Blog Post #6

Culinary information can be challenging to utilize on an international scale due to poor language translations, the lack of availability of key ingredients, and differences in cultural food norms; however, there are also thornier and more complicated issues at play globally.

A simple online search for a recipe often produces a deluge of choices, more than one could ever hope to use in a lifetime (Brown, 2017).  However, for all that they offer in quantity, these searches are often lacking in quality; online recipe sources are vetted and tested very little when compared with recipes in cookbooks (Carter, 2016). These online recipes also often lack contextual framing, a vital component of understanding how foods relate to culture, society, and history. As Whitman-Salkin states when bemoaning the lack of context in online recipes, “ The big questions go unanswered: how this recipe came to be and why it exists, what conditions (cultural, sociological, political, religious, technological) led to its development and refinement, who helped it along over time, whose life was shaped by it. (2017)”. Without these answers, the doors are flung wide open to problems of intellectual theft, cultural appropriation, and ignorance about the inequitable power structures that affect the culinary world.

Folklore places the earliest known culinary copyright dispute in France, in 1658. According to legend, after an unsuccessful attempt to copyright his sauce, a belligerent chef stormed into a competitor’s kitchen throwing handfuls of hair into pots of sauce made with his “stolen” recipe (Abbott, 2011, p.88). Culinary copyright issues continue to be a major issue today. According to the United States Copyright Office (n.d.), “A mere listing of ingredients is not protected under copyright law. However, where a recipe or formula is accompanied by substantial literary expression in the form of an explanation or directions, or when there is a collection of recipes as in a cookbook, there may be a basis for copyright protection.” This definition is open to interpretation, and has led to a “general lack of understanding that pervades recipe use and attribution (Lawrence, 2011, p.212)”. The online culinary world seems to be the worst offender, with studies proving that unattributed recipe copying, and outright theft runs rampant in food blogs (Lawrence, 2011, p.202). Culinary content creators are not united in their ideas about copyright; some see imitation as harmless flattery, while others go so far as to try to legally patent their innovations (Lawrence, 2011). This diversity of opinion has led to a lack of a standard code of copyright behavior for food blogs. As the virtual culinary universe expands, the original sources of content become more and more difficult to trace, leading to increased difficulty in attribution. Issues of copyright should be carefully considered by PHCs wading into the waters as food bloggers, as well as when choosing sources for online recipes.

Cultural appropriation is a grievous problem in the culinary world (in addition to the world at large), it extends to food blogs, major cooking magazines, cookbooks, and other sources of information that PHCs use and contribute to. It takes many forms including: columbusing, white washing, digital black-facing, and unattributed copying.

Columbusing is defined as, “when you ‘discover’ something that’s existed forever…outside of your own culture, nationality, race or even, say, your neighborhood (Salinas, 2014).” In the culinary world, this involves a culinary content creator claiming to have “discovered” the traditional dishes of another culture, while usually using their own societal advantages to benefit monetarily from this contrivance. As an example, white American celebrity chef Rick Bayless has formed a massive culinary empire based on the “discovery” of traditional Mexican recipes, while simultaneously benefiting from his status as a white American man (Albala, 2019).

White washing goes hand in hand with columbusing; a white content creator takes an established dish from another culture and when “putting his or her spin on it” completely overlooks the history, context, and traditions associated with the dish. As an example, celebrity chef Ina Garten was criticized for being culturally insensitive and lazy (in terms of culinary research) when she published a version of pozole that had very little in common with traditional Mexican recipes (Pellot, 2019).

Digital Blackface is another type of culinary cultural appropriation. When the formerly anonymous creators of the popular vegan Thug Kitchen blog (renamed Bad Manners) were revealed to be two white twenty-somethings, much of the food world exploded with anger. As African-American vegan chef Bryant Terry explained, these were “whites masking in African-American street vernacular for their own amusement and profit (2014).” The anonymity of the internet provides amble opportunity for deception and artifice.

Unattributed copying becomes cultural appropriation when a culinary content creator uses the recipes, ingredients, or ideas from another food culture without acknowledgement. For example, NYT Cooking contributor Alison Roman’s wildly successful recipe for “The Stew” was criticized for making no mention of its Caribbean and Indian roots (the forward of the recipe has since added attribution). After various complaints about the publication’s lack of diversity, Bon Appetit’s research director admitted that the magazine was “guilty of decontextualizing recipes from non-white cultures and knighting ‘experts’ without considering if that person should, in fact, claim mastery of a cuisine that isn’t theirs’ (Blitz, 2020).” This admission provides more evidence of why context is so important to recipes; food, culture, and ethnicity are inextricably interwoven.

