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the medical literature, obesity was declared a main cause of soaring rates of early puberty among girls as young as nine years old. Fatness also lay behind a disturbing rise in the rate of Pseudotumor cerebri, which, as its name denotes, is a brain tumor-like condition, often found in obese women. Weight-induced sleep apnea, hypertension, and arthritis of the knee were on the rise too. (Critser 2004, 109)

According to year 2000 statistics, 15.3 percent of children ages 6 through 11 and 15.5 percent of children ages 12 through 19 were overweight (Overweight and Obesity Statistics 2007). The documentary Supersize Me (2004) by Morgan Spurlock and the book Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal (2002) by Eric Schlosser are warnings to be heeded. Easily available Web sites guide individuals about healthy food choices, and it is time they are taken seriously. The United States Department of Agriculture posts guidelines on its Web site (http:www.mypyramid. gov/), and the Harvard School of Public Health posts their version of the health pyramid on its site (http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/pyramids. html). It is time that we take this information seriously so that the consequence to our lives is not the same as Brillat-Savarin’s inquirer.

FIELDWORK AND ETHNOGRAPHIC STUDIES FOR STUDENTS As stated in the introduction to this book, folklorists collect, classify, analyze, and discuss, through presentations and publications, the folkloric stories, practices, and material evidence they find. In conducting this type of research, the researcher not only learns more about various topics in U.S. culture (or other cultures), but it is sometimes revealing to discover how many interesting people and topics there are to pursue and how we, ourselves, respond to the studies. There are countless topics that may be pursued. I had one student at the University of Toledo, in Ohio, collect hiccup cures and their successes and failures. I have had a student in Utah collect Navaho folk cures (including one cure that used the juice from a black stinkbug for sore gums) and another student who lived near an international port collect maritime superstitions from deckhands (including one that prohibited women from stepping aboard just before departure). In each of the basic folkloric categories—oral, material, customary, and belief—there are thousands of topics that can be collected and studied. These can range from jokes and urban legends to family recipes to holiday customs to folk cures. Particularly helpful guidelines for putting together a focused fieldwork collection can be found in introductory folklore texts. They are usually in the back of the book along with examples. I recommend Living Folklore: An Introduction

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to the Study of People and Their Traditions by Martha C. Sims and Martine Stephens (2005). In addition to those sources, William A. Wilson’s essay, “Documenting Folklore,” in The Marrow of Human Experience: Essays on Folklore, edited by Jill Rudy (2006), is very instructive. If you choose to make tape recordings of your interviews, The Tape-Recorded Interview: A Manual for Field Workers in Folklore and Oral History, 2nd edition (1995) by Edward D. Ives is useful. Because collecting oral histories has become so popular, there have been many texts on conducting ethnographic studies published in the last few years.

Contents of the Focused Fieldwork Collection Cover: Most university archives have specific guidelines for the type of cover to be used. Table of contents: List each topic and item with an individual page number, including the consent forms. (The consent forms may be neatly numbered by hand.) Contextual essay: The length depends on your instructor, but the essay is to discuss who, what, where, why, when, and how your focused fieldwork project took place, and it must also include appropriate examples from the collection. References to other scholarly work in the same or a similar topic area as your project should be made and then acknowledged in a list of works cited at the end of the essay. Item: Each collected item should be clearly identified. The item is the nugget of information on your topic that you collect. Included should be the name of the person who contributed the item, the name of the item, some biographical information about the contributor, your name, the date, and possibly other information regarding the class that your instructor will suggest. Most focused fieldwork collections include 15 to 20 items, or more. The items may be collected from 15 different people, or several items may be contributed by just a few contributors. Appendix: The appendix includes consent forms signed by your informants in order to release the information for researchers to use. The appendix may also include copies of photographs or other materials related to the focused fieldwork project.

WORKS CITED Boublil, Alain, and Claude-Michel Schönberg. 1991. Les Misérables. New York: Alain Boublil Music Ltd. Brand, Sean. 2006. Literary Feasts: Inspired Eating from Classic Fiction. New York: Atria. Brillat-Savarin, Jean Anthelme. 2002. The Physiology of Taste. Mineola, New York. Orig. pub. 1825.

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Critser, Greg. 2004. Fat Land: How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Falassi, Alessandro, ed. 1987. “Festival: Definition and Morphology.” In Time Out of Time: Essays on the Festival. 1–10. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press. Fleming, William. 1986. Arts and Ideas. 7th ed. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. Hieatt, Constance B., Brenda Hosington, and Sharon Butler. 1997. Pleyn Delit: Medieval Cookery for Modern Cooks. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Holmes, Ramona. 2006. “Estonia.” In The Ethnomusicologists’ Cookbook: Complete Meals from Around the World. ed. Sean Williams. 251–54. New York: Routledge. Inouye, Benjamin. 2007. A Legacy of Good Food. Unpublished study for English 495: Folklore in Literature, Brigham Young University. Ives, Edward D. 1995. The Tape-Recorded Interview: A Manual for Field Workers in Folklore and Oral History. 2nd ed. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press. Kingston, Maxine Hong. 1990. Tripmaster Monkey: His Fake Book. New York: Vintage Books. Korsmeyer, Carolyn. 1999. Making Sense of Taste: Food and Philosophy. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. Mariani, John, and Galina Mariani. 2001. The Italian-American Cookbook: A Feast of Food from a Great American Cooking Tradition. Boston: Harvard Common Press. O’Brian, Patrick. 2000. Lobscouse and the Spotted Dog: Which It’s a Gastronomic Companion to the Aubrey/Martin Novels. New York: W. W. Norton. Overweight and Obesity Statistics. 2007. Obesity. Available at: http://www.obesityfocused. com/articles/. Accessed December 17, 2007. Ransome, Hilda M. 2004. The Sacred Bee: In Ancient Times and Folklore. Mineola, N.Y.: Dover. Orig. pub. 1937. Rudy, Jill Terry, ed., and William A. Wilson. 2006. The Marrow of Human Experience: Essays on Folklore. Logan: Utah State University Press. Schlosser, Eric. 2002. Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal. New York: Perennial, Harper Collins. Scrafford, Barbara. 2004. Literary Feasts: Recipes from the Classics of Literature. Denton, Tex.: iUniverse. Shapiro, Ann. 1996. A Feast of Words for Lovers of Food and Fiction. New York: W. W. Norton. Shepard, Aaron. 2008. The Monkey King: A Superhero Tale of China, Retold from The Journey to the West. Olympia, W.A.: Skyhook Press. Sims, Martha C., and Martine Stephens. 2005. Living Folklore: An Introduction to the Study of People and Their Traditions. Logan: Utah State University Press. Stern, Joseph. 1965. Fiddler on the Roof. New York: Pocket Books. Tresidder, Jack, gen. ed. 2005. The Complete Dictionary of Symbols. San Francisco: Chronicle Books. Vlach, John Michael, and Simon J. Bronner, eds. 1992. Folk Art and Art Worlds. Logan: Utah State University Press. Wenger, Shaunda Kennedy, and Janet Jensen. 2005. The Book Lovers Cookbook: Recipes Inspired by Celebrated Works of Literature and the Passages that Feature Them. New York: Ballantine Books.

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Wilde, Oscar. 2005. The Importance of Being Earnest. Cheswold, Del.: Prestwick House, Literary Touchstone Press. Orig. pub. 1919. Williams, Sean. 2006. The Ethnomusicologists’ Cookbook: Complete Meals from Around the World. New York: Routledge. Wu Ch’êng-ên. 1943. Monkey. Trans. Arthur Waley. New York: Grove Press.

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Glossary Aesthetic. Associated with beauty, sensitivity to art, and showing good taste. Agrarian. Relating to land or the ownership of land, generally of agriculture or farmers. Almanac. A yearly calendar of days, weeks, and months, with astronomical data, weather forecasting, planting dates, and short articles. Anecdotal. Evidence given that is not verified. An anecdotal comment is usually an entertaining account of some happening, usually personal or biographical. Annona.The distribution of free food in Rome as an official attempt to relieve poverty. Aphrodisiac. A substance that is said to arouse physical desire. Apocryphal. A story of doubtful authorship or authenticity. Apprentice. A person who had made a legal agreement to work for a master craftsman for a period of time, usually in order to learn the trade. Aristocracy. Government by a privileged minority or upper class, usually of inherited wealth and social status. Austere. Having a forbidding or stern look; vary plain and lacking ornament. Avocation. Something one does in addition to regular work, a hobby or pleasurable pastime. Basques. People who live in the western Pyrenees of Spain and France. Bento box. A small lunch box, usually of enameled wood, originated by the Japanese for portable lunches. Bourgeois cuisine. The type of cooking prepared by home cooks, often the mother, for the family and/or guests. Boxty. A pan-fried potato pancake originally from the Irish county of Leitrim. Bricolage. The process of transforming the meaning of objects or symbols through unconventional arrangements of unrelated things. The outcome is more important than the parts because the parts are changed through the act of creation. Buster. The stage of a crab’s development when it is soft inside and hard outside. Canterbury. A city in Kent, southeastern England, and seat of the primate of the Church of England.

