Field Methods Spring 2024: Eating Out and Gastronomy

Restaurants are a site of cuisine shaping and an economic niche catering to people who travel away from home for work, for pleasure, or in search of a new life - ETHNOSITES

Eating Away From Home

Meals eaten at home are relatively safe, familiar, and cooked by trusted people and the company is socially safe, with predictable gastro-politics.
industrialization and urbanization have increased the numbers of people who must eat away from home
There are health but also social risks to eating away.

early coffee houses were places of public discourse which often fueled social dissent.
different classes can co mingle in restaurants, possibly violating the social order
imperial Russia- controlled the clientele to maintain social stratification
gentrification can bring in elite restaurants to poor neighborhoods and upset the social and economic landscape

Shared characteristics

food for a price
food for those who cant or don't want to cook
acceptance of public eating culture in some form

Street Food: Eating Standing Up

started to serve the needs of a diversified workforce who had moved into urban centers, lacked access to kitchens
humble beginnings but can lead to a national cuisine
led to more fixed locations for slower food and later fast food franchises
Low cost food and low cost for business owner
Plays out class relations

many rely on the food while others, like the middle class, will choose to venture across class lines for a new foodie opportunity

Mexican Street Food

some of the earliest
catered to new rural workers who migrated en masse to cities - 18th century
based on Mestizo identity, mixing indigenous and European ingredients
Has gone global

Restaurants: Eating Sitting Down

Eating in public was not always an accepted social activity

this is especially true for women, whose lives occur away from public view in many cultures
India as an example, but Sicily is another if you are a widow

Western style cities were constructed with plazas which made great sites for hotels and restaurants that served "continental cuisine"

suit a variety of tastes
conspicuously patronized by the wealthy
normalized the culture of public eating
origins in France

Eating out is about making important social and cultural statement

pursuit of status by dining in public- anyone could dine as long as they could pay regardless of social class or caste

History

earliest served light foods like restorative broths (restaurant) and later developed much more substantial fare
by the 1820s, the restaurant was well established and catered to travelers and those who wanted to dine out
became a space for urban sociability- but following a new model of service and choice

Characteristics of Restaurants

Six characteristics

Commercial Business Setting

restaurants are market transactions but are "de-commodified" by attributing them social and cultural meaning

decor is an important part of meaning making
shaping the ambiance- sounds, images, colors, furniture, temperature
everything is carefully managed to give you a home away from home experience or an exotic location
ethnicity may be expressed -menu, decor, theatrical quality where culture is exaggerated

there is a gastro-politics

host/guest relationship
internal- front/back of house
waiters police social ettiquette

Time

May be open 24/7 (fast food) or during restricted hours
manage when people eat certain meals and what they eat

Tables

sitting down to eat a meal is an important part of the restaurant experience
public and at the same time private (you have your own table and you are not expected to interact with others
Restaurants have become a third space-- not home, not work, but a space inhabited to do things in public

Commercial Kitchen

professional spaces where public cooking has become systematized for the commercial production of large quantities of food
lead to new cooking styles and highly organized kitchens
Kitchens used to be "obscure" now they may be visible to the public and part of the "show" especially if there is a celebrity chef
precarious living for those who work in them

fraught labor relations
low pay
unsafe working conditions
little job security
tip deductions for mistakes
exploitation of minorities and sometimes family members

Menu Selections

fixed pricing- prevented haggling and encouraged patrons to eat within their means (early restaurants were very expensive)
separate dishes- restaurant innovation
choices- personal options puts pressure on home cooks to meet individual preferences
Menus are about "choice" for diners abut also are the DEFINING DOCUMENT for the restaurant's identity as a purveyor of particular dishes and cuisines
make the geography of a nation taste familiar-standardization of dishes

Performance

gastro-politics of meals assumed a new level of intensity in public
eating out is special and requires more attention to norms of behavior appropriate to ones social identity
social identity is negotiation in aprt in this public space through ones choices and behaviors

