Perfection Salad by Laura Shapiro

 

Perfection Salad - Laura Shapiro

Book Club read recommended by a member

Part of a throng of research projects that emerged in the early seventies when women began doing doctoral research.  The book highlights key women of influence in the United States (particularly New England) who led the charge in creating cooking schools, industrializing and streamlining the kitchen, established standards of measurement, as well as promoting quality control, safety, and nutritional awareness. 

The book discusses different waves of the movement from the mid 1800s up until the early to mid 1900s.  

She also talks about trends and public perceptions that influenced women. For example it was very popular in the 1800s for women to be "dainty." This led to women believing that they should eat very little, and when they did it should be in the form of "dainty" carb like things ie toast, wafers, tiny sandwiches etc. Meat and hearty dishes were considered more appropriate for men. This led to many women being undernourished and having anemia even. 

She also discusses the spiritualization of homemaking that transpired in the United States during the Victorian era. This was the idea that the woman was the spiritual heart and spiritual leader of the home. By maintaining order and creating domestic tranquility, training up the children etc. this was considered to be an end unto itself - a lofty goal and task that only a woman could achieve.  Through throwing herself into this work, she was truly a missionary in her home and then this could seep out beyond to include the community at large. Cooking and cleaning were thus glorified to fulfill a high and noble calling and it was approached with due seriousness. 

In our book club meeting we talked about feminism, its waves, and also the counter revolutions that followed. We see this today -with women identifying with traditional ideas of wife/motherhood. We talked about our own ancestors and the ways in which they viewed cooking and domesticity. Was it something to be accomplished in order to get on to something else or was it more? 

Views of food: In my family there was a saying "Eat to live, not live to eat." I think it's a very industrialized notion of food as a source of energy so you can go out and do more work. I noted that this is a a very different approach from the Italian family I married into. In Italian culture, how you prepare food, the ingredients you use, when you eat, in what order, at what time are all very important to them. (Not to mention the relative tastiness of the food.) 

I always enjoy pondering food processes of other times and places because they were so labor intensive. People at the turn of the century celebrated the newfangled notion of "processed foods." Our relationship with processed foods has become increasingly complex and I think most people rely on them but view the relationship dubiously. Our connection to the sources of food (for most US dwellers) is pretty remote. Most of our food travels through multiple entities before it reaches our plates or greasy paper bags. 

This book offers interesting insights into the evolution of that process and how industrialization affected the way cook, eat, and think about food and those who prepare it.