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Glossary

Capitalism. An economic system in which the means of production and distribution are privately owned and operated in a competitive environment. Capsicum. A genus of pepper plants of the nightshade family. They usually have red pods and can range from hot chili peppers to sweet bell peppers. Chine. A cut of meat from an animal containing part of the backbone. Cholesterol. A solid, white substance (a crystalline sterol) found in animal fats, blood, nerve tissue, and bile. Chorizo. A highly seasoned sausage originating in Spain and then Mexico. It is flavored with garlic, paprika, and other spices. Clootie dumpling. A steamed pudding flavored with spices and black treacle, a molasses. Clout (or cloot). A piece of cloth in which a clootie dumpling is cooked. Conceptual. From concept, an idea or thought or abstract notion. Coney warren. A piece of land where rabbits are raised. Confucianism. Ethical teachings taught in China by Confucius (551–479? b.c.e.), including loyalty and devotion to parents, family, and friends. The teachings include self-restraint and dignity at all times. Covert. Hidden, disguised, or undercover. Crumpet. An unsweetened cake, small and round, poured onto and then baked on a griddle. It is usually toasted before serving. Cuisine. Prepared food from the home kitchen or from a restaurant. Cynicism. A critical, often sarcastic, perspective based on the idea that people are motivated only by selfishness. Diabetes. A disease caused by insulin deficiency. It is characterized by excessive sugar in the blood and urine, hunger, thirst, and gradual loss of weight. There are several varieties. Didactic. Used for teaching or instructing. Druid. A member of a literate and powerful class in ancient Celt society of Britain, Ireland, and France and included priests, judges, poets, and soothsayers. Durham pikelet. Similar to a crumpet and likewise cooked on a griddle, but the pikelet has a spongy, holey surface. The recipe is yeast based, and the pikelet is served toasted with butter. Ekiben box lunch. Boxed lunch of seasonal regional foods sold at Japanese train stations for the convenience of travelers. Entrepreneur. A businessperson who takes risks in various business enterprises in order to make a profit. Euphrates River. A river that flows from east-central Turkey southward through Syria and Iraq, joining the Tigris River to form the Shatt al Arab. Exorable. One who can be persuaded or moved. Explicating. To explain fully and make plain and clear. Fief. Under feudalism this was inherited land held in return for service to a liege lord. Fitched. Refers to the shape of an old-style, five-sided English meat pie sometimes prepared in autumn. Foodways. The intersection of food and culture. The folklore of foods includes elements of traditional expressive culture in relation to food stories, symbolism, trends, memory and nostalgia, practices, customs, ethnicity, as well as the material elements of the foods themselves.

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Foreshadowing. To suggest beforehand something that is to happen. Formulaic. Expressed according to a formula or system. Fresco. Painting with water-soluble colors on wet plaster. Ginseng. A forked root used as in tonics or herbal medicine. Globalization. To organize or establish something worldwide. Gosforth Gridie. Griddle cakes. Gourmet. One who is an excellent and discerning judge of fine foods and beverages. Grand or haute cuisine. Fine food prepared by highly trained chefs. Homogeneity. Similar or identical elements or parts. Iliad. An ancient epic poem describing the last events of the Trojan War, probably written by the Greek bard Homer. Incantation. The chanting of words that are believed to cast a spell or create other magical responses. Islam. The Muslim monotheistic religion founded by Muhammad in which the supreme deity is called Allah. Krishna. The second god of the Hindu trinity and incarnation of Vishnu. Lenten. Connected with Lent, the 40 weekdays from Ash Wednesday to Easter observed with fasting and repentance by many Christians. Manchurian. An individual from Manchuria, a region in northeastern China. Mandrake. A poisonous plant of the nightshade family that grows in Mediterranean areas. Marginalia. Notes or doodles in the margins of printed books. Metaphoric. A figure of speech containing an implied comparison (the curtain of the night). Millet. A small cereal grain primarily grown and used in Europe and Asia. Mole poblano. A Mexican chicken dish served with a highly seasoned chocolate sauce. Monopolize. To control or dominate something. Mosaic. An art form created by inlaying small bits of glass, stone, tile, or other tiny bits of colored material or texture in mortar. Myriad. A large number of things. Narrative. A story, tale, or an account of something. Natufian. Designates a Mesolithic culture of the Near East with evidence of pestles and sickles used in the reaping and grinding of cereals. Neolithic. An ancient cultural period characterized by stone tools, pottery, and early agrarian settlements; circa 8000 to 3500 b.c.e. Nightshade. A tropical plant also called belladonna. The nightshade family includes tobaccos, red peppers, tomatoes, potatoes, petunias, and eggplant. Northumbrian girdle cake. A type of English biscuit. Nostalgia. A longing to return to the past, sometimes with the idea that former circumstances were happier. Opine. To hold or express a strong opinion. Overland pioneers. Refers to American pioneers who crossed the continent from east to west. Overt. Open, not hidden, apparent. Paleolithic. An Old World cultural period characterized by flint, stone, and bone tools; hunting; fishing; and gathering; circa 2 million to 10,000 years b.c.e.

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Peeler. The stage of a crab’s development before the buster. Persuasive. To be convincing. Phytophthora infestans.The black fungus that destroyed the Irish potato crops in the 1800s and caused millions of people to starve to death. Poaching. Capturing game illegally, particularly when trespassing. Pomegranate. A round, red fruit full of juicy seeds encased in a red, leathery rind. Protagonist. The main character in a drama, novel, or story. Psychological. Of the mind or referring to the mind. Pungent. A sharp or acrid taste. Qur’an (or Koran). The sacred book of Islam believed to be revelations made to Muhammad by Allah. Rampion. A European bellflower, the leaves and roots of which are used in salads. Regional cuisine. Food dishes based on what is found or grown in a particular region. Replicated. To repeat or duplicate exactly. Rôtisseur. A meat chef. In France, before the French Revolution (1789–1799), meats were roasted in shops. Today there are shops, called rotisseries, where meats are roasted and sold. Ruminant animal. A cud-chewing animal such as cattle, buffalo, goat, deer, antelope, and giraffe. Rush. A plant with pliant stems and leaves that grows in wet places. Rushes are used to make baskets, ropes, mates, and other woven items. Samsara. A Hindu belief in the continuing recycling of the individual human soul until a final goal of perfection is reached. At that point, the soul is absorbed into a greater whole. Skepticism. To seriously doubt information. Spiritual. To have a mythic sense of invisible and/or nonmaterial realities. Stereotype. A perception of a person, group, or idea that allows for no critical judgment or allowances for individuality. Sui generis. Unique; no counterpart or equal. Sushi. Chinese/Japanese rice roll wrapped in seaweed and sliced. Flavored with vinegar and filled with vegetables, raw or cooked fish, or egg. Symbolic. Something that stands for or represents something else. Taboo. Prohibited or forbidden by convention or tradition. Taoism. A Chinese religion and philosophy that advocates simplicity, selflessness, and acceptance. Textile. Fabrics made by weaving or knitting. These can be machine made or handmade. Tigris River. A river flowing from east-central Turkey through Iraq, joining the Euphrates River to form the Shatt al Arab. Ubiquitous. Omnipresent; seems to be everywhere at the same time. Vernacular transmission. To pass along information by word of mouth. Vikings. Scandinavian aggressors and pirates who looted coastal Europe between about 700 and 900 c.e.

Bibliography ENCYCLOPEDIAS AND DICTIONARIES OF FOODS AND RELATED INFORMATION Blum, Daniel G. 2005. Pocket Dictionary of Ethnic Foods. Washington, DC: Word Craft. Davidson, Alan. 1999. The Oxford Companion to Food. New York: Oxford University Press. Ducasse, Alain, Didier Elena, Franck Cerutti, and Patrick Ogheard. 2007. Grande Livre de Cuisine. New York: Stewart, Tabori, and Chang. Mariani, John F. 1994. The Dictionary of American Food and Drink: More than 2,000 Definitions and Descriptions of American Classics from Caesar Salad to Cole Slaw, from Eggs Benedict to Egg Foo Young, from Hot Dogs to Heros, from Manhattans to Mint Juleps. New York: Hearst Books. Mason, Laura, and Catherine Brown. 2004. Traditional Foods of Britain: A Regional Inventory. Devon, England: Prospect Books. Palmatier, Robert A. 2000. Food: A Dictionary of Literal and Nonliteral Terms. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press. Smith, Andrew F. 2004. The Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America. 2 vols. New York: Oxford University Press. Solomon, Charmaine, and Nina Solomon. 1998. Charmaine Solomon’s Encyclopedia of Asian Food. Boston: Periplus Editions. Tresidder, Jack, gen. ed. 2005. The Complete Dictionary of Symbols. San Francisco: Chronicle Books.

DISCUSSIONS OF FOODWAYS FOUND IN CELEBRATED LITERARY WORKS Brand, Sean. 2006. Literary Feasts: Inspired Eating from Classic Fiction. New York: Atria. Grossman, Anne Chotizinoff, and Lisa Grossman Thomas. 1997. Lobscouse and Spotted Dog: Which It’s a Gastronomic Companion to the Aubrey/Maturin Novels. New York: W. W. Norton.

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Bibliography

Scrafford, Barbara. 2004. Literary Feasts: Recipes from the Classics of Literature. Denton, Tex.: iUniverse. Shapiro, Ann. 1996. A Feast of Words for Lovers of Food and Fiction. New York: W. W. Norton. Wenger, Shaunda Kennedy, and Janet Jensen. 2005. The Book Lovers Cookbook: Recipes Inspired by Celebrated Works of Literature and Passages that Feature Them. New York: Ballantine Books.

COOKBOOKS WITH FOODWAYS Beeton, Isabella. 2004. Essential Beetons: Recipes and Tips from the Original Domestic Goddess. Ed. Alistar Williams. Chichester, West Sussex, U.K.: Summersdale. Bertolli, Paul, and Alice Waters. 2006. Chez Panisse Cooking. New York: Random House. Brennan, Terrance, and Andrew Friedman. 2005. Artisanal Cooking: A Chef Shares His Passion for Handcrafting Great Meals at Home. Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley. David, Elizabeth. 2006. South Wind through the Kitchen: The Best of Elizabeth David. Comp. Jill Norman. Boston: Nonpareil. Escoffier, Butuste. 1989. The Escoffier Cookbook. New York: Crown. Orig. pub. 1941. Ferguson, Sheila. 1993. Soul Food: Classic Cuisine from the Deep South. New York: Grove Press. Fisher, Abby. 1995. What Mrs. Fisher Knows about Old Southern Cooking. A facsimile with historical notes by Karen Hess. Bedford, Mass.: Applewood Books. Orig. pub. 1881. Fisher, M.F.K. 1968. The Cooking of Provincial France. New York: Time-Life Books. Height, Dorothy I., and the National Council of Negro Women, Inc. 1994. The Black Family Dinner Quilt Cookbook: Health Conscious Recipes and Food Memories. New York: Simon and Schuster. Hieatt, Constance B., Brenda Hosington, and Sharon Butler. 1997. Pleyn Delit: Medieval Cookery for Modern Cooks. 2nd ed. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Kolpen, Jana Fayne. 1996. The Secrets of Pistoulet. New York: Stewart, Tabori, and Chang. Montagne, Prosper, and Larousse Gastronomique. 1989. Larousse Gastronomique. New York: Clarkson Potter. Orig. pub. 1969. Nathan, Joan. 1984. An American Folklife Cookbook. New York: Shocken Books. National Council of Negro Women. 2006. The Historical Cook Book of the American Negro (Cookery). Boston: Beacon Press. Orig. pub. 1958. ———. 1993. The Black Family Reunion Cookbook: Recipes and Food Memories. New York: Simon and Schuster. Ostmann, Barbara Gibbs, and Jane Bake, eds. 1984. Food Editors’ Hometown Favorites Cookbook: American Regional and Local Specialties. New York: Dial. Peterson, James. 2002. Glorious French Food: A Fresh Approach to the Classics. Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley. Peterson, John, and Angelic Organics. 2006. Farmer John’s Cookbook: The Real Dirt on Vegetables. Salt Lake City, Utah: Gibbs Smith. Rendall, Joe, and Toni Tipton. 2002. A Taste of Heritage: The New African American Cuisine. Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley.

