In one of the comments, Alice remarked that "the ethnic and old historical ways of cooking will be fascinating to some people."
This is undoubtedly true - it interests me! - although to me what's more important is that we North Americans, and this is probably true of people in other immigrant nations around the world, have mostly lost our connection to whatever culinary tradition tied the generations one to the next in the "Old Country". Our ancestors went through the immigrant experience of leaving everything behind, and having to make the best of unfamiliar foods and little money, and no leisure time, in a new place. Americans cook from printed recipes, and often those recipes are for dishes that were unknown to their parents and grandparents. What has emerged as "traditional fare" is sort of appalling... green bean casserole, anyone?
That's not to say that good food has disappeared; what we lack in tradition we make up for in inventiveness! But I lament the loss of family memories that are evoked by favorite traditional foods. If you've lost your family memories, you've lost something of yourself. I hope that what I have remembered and learned, what I've salvaged from the memories of other people, will help someone recover their own memories, or provide some tools for passing memories on to the next generation.
Someone in my family is gluten intolerant, and so, since I am figuring out ways to manage without wheat and barley and rye anyway, I decided to carry on here. I grew up on the Gulf Coast where wheat does not grow, so most dishes from my own local culture aren't wheat-based anyway. Rice and cornmeal are more common. All these recipes are gluten free (though it's up to you to read labels in the supermarket, if it really matters for your health). Later I'll do a section on bread (because there are two people twisting my arm!) and that won't be gluten free.
Meanwhile, back to the lab. I mean, the kitchen.
2 comments:
I like that you're working to preserve your personal family and ethnic culture through food. It seems like such an important thing to do akin to what other people are doing with native languages; documenting them before they're gone.
Something that fascinates me is how humans figured out how to use different kinds of foods and how those foods traveled through human culture/history. It's not something I go hunting for, but when I see it in print or online I usually stop whatever I'm doing to read it.
The other thing I'm appreciating is what's happening with food because of the Internet and the mingling of different cultures. Flavors from cultures who rarely if ever interacted in the past are being combined in delicious ways. It's not unusual to see a restaurant menu where chinese, mexican, indian dishes are served together in the same meal. Cooking shows prepare recipes with African and European spices. Too late atm to find specific examples, but it's something I've noticed and am enjoying seeing it happen.
Mingling occurs without the internet, too! Gumbo, of all things, is a result of African encounters with Native Americans. Looking back, far back, in history one sees certain foods travelling around the known world. Didn't Marco Polo bring spaghetti to Italy from China? And do you know what everybody seasoned their food with, in antiquity? Fish Sauce! Made about the same way as it is made in Southeast Asia today.
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