Gastronomy: Cultivating Culinary Taste

the culture of gastronomy is crucial to the rise of restaurants as social spaces, rather than just providers of food
Concepts in French gastronomy (Brillat-Savarin)

Taste was something everyone had- not restricted to privilege and could be cultivated by experience
taste could facilitate social mobility
gastronomy is the pleasure and art of good eating
restaurants were temples to the culture
"taste" becomes an expression of social distinction even beyond food

Gastronomy is about shaping local, regional and national cuisines and about sampling and becoming familiar with other people's cuisines.
It has transformed eating beyond necessity and into a practice of pleasure and social differentiation, and a medium for negotiating identity politics
it has enabled public eating to flourish and be a socially meaningful activity
Urban Mass gastronomy-- adopted by many cultures

example Japan

yoshoku -- western style food
washoku -- Japanese cuisine

example Mexico

focus of upper classes was eating french haute cuisine with mexican ingredients

Types of Restaurants

Indigenous Restaurants

In many places, like the US and Canada, indigenous people have little access to the restaurant business or consideration for the national cuisine
generally they are absent from the restaurant culture- economically marginalized and so untenable
In places like Mexico and Guatemala, local restaurants will serve indigenous cuisine of a region
Is as contemporary as any cuisine
becoming more popular but generally cater to a non-indigenous clientele
The access to the traditional ingredients and flavors are important, part of food sovereignty issues, and it is the home of community cooking, not commercial ventures, that are for eating their own cuisine

Mainstream Restaurants

Nations that were founded by the greatest influxes of immigrants have grappled with the challenge of creating culinary unity from culinary diversity.
from the point of view of the state, associated with citizenship needs to be constructed in order for people to have a sense of belonging.
The national identity is usually constructed using the culture of the dominant ethnic group(s) and they will be the societal image-makers and constitute the "mainstream".
"Ethnic" is contrasted with "mainstream"
the cuisines of plural societies will reflect the power of the social order; the dominant ethnic group will form the culinary vocabulary, and the accent will include references to all other contextual influences-

history
place
ethnic groups
availability of foods (ingredients)

Ethnic cuisines can be mainstreamed - adopted into the national cuisine so that their ethnic origin, though known, is disregarded

pizza and pasta in the USA (almost everywhere)
made with creative adaptations
Examples of mainstreaming

Japanese kaiseki -highly refined Japanese cuisine restaurants
Japanese Kaitenzhushi - conveyor belt sushi restaurants

Immigrants and Ethnic Restaurants

The nostalgic desires for foods from home has created an economic niche for many immigrants:

opening shops that import specialty foods
opening restaurants that can equally serve their own community and interested others

Starting point for the study of mainstream attitudes toward ethnic minorities

acceptance of an ethnic group by mainstream society, often AFTER immigration of that ethnic group has lessened
the willingness to eat their cuisine
there may be an inverse relationship between immigration intensity and the status of a group's cuisine

Many marginalized immigrant groups will operate restaurants serving the prestige food of another ethnic group

Chinese owned sushi restaurants
Mexican owned pizza shops
Bangladeshi owned Indian shops
Italian owned French Restaurants

Serve the needs of their own community first, and after adventurous mainstream diners popularize the cuisine, and provide a place for immigrants to find employment
Needs:

There must be a well-established culture of dining out
also, the restaurant business needs to be attractive to the new immigrant

Urban Mass Gastronomy

the exercise of cultural omnivourousness by the wealthy have made ethnic restaurants an attractive option
four factors for viable employment

low capitol cost
presumed cultural capitol of "authentic knowledge" of the immigrant
social capital available- borrow money, draw upon workers willing to work long hours for little pay

loyal kin
friends
the ethnic community

the serial pattern of migrants moving into this employment niche

Ethnic Cuisine: Diaspora Dining

Indian Cuisine in Britain

created an anglo-Indian cuisine through cookbooks
appropriated Indian spices and dishes during colonial rule
Hindustanee Coffee House