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Roden, Claudia. 1999. The Book of Jewish Food: An Odyssey from Samarkand to New York. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. ———. 2001. The New Book of Middle Eastern Food. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. Rombauer, Irma S., Marion Rombauer Becker, and Ethan Becker. 2006. The Joy of Cooking. New York: Simon and Schuster. Tillery, Carolyn Quick. 1996. The African American Heritage Cookbook: Traditional Recipes and Fond Remembrances from Alabama’s Renowned Tuskegee Institute. New York: Citadel Press. Tilson, Jake. 2006. A Tale of 12 Kitchens: Family Cooking in Four Countries. New York: Artisan. Willen, Anne. 2007. The Country Cooking of France. San Francisco: Chronicle Books.

ETHNIC CUISINE AND FOODWAYS Bayless, Rick, JeanMarie Brownson, and Deann Groen Bayless. 2000. Mexico: One Plate at a Time. New York: Scribner. Brown, Linda Keller, and Kay Mussell. 1997. Ethnic and Regional Foodways in the United States: The Performance of Group Identity. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press. Child, Julia, Louisette Bertholle, and Simone Beck. 1961. Mastering the Art of French Cooking. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. Dasa, Adiraja. 2006. The Hare Krishna Book of Vegetarian Cooking. Los Angeles: Bhaktivedanta Book Trust. David, Elizabeth. 1998. Mediterranean Food, French Country Cooking, Summer Cooking. Newton, Mass.: Biscuit Books. Orig. pub. 1950. Denker, Joel. 2003. The World on a Plate: A Tour through the History of America’s Ethnic Cuisine. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press. Diner, Hasia R. 2002. Hungering for America: Italian, Irish and Jewish Foodways in the Age of Migration. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Germano, Robert A. 2005. The Eve of Seven Fishes: Christmas Cooking in the Peasant Tradition. New York: iUniverse. Kennedy, Diana. 2000. The Essential Cuisines of Mexico: Revised and Updated throughout with More than 30 New Recipes. New York: Clarkson Potter. Mariani, John, and Galina Mariani. 2001. The Italian-American Cookbook: A Feast of Food from a Great American Cooking Tradition. Boston: Harvard Common Press. Mehta, Shahnaz, and Joan Bravo Korenblit. 1985. Good Cooking from India: 200 Delicious, All-Natural Recipes from the Best of Indian Cuisine. New York: Gramercy. Miller, Gloria Bley. 1997. Thousand Recipe Chinese Cookbook. New York: Value Proprietary. Murata, Yoshihiro. 2006. Kaiseki: The Exquisite Cuisine of Kyoto’s Kikunoi Restaurant. Tokyo: Kodansha International. Olney, Richard. 2002. The French Menu Cookbook: The Food and Wine of France Season by Delicious Season in Beautifully Composed Menus for American Dining and Entertaining by an American Living in Paris and Provence. Berkeley, Calif.: Ten Speed Press. Orig. pub. 1970.

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———. 1992. Simple French Food. New York: Collier Books. Tsuji, Shizuo. 2006. Japanese Cooking: A Simple Art. 25th anniv. ed. Tokyo: Kodansha International.

FOOD THEORY AND PHILOSOPHY Counihan, Carol, and Penny Van Exterik, eds. 1997. Food and Culture: A Reader. New York: Routledge. Korsmeyer, Carolyn. 2002. Making Sense of Taste: Food and Philosophy. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. Lister, Ted, and Heston Blumenthal. 2005. Kitchen Chemistry. London: Royal Society of Chemistry.

FOOD HISTORY, CULTURAL STUDIES, AND FOODWAYS Belasco, Warren J. 1993. Appetite for Change: How the Counterculture Took on the Food Industry. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. Brillat-Savarin, Jean Anthelme. 2002. The Physiology of Taste. Mineola, N.Y.: Dover. Orig. pub. 1825. Confucius. 1998. The Analects of Confucius: A Philosophical Translation. Trans. Roger T. Ames and Henry Rosemont Jr. New York: Ballantine Books. Counihan, Carole, and Penny Van Esterik, eds. 1997. Food and Culture: A Reader. New York: Routledge. Critser, Greg. 2004. Fat Land: How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World. New York: Houghton Mifflin. Harris, Marvin. 1980. Cultural Materialism: The Struggle for a Science of Culture. New York: Vintage Books. Kass, Leon R. 1999. The Hungry Soul: Eating and the Perfecting of Our Nature. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Long, Lucy M., ed. 2004. Culinary Tourism. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky. Mintz, Sidney W. 1996. Tasting Food, Tasting Freedom: Excursions into Eating, Culture, and the Past. Boston: Beacon Press. Mitchell, Patricia B. 2005. French Cooking in Early America. Chatham, Va.: Mitchells. Okakura, Kakuzo. 1993. The Book of Tea. Boston: Shambhala. Pool, Daniel. 1993. What Jane Austin Ate and Charles Dickens Knew: From Fox Hunting to Whist—The Facts of Daily Life in 19th-Century England. New York: Simon and Schuster. Ransome, Hilda M. 2004. The Sacred Bee in Ancient Times and Folklore. Mineola, N.Y.: Dover. Orig. pub. 1937. Revel, Jean-François. 1982. Culture and Cuisine: A Journey through the History of Food. New York: Doubleday. Schenone, Laura. 2003. A Thousand Years over a Hot Stove: A History of American Women Told through Food, Recipes, and Remembrances. New York: W. W. Norton. Schlosser, Eric. 2001. Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal. New York: Houghton Mifflin.

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Sinclair, Upton. 2003. The Jungle: The Uncensored Original Edition. Tucson, Ariz.: See Sharp Press. Orig. pub. 1906. Tannahill, Reay. 1988. Food in History. New York: Crown.

JOURNALISTIC FOOD WRITING Hughes, Holly. 2000. Best Food Writing, 2000. New York: Marlow. ———. 2001. Best Food Writing, 2001. New York: Marlow. ———. 2002. Best Food Writing, 2002. New York: Marlow. ———. 2003. Best Food Writing, 2003. New York: Marlow. ———. 2004. Best Food Writing, 2004. New York: Marlow. ———. 2005. Best Food Writing, 2005. New York: Marlow. ———. 2006. Best Food Writing, 2006. New York: Marlow.

NONFICTION FOOD MEMOIRS Ehrlich, Elizabeth. 1997. Miriam’s Kitchen: A Memoir. New York: Penguin Books. Fisher, M.F.K. 1943. The Gastronomical Me. New York: North Point Press. Guiliano, Mireille. 2005. French Women Don’t Get Fat. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. Kingsolver, Barbara, Steven L. Hopp, and Camille Kingsolver. 2007. Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life. New York: HarperCollins. Mones, Nicole. 2007. The Last Chinese Chef. New York: Houghton Mifflin. Reichl, Ruth. 1999. Tender at the Bone: Growing Up at the Table. New York: Broadway Books.

A SAMPLING OF CONTEMPORARY NOVELS WITH FOOD ELEMENTS (Amazon.com listed 6,625 novels when I requested “Food Novels—Fiction.”) Alexander, Lloyd. 1990. The Black Caldron. New York: Bantam Doubleday Dell Books for Young Readers. Ashenhurst, Noah. 2005. Comfort Food: A Novel. Shelton, WA: Old Meadow. Brookshire, LaJoyce. 1997. Soul Food. New York: HarperTorch. Butler, Octavia E. 2003. Kindred. Boston: Beacon Press. Divakaruni, Chitra Banerjee. 1997. The Mistress of Spices. New York: Anchor Books. Esquirel, Laura. 1992. Like Water for Chocolate: A Novel in Monthly Installments with Recipes, Romances, and Home Remedies. New York: Doubleday. Harris, Joanne. 2000. Chocolate. New York: Penguin. Hurston, Zora Neale. 1978. Their Eyes Were Watching God. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. Kidd, Sue Monk. 2002. The Secret Life of Bees. New York: Penguin Books. Kingston, Maxine Hong. 1990. Tripmaster Monkey His Fake Book. New York: Vintage Books. Lowry, Malcolm. 2000. Under the Volcano. New York: Penguin Putnam. Orig. pub. 1947.

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Bibliography

Marshall, Paule. 1983. Praisesong for the Widow. New York: PLUME. Naylor, Gloria. 1993. Mama Day. New York: Random House. Reichl, Ruth. 1999. Tender at the Bone: Growing Up at the Table. New York: First Broadway Books. Walker, Alice. 1982. The Color Purple. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.

