Upcoming Meeting:
Thursday, 14 August 2008Time: 6 - 9 pm
Location: Napa
Topic: A Feast of Figs
Speaker: Georgeanne Brennan, renowned cooking teacher and author of A Pig in Provence (2007); Little Herb Gardens (2004); and Olives, Anchovies and Capers (2001), among many other books. See www.georgeannebrennan.com
For address, RSVP to ejpeters@chonc.com by August 12th.
Unless otherwise noted, CHoNC meetings are free and open to the public.
Interested parties can join our mailing list by signing up at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CHoNC/
Past CHoNC Events:
2008
10 July 2008
Sausalito
Event: Dinner at Avatar's (Mexican-Punjabi cuisine)
12 June 2008
Magnes Museum in Berkeley
Topic: "Of Chocolate and Change"
Panelists: Bert Gordon, History Dept., Mills College; Fran Gage, patissier and author of Bread and Chocolate; Thalia Hohenthal, Guittard Chocolate Co; Alice Medrich, chocolatier and author of Pure Dessert and A Year in Chocolate; Frankie Whitman, Fullbloom Baking Co. (formerly at Scharffen Berger)
Magnes Museum in Berkeley
Speaker: Jeannette Ferrary, author of M. F. K. Fisher and Me
Topic: A Centenary Celebration of M. F. K. Fisher: 'Nothing is in the Books'
15 April 2008
Vacaville Performing Arts Theater
Field Trip to see the Kitchen Sisters (NPR's Davia Nelson & Nikki Silva)
Topic: Hidden Kitchens across the United States
13 March 2008
Magnes Museum in Berkeley
Speaker: Andrew Griffin of Mariquita Farm
Topic: The early days of the California mesclun salad industry
21 February 2008
Burlingame
Event: Dinner at Yaya Cuisine (Mesopotamian restaurant)
Reading: The Restaurants Book: Ethnographies of Where We Eat (Berg, 2007).
17 January 2008
Chancellor Hotel, San Francisco
Speaker: Andrew F. Smith, editor of The Oxford Companion to American Food and Drink (2007)
Topic: "Eating History: 25 Historical Events that Shape What Americans Eat Today"
2007
13 December 2007
Field trip to the JCC East Bay, for the U.S. premiere of "Chez Schwartz" (2006)
Discussion afterwards with Peter Levitt and Karen Adelman, co-owners of Saul's Deli in Berkeley
8 November 2007
Magnes Museum in Berkeley
Speaker: Dianne Jacob, author of Will Write For Food (2005) and the forthcoming Grilled Pizzas and Piadinas (Spring 2008)
Topic: Iraqi Jewish cuisine in 1930s Shanghai
11 October 2007
Magnes Museum in Berkeley
Speaker: Thy Tran <www.wanderingspoon.com>
Topic: Sikh Temples and Communal Meals in California's Central Valley
20 September 2007
Magnes Museum in Berkeley
Speaker: Victor Geraci, Food and Wine Historian at Berkeley's Regional Oral History Office
Topic: Cultural Terroir: Defining Self and the Bay Area Region with Food and Wine
12 July 2007
Event: Viewing Ratatouille (the Disney-Pixar movie)
Location: Discussion afterwards at Bistro Liaison (Berkeley)
14 June 2007
Napa
Speaker: Robert Brower
Topic: Solving a Culinary History Mystery: Tracing Abby Fisher's Roots to South Carolina
10 May 2007
Oliveto Restaurant (Oakland)
Speaker: William Rubel, author of The Magic of Fire, spoke about his new work on heritage breads in Europe.
23 April 2007
Orinda Bookstore (Orinda)
Speaker: Laura Shapiro, author of Perfection Salad and Something from the Oven spoke about her new book, Julia Child (Viking, 2007).
19 April 2007
Magnes Museum in Berkeley
Speakers: Melissa Salazar and Patrice Savery
Topic: Children and Food in the Public School System: Culture and Curricula
8 March 2007
Magnes Museum in Berkeley
Speaker: Sandra Oliver, editor of Food History News, author of Food in Colonial and Federal America (Greenwood, 2005) and co-author of Giving Thanks: Thanksgiving Recipes and History, from Pilgrims to Pumpkin Pie (Clarkson Potter, 2005).
Topic: Rethinking regionalism's role in American culinary history.
8 February 2007
Magnes Museum in Berkeley
Michele Simon spoke about her new book, Appetite for Profit: How the Food Industry Undermines our Health and How to Fight Back (Nation Books, 2006).
11 January 2007
Magnes Museum in Berkeley
Speaker: Lynette Hunter (UC Davis)
Topic: Food, Culture, and Community (2006 collected volume honoring Alan Davidson)
2006
7 December 2006Mountain View
Andrea Nguyen spoke about the role of family history in her new cookbook, Into the Vietnamese Kitchen: Treasured Foodways, Modern Flavors (Ten Speed, 2006), and members prepared dishes from her cookbook for the group to share.
14 November 2006
Field Trip to hear Professor Carole Counihan speak at a UC Davis event co-sponsored by Critical Studies in Food and Culture and the UC Davis Women's Center.
