In Celebration of Civic Fruit: The Boston Tree Party Inauguration
by Mayling Chung
At the Boston Tree Party’s inauguration this past Sunday, somebody from the crowd shouted, “Live tree or die!” and many people replied with laughter. The person’s play on words and its reception really fit what we were gathered there for: the ceremonial kick-off of the Boston Tree Party, a project that creatively uses language and metaphor around apple trees to promote positive changes in social health. Their goal is to have self-elected delegations plant 100 pairs of heirloom apple trees across greater Boston in the next couple of months. The Boston Tree Party will then place all the trees on a map and collectively create a decentralized urban orchard, in the hopes that the people involved will come together, across boundaries, as parts of a whole.
Through a combination of urban agriculture and conceptual art, this multilayered campaign engages people in activities centered on the heirloom apple trees. The Inauguration was such an event, in which the first pair of whips, or 1-year old single stem trees, was planted at the Rose Kennedy Greenway in downtown Boston. First, the youngest children were asked to help break ground as a symbol of the long-term investments being made. As the tree’s roots were placed into the ground, we learned about apple trees, apple tree planting, and the significance of apple trees in Boston history at a site just off the Boston Harbor, near where the Boston Tea Party took place hundreds of years ago. There were 80 to 100 people in attendance, many of whom plan to plant and care for a pair of apple trees, so the physical planting served as a demonstration of what’s to come. Volunteers from the crowd participated in a playful toast, which involved putting a piece of toast on the tree, pouring sparkling cider on the ground and in cups, and wassail, which involved a sequential cheer and banging pots and pans while moving around in a circle. Note: For those of you wondering what wassail is outside of this context, it typically takes place in the winter, involves lively and noisy festivities, and drinking a lot of alcohol!
Both Inauguration trees, a Grimes Golden and a Golden Russet, are American Heritage varieties, and were planted as a pair because apple trees must cross-pollinate in order to produce fruit. Cross-pollination is one of the ecological principles that the Boston Tree Party uses in reference to the partnerships they hope to foster. On that note, stayed tuned for the details of a BU planting party next month, as the Center for Energy and Environmental Studies has generously welcomed us to be involved with their pair of apple trees. Additionally, there is still a bit of time before the sign-up deadline of April 15, if you or anyone you know wants to join the party! For more information and to see what fruit this project has to bear, visit the Boston Tree Party’s website.
Graduating Project | Barbara Rotger’s How to Read a Recipe Box: A Scholar’s Guide
by Barbara Rotger
Both my grandmothers’ recipe boxes sit on top of the bookshelf in my office, and the first paper I wrote as a student in the Gastronomy program was an analysis of these, plus I few others I have acquired as a result of an eBay habit. More accurately, this first paper was an attempt at such an analysis. Looking back at it, I see that it was not my best work. The truth is, recipe boxes and their kin — manuscript recipe books and recipe scrapbooks — are not easy sources to work with, if you can find them at all. They usually lack any kind of organizational structure, including indexes and page numbers, and often feature crumbling newspaper clippings or illegible handwriting.
You might ask, “Why not just use cookbooks?” After all, a number of scholars have done very interesting work in this area, especially with community cookbooks. There are some very good reasons to look at recipe collections instead. To me, this difference can be summed up as follows: cookbooks say, “This is who we would like you to think we are” while recipes collections say, “This is who I am.”
Working my way through the program, I periodically returned to the idea of using personal recipe collections as sources and developed my own informal methods for approaching them. As a student in Professor Glick’s cookbook seminar I realized that there was a need for a more structured approach. My thesis project represents an attempt to do just this: develop a comprehensive methodology for analyzing personal recipe collections as historical, cultural and gendered artifacts. More
Food news roundup: April 8
From around the web this week, a few bites of food news. Feel free to comment with thoughts, reactions, or anything else of interest.
Boston food bank aims to narrow 'meal gap'
Learning about beef from America's first cookbook
Recent donation to NYU's Fales Library makes it one of the largest food-related collections in the country
It's fear, not radiation, that's a risk to Japanese fish sellers
FDA launches Web page for recalled foods
A Sunday of swapping
by Khalilah Ramdene
While a diet rich in ramen noodles may be the stereotypical grad school diet, it’s unlikely you’ll find a Gastronomy student sticking to this tradition. That is, unless they made the ramen themselves or had it at a spot in Chinatown.