WEIGHT LOSS GUIDELINES AND TEXTS Agatston, Arthur. 2003. The South Beach Diet: The Delicious, Doctor Designed, Foolproof Plan for Fast and Healthy Weight Loss. New York: St. Martin’s Griffin. Atkins, Robert C. 2003. Dr. Atkins’s New Diet Revolution. Rev. ed. New York: M. Evans. Brand-Miller, Jennie, Thomas M. S., Wolever, Kaye Foster-Powell, and Stephen Colagiuri. 2006. The New Glucose Revolution: The Authoritative Guide to the Glycemic Index, the Dietary Solution for Lifelong Health. New York: Marlow. D’Adamo, Peter D. 2002. Eat Right for Your Type Complete Blood Type Encyclopedia. With Catherine Whitney. New York: Riverside Books. Guiliano, Mireille. 2005. French Women Don’t Get Fat. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. Guttersen, Connie. 2005. The Sonoma Diet. Des Moines, Iowa: Meredith Books. Miller-Kovach, Karen. 2005. Weight Watchers Family Power: 5 Simple Rules for a Healthy-Weight Home. Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley. Perricone, Nicholas. 2002. The Perricone Prescription: A Physician’s 28-Day Program for Total Body and Face Rejuvenation. New York: Harper Resource/HarperCollins. Pescatore, Fred. 2004. The Hampton Diets: Diet Secrets of the Rich, Famous, and Thin. Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley. Roizen, Michael F., and John La Puma. 2003. Cooking the Real Age Way. New York: HarperCollins. Sarah, the Duchess of York, and Weight Watchers. 2003. Dining and Dieting with the Duchess: Secrets and Tips for a Healthful New Lifestyle. New York: Barnes and Noble Books. Sears, Barry, and Bill Lawren. 1999. The Zone: A Dietary Road Map. New York: Regan Books. Steward, H., Leighton, Morrison C., Bethea, Sam S., Andrews, and Luis A. Balart. 2003. The New Sugar Busters: Cut Sugar to Trim Fat. New York: Ballantine Books. Stroot, Michel. 2003. The Golden Door Cooks Light and Easy: Delicious Recipes from America’s Premier Spa. Layton, Utah: Gibbs Smith.

WEB RESOURCES Introduction A vast amount of food information resides on the Internet, although—as is the case with a dynamic topic such as foodways—some of the information is questionable. New material is added daily, and some sites change their addresses or disappear altogether. Using the search engines as a directory, rather than for primary

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research, will eliminate the disappointment and frustration that comes with researching on the ever-mercurial Internet.

Search Engines The most effective search engine I use is Metacrawler (http://www.metacrawler. com). Nearly any noun, topic, or combination of words typed into the window will result in a useful list of sites. Metacrawler is user friendly in that it will often search for the topic even if the initial request is slightly misspelled. The following list includes several other search engines that have proved dependable and are easily accessible: Google (http://www.google.com) All the Web (http://alltheweb.com) Alta Vista (http://altavista.org) DMOZ (http://dmoz.org) Excite (http://www.excite.com) Lycos (http://www.lycos.com) Teoma (http://www.teoma.com) Webcrawler (http://www.webcrawler.com) WiseNut (http://www.wisenut.com) Yahoo! (http://www.yahoo.com)

Encyclopedias and General Reference Works British Broadcasting Corporation Online Food Glossary. http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/ glossary/ Encarta Online (http://encarta.msn.com/). Food Dictionaries and Encyclopedia Food and Nutrition Information Center. Encyclopaedia Britannica (http://info.britannica.com/). Especially written for elementary and high school students. Encyclopedia Smithsonian (http://www.si.edu/Encyclopedia_SI/). Links to online Smithsonian Resources and Answers to Food and other topics. Glossaries and Dictionaries by Encyberpedia (http//:www.encyberpedia.com/glossary. htm). Food Glossary, Interactive. USDA National Agricultural Library Food Dictionaries and Encyclopedia (http://riley. nal.usda.gov/nal_display/index.php?info_center=8&tax_level=1&tax_subject=2).

Research Libraries Food Resource (http://food.oregonstate.edu/ref/book.html). Journals and Encyclopedia of Food and Food-Related Topics Internet Public Library (http://www.ipl.org/div/subject/browse/ent30.00.00/). Encyclopedias and foods by topic.

186

Bibliography

Online Bibliographies Bibliography on Feasts and Festivals (http://lilt.ilstru.edu/rtdirks.FEAST.html). Bibliography of Food and Culture (http://www.utexas.edu/courses/stross/bibliographies/ foodbib.htm). Food Web References on Food (http://www.fatfree.com/foodweb/ref.html). Short list on specific items. World Food Habits Bibliography (http://lilt.ilstu.edu/rtdirks/).

Online Museums The Chocolate Museum (http://www.choco-story.be). Culinary Archives and Museum (http://www.culinary.org). Food Museum Weblog (http://www.foodmuseum.typepad.com). Potato Museum (http://www.potatomuseum.com). Southern Food and Beverage Museum (http://www.southernfood.org/index.php).

General Food Sites and Links About McDonald’s (http://www.mcspotlight.org). History and discussion of McDonald’s fast-food chain. Association for the Study of Food and Society (ASFS) (http://foodculture.org/). Ethnic Cuisine (http://www.sallys-place.com/food/cuisines/ethnic_cuisine.htm). Culinary journalism with historical dimensions. Food Timeline (http://www.foodtimeline.org). A chronological listing of food products, recipes, and links. Research Centre for the History of Food and Drink (http://arts.adelaide.edu.au/ centrefooddrink). Bibliography, publications, colloquia, workshops, and links.

Sites Dedicated to Food Pictures and Films Food-Image.com (http://www.food-image.com/). Food Pictures and Photos (http://www.fabfoodpix.com/). StockFood (http://stockfood.com). Links to Movies and Documentaries (http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~russell/fall03/food films.html). The Nibble (http://thenibble.com). This provides a categorized list as well as annotations on many of the films listed.

Listings of Food Novels and Writing Culinary Media Network: Home of the Gilded Fork (http:/www.gildedfork.com/). Various essays and writings on food. Delicious Evil: Food Mystery Novels. (http://www.springfieldlibrary.org/reading/delici ousevil.html). List of food mystery novels.

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Food Reference Website (http://www.foodreference.com). Links to lists of food novels and quotations. Roadfood (http://www.roadfood.com). Links to lists of food novels and discussion.

For Teachers and Students Agriculture in the Classroom. (http://www.extension.usu.edu/aitc/). 75 Resources for food studies and teaching. Cheese! (http://library.thinkquest.org/5417). Culinary Institute of America Culinary Dictionary (http://www.ciakids.com.forkids/ dictionary/dictionary_a.html). Cultural and Ethnic Food and Nutrition Education Materials: A Resource List for Educators (http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/pubs/bibs/gen/ethnic.html#12). Dying to be Thin (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/thin/). Eatsmart.org (http://www.eatsmart.org/). Food pyramid and portions. Nutrition on the Web for Teens (http://www.library.thinkquest.org/10991). Weird Foods from around the World (http://www.weird-food.com/).

Newsletters and Journals Anthropology of Food (e-zine, France, 2004) (http://www.aof.revues.org). Appetite (http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/homepage.cws_home). Association for the Study of Food and Society (http://food-culture.org/FCS.html). Food and Foodways (http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/titles/07409710.asp). Food and History (http://www.iehca.eu/publication_02.html). Food History News newsletter (http://foodhistorynews.com). Gastronomica: The Journal of Food and Culture (http://www.gastronomica.org).

World and Foreign-Language Foods Sites Cuisines of the World (http://www.cookbookwiki.com/Cuisines_of_the_World). European Network of Regional Culinary Heritage (http://www.culinary-heritage.com). International Commission for the Research into European Food History (http://www. vub.ac.be/SGES/ICREFH.html) World on a Plate (http://www.globalgourmet.com/destinations/).

Food Links around the World Africa (http://www.cbel.com/african_recipes/). Asia (http://www.asiafood.org/). Australia (http://www.arts.adelaide.edu.au/centrefooddrink/). Austria (http://www.virtualvienna.net/community/modules.php?). Belgium (http://www.belgianfries.com). Brazil (http://www.archaeolink.com/brazilian_cooking_anthropology_o.htm). Bulgaria (http://altours-bg.com/Altours_files/cuisine.htm).

188

Bibliography

Cameroon (http://www.cookbookwiki.com/Cameroon). China (http://www.archaeolink.com/china_cooking_anthropology_of_fo.htm). Very rich data, constructed by R. Parkinson. Estonia (http://www.einst.ee/publications/cuisine/index.html). Estonian Agricultural Museum, near Tartu. Ethiopia (http://www.ethiopiantreasures.toucansurf.com/pages/festival.htm). Finland (http://www.finfood.fi/tasteoffinland). France (http://www.lemangeur-ocha.com). Germany (http://www.germanculture.com.ua/library/links/food.htm). Greece (http://www.gourmed.gr). Italy (http://www.pastainmuseum.com). Latin America (http://www.cocamuseum.com/htm/historycoca.htm). Latvia (http://www.li.lv). Middle East (http://www.knowledgehound.com/topics/middleer.htm). “In Mama’s Kitchen,” by E. Moore. Morocco (http://www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuisine_of_Morocco). Nepal (http://www.globalgourmet.com/destinations/nepal). Norway (http://www.cyberclip.com/Katrine/NorwayInfo/Mat/). Poland (http://www.polskiinternet.com/english/info/1food.html). Romania (http://www.members.aol.com/simonagscu/recipes.html). Russia (http://www.archaeolink.com/russia_cooking _anthropology_of_f.htm). Slovenia (http://www.answers.com/topic/slovenia). Spain (http://www.arrakis.es/~jols/tapas/historin.html). Sweden (http://www.archaeolink.com/sweden_cooking_anthropology_of_f.htm). Turkey (http://www.kultur.gov.tr). Go to “Culture,” then to “Culinary Culture.” United Kingdom (http://www.oxfordsymposium.org.uk/). United States (http://www.whatscookingamerica.net/History/HistoryIndex.htm). DMOZ (Open Directory Project) (http://www.dmoz.org). There are links listed for cooking and foods, ethnic and regional topics, health, home and garden, and other topics that related to foodways. The language list is long, but the information can be accessed in Arabic, Basque, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Farsi, Finnish, French, German, Hebrew, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Swedish, Turkish, Esperanto, and more.

