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The Jewish Role in American Life: An Annual Review
Tastes of Faith: Jewish Eating in the United States
"Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are," wrote the 18th Century French politician and musician Jean Brillat-Savarin, giving expression to long held assumptions about the role of food, taste, and eating in the construction of cultural identities.
Foodways―the cultural, religious, social, economic, and political practices related to food consumption and production―unpack and reveal the meaning of what we eat, our tastes. They explain not just our flavor profiles, but our senses of refinement and judgment. They also reveal quite a bit about the history and culture of how food operates and performs in society.
More specifically, Jewish food practices and products expose and explain how different groups within American society think about what it means to be Jewish and the values (as well as the prejudices) people have about what "Jewish" means. Food―what one eats, how one eats it, when one eats it―is a fascinating entryway into identity; for Jews, it is at once a source of great nostalgia and pride, and the central means by which acculturation and adaptation takes place.
In chapters that trace the importance and influence of the triad of bagels, lox, and cream cheese, southern kosher hot barbecue, Jewish vegetarianism, American recipes in Jewish advice columns, the draw of eating treyf (nonkosher), and the geography of Jewish food identities, this volume explores American Jewish foodways, predilections, desires, and presumptions.
Foodways―the cultural, religious, social, economic, and political practices related to food consumption and production―unpack and reveal the meaning of what we eat, our tastes. They explain not just our flavor profiles, but our senses of refinement and judgment. They also reveal quite a bit about the history and culture of how food operates and performs in society.
More specifically, Jewish food practices and products expose and explain how different groups within American society think about what it means to be Jewish and the values (as well as the prejudices) people have about what "Jewish" means. Food―what one eats, how one eats it, when one eats it―is a fascinating entryway into identity; for Jews, it is at once a source of great nostalgia and pride, and the central means by which acculturation and adaptation takes place.
In chapters that trace the importance and influence of the triad of bagels, lox, and cream cheese, southern kosher hot barbecue, Jewish vegetarianism, American recipes in Jewish advice columns, the draw of eating treyf (nonkosher), and the geography of Jewish food identities, this volume explores American Jewish foodways, predilections, desires, and presumptions.
160 pages, Hardcover
Published December 15, 2017
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January 14, 2024
This book is part of the ten-part series The Jewish Role in American Life: An Annual Review and came out in 2017. It is also listed as vol. 15 of the Casden Institute for the Study of the Jewish Role in American Life Annual Review.
Tastes of Faith is a collection of six articles about different aspects of food in Jewish American history. It begins with an article (later either expanded into or part of a book) about the Sephardi cacao trade in Colonial America, and ends with a meditation on food metaphors in an Amazon Studios series. In between, we get histories of Jewish peddlers, bagels and lox (and delis), vegetarian cookbooks (more or less kosher), and the evolution of the late 20th century post-Yom Kippur break fast celebration. Oddly enough, I think my favorite article was the one about deli bagels, which is a wild ride through over a century's worth of all sorts of foodways. I'd thought my favorite would be the one about cacao (and I do intend to get that book), but I think the realization that so much of the earlier information came from interrogations of Spanish Conversos who were later burned as heretics made me too sad. It's also very dense with primary source information, though that's not necessarily a bad thing.
Interestingly enough, most of the articles are by women. I suppose this makes sense in light of who traditionally has made the food in Jewish households and passed down non-commercial information about food. There is surprisingly little in the volume about the roles of Jewish women and food, though there is some scattered discussion about their interactions with it and family. Still highly recommended.
Tastes of Faith is a collection of six articles about different aspects of food in Jewish American history. It begins with an article (later either expanded into or part of a book) about the Sephardi cacao trade in Colonial America, and ends with a meditation on food metaphors in an Amazon Studios series. In between, we get histories of Jewish peddlers, bagels and lox (and delis), vegetarian cookbooks (more or less kosher), and the evolution of the late 20th century post-Yom Kippur break fast celebration. Oddly enough, I think my favorite article was the one about deli bagels, which is a wild ride through over a century's worth of all sorts of foodways. I'd thought my favorite would be the one about cacao (and I do intend to get that book), but I think the realization that so much of the earlier information came from interrogations of Spanish Conversos who were later burned as heretics made me too sad. It's also very dense with primary source information, though that's not necessarily a bad thing.
Interestingly enough, most of the articles are by women. I suppose this makes sense in light of who traditionally has made the food in Jewish households and passed down non-commercial information about food. There is surprisingly little in the volume about the roles of Jewish women and food, though there is some scattered discussion about their interactions with it and family. Still highly recommended.
Displaying 1 of 1 review