1811 opened in London as the first Indian ethnic restaurant by Bangladeshis for the Sylhet region.
Sylhet began buying bombed out fish and chips shops - opening them and selling pies, peas, fish and chips, curry and rice, curry and chips
moved Indian food into the heart of working class life and established its place in the minds of the British population as "British cuisine"

Two types of Indian restaurants

small family run- standardized Indian cuisine
Newer restaurants serving regional cuisines of India

Gujarati
Goan
Kashmiri

Diversification allows foodies to claim their preference for one local tradition over another and increase their status as foodies

The popularity of Indian cuisine has led to increased immigration as second generation wants to be in white collar professions rather than work at resturaunts
Also need chefs from India to refine cuisine

Chinese Cuisine in North America

Chinese restaurants first opened in many ghettoized Chinatowns to serve the needs of kitchen-less men, and slowly adventurous non-Chinese cultural omnivores
Chop Suey, Chow Mein and lemon chicken are all derivatives of Chinese cuisine shaped to new circumstances
Change in meal format

traditional: tea, appetizer, main course, soup, tea (again)
modern adaptation: soup, meal, dessert

Fortune cookie: derived from lucky dumplings (New Years tradition)

only one dumpling traditionally had money in it but Because Americans believe everyone should have an equal chance at good fortune, there is a fortune in every cookie.

RESTAURANTS AS "ETHNOSITES": CROSS CULTURAL ENCOUNTERS

Ethnocites

places where mainstream sociaty can eat the food of other ethnic groups
places where immigrants can eat their own food and reaffirm their identity

Authenticity

in these spaces, the complex gastro-politics of identity work , at the level of the individual and ethnic groups in plural states are performed through "authentic food" served as a commercial transaction.
It is about the power to claim and reclaim authenticity and to constantly rework identity through the public consumption of food.
How is it determined?

depend upon a contrast between our food and other peoples food (both constructed- staged authenticity)
Creolization; adapt to changes in the tastes of their new environment (creolization adaptation)
There is a dialectical relationship between authenticity, rooted in tradtion, and in creolization, rooted in in the new context.
can be projected by:

assumptions about the owners ancestry and ethnicity
the exotic -sounding name of the restaurant
decor depicting cultural artifacts
evocative music

ultimately judged by the EXPERIENCE of the diner- it is relational

Role of ethnic restaurants

conserver of tradition
innovator for forging new identities
vehicle for diners to maintain a connection to their homeland
offers diners a strategy to undermine the dominant stereotypes
archive of culinary memories
living rooms for the homesick
Eating in ethnic restaurants correlates with higher income levels, class, education and value for money
positive way to bridge cultural barriers while appearing cosmopolitan for non-ethnics sampling other's cuisines

places where one can experience the other safely
where the foreign is made familiar
where the global is miniaturized

Restaurants foster cross cultural encounters

Ethnic Restaurants Become Tourist Sites

staged, exaggerated and essentialized reduction of culture
diners become culinary tourists, willing to experience the cuisine, and sometimes taking postcard-like photographs to document their visit

Culinary Colonialism?

The eating of ethnic food by individuals of the mainstream dominant culture can be seen as a kind of culinary colonialism or imperialism.
reinforces inequality in society
dishes are a resource that can be appropriated without any regard for the people whose cuisine it is, or the social, economic, and political circumstances in which they find themselves, as immigrants or members of distant states
commercial food commodifies culturethrough ethnically marked ingredients, flavor, and dishes that hide the reality of the lives of the people who produce the restaurant meal , and those who produce the ingredients and flavors along the food chain.
the "cheapnes" of ethnic food is exploited-demanding low wages, cheapens the originating people, their lives, and their culture

provide culturally branded food through which dominant ethnic group defines itself
BUT supports the local economy and provides livelihoods

"Anti-Colonial Eating Manifesto"

Ethnic groups have the right to define their own authentic culinary traditions, which have been creatively adapted to a new locality
Diners should respectful, gain knowledge of the cuisine, reflect on the complexities of race, gender, class, privilege, and power
there should be empathy between the consumer and the producer

Eating Out: Indigenous restaurant -Swika San Jose Costa Rica