Index American Eats: Forms of Edible Folk Art, 147 American Folklore Society, 122 American Foodways: What, When, Why, and How We Eat in America, 121, 122 American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 148 American West, 41 America’s First Cuisines, 144 Ammole, 67 The Amphictyons, 127 Analects, 125 Ancient foodways, 122, 158 Ancient writings, 123 Andoh, Elizabeth, 135 Anecdotes, 142 Annona, 11 An Ordinance of Pottage: An Edition of the 15th Century Culinary Recipes in Yale University’s MS Beinecke 163, 130 Anthimus, 130 Aphrodisiac, 16 Aphrodite, 158 Apicus, 128 Apocryphal, 19

Acadian, 106 Achilles, 10 Adamson, Melitta Weiss, 131 Aestheticism, 8 African American foodways: Abby Fisher, 40; Black Family Reunion Celebrations, 72; bourgeois cuisine, 33 –34, 39 – 40; caldrons, 73 –75; The Color Purple, 71–72; culinary studies of, 142– 43; gumbo, 73; Kwanzaa, 161; Sidney W. Mintz, 70 –71; slavery, 70 –71; soul food, 71; Tuskegee Institute, 71 African American Heritage Cookbook: Traditional Recipes and Fond Remembrances from Alabama’s Renowned Tuskegee Institute, 71, 142 Agrarian, 6 Ahti, 87 Alcott, Louisa May, 158 Algonquin tribes, 64 “Alice in Wonderland,” 2 All Souls’ Day, 86 Almanac, 46 Amazon.com, 135, 158 American Chinese takeout, 132

189

190 Appetite for Change: How the Counterculture Took On the Food Industry, 51, 112 Appetite for Life: The Biography of Julia Child, 50 Apples, 158 Appliances, electrical, 49 Apprentice, 23 Aratow, Paul, 139 Arden, Edward, 19 Aristocracy, 18, 21, 37 Aristotle, 126 Aromatic fumigations, 19 Art, 162– 64 The Art of Cookery in the Middle Ages, 131 The Art of Cooking: The First Modern Cookery Book, 131 Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, 101 Asian foodways, 126 Athenaeus, 127 Augustus, Romulus, 12 Austen, Jane, 25 Austere, 12, 13 Baker-Roshi, Zentatsu, 113 Ballerinim, Luigi, 131 Bareham, Lindsey, 76 Basket of Apples, 162 Basques, 15, 44, 48, 68 Batali, Mario, 168 Bayless, Deann Groen, 145 Bayless, Rick, 145 Beard, James, 137, 140 Bechamel, 137 Beck, Simone, 50, 139 Becker, Ethan, 139 Becker, Marion Rombauer, 123, 139 Becket, Thomas, 14 Beeton, Isabella, 141 Belasco, Warren J., 51, 112 Belief customs, 5

Index Bender, Barbara, 6 Bend It Like Beckham, 167 Benedictine Rule, 13 Benes, Peter, 122 Bento box, 111, 136 Bento Boxes: Japanese Meals on the Go, 136 Beowulf, 12 Berra, Yogi, 89 Bertholle, Louisette, 50, 139 Best Food Writing series, 122, 137–38, 139 Bethune, Mary McLeod, 72 Bethune-Cookman College, 72 Beverages, 26 –29 Bhagavad Gita, 10 Bible, 10 Big Night, 167 Black Family Dinner Quilt Cookbook: Health Conscious Recipes and Food Memories, 72, 143 Black Family Reunion Celebrations, 72 Black Family Reunion Cookbook: Recipes and Food Memories from the National Council of Negro Women, 34, 72, 142 Black Forest Bakery, 76 Black Sea, 128 Blumenthal, Heston, 30, 141 Bond, James, 158 The Book Lovers Cookbook: Recipes Inspired by Celebrated Works of Literature and the Passages that Feature Them, 158 Book of Jewish Food: An Odyssey from Samarkand to New York, 146 The Book of Tea, 100 Bosker, Gideon, 136 The Boston Cooking-School Cookbook, 139 Boston Museum of Fine Arts, 26, 100 Boston’s Federated Jewish Charities, 83 Botany of Desire: A Plants-Eye View of the World, 147 Boublil, Alain, 159 Boulestin, Marcel, 137

Index Bourgeois cuisine: Abby Fisher, 40; African American foodways, 33 –34, 39 – 40; canneries, 39; Caroline Gilman, 36 –37; cookbooks, 38, 40; defined, 22; economic stratification, 35; hamburgers, 42– 43; hearth, outdoor, 31; hot dogs, 42– 43; ice cream, 43; immigrants, 40 – 42; importation, 33; pioneers, 34 –35; rich vs. poor, 32, 38; slavery, 33 –34, 38; social class, 36; soul foods, 34 Boxcar, Ruby Ann, 148 Boxty, 79 Brand, Sean, 158 Breakfast, 25–26 Breaking Away, 167 The Breath of a Wok: Unlocking the Spirit of Chinese Wok Cooking through Recipes and Lore, 133 Bricolage, 70 Brillat-Savarin, Jean Anthelme, 21, 27, 29, 140, 169 British foodways, 141 Bronner, Simon J., 81, 163 Brown, Catherine, 76, 141 Brown, Edward Espe, 51, 113 Brown, Linda Keller, 122 Brown, Mayme L., 72 Brown, William J., 33 Brownson, JeanMarie, 145 Brühwurst, 42 Buck, Jack, 89 Buddhism, 9 Buffalo Bird Woman, 66, 143 Buffalo Bird Woman’s Garden: Agriculture of the Hidatsa Indians, 143 Buonopane, Marguerite DiMino, 138 Burger King, 109 Buster, 107 Butler, Octavia E., 33 Butler, Sharon, 130, 160

191 Cajun cooking, 106 –7 Cajun popcorn, 106 –7 Caldrons, 73 –75 California cuisine, 112 California Rice Commission (CRC), 101 California roll, 101 Camp, Charles, 121–22 Campbell’s Soup Cans, 162 “Canal boys,” 77 Canneries, 39 Cannery Row, 158 Canterbury, 14, 15, 160 Canterbury Tales, 160 Cape Cod, 68 Capitalism, 53 Caponata, 137 Capsicum, 16 Careme, 139 Car Hops and Curb Service, 48 Caribbean cuisine, 70 Carlson, Bruce, 148 Carson, Rachel, 51, 111 Carver, George Washington, 71 Casey, Marion, 78 Çatalhöyük, 6 Cattle, 7 Celtic feasts, 129 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 114 Ceres, 164 Cézanne, Paul, 162 Chang (Chinese goddess), 99 Ch’a su, 100 Chaucer, Geoffrey, 160 Cheddar cheese, 75 Cheerios, 5 Chefography, 168 Chekhov, Anton, 158 Ch’êng-ên, Wu, 156 Cheshire, 75 Chez Panisse, 51, 52, 111

192 Chicken soup, 84 Child, Julia, 50 –51, 122–23, 139 Chine, 11 Chinese American foodways: apples, 158; capsicum, 16; Chinese takeout food, 132; chopsticks, 98; culinary studies of, 132–34; food, history of, 8 –9; food lore, 123; fortune cookies, 98, 99; Ginseng, 69; Golden Gate Fortune Cookie Factory, 99; immigrants, 96 –97; literature, 157; Monkey, 156; mooncakes, 98 –99; multicourse meals, 96; Polynesian-style restaurants, 50; regions of, 95 –96; sensory aesthetics, 96; Silk Road, 8; straw empaistic, 164; tea, 99 –100; tofu, 115; wok, 133 Chinese Food Finders: Los Angeles and the San Gabriel Valley, 134 Chinese takeout, 132 Chinese Taoism, 9 Chiquarts ‘On Cookery’: A Fifteenth Century Savoyard Culinary Treatise, 131 Cholesterol, 11, 115 Chopsticks, 9, 98, 100 Chorizo, 75 Christian Christmas, 160 A Christmas Story, 1 Christmas Yule log, 161 Chu, Carl, 134 Church suppers, 59, 102, 107 Cistercians, 13 Clam Sauce, 137 Classical cuisine, 135 Clemens, Samuel, 41 Clinton, Bill, 110 Cloot, 20 Clootie dumpling, 20 Clout, 20 Coca Cola, 109 Cod, 68 Cod, fried, 68

Index Coe, Michael D., 144 Coe, Sophie, 144 Coffeehouses, 22 Colette, 159 Collins, Joseph, 148 Colombosians, 91 Colombo Yogurt, 91 The Color Purple, 71–72 Columbus, Christopher, 15 –16 Community-supported agriculture (CSA), 147 Conceptualism, 2 Coney warren, 19 Confucianism, 9, 98, 124 Confucius, 9, 96, 97, 125 Conspicuous consumption, 160 Contemporary culture, 167–70 Contemporary foodways, 122, 132, 169 Convenience foods, 53 Cookbooks, 38, 40 The Cooking of Provincial France, 140 Cork, 20 Corn, 62– 63, 164 – 65 Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine, 114 Cornucopia, 166 Counihan, Carole, 147 Counterculture climate, 111–12 Court cuisine, 18 “Crabs and Church Suppers in Southern Maryland,” 107 Cradle of civilization, 7 Crayfish, 106 –7 Critser, Greg, 148, 169 Crumpet, 21 Cuisine: américaine, 42; bourgeois, 30 – 43; grand or haute, 25 –30; regional and ethnic, 43 –55. See also specific types Culinary studies: African American, 142– 43; Chinese, 132–34; English, 140 – 42; French, 139 – 40; generic,

