#29 Something to Chew On in October
"We are overwhelmed with recipes, which are pushed on us by forces that have little to do with good cooking and a lot to do with traffic."
Happy October, BookStarrs!
It was this recent review of British baker and columnist Ruby Tandoh’s latest book in the NYT (gift article) – “A Tart, Spicy Take on Our Ridiculous Foodie Culture” – that got us thinking, and resulted in a different take on our monthly feature book post.
“In a simpler time, you paged through your grandmother’s Gourmet magazines or watched Rachael Ray make dinner in 30 minutes. You took restaurant advice from friends, a newspaper critic, maybe an edgy blogger. Today, food culture is a churning, untamed river, delivered by an algorithm designed to simultaneously render you hungry, jealous and terrified.”
Food – and foodie – culture has just become the culture. You can’t escape the recipe economy, from the NYT Cooking Section to viral TikTok recipes to Alison Roman’s (still love her) newsletter in your inbox or Wishbone Kitchen’s latest Instagram post in your feed.
Somehow, along the way, the recipe economy has “morph[ed] into a crispy, sticking, creamy, cheesy miso-coated thirst trap dusted in turmeric.” Cookbooks frankly seem irrelevant these days, as Tandoh notes in her book – useful only as “marketing exercises and anthropological guides to moments in the zeitgeist.”
Despite that, though, Tandoh notes that “we are overwhelmed with recipes, which are pushed on us by forces that have little to do with good cooking and a lot to do with traffic.” How did we get here, and what is lost (and gained)?
Julie: It wasn’t always like this. I can remember when most young women drew their primary cooking inspiration from their mother or grandmother. My university days saw me replicating favourite home meals that I had been served growing up. When the girls on Craig Street decided to host a Thanksgiving dinner, I happily volunteered to roast the turkey. I consulted my own personal expert and did it exactly like my Nan did - complete with her famous Newfoundland savoury dressing, of course.
Trading recipes with friends and family members was where we got a lot of recipes for our arsenal. A coffee date or dinner party was always followed up with a request for one of the recipes, and a handwritten note or card would be delivered shortly after. My battered recipe folder is crammed with these heartwarming mementos. Michele’s Tomato Soup, Nancy’s Breakfast Casserole, and Maureen’s Easy Cinnamon Rolls are just as delicious to see in the writer’s penmanship as they are to recreate and enjoy today.
That’s not to say that cookbooks and magazines were not having their moment. The publication of cookbooks had been increasing steadily in the second half of the twentieth century. It just seemed in the pre-internet days of the 80s as if there was the “It” cookbook that people were buying, using, and talking about.
What were my go-to cookbooks as a young wife? Anne Lindsay’s Smart Cooking was a staple - not only in our house, but in my girlfriends’ homes, too. Nancy M. and I would talk often about what recipe we had recently prepared from one of Anne’s books. I still have the Broccoli Buffet Salad in my regular rotation, and if I’m serving a Flank Steak, you can bet it’s been marinated with Anne’s blend of soy sauce, honey, and ginger.
A fun fact and visceral memory for me: Anne McColl Lindsay had a beautiful kitchen shop (Anne McColl’s Kitchen) on Talbot Street in London, Ontario. I’m talking a kitchen shop worthy of a Nora Ephron movie starring Meryl Streep. I used to pass that shop daily as a student. I’d peer through the gorgeous arched windows, dreaming of my future kitchen in my grown-up life. I’m still dreaming btw.
And then there was Martha! Martha Stewart was a monoculture of her own in the 80s. Her cookbooks were a constant, and although I never owned one, I signed them out from the public library regularly.
To round off my cooking influence was my monthly subscription to Canadian Living. Where would any of us be without this stalwart of Canadian domesticity? Countless family meals, dinner parties, elaborate birthday cakes, and shared recipes found their beginnings in the pages of this publication.
And there you have it - cooking inspiration, 80s and 90s version.
Katie: Oh, I loved reading your reflections! A lot of my childhood memories overlap with some of those cookbooks, magazines, and recipes. When I think of my “Ottawa years” – the years in my mid-20s to very early-30s when I was living alone and starting to cook meals for myself, I think not of cookbooks, but of blogs. Smitten Kitchen, How Sweet Eats, Oh She Glows, Peas and Thank you, Halfbaked Harvest…that was how I chose recipes and decided what to cook. And there were a lot of options! I remember clicking around to different blogs and then pasting the links to the recipes into one increasingly long email chain to myself, which was an absolute nightmare to weed through and find “that one recipe” I wanted to make.
I had a handful of cookbooks, all written by bloggers I had started following on the Internet first, but honestly? They were more for aesthetic decor and weren’t exactly the sauce-splattered, much-beloved Crazy Plates I remembered my mom consulting in the 90s.
By the time the pandemic rolled around and I was living in Japan (and honestly not really cooking because my Tokyo kitchen was so tiny and takeout was so affordable and nutritious), a new host of Millennial food developers – a little more polished, a little more professional – had emerged from the blogger generation, from Alison Roman and Molly Baz and Samin Nosrat to Dan Pelosi and Eric Kim. Personalities seem to matter more, as, of course, does marketing and social media prowess.
“The internet has put tens of thousands of recipes at our fingertips—and the art of the dinner party is now the subject of books, blogs, and debate. How did the kitchen become a showcase for the self?” ~ from The New Yorker’s Critics at Large recent podcast episode on foodie culture
Which version can you relate to — the 80s/90s food culture, or the 2010s/20s? Where do you get your recipes today? Katie recently asked ChatGPT for some recipe ideas that were toddler-friendly, low-salt and no sugar, used fall flavours and ingredients, and felt “simple but sophisticated” — and was stunned at how successful the suggestions were, from pumpkin applesauce muffins to a stew with chicken thighs, lentils, and carrots (gobbled up by said-toddler!). Is AI going to replace paging through cookbooks or scrolling through blogs and sites? We’d love to hear your thoughts!
Thanks for reading, fellow BookStarrs! Join The Dish in the comments - let us know what’s on your nightstand, what you’re trying this fall, and what Internet tabs you have open. As always, feel free to share our newsletter with fellow bookish people in your life.