Topic: "Speaking Food and Making Place in the San Luis Valley of Colorado"
12 October 2006
Magnes Museum in Berkeley http://www.magnes.org/
Speaker: Ken Albala (University of the Pacific)
Topic: A Hill of Beans: A History of the World's Most Ubiquitous Peasant Food
21 September 2006
Magnes Museum in Berkeley
Speaker: Mary Margaret Pack (Foodways of Austin)
Topic: "Paradise Gardens and Mediterranean Gastronomy"
10 August 2006
Magnes Museum in Berkeley
Topic: "Curries, Chilies, and Colonial Cuisines"
Resources: Lizzie Collingham's Curry: A Tale of Cooks and Conquerors (2006); David Thompson's Thai Food (2002); and Jeffrey Alford & Naomi Duguid's Mangoes and Curry leaves (2005). Also discussed Madhur Jaffrey's Ultimate Curry Bible (2003).
20 July 2006
Oakland
Topic: History of Children's Food
22 June 2006
Napa
Topic: Taste, Terroir, and the Wine Industry
Wine expert Ann Littlefield guided our "Judgment at Betty's"
18 May 2006
Magnes Museum in Berkeley
Speaker: Erica J. Peters
Topic: "Chopsticks, Forks, and Fingers, or How to Eat in Nineteenth-Century Vietnam"
27 April 2006
Magnes Museum in Berkeley
Speaker: Samantha Barbas
Topic: The history of women and dieting in the United States.
9 March 2006
Magnes Museum in Berkeley
Speaker: Jessica Weiss, CSU East Bay
Topic: Kay Wahl's "She
Also Cooks" Column (1950s and 60s).
7 February 2006
Upstairs at Cody's Books (on Telegraph) in Berkeley
Marion Nestle (NYU) presenting her current research.
19 January 2006
Magnes Museum in Berkeley
Speaker: Charlotte Biltekoff, UC Davis
Topic: “Courage, Cooperativeness, and Character: The Meaning of Dietary
Health on the World War II Home front”
Resource: Amy
Bentley, Eating for Victory: Food Rationing and the Politics of Domesticity.
2005
8 December 2005 - Holiday Dinner 10 November 2005
Topic: "Food Porn" -- the lavish, lovingly arranged food
photos in cookbooks and magazines, the decadence of some shows on the Food
Network, and food literature that borders on the ecstatic.
Resources:
-- Molly O'Neill, "Food Porn," Columbia Journalism Review,
Sept/Oct 2003.
-- Frederick Kaufman, "Debbie Does Salad: The Food Network at the
Frontiers of Pornography," Harper's Magazine, October, 2005.
-- Roland Barthes' 1957 essay on "ornamental cookery" in Mythologies
-- Nigella Lawson's cookbooks, Marcel Desaulniers' Death by Chocolate
19 October 2005
Topic: "Holiday Foods, Past and
Present."
Resources:
1979 Ruth Reichl interview with Ian Dengler, entitled "Food Sleuth."
20 September 2006
Topic: Food Writing and Autobiography. Jeannette Ferrary, author of M.F.K.
Fisher and Me and Out of the Kitchen: Adventures of a Food Writer,
will help us think about the genre.
11 August 2005
Topic: The Dangers and Delights of Culinary Tourism
Why might culinary tourism be growing so rapidly at this particular time? What
are people looking for, as compared to the past? What are possible positive and
negative consequences of culinary tourism for the regions visited, for the
tourists, and for their "home" cultures?
Resources:
1) ICTA white paper on Culinary Tourism as a "Tasty Economic
Proposition"
2) Heather Schell's "Gendered Feasts: A Feminist Reflects on Dining in New
Orleans" in Pilaf, Pozole, and Pad Thai (Sherrie Inness, ed.)
12 July 2006
Topic: Food in Film History.
2 June 2005
COPIA: The American Center for Wine, Food and the Arts (Napa)
Topic: "What is American Food?"
13 May 2005
Ann Arbor, MI
Formation of National Association of Culinary History Organizations (NACHO)
26 April 2005
Deanna Pucciarelli and Professor Louis Grivetti (UC Davis)
Topic: The Chocolate History Project
3 March 2005
Alice Arndt presenting on her biographical dictionary, Culinary Biographies.
Discussion of Brillat-Savarin's The Physiology of Taste.
27 January 2005
Bert Gordon (Mills College) presenting on Gourmet Magazine
Discussion of
1) Accounting for Taste: The Triumph of French Cuisine
by Priscilla Parkhurst Ferguson (U. of Chicago, 2004), 272 pages
2) Something From the Oven: Reinventing Dinner in 1950s America
by Laura Shapiro (Viking Books, 2004), 306 pages
2004
22 October 2004 --
Organizational Meeting
The
Culinary Historians of Northern California is a new non-profit educational
organization focused on the role of food and drink in human history. The
purpose of this group is to encourage informal exchanges and conversations
among people living in Northern California who work on and/or like to talk
about culinary history. The first meeting of this group will be an
opportunity to work out the details of where and when to meet, to suggest
topics for discussion, and to shape the structure of the group.
Sally Scully, Department of History, San Francisco State University
Erica J. Peters, Independent Scholar
Email <ejpeters@chonc.com>