Index 146 – 48; Italian, 136 –38; Japanese, 134 –36; Jewish, 145 – 46; Mexican American, 145; Middle Eastern, 145 – 46; Native American, 143 – 45 Culinary Tourism, 102, 136 “The Culinary Triangle,” 126 Cultural celebrations, 160 – 62 Culture and Cuisine: A Journey through the History of Food, 22, 95 Customary lore, 4 Cynicism, 22 Dairy products, 75 –76 Dark Ages: Christopher Columbus, 15 –16; fiefs, 12; folkloric sign language, 13; monasteries, 12–13; peasants, 13 –14, 15; tomatoes, 16 –17 David, Elizabeth, 137, 140 Davidson, Alan, 42, 82, 130 da Vinci, Leonardo, 18 Davis, Adelle, 51, 111 Day of the Dead, 86 The Deipnosophists, 127 De Laurentiis, Giada, 168 Delmonico’s Restaurant, 32 Demeter, myth of, 2, 157 De Niro, Robert, 135 Denker, Joel, 82, 84, 89, 91 De Pensey, Henrion, 21 Di, Huang, 123 Diabetes, 11, 53, 72, 148 Dickens, Charles, 25, 158, 159 The Dictionary of American Food and Drink, 43, 71, 80 Didactic, 90 Diehl, Daniel, 131 Dietary guidelines, government and universities, 149 Diet for a Small Planet, 111 Digest: An Interdisciplinary Study of Food and Foodways, 122

193 Diner, Hasia R., 77 Dinner, 29 “The Dinner of the Savants,” 127 Dinner parties, 29 Dionysus, 157–58 Donnelly, Mark, 131 Don the Beachcomber, 50 Dorson, Richard, 121 Douglas, Mary, 148 Doyle, Larry, 79 Drake, Sir Francis, 63 Drama, 159 – 60 Drive-in restaurant, 48 DuJunco, Mercedes, 132 Dundes, Alan, 10 Durham pikelet, 21 The Dynamics of Folklore, 101 Early French Cookery: Sources, History, Original Recipes and Modern Adaptations, 131 East Asia foodways, 123 –26 Easter Sunday, 5 East Meets West, 168 Economic stratification, 35 Edwards, Mark, 135 Egiku, 101 Ehrlich, Elizabeth, 83 Ekiben: The Art of the Japanese Box Lunch, 136 Ekiben box lunch, 111, 136 El Día de los Muertos, 86 Elizabeth, Queen, 19 Elizabeth David Classics: Mediterranean Food, French Country Cooking, Summer Cooking, 137, 140 England, John, 79 English American foodways, 75 –77 Enlightenment, 20 Entrepreneurs, 39, 101, 104 Esquirel, Laura, 85

194 Essential Beeton, 141 Esterik, Penny Van, 147 Ethnic and Regional Foodways in the United States: The Performance of Group Identity, 122 Ethnic cuisine. See Regional cuisine and ethnic cuisine “Ethnic Foodways in America: Symbol and the Performance of Identity,” 137 Ethnographic studies, 170 –71 Ethnomusicologists’ Cookbook, 132, 167 Euphrates River, 6 European cuisine, 32 European foodways, 68 – 69 The Eve of Seven Fishes: Christmas Cooking in the Peasant Tradition, 138 Everyday Italian, 168 “Exo-cuisine,” 30 Exotic cuisine, 122 Explicating, 133, 140 Fables of the Ancients? Folklore in the Qur’an, 10 Falafel, 92 Falassi, Alessandro, 160 Family cuisine, 18 Farmer, Fannie, 139 Farmer John’s Cookbook: The Real Dirt on Vegetables, 147 Fast food, 108 –9 Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal, 53, 109, 170 The Fat Duck, 141 Fat Land: How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World, 148, 169 A Feast of Words for Lovers of Food and Fiction, 159 Feltman, Charles, 42 Feniger, Susan, 168 Ferguson, Sheila, 143 Feuchtwanger, Anton, 42

Index Fiddler on the Roof, 159 Fiefs, 12 Fine cuisine, 8 Fisher, Abby, 40, 142 Fisher, M.F.K., 122, 134, 140 Fish fries, 104 –5 Fitch, Noel Riley, 50 Fitched, 21 Fitzgerald, F. Scott, 158 Flay, Bobby, 168 Folk Art and Art Worlds, 163 “Folk Cookery,” 121 Folklore, 10 Folklore and Folklife: An Introduction, 121 Folkloric sign language, 13 Folklorists, 170 –71 Folk medicine, 5 Folk stories, 55 Food and Culture: A Reader, 147 Food in Medieval Times, 131 Food in the Middle Ages, 131 Food lore, 123 Food Marketing Institute, 112 Food-monopolizing guilds, 21 Food Network, 168 Foodway competitions, 109–10 Foodways, history of: Beowulf, 12; Çatalhöyük, 6; Chinese American foodways, 8 –9; Greece foodways, 11; Iliad, 10 –11; Indo-Indians, 7– 8; Neoclassical period, 20 –22; Pakistan, 5 – 6; Qur’an, 10; Renaissance, 18 –20; Romantic period, 22–23; Rome foodways, 11; Sonoma diet, 11–12; vegetarianism, 9 –10; Way of Tea, 9. See also Dark Ages Foodways, symbolic meanings of: art, 162– 64; contemporary culture, 167–70; corn, 164 – 65; cultural celebrations, 160 – 62; drama, 159 – 60; folklorists, 170 –71; fruits

Index and vegetables, 165 – 67; literature, 156 –59; wheat, 164 – 65 Foodways, types of: Cajun cooking, 106 –7; competitions, 109 –10; counterculture climate, 111–12; English American, 75 –77; European, 68 – 69; fast food, 108 –9; fish fries, 104 –5; funeral banquets, 103 – 4; game fests, 105 – 6; generic U.S., 102; German American, 79 – 81; Irish American, 77–79; Italian American, 88 –90; Japanese American, 100 –2; Jewish, 81– 84; Mexican American, 84 – 87; Middle Eastern American, 90 –93; organic foods, 114; Scandinavian American, 87–88; school lunches, 110 –11; South Asian Indian American, 93 –95; Southern Maryland crab suppers, 107– 8; supermarket frozen gourmet dinners, 115 –16; Tassajara Bread Book, 112–14; vegetarianism, 114 –15. See also African American foodways; Chinese American foodways; Native American foodways “Foodways and Eating Habits: Directions for Research,” 121 Foodways and Lore, Medieval Celebrations: How to Plan for Holidays, Weddings, and Reenactment with Recipes, Customs, Decorations, Songs, Dances, and Games, 131 Foodways in the Northeast, 122 Foraging, 60 Foreshadowing, 61 Formulas, 10 Fortune cookies, 98, 99 $40 a Day, 168 Foster, Luther H., 142 Freedman, Alix, 112 Freeman, Leslie Littlefield, 147

195 Freeman, Roland L., 143 The French Chef, 50 French Cooking in Early America, 139 French cuisine, 139, 140 French Menu Cookbook, 123 Frescoes, 166 Frugal Gourmet on Our Immigrant Ancestors, 90 –91 Fruits and vegetables, 165 – 67 Funeral banquets, 103 – 4 Funeral Festivals in America: Rituals for the Living, 103 Fussell, Betty, 106, 147 Game fests, 105 – 6 Garagiola, Joe, 89 Garden of Eden, 163 Garum, 128-29 General Mills, 91 Gentility, symbols of, 21 Genuine American Fortune Cookies, 98 German American foodways, 79 – 81 Germano, Robert A., 138 Gibbons, Euell, 111 A Gift for Abuelita: Celebrating the Day of the Dead, 86 Gilded Age, 41, 52 –53 Gilman, Caroline, 36 –37 Gilroy Garlic Festival, 110 Ginseng, 69 Globalization, 5, 164 Glorious French Food, 139 Godey, Louis A., 37 Godey’s Lady’s Book, 36 Godfather series, 167 Golden Gate Fortune Cookie Factory, 99 Golden Gate Park, 99 “Golden Mountain,” 96 Gombo, 73 Good Cooking from India, 95 Gosforth Gridie, 21

196 Gosnold, Bartholomew, 68 Gourmet dishes, 107 Gourmet ghettoes, 112 Gourmet magazine, 135 Gourmet restaurants, 101 Goya, Francisco, 162 Grand cuisine: beverages, 26 –29; breakfast, 25 –26; defined, 22; dinner, 29 –30; Julia Child, 50; lunch, 26; private dining, 25 Great Depression, 47– 48 Great Expectations, 26 Great Gatsby, 158 Greece foodways, 11, 126 –28 Grewe, Rudolf, 131 Group for Cultural Documentation, 143 Guinness World Record, 109 Gullah, 39 Gumbo, 73 Gutierrez, C. Paige, 11, 107 Hagiwara, Makoto, 99 Hale, Sara, 36 Hall, Ross Hume, 51 Hamburgers, 42– 43 A Handbook of Chinese Healing Herbs, 134 Handwerker, Nathan, 42 “Hansel and Gretel,” 80–81 Hanson, Jeffery R., 143 Hanukkah, 161 Haoles, 50 Hardy, Thomas, 159 Harris’ Farmer’s Almanac, 46 Harvard School of Public Health, 54, 149, 170 Hatch, Mike, 92 Hawaii, 49–50 Healthy Eating Pyramid, 54 Hearth, outdoor, 31 Height, Dorothy I., 143

Index Heimann, Jim, 48 Helen of Troy, 158 Henry VIII, King, 77 Heracles, 158 Hess, Karen, 142 Hieatt, Constance, 130, 131, 160 High cuisine, 32 The Hill, 89 The Hill: Its History—Its Recipes, 138 Hindu belief system, 7, 10 Hindu Upanishads, 10 Historical Cook Book of the American Negro (Cookery), 142 Historical cuisine, 133 History Magazine, 26 “History of Soul Food,” 72 Home cuisine, 37 Homer, 12, 126 Homogeneity, 48 Honey, 163 Hong Kong Noodle Company, 99 Hopkinson, Simon, 76 Hosington, Brenda, 130, 160 Hot dogs, 42– 43 Hotel cuisine, 30 The Huddled Masses, 45 Hughes, Holly, 137, 139 Humphrey, Lin T., 122 Humphrey, Theodore C., 122 Hungering for America: Italian, Irish, and Jewish Foodways in the Age of Migration, 77 Hybrid cuisine, 85 Ibsen, Henrik, 159 Ice cream, 43 I Hear America Cooking: A Journey of Discovery from Alaska to Florida—The Cook, the Recipes, and the Unique Flavors of Our National Cuisine, 147 Iliad, 10–11, 127

