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rebcamuse's review against another edition
funny
informative
inspiring
fast-paced
4.5
The best food histories are just histories. Sarah Lohman captures a whole lot of history in narratives about eight flavors that she feels best define American cuisine: black pepper, vanilla, chili powder, curry powder, soy sauce, garlic, monosodium glutamate (MSG), and sriracha. I could feel my resistance when I read MSG, but it is worth quoting the book here:
Today there’s a double standard when it comes to the perception of MSG. If it’s in Chinese takeout, it’s called MSG, and it’s like poison. But when MSG is utilized by high-end American chefs and brands, it referred to as “Umami" and it’s celebrated as revolutionary. Although [Kikunae] Ikeda named this taste umami in 1907, the designation wasn’t accepted officially by the scientific community until 2000, when taste receptors on the tongue were specifically identified for glutamate. Umami became the fifth official taste, alongside sweet, salty, bitter, and sour.(193)
That was a bit of a mic drop moment for me because I had honestly never really made the connection. Although I've not lived in fear of MSG, I certainly grew up hearing about its various pros and cons (mostly cons). But I'm beginning to appreciate more and more how we fear "chemicals" by virtue of that nomenclature alone, never really considering that nature and chemistry are bedfellows a good portion of the time.
But the book is also a story of people--like the Chili Queens of San Antonio and William Gebhardt who used their chili con carne as the inspiration for his chili powder. Or the mysterious Ranji Smile and his role in popularizing curries in the U.S. Or how anti-Italian sentiments in the late 1930s made garlic vile in spaghetti, but a charm in Provençal/French cuisine. The story of David Tran, inventor of sriracha (inspired by a Thai sauce called Sriraja Panich, invented in 1949 by a woman named Ms. Thanom Chakkapak), was one of the most riveting, as Lohman narrates Tran's journey from Vietnam aboard a Panamanian freighter to Hong Kong, then to Boston (briefly), finally to California, birthplace and home of that blend of chili mash, garlic, sugar, and xantham gum that has become beloved sriracha.
Lohman writes conversationally and weaves together anecdotes and research in the best of ways. This is a great read for anyone who likes to cook or likes to eat (or at least care about what they eat). Lohman illuminates the narratives in our food, and carefully extracts specific flavors that deserve recognition instead of being smothered with the falsehood of the American "melting pot."
jmrprice's review
4.0
A wonderful mix of history and contemporary views of flavors that have influenced and changed the landscape of American cuisine. Not too difficult to believe the incorporation of most are due to globalization - immigration and integration through food. (Think about Chinese and Italian immigration waves especially) The recipes are a bonus.
missrhinnan's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
informative
lighthearted
reflective
fast-paced
4.5
daumari's review against another edition
5.0
The easiest and often most enjoyable way to get to know a culture is through its food, and the makeup of American flavor covers not just the taste spectrum of spicy, sweet, and umami but also the history of immigration waves and economics.
[a:Sarah Lohman|15061387|Sarah Lohman|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png] of the Four Pounds Flour blog noticed in old cookbooks there were certain flavor profiles popping up, such as rose water as a baked goods sweetener rather than vanilla because vanilla was prohibitively expensive. She made a timeline of recipes through history and plotted them with Google Ngrams to see word frequency use between 1796 and 2000. These eight flavors were the noticeable peaks (chocolate and coffee were also popular, but they're extensively covered elsewhere), and are organized chronologically by when they appeared in American kitchens.
I was unsurprised to find that some flavors, such as black pepper and vanilla, became common after entrepreneurs and botanists figured out ways to make them more widely available and to actually cultivate respectively. Others, like chili and curry powders, come from the desire for a premixed pack, easy to reach without putting in the effort of roasting and mixing spices anew for each use.
Soy sauce and garlic were both interesting to me because they became widely available due to immigrant groups (Chinese and Italians) but were deemed too "ethnic" until a more "respectable" culture's food became #goals (Japanese and French cuisine). This bias is still around- think about how much people are willing to spend at an upscale sushi place, then try to remember how much you paid at your last dim sum visit.
My absolute favorite parts (which I also noted on Twitter) were when Lohman pointed out that compounds are compounds- regardless of source, vanillin will have the same structure and its atoms won't remember if they were derived from a vanilla vine or processed from leftover lignin from wood. Monosodium glutamate is its own flavor profile and yes, if you intake too much salt you will feel terrible, but the amounts of MSG in food are not the horrifically high concentrations used in early misleading studies of "Chinese Restaurant Syndrome". As someone with a genetics background who lives in the PNW, I am wary whenever some group touts their "natural" foods, as if natural can be quantified and measured somehow when really it's just emotion.
If a heftier read is desired, there's a very comprehensive notes for all sources and a selected bibliography for specific works in the back.
[a:Sarah Lohman|15061387|Sarah Lohman|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png] of the Four Pounds Flour blog noticed in old cookbooks there were certain flavor profiles popping up, such as rose water as a baked goods sweetener rather than vanilla because vanilla was prohibitively expensive. She made a timeline of recipes through history and plotted them with Google Ngrams to see word frequency use between 1796 and 2000. These eight flavors were the noticeable peaks (chocolate and coffee were also popular, but they're extensively covered elsewhere), and are organized chronologically by when they appeared in American kitchens.
I was unsurprised to find that some flavors, such as black pepper and vanilla, became common after entrepreneurs and botanists figured out ways to make them more widely available and to actually cultivate respectively. Others, like chili and curry powders, come from the desire for a premixed pack, easy to reach without putting in the effort of roasting and mixing spices anew for each use.
Soy sauce and garlic were both interesting to me because they became widely available due to immigrant groups (Chinese and Italians) but were deemed too "ethnic" until a more "respectable" culture's food became #goals (Japanese and French cuisine). This bias is still around- think about how much people are willing to spend at an upscale sushi place, then try to remember how much you paid at your last dim sum visit.
My absolute favorite parts (which I also noted on Twitter) were when Lohman pointed out that compounds are compounds- regardless of source, vanillin will have the same structure and its atoms won't remember if they were derived from a vanilla vine or processed from leftover lignin from wood. Monosodium glutamate is its own flavor profile and yes, if you intake too much salt you will feel terrible, but the amounts of MSG in food are not the horrifically high concentrations used in early misleading studies of "Chinese Restaurant Syndrome". As someone with a genetics background who lives in the PNW, I am wary whenever some group touts their "natural" foods, as if natural can be quantified and measured somehow when really it's just emotion.
If a heftier read is desired, there's a very comprehensive notes for all sources and a selected bibliography for specific works in the back.
kellyofcali's review against another edition
informative
lighthearted
fast-paced
3.75
Very fun, easy read that will give you LOTS of conversation points for dinner parties! If you like articles in Bon Appetit, or Food & Wine, you will probably like this book, which reads like a collection of them. The author manages to incorporate some personal anecdotes, too, which adds a nice bit of color.