false http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172335739m/164459.jpg 164459 5 Perfection Salad, a dish that won its creator first prize in a 1905 cooking contest, consisted of pristine molded aspic containing celery, red pepper, and chopped cabbage. Laura Shapiro, author of this eponymous social history, part of the Modern Library Food series, takes the salad as a model for the domestic science movement, an intriguing women's crusade of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Bent on convincing housewives that the way to domestic order lay in cooking "dainty" nutritional meals from sanitary ingredients in "scientific" kitchens, the movement helped give birth to our mass-market food scene, with its reliance on home economics precepts, processed convenience foods, and no-cook cooking--our cuisine of boil-in bags and microwave frozen dinners. Entertaining and informative, but also unexpectedly moving, the book chronicles in numerous intriguing stories the ways in which an impulse to liberate women from the drudgery and imprecision of daily food preparation led to its debasement. It's a fascinating story, of interest to anyone who wonders why and how we cook and eat--and think about food--as we do.<p> Beginning with portraits of early domestic movement reformers such as Catherine Beecher and Mary Lincoln, and investigating institutions like the Boston Cooking School, home of Fannie Farmer, the Mother of Level Measurements, the book then pursues "scientific cookery" into its mid-20th-century manifestation. "With the help of the new industry of advertising," Shapiro writes, "the food business was able to reflect Mrs. Lincoln's values [of food-production uniformity] by keeping its achievements in packing, sanitation, convenience, and novelty at the forefront." But greater ills ensued: the effect of the reformers, Shapiro contends, was to encourage women to become docile consumers tethered to commercial interests--and to rob our vigorous cooking and eating traditions of their rich life. In making that point, <I>Perfection Salad</I> reveals its true subject: the cultural priorities that defined American 20th-century life and, finally, the sorry nature of the order they established. <I>--Arthur Boehm</I> 158776 1986 Perfection Salad: Women and Cooking at the Turn of the Century (Modern Library Food) total:59|5:17|4:19|3:16|2:3|1:4| 59 219 142 14 3 0 false false Sat Jan 03 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Fri Jan 02 13:38:06 -0800 2009 Sun Jan 04 08:38:03 -0800 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Sat Jul 25 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Thu Jul 02 05:40:23 -0700 2009 Mon Jul 27 06:12:27 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Tue Oct 14 05:45:41 -0700 2008 Tue Oct 14 05:51:52 -0700 2008 more...]]> 5 0 false false Wed Jan 28 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Wed Dec 10 06:06:25 -0800 2008 Wed Jan 28 19:02:43 -0800 2009 more...]]> 3 0 false false Fri Jan 23 10:02:21 -0800 2009 Fri Jan 23 10:08:16 -0800 2009 4 0 false false Sun Apr 09 00:00:00 -0700 2006 Wed Jul 15 21:17:58 -0700 2009 Wed Jul 15 21:17:58 -0700 2009 here on my blog. ]]> 4 0 false false Sat Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2000 Sun Mar 29 15:18:52 -0700 2009 Sun Mar 29 15:21:03 -0700 2009 4 0 false false Wed Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Tue Jun 19 10:45:01 -0700 2007 Tue Jun 19 10:45:06 -0700 2007 more...]]> 1 0 false false Sat Mar 01 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Sun Mar 16 09:00:16 -0700 2008 Sun Mar 16 09:00:16 -0700 2008 more...]]> 4 0 false false Thu Apr 05 14:52:23 -0700 2007 Thu Apr 05 14:55:46 -0700 2007 4 0 false false Wed Oct 17 13:27:07 -0700 2007 Wed Oct 17 13:29:55 -0700 2007 1 0 false false Thu Jul 19 13:43:47 -0700 2007 Thu Jul 19 13:47:10 -0700 2007 5 0 false false Fri Sep 05 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Thu Aug 07 07:59:28 -0700 2008 Fri Sep 05 09:07:26 -0700 2008 0 0 false false Mon Jun 30 11:54:41 -0700 2008 Mon Jun 30 11:55:20 -0700 2008 5 0 false false Mon Nov 23 22:36:20 -0800 2009 Mon Nov 23 22:36:20 -0800 2009 5 0 false false Sun Nov 15 18:30:39 -0800 2009 Sun Nov 15 18:30:39 -0800 2009 0 0 false false Wed Nov 11 09:12:59 -0800 2009 Wed Nov 11 09:12:59 -0800 2009 5 0 false false Sat Nov 07 21:32:59 -0800 2009 Sat Nov 07 21:32:59 -0800 2009 0 0 false false Fri Nov 06 11:31:44 -0800 2009 Fri Nov 06 11:31:44 -0800 2009 0 0 false false Tue Nov 03 17:27:29 -0800 2009 Tue Nov 03 17:27:29 -0800 2009 http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=164459