Index Immigration: bourgeois cuisine, 40 – 42; Chinese American foodways, 96 –97; regional cuisine and ethnic cuisine, 48 The Importance of Being Earnest, 158, 159 Importation, 33 Inca people, 62 Indian cuisine, 93 Indian Temple, 94 Indo-Indians, 7– 8 In Search of Perfection: Reinventing Kitchen Classics, 141 International Cherry Spitting Championship, 109 International cuisine, 30, 40 International Rice Festival, 110 International Society for Krishna Consciousness, 93 International Symposium on Ethnological Food Research, 121 Inuit foodways, 49 Iowa’s Road Kill Cookbook: A Collection of Spurious Recipes Using Bentre Mongant (French for Belly-Up) Animals One Finds on Iowa Highways, 148 Irish American foodways, 77–79 Irish Pub Cooking, 79 Islam, 10, 90, 94, 146 Isleta Pueblo tribe, 66 Italian-American Cookbook: A Feast of Food from a Great American Cooking Tradition, 138, 167 Italian American festival, 136 Italian American foodways, 88 –90 Ives, Edward D., 171 Izakaya Haru Ulala, 101 Jains, 9 –10 Jamie’s Great Italian Escape, 168 Japanese American foodways, 100 –2 Japanese bento box, 136 Japanese box lunch, 111

197 Japanese Cooking: A Simple Art, 134 Japanese foodways, 135 Japanese Kobe beef, 102 Japanese tea ceremony, 9 Japanese Tea Garden, 99 Jeffries, Bob, 71 Jensen, Janet, 158 Jewish Diaspora, 83 Jewish foodways, 81– 84 Jewish Sabbath, 82 Jews, Sephardic, 81 Jinnis, 92 Johns Hopkins University, 70 Johnson, Andrew, 40 Joyce, James, 158 Joy of Cooking, 105, 123, 139 Jung, David, 99 The Jungle, 53 Juvenal, 129 Kafka, Barbara, 148 Kaiseki: The Exquisite Cuisine of Kyoto’s Kikunoi Restaurant, 135 Kaléik, Susan, 137 The Kalevala, 87 Kamekura, Junichi, 136 Kawafuku Restaurant, 101 Kennedy, John F., 79 KFC (Kentucky Fried Chicken), 108 –9, 110 Kijima, Naomi, 136 Kindred, 33 King’s Cake, 2 Kingston, Maxine Hong, 157 Kitchen Chemistry, 141 Kitty Hawk, 45 Kodiak Crab Festival, 108 Kondansha International Publishing House of Tokyo, 135 Koran, 10 Korenblit, Joan Bravo, 95

198 Korsmeyer, Carolyn, 162 K-Paul’s Louisiana Kitchen, 106 Krause, Brian “Young Gun,” 109 Krause, Rick “Pellet Gun,” 109 Kraut, Alan, 45 Krishna, 93, 163 K’ung Ch’iu, 125 Kurlansky, Mark, 68, 129 Kwanzaa, 161 Kyoto’s Kikunoi Restaurant, 135 “La Belle France,” 139 La Bonne Cuisine de Madame E. Saint-Anges: The Original Companion for French Home Cooking, 139 La Cuisine Franraise: French Cooking for Every Home Adapted to American Requirements, 139 Lady and the Tramp, 167 Lagasse, Emeril, 168 La haute cuisine, 139 Lao-tzu, 124 Lappé, Frances Moore, 111, 148 Lark Rise to Candleford, 16 Lawrence, D. H., 158 Lenten, 5, 92, 154 Les Misérables, 159 Lessing, Doris, 159 Letto, Jay, 112 Lévi-Strauss, Claude, 30, 70, 126, 147 Libellus De Arte Coquinaria: An Early Northern Cookery Book, 131 Liberty gardens, 46 Like Water for Chocolate, 85 Lincoln, Abraham, 5, 40 Lister, Ted, 141 Literary Feasts: Inspired Eating from Classic Fiction, 158 Literary Feasts: Recipes from the Classics of Literature, 158 Literature, 156 –59

Index Little Rascals, 167 Little Women, 158 Living Folklore: An Introduction to the Study of People and Their Traditions, 170 –71 Lobscouse and the Spotted Dog: Which It’s a Gastronomic Companion to the Aubrey/ Martin Novels, 159 Long, Lucy, 102, 136 Los Angeles Times, 143 Louisiana Purchase Exposition, 42, 44 – 45 Love apple. See Tomatoes The Lowell Offering, 36 Lucy, Sir Thomas, 19 Luenn, Nancy, 86 Lumbee Indians, 63 Lunch, 26 Lutefisk, 87 Luther, Martin, 18 Lüthi, Max, 81 Macbeth, 73 The Machine in the Garden, 33 Magliocco, Sabina, 136 Mahabharata, 94 Making Sense of Taste: Food and Philosophy, 162 Manchurian, 69 Mandrake, 16 Manoomin, 63 “The Man Who Married the Moon,” 66 Marchiony, Italo, 43 Marfisi, Eleanore Berra, 138 Marginalia, 127 Mariani, John and Galina, 71, 80, 138, 167 Márquez, Gabriel García, 158 The Marrow of Human Experience: Essays on Folklore, 171 Martial, 129 Martino, Maestro, 131

Index Marx, Leo, 33 Mason, Laura, 76, 141 Massachusetts Dietetic Association, 83 Master and Commander, 159 Mastering the Art of French Cooking, 50, 139 “Master of the House,” 159 Material foodways, 2 Matsuhisa, Nobu, 135 Mayans, 60–61 Maza, 127 McDonald, Ronald, 2, 109 McDonald’s Corporation, 2, 108, 147 McDonald’s Hamburger University, 109 McMillan, Sherrie, 26 McNeil, W. K., 121–22 Medieval Banquet, 14 Medieval period foodways, 130 –32 Mediterranean diet. See The Sonoma Diet Mehta, Shahnaz, 95 Metamorphoses, 88 Metaphors, 155, 162 Mexican American foodways, 84 – 87 Mexican cuisine, 85 Mexico–One Plate at a Time, 145 Mickler, Ernest Matthew, 148 Middle-class cuisine, 30 Middle Eastern American foodways, 90 –93 Millet, 6 Milliken, Mary Sue, 168 – 69 Ming’s Quest, 168 “Minivan parents,” 2 Mintz, Sidney W., 70 –71 Miriam’s Kitchen, 83 Mitchell, Patricia B., 139 Model Restaurant, 45 Mole poblano, 161 Monasteries, 12–13 Monkey, 156 The Monkey King: A Superhero Tale of China, 156

199 Monopolization, 21 Mooncakes, 98 –99 Moonstruck, 167 Morishita family, 101 Mormons, 103 Mosaics, 21 Muhammad, 10 Multicourse meals, 96 Mumford, Lewis, 32 Murata, Yoshihiro, 135 Museum of American Folk Art, 147 Muslims, 10, 104 Mussell, Kay, 122 MyPyramid, 53 –54 Myriad, 8, 53, 111, 161 Napoleon III, 139 Narrative, 88, 90, 122, 159 Nathan, Joan, 107, 137 Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest, 110 National Assembly, 21 National Council of Negro Women, Inc., 72, 142, 143 National War Gardens Commission, 46 Native American foodways: corn, 62– 63, 66, 67; culinary studies of, 143 – 45; foraging, 60; Great Plains, 65; Inca people, 62; Mayans, 60 – 61; Navajo tribes, 66; pemmican, 67– 68; Pueblo tribes, 66; settlements, 63 – 64; slavery, 64; South America, 61– 62; trail mix, 67 Natufian, 6 Navajo tribes, 66 The Negro in the Making of America, 70 Neoclassical period, 20 –22 Neolithic, 6 The New Book of Middle Eastern Food, 91, 145 The New Yorker, 132 New York Yankees, 89

200 Nibble, 167 Nightshade, 16 Nobu West, 135 Nong, Shen, 123 The North End Italian Cookbook, 138 “Northern Flint” corn, 63 Northumbrian girdle cake, 21 Nostalgia, 1, 83, 85 Not by Bread Alone, 49 Nutritional guidelines, contemporary, 148 – 49 O’Brian, Patrick, 159 Odoacer, 12 Odysseus, 10, 126 Odyssey, 127 Oil lighting, 27 Okakura, Kakuzo, 26, 100 Oliver, Jamie, 168 Olney, Richard, 112, 123, 140 The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals, 146 Once upon a Time: On the Nature of Fairy Tales, 81 Oneg Shabbat, 81 O’Neill, Molly, 112 Open-air food markets, 46 – 47 Opine, 18 Oral folklore, 1 Organic foods, 114 Organics, Angelic, 147 Oriental treasure, 16 Osterweis, Rollin G., 37 Overland pioneers, 34 Ovid, 12, 88, 129 Oxford Companion, 49 The Oxford Companion to Food, 16, 42, 83, 130 Pakistan, 5 – 6 Palace of Machinery, 45

Index Paleolithic, 6 Panethnic combinations, 52 Parzen, Jeremy, 131 “Paul Bunyan,” 2 Peasant cuisine, 18 Peasants, 13–14, 15 “Pecos Bill,” 2 Peeler, 107 Pemmican, 67– 68 Penn, William, 80 “Persephone,” 2 Persuasiveness, 114, 123 Peruvian mountains, 62 Pesticides, 49 Pesto, 137 Peterson, James, 139 Peterson, John, 147 Philip, King, 63 The Physiology of Taste, 140, 169 Pierce, Michelle, 7, 8 Pig Stand, 48 Pioneers, 34 –35 Plains Indians, 65 – 66 Plebeian cuisine, 18 Pleyn Delit: Medieval Cookery for Modern Cooks, 130, 160 Pliny the Elder, 127 Poaching, 19 –20 Pollan, Michael, 53, 146 Polynesian-style restaurants, 50 Pomegranate, 2, 3 Pool, Daniel, 26 Potatoes, 77–78 Potjiis, 73 The Prawn Cocktail Years, 76 Private dining, 25 Progresso, 136 Prohibition, 47 Prometheus, 123 Protagonist, 156 Providence Cheese, 137

