Kitchen Culture in America (Inness 2000) describes the ways in which American culture has changed and how women’s day to day lives in the kitchen has been affected. Issues of gender and culture are interwoven in the history of domestic space. Issues of gender and culture are interwoven in the history of domestic space. This book opens one’s eyes to the role gender has played in the domestic space of the kitchen.
We often limit our consideration of cookbooks recipes and instructions and nothing more than that. Yet cookbooks as Inness points out are one of the most strongly gendered forms of literature other than romance novels. From the 1920’s to the 1960’s cookbooks were manuals on how to live one’s life. Some cookbooks specifically told women that if they were to cook the recipes in “this” book then all the men would come to them like hungry little fish. The other cookbooks convinced women that the certain recipes would help them keep their husbands. The main intention of those cookbooks was to instruct women on how to catch and keep a man.
Cookbooks played a huge role in American food culture. Along with the industrial revolution, food processing, and fast food joints, cookbooks have shaped our culture to be what it is now. Depending on the author and what his or her cultural background was cookbooks informed women about culturall specific types of food and preparation. Cookbooks also instructed women on what to wear while they worked in the kitchen and what they should look like. One cook book would tell women that they need to dress up, put on make-up and fix their hair just right while another cookbook would tell women that they should not wear any jewelry, or make-up, that a simple cotton dress on with a specific type of apron was best in the kitchen.
This book is recommended to anyone that is interested in American food culture and who appreciates great visual as illustration.