This past Sunday, a group of Gastronomy students and faculty gathered to share the food they cook and eat. (This article on food swapping from The New York Times inspired the get-together.) The food swap was an opportunity for students and faculty to gather around food in a more casual setting and talk over a generous spread of cheese and wine. They traded an impressive list of homemade food that evening, including hot sauce, citrus curds, pasta, pizza dough, and two different sourdough starters. The food swapped is evidence that Gastronomy students are cooking and eating well, and are sure to have more up their sleeves. The evening ended with talk of the next swap, perhaps with pickled foods as its theme. Sauerkraut, anyone?
Outside of the Classroom: Chris Malloy and Chefs Collaborative
by Chris Malloy
Until I saw the email, my plan was to read in bed.
Hey Chris, Jon noticed a couple of mistakes in your piece on salmon handling. Could you check in with him and see if you can get those corrected?
It was a frosty morning, one that capped a busy week, and I just wanted to sip tea and get lost in a warmer world. Instead, I would be spending the morning in Alaska.
I called Jon, an Alaskan fisherman, and we chatted about salmon—how the fish is bled on deck, how well the different species ship, and how chefs can discriminate when buying. This last bit was of particular importance given the mission of Chefs Collaborative: to inform chefs about sustainable and delicious food choices.
By mid-afternoon, I had updated my piece on the Chefs Collaborative blog. Chefs Collaborative staff post to the blog regarding food news, sustainability issues, member profiles, and so forth. As the Collaborative’s research and writing intern, I post to the blog about my findings—all salmon-related, for now.
The blog posts are part of a larger project. I’m writing a communiqué on salmon, a pamphlet advising chefs on how to handle the fish in a way that benefits the environment and our stomachs. This is the kind of thing that Chefs Collaborative does. They've published literature on a wide range of sustainable food topics, including how to go "whole hog" and cooking with heirloom beans.
But Chefs Collaborative does other things, too. Members can host earth dinners, themed meals celebrating responsible food. And Chefs Collaborative holds a yearly national summit, at which members attend and conduct, panels, workshops, and tastings. And that’s just the beginning of what Chefs Collaborative does. Look them up on Facebook and Twitter. Theirs is a good cause to follow, even with the odd morning in Alaska.
This is part of a series of posts from Gastronomy students on how they’re putting their classroom knowledge to work and expanding their education through internships and volunteer opportunities. To write about your own internship, volunteer position or job, send an email to gastronomyatbu@gmail.com.
Food news roundup: April 1
From around the web this week, a few bites of food news. Feel free to comment with thoughts, reactions, or anything else of interest.
Rikers Island inmates bake 36,000 loaves of bread per week
The cult wine of 121 B.C.
New bill aims to limit rights of beer and wine producers to ship directly to consumers
Food inflation kept hidden in tinier packaging
What does "sustainable" mean for wine?
Good Food Jobs and the importance of ice cream
Dorothy Neagle and Taylor Cocalis, the ladies behind Good Food Jobs, are coming to BU for a free seminar this weekend. They’ll impart some general wisdom on food-focused careers and will help participants think creatively about applying food writing skills beyond traditional channels. The seminar is full, but keep an eye on our Events page and the Lifelong Learning website for future opportunities like this one.
by Erin Carlman Weber
Like so many great things, Good Food Jobs wouldn’t be if it weren’t for pluck and ice cream.
Taylor Cocalis and Dorothy Neagle, founders of the gastro-job website, first bonded during a car ride home from a dairy festival in upstate New York, an event to which they'd been lured by the 25-cent ice cream cones. They remained close for the rest of their undergrad studies at Cornell University, adding to the growing body of evidence that says connections fostered by churned frozen cream are unbreakable. After the pomp and circumstance, Taylor headed to graduate school at the University of Gastronomic Sciences in Italy, and Dorothy began working for an interior design firm in New York City.
Five years after that first ice cream date, the friends found themselves possessed by a combination of career unrest, entrepreneurial urge, food tunnel vision and a desire to work together on a project that would make a difference. They were bound once again for the dairy fair and its pocket change-priced cones when they had an “a-ha!” moment that set Good Food Jobs in motion.