Index Prud’homme, Alex, 139 Prudhomme, Paul, 106 Psychology, 7, 46, 156, 158 Pudding, 76 Pueblo tribes, 66 Pungent, 41, 84 Pym, Barbara, 159 Quarles, Benjamin, 70 Queso fundido, 145 Qur’an, 10 Rababy, George, 92 Rachel Ray’s Tasty Travels, 168 Railroad system, 32 –33 Rampion, 20 Ransome, Hilda M., 163 “Rapunzel,” 20 Ratatouille, 167 Ravioli foodways, 138 Regional cuisine and ethnic cuisine: Alice Waters, 52; appliances, electrical, 49; convenience foods, 53; defined, 22, 43; folk stories, 55; Gilded Age, 52 –53; Great Depression, 47– 48; Hawaii, 49 –50; Healthy Eating Pyramid, 54; immigration, 48; Julia Child, 50 –51; Louisiana Purchase Exposition, 44 – 45; Model Restaurant, 45; MyPyramid, 53 –54; nutritional studies on, 51; Open-air food markets, 46 – 47; overview of, 44; panethnic combinations, 52; pesticides, 49; Polynesian-style restaurants, 50; recipes, 55; Roaring Twenties, 47; settlements, 43 – 44; transportation, 48 – 49; urbanization, 46; vernacular folk exchanges, 46 Regional Cuisines in Medieval Europe: A Book of Essays, 131 Reichl, Ruth, 134

201 Reid, Daniel, 134 Reincarnation, progressive, 9 Religious dictums, 7 Religious lores, 7 Renach, Salomon, 126 Renaissance, 18–20 Rendall, Joe, 143 Replication, 135 Restaurant cuisine, 22, 47 Revel, Jean-François, 18 –19, 30, 95, 127 Rice Eating Contest, 110 Rigattzi’s restaurant, 89 Rig-Veda, 94 Ritchason, Jack, 69 Roanoke colony, 63 Roaring Twenties, 47 Robbia, Luca Della, 166 Rodale Press, 51 Rodin, Claudia, 91, 145 Roman Catholic Church, 77 Romantic period, 22–23 Rombauer, Irma, 139 Rombauer, Irma S., 123 Rome foodways, 128 –30 Rorer, S. T., 45 Rôtisseurs, 22 Rowlandson, Mary, 63 Royal Society of Chemistry, 141 Ruby Ann’s Down Home Trailer Park Cookbook, 148 Rudy, Jill, 171 Ruminant animal, 69 Rush, 21 The Sacred Bee: In Ancient Times and Folklore, 163 Sadow, S. Etta, 83 St. John’s River, 63 St. Louis Cardinals, 89 St. Patrick’s Day, 77 Salt: A World History, 129

202 Samsara, 9 San Antonio’s Military Plaza, 84 Sandwiches, 28 Satan Devouring One of His Children, 162 Sato, Osamu, 101 Scandinavian American foodways, 87– 88 Schenone, Laura, 35, 47, 75 Schlosser, Eric, 53, 109, 170 Scholarships: Ancient writings, 123; Charles Camp, 121–22; contemporary nutritional guidelines, 148 – 49; East Asia foodways, 123 –26; government and university dietary guidelines, 149; Greece foodways, 126 –28; Julia Child, 122 –23; Medieval period foodways, 130 –32; M.F.K. Fisher, 122; Rome foodways, 128 –30; U.S. foodways, 132; W. K. McNeil, 121–22 Schonberg, Claude-Michel, 159 School lunches, 110 –11 Scrafford, Barbara, 158 Scully, D. Eleanor, 131 Scully, Terence, 131 Seafarer’s cuisine, 18 Sensory aesthetics, 96 Settlements, 43 – 44, 63 – 64 Sexton, Anne, 81 Shakespeare, William, 19, 159 Shapiro, Ann, 159 Sheaf of grain, 165 Shepard, Aaron, 156 Sherman, William Tecumseh, 39 Shropshire fidget pie, 21 Silk Road, 8, 15 Simple French Food, 123, 140 Sims, Martha C., 171 Sinclair, Upton, 53 Skepticism, 22 Slave cooks, 33

Index Slavery: African American foodways, 70 –71; bourgeois cuisine, 33 –34, 38; Native American foodways, 64 “The Smiling Rabbit,” 61 Smithsonian Institution, 122 Smorgasbords, 88 “Snow White,” 2 Social class, 36 Society for Creative Anachronism, Inc., 131 The Sonoma Diet, 11–12 Soul food, 34, 71 Soul Food, 71 Soul Food: Classic Cuisine from the Deep South, 143 Soul Food Cookbook, 71 Soup, 91 South America, 61– 62 South Asian Indian American foodways, 93 –95 Southern Maryland crab suppers, 107– 8 Spartans, 128 Spiritualism, 6, 65, 133, 165 Spiritual rituals, 65 Splist, Inof, 148 Spurlock, Morgan, 109, 170 Stalking the Wild Asparagus, 111 Stanton, Edwin M., 39 Star Trek, 160 Stefansson, Atkins, 49 Stefansson, Vilhjalmur, 49 Steinbeck, John, 158 Stephens, Martine, 171 Stereotyping, 141, 157 Stevenson, Robert Lewis, 158 Stewart, Martha, 135 Stradley, Linda, 43 Straw empaistic, 164 Subway, 110 Summertime, 167 “Sundays with Ravioli,” 138

Index Sung Dynasty, 100 Supermarket frozen gourmet dinners, 115 –16 Supersize Me, 109, 170 Sushi, 101 Sushi Go 55, 101 Symbolism, 99, 155, 158, 161 Table etiquette, 9, 21 Taboo, 10, 98, 113 Tamale Eating Contest, 110 Tamales, 86 – 87 Tang Dynasty, 100 Tanty, Françrois, 139 Taoism, 9, 124 Taoist philosophy, 125 Taormina, John, 136 Tao Te Ching, 125 The Tape-Recorded Interview: A Manual for Field Workers in Folklore and Oral History, 171 Tapia, 87 Target Corporation, 114 Taro root, 50 Tassajara Bread Book, 112 –14 Tassajara Cooking: A Vegetarian Cooking Book, 51, 113 A Taste of Heritage: The New African American Cuisine, 143 Tea, 99 –100 Tea drinking, 134 Tea houses, 100 –1 Telecleides, 127 Tex-Mex foods, 2 Textile, 35, 37 Textured vegetable protein (TVP), 115 Thanksgiving Day, 5 The Theory of the Leisure Class, 41 30 Minute Meals, 168 Thompson, Flora, 16 Thoreau, Henry David, 68

203 Tigris River, 6 Tillery, Carolyn Quick, 71, 142 Tillman, George, Jr., 71 Time-Life Books, 140 Time Out of Time: Essays on the Festival, 160 Tipton, Toni, 143 Toelken, Barre, 101 Tofu, 115 Tokyo Kaikay, 101 Tolstoy, Leo, 159 Tomatoes, 16 –17 Too Hot Tamales, 168 Townsend, Martin, 107 Trader Vic’s, 50 Traditional cuisine, 135 Traditional Foods of Britain: A Regional Inventory, 76, 141 Trail mix, 67 Transportation, 48 – 49 Treasure Island, 158 Tree-Mendus Fruit cherry orchard, 109 Trifles, 76 Tripmaster Monkey, 157 Trollope, Anthony, 25 The True History of Chocolate, 144 Tsai, Ming, 168 Tsuji, Shizuo, 134 Tsuji, Yoshiki, 134 Turner, Frederick Jackson, 41 Tuskegee Institute, 71, 142 Twain, Mark, 158 Tycoon, 41 Ulysses, 158 U.S. cuisine, 43, 68, 139 U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), 53, 149, 170 U.S. foodways, 102, 132 University of Rochester School of Medicine, 149

204 University of Toronto, 130 Up from Slavery, 71 Urbanization, 46 Van Camp, 39 Veblen, Thorstein, 41, 160 Vegetarianism, 9 –10, 114 –15 Verbal folklore, 1 Vernacular folk exchanges, 46 Vernacular transmission, 10 Victorian age, 25 Victory gardens, 46 Vidalia Onion Eating Contest, 110 Vikings, 68 Virginia Company of London, 63 Vlach, John Michael, 163 Walker, Alice, 71, 111 Wal-Mart, 114 Walt Disney Company, 2 Warhol, Andy, 162 Warwick, Dionne, 142 Washington, Booker T., 71 Washington, George, 161 Washoku concept, 135 Washoku: Recipes from the Japanese Home Kitchen, 135 Watanake, Hiroshi, 136 Waters, Alice, 51, 52, 123, 137, 140 Waverly Novels, 37 Way of Tea, 9 Weaver, William Woys, 31–32, 36, 147 Wedding breakfasts, 26 We Gather Together: Food and Festival in American Life, 122 Wendy’s, 109 Wenger, Shaunda Kennedy, 158 Wensleydale, 75

Index Western Folklore, 121 What Mrs. Fisher Knows About Old Southern Cooking, Soups, Pickles, Preserves, Etc., 40, 142 Wheat, 164 – 65 White, John, 63 White Trash Cooking series, 148 Wilde, Oscar, 158, 159 Williams, Sean, 167 Williams, Tennessee, 159 Wilson, Gilbert L., 143 Wilson, Liz, 133 Wilson, William A., 171 Winn-Dixie, 137 Witchel, Alex, 138 Wodehouse, P. G., 158 Wok, 133 Wonton Food Company, 98 Woolf, Virginia, 158 Worcestershire sauce, 129 World Fair, 45 The World on a Plate: A Tour through the History of America’s Ethnic Cuisine, 82, 89 Wright brothers, 44 – 45 Xi, Fu, 123 Yanagihara School of Classical Cuisine, 135 Yangtzi River, 6 Yellow-Corn-Maidens, 66, 67 Yellow River, 6 Yoder, Don, 121 Yogurt, 91 Young, Grace, 133 Zea mays, 62 Zheng, Su, 132

About the Author JACQUELINE S. THURSBY is Professor of English at Brigham Young University. Her previous books include Story: A Handbook (Greenwood, 2006).

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