Structural racism permeates the food world, culinary content creators have by and large been white– dominating cookbook sales, getting top positions at magazines, and controlling other popular information sources for PHCs. It is often an echo chamber of culinary whiteness–white magazine owners promoting white editors, who then promote white food writers (Giorgis, 2020).  After a massive turnover in staff due to evidence of racism, Bon Appetit and Epicurious staff members admitted that “have continued to tokenize many BIPOC staffers and contributors in our videos and on our pages,” (Giorgis, 2020)”. When the culinary world isn’t diverse, the information sources that they produce are narrow, skewed, devoid of context, and frequently racist.

When culinary information is examined out of context it prevents the profound understanding of food, the eventual goal of a true PHC. In order to avoid this, a PHC must be careful when encountering, searching for, using and creating information sources. When encountering a new source, it can be helpful for a PHC to ask themselves questions such as:

• “Who is providing this good or service for me?
• Am I engaging with them in a thoughtful manner?
• Am I learning about this culture?”
• Are people from this culture benefiting from my spending money here?
• Are they being hurt by my spending money here? (Salinas, 2014)”

Fortunately, there have been recent developments that make it easier for a PHC to discover a wider variety of information sources. YouTube tube videos of elders cooking the traditional foods of their cultures have become worldwide phenomena, particularly in Mexico , India , and Italy . The League of Kitchens employs immigrant cooks as teachers who invite PHCs into their homes to learn traditional dishes. There are food tourism organizations, such as authentic food quest,  that make it possible for a PHC to travel to different countries to learn about food, culture, and ethnicity in context. My hope is that the rise in participative food journalism, increased internet access, and societal desire for increased D.E.I. will lead to richer and more authentic information sources for the community of PHCs.

References

Abbott, W. (2011). Copyright of recipes and dishes. In E. M. Williams
and S. J. Carter (Eds.), The A-Z Encyclopedia of Food Controversies and the Law (Vol. 1, pp.88-89). https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/sjsu/reader.action?docID=620086

Albala, K. (2019, February 15). Food “columbusing” and the debate over cultural appropriation. The Great Courses Daily. https://www.thegreatcoursesdaily.com/food-columbusing/

Blitz, S. (2020, June 26). Now RECIPES are reviewed for ‘cultural insensitivity’ over claims chefs are ‘appropriating dishes’ from ethnic minorities without properly crediting them. MAILONLINE. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8465301/Recipes-reviewed-chefs-appropriating-dishes-ethnic-minorities-without-crediting-them.html

Brown, H. (2017, December 12). The recipe problem – How the internet is changing the way we cook. Blasting News. https://uk.blastingnews.com/food-and-wine/2017/12/the-recipe-problem-how-the-internet-is-changing-the-way-we-cook-002227351.html

Bryant, T. (2014. October 10) The problem with ‘thug’ cuisine. CNN. https://www.cnn.com/2014/10/10/living/thug-kitchen-controversy-eatocracy/index.html

Carter, N. (2016, April 29). If the recipe hasn’t been tested, can you trust it? The Los Angeles Times. https://www.latimes.com/food/la-fo-recipe-testing-20160430-story.html

Giorgis, H. (2020, June 16). The table stays white. The Atlantic. https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2020/06/bon-appetit-and-why-table-stays-white/613093/

Lawrence, M. (2011). Edible plagiarism: Reconsidering recipe copyright in the digital age. Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment and Law, 14(1). https://go-gale-com.libaccess.sjlibrary.org/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&u=csusj&id=GALE|A278509714&v=2.1&it=r

Pellot, E. (2019, September 23). A Food Network star created her version of mexican ‘posole’ and some people are not having any of it. Mitú. https://wearemitu.com/culture/latino-twitter-is-dragging-food-network-star-for-her-white-washed-pozole-recipe/

Rossetto Kaspar, L. (2015, February 13). In the kitchens of immigrants learning to cook. The Splendid Table. https://www.splendidtable.org/story/2015/02/13/in-the-kitchens-of-immigrants-learning-to-cook

Salinas, B. (2014, July 6).  “Columbusing”: The art of discovering something that is not new. NPR Code Switch. https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2014/07/06/328466757/columbusing-the-art-of-discovering-something-that-is-not-new

United States Copyright Office (n.d.). FAQ’s. https://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-protect.html

Whitman-Salkin, S. (2017, March 21). For the most helpful recipes, unplug your internet. Food52. https://food52.com/blog/19319-for-the-most-helpful-recipes-unplug-your-internet