The site is a boon for many food studies students, who, if they’re anything like this one, can be found hitting their browser’s refresh button on the site's job listings several times a day. Since its launch in May 2010, Taylor and Dorothy have transformed their brainchild from a weekly e-newsletter to full-fledged search engine. They’re currently putting up an average of 60 new opportunities a week, and they recently passed the six hundred listings mark. Openings posted on the site span the breadth of the food world. A random sampling could turn up a decorated New York City restaurant looking for line cooks, a marketing position with an urban gardening organization, a Michigan farm searching for interns, or one of the country’s top food websites hiring freelance writers.
Taylor and Dorothy say it’s their goal to ensure there’s a greater chance this diverse range of food-centric businesses exists. They vet each listing to make sure it meets not only their high standards for sustainability, but also the desires of their uniquely food-focused job seekers. The wide range of postings speaks to an idea the women say has been eye-opening for many—just because you want to work in food, it doesn’t mean you have to work with food.
Having ice cream on hand does help, though, as Dorothy and Taylor can attest.
Food writing students want to warm you up
In New England, finding creative and tasty ways to eat your way through the last bits of winter before spring finally bursts onto the scene can seem a never-ending task. Students from this semester's food writing class, taught by Boston Globe food editor Sheryl Julian, are here to help. A few weeks ago, Julian tasked the group with developing a recipe and writing an introduction for a winter-worthy dish. Here are the three hearty, Italian-inflected dishes that rose to the top.
Sophie Gees' rib-sticking ribollita
Chris Malloy's spaghetti all'amatriciana
Rachel Weiner's roasted butternut squash risotto
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Food news roundup: March 25
From around the web this week, a few bites of food news. Feel free to comment with thoughts, reactions and anything else of interest.
Japan's food contamination problem 'serious,' says WHO
Can city farmers make a living? Activist Eli Zigas on the challenges of urban agriculture
Minnesota acts against 'food club' milk seller
Amanda Hesser on how the new Google recipe search gets it wrong
ConAgra broadens campaign to fight child hunger
Genetically modified crops get a boost over organics with new USDA rulings
Graduating Project | Ilona Baughman’s A Touch of Spice: Eating, Exile and Identity
This is the first in a series of posts on the diverse range of projects our students undertake as a culmination of their Gastronomy studies. To write about your own graduating project, send an email to gastronomyatbu@gmail.com.
by Ilona Baughman
I came to the Gastronomy department, not surprisingly, with an abiding interest in many aspects of food. In the course of my studies, I found myself most particularly interested in food’s utility as a lens into culture. A class with chef Ana Sortun opened my eyes to the sophisticated culinary legacy of the Ottoman Empire. I soon began to investigate food’s utility as a lens into my culture, me being a daughter of Greek parents, and a granddaughter of Ottoman subjects.
I learned that although Greeks have lived throughout the Eastern Mediterranean for millennia, only a fraction of them actually lived in the place that became Modern Greece in the early nineteenth century. The Ottoman Empire was comprised of a diverse, multi-cultural population. The new republic quickly and successfully promulgated a nationalist agenda that rejected that diversity, along with any memory of its legacy, which resulted in an almost entirely homogeneous Greek population. This collective amnesia of the recent past enabled the newly constructed national narrative to leapfrog over time, and trace a straight line from the present back to a glorious past in antiquity.
The idea of Greek culture as a modern construction, in opposition to the Ottoman past was the subject I wanted to tackle in my thesis, using food and eating practices as a way to illuminate cultural differences and similarities. The problem was how to narrow the scope to a manageable, meaningful project, with sources to which I had access.
The answer came to me after seeing the 2003 film A Touch of Spice. It is the story of a Greek family from Istanbul who, for political reasons, are deported to Athens, a place as alien to them as anywhere on earth. Berated there as foreigners, they are considered positively unpatriotic for continuing to cook and consume “Turkish” food.
The film thus poses the question “what is Greek food – and by extension – how does one really define Greek identity?” An analysis of the film has allowed me to investigate the issues inherent in teasing out these questions of national identity, anchored in recent history.
Using the film has also solved the issue of sources: the film and cookbooks are my primary sources. Secondary sources include works in food studies, film studies, nationalism and Modern Greek history. The writing is finally underway. With a little luck, you will see me at graduation this May!