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- Verified Buyer
Should the celebrated "Alice B. Toklas Cookbook" have been credited to the Vietnamese men who cooked for Alice and Gertrude in France? How do you feel about Uzbeks bringing their passion for horse meat sausages into conformity with Moslem dietary laws by a little sleight of hand? Had you realized how food can affect the complex relationships among queer Indian women living in Great Britain?This edited collection is a chance for readers fascinated with culture, history, and food to learn about the Toklas-Vietnamese connection, the dilemnas of Moslem Uzbeks, the implications of the queer kitchen, and a lot more. The editors intend to "examine the importance of centering the study of foodways and culinary practices on theorizing [about] the racialized underpinnings of Asian Americans....[the authors] refuse to yield to the superficial multiculturalism that naively celebrates difference and reconciliation through the pleasures of food and eating." (p. 3)"Eating Asian American" brings together 20 such essays, about 430 pages in all, none of them yielding to superficial multiculturalism, arranged in four sections:-- "The Labors of Taste" mostly deals with the workers---the hard-working entrepreneurs of Cambodian doughnut shops in California, the Japanese cafeteria ladies of post-War Hawaii, the remarkable feat of scholarship tracing the life of a Chinese cook in New York, Los Angeles' taco trucks, and a fascinating study of the origins & socio-political implications of the chefs & farmers of Hawaiian Regional Cuisine.-- "Empires of Food" continues the colonialism, racism, and political themes in chapters on how mess-halls contributed to shattering families during the World War II incarceration of Japanese, Filipina/o experiences in sustaining their accustomed foods (2 chapters) and the cold war implications of U.S. enthusiasm for Asian foods. Thie section closes with an irresistable discussion of Kikkoman Soy Sauce and the implications of when it really first came to the States.-- In the well-titled section on "Fusion, Diffusion, and Confusion," readers can plunge into urban hippiness & food trucks including one offering Korean tacos, the story of samsa and the Uzbeks, the Filipina/o culinary diaspora, and two chapters on Asian Americans, one as producers of food and the other on Japanese women's choices and their socio-political implications.--"Readable Feasts," the fourth section, almost could be X-rated. One chapter deconstructs a novel about the Toklas/Stein/ Vietnmese chefs connection, another deconstructs a film about the queer kitchen and transnationality, another chapter looks at the implications of Madhur Jaffrey and vegetarianism,and there's an eye-opening chapter on food consumption and a genre of edible contemporary art in Hawaii including the implications of chocolate formed into hula dancers.The content & theorizing in these chapters may be familiar to scholars in the academic discipline of food studies, but new ground for the general reader. This emerging discipline encompasses looking back at colonialism, oppression and historic racialism as well as interpretations of contemporary events such as those roving food trucks accessed by the latest in webs, phones, tablets, and twitters.Almost all the chapters are written by such scholars, who offer the quality one would expect in depth of research and documentation, including extensive footnotes. The result is a splendid book, intended perhaps for food studies professionals and students but a delight for readers eager to learn more through such research about who we are, how we got here, and the wider meaning of what we do and do not eat. Readers who appreciated, for example, Williams-Forson's 2006 "Building Houses Out of Chicken Legs: Black Women, Food, and Power" may particularly be interested in this examination of the Asian American experience.As the United States and the world becomes increasingly transational, such understanding becomes almost essential. "Eating Asian American" can help us think about the social-political implications, for instance, of the Moslem diaspora we see in foods, groceries, butchers, restaurants, cookbooks and, yes, school lunches.Reader Alert: The writing style is between popularization such as Pollan's "Omnivore's Dilemma" and high church academe, with such locutions as "I will argue that..." Some general readers may like or manage this style out of interest in the topic; others may not.The chapters vary in liveliness and readability, though not in academic quality. The differences may be in whether the lens is primarily colonialism, racism,and exploitation of Asians or if the chapter authors seem open to more complex possibilities such as the interaction of these with economic class. The brief chapters perhaps may preclude the in-depth study possible in full-length books. However, the extensive bibliography should open many doors for additional reading. There is an index, as well as brief bios for all the chapter authors.Foodie Readers Alert: Only the chapter on the school cafeteria ladies has some recipes. There are plenty of cookbooks available including many of Madhur Jaffrey's. Her recipes & stories can delight the omnivores & carnivores as well as herbivores.The handsome, eye-catching cover shows a re-labeled bottle of sriracha, a tangy sauce originating in Thailand. In this case, readers can tell a lot about the book from its cover. I found "Eating Asian American" fascinating, provocative reading. Where I have first-hand knowledge as in some of the Hawaii chapters, the book is insightful & accurate. Highly recommended.
