Dining on History

I post regularly on several message boards -- a couple of which are food and cooking related.  While browsing the boards, I have noticed a change in the world of cooking.  And it's a change I think may be more dangerous than fad diets and CSPI recommendations.

More and more I have noticed that it seems people no longer own cookbooks.  Home cooks are more and more getting, and posting, recipes to food blogs.  Understand, it is not the sharing of recipes I think is the problem.  I think the problem is that as recipes are uploaded to blogs, the original sources are lost -- maybe not intentionally, but lost nonetheless.

As a person who considered her 900+ volume library too important to leave behind when I began my life in Australia, I mourn any loss of paper books.  But the loss of actual paper cookbooks is not even my main concern here.

The problem is that as people share the recipes, the culinary history behind them is lost.  I have a recipe for an excellent Chocolate Snack Cake.  I got it from my mother, who got it from a magazine.  This progression of trusted and favourite recipes is never going to be lost, whether it's from a cookbook to a friend to the friend's daughter or from a grandmother to granddaughter to a neighbor's blog.  I do not worry about that.  But I do worry about the loss of knowledge that went with the recipe.

The recipe for Chocolate Snack Cake is as follows:

1 1/2 Cups All-Purpose Flour

1 Cup Sugar
1/3 Cup Baking Cocoa

1 Teaspoon Baking Soda
1/2 Teaspoon Salt

1 Cup Water
1/2 Cup Vegetable Oil

2 Tablespoons Vinegar
2 Teaspoons Vanilla Extract

In one mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, and salt.  In another bowl, combine water, oil, vinegar, and vanilla.  Add to dry ingredients and mix until just blended.  Pour into a greased 8" square pan.  Bake at 375 for 20-25 minutes, until pick inserted near the center comes out clean.  Cool slightly before cutting.  Makes 9 servings.

It makes a moist cake that can be served without any frosting or filling, though a light dusting of powdered sugar, sliced, sugared strawberries, or a healthy dollop of whipped cream are not unwelcome.

But there is something about this recipe, something that someone with a knowledge of culinary history will notice right away.  This recipe has no eggs, it also uses relatively small amounts of sugar and fat.  While those facts result in a recipe that is conveniently vegan, that is not what a culinary historian would notice.  A culinary historian would notice that this recipe, with the lack of eggs and small amounts of sugar and fat, is a war-time recipe, designed to make the most of precious, rationed ingredients.  The fact that the resulting cake is moist without the addition of a sugar laden frosting or glaze only adds to its war-time pedigree.

I mourn not only for the loss of well-worn cookbooks, but for the stories and history they provide.

I have a number of what would now be considered "vintage" cookbooks.  My mother bought them second-hand for me to have in my kitchen.  They are copies of the same cookbooks my mother used while I was growing up.  Most are Better Homes & Gardens cookbooks, but a couple are brand-name recipe books, the kind that were popular during the 50's, 60's and 70's.  While many of the recipes in the books are no longer in fashion, most can be easily adapted to fit today's culinary tastes.

I have a cookbook that is a collection of Amish & Mennonite recipes.  These are perfect for the return to wholesome, fresh, in-season cooking that is in vogue.  I suppose at some point, someone will "rediscover" these recipes and post them to their blogs, but will they understand the history behind them?  Will the blog readers believe the author is imaginative or innovative?

I suppose it's no different than people not recognizing references to classic books or movies, or not knowing classic works of art when they see them, but somehow it just seems worse to me to share the recipes without understanding the history.