Local food is elitist? Part II

So I knew I had more to say in response to Mark Bittman's article, "Local Food: No Elitist Plot," which I blogged about a few days ago, but it took a Saturday afternoon at the playground to work through some ideas and thoughts regarding the absurdity of calling local food elitist.

(Here's a total side note: A friend of mine asked today if "eating local" included squirrel. I'd say yes, probably; not much meat on 'em though. Maybe a stew? But I digress....)

So this idea that eating local is trendy or elitist stirred up such an angry ant's nest in my mind. But why? Why did it make me so mad?

Let me step back a little. Throughout our existence as human beings (and probably before that), most food was local. Furthermore, seasons, geography, and weather restricted the availability of ingredients. However, these limitations unleashed human creativity (if for no other reason than to stave off the boredom of eating the same dish for the sixth week in a row because that's all that's left after a long winter or dry season). All across the globe, cooks got imaginative, developing techniques to bring out new flavors in foods, tweaking textures and forms, trying new things they found in their environment--continually innovating, refining, experimenting to make the most of what they had.

Local cuisines and flavor profiles arose around the world based in large part on what foodstuffs were available. And with the Columbian Exchange new ingredients spread throughout the world--peppers bringing their heat to the far east and wheat and apples coming to the new world, redefining what local food was, yet maintaining an essential uniqueness, localness, and authenticity.

Here's the contrast: Industrial food--whether you are talking about fast food restaurants, meals in a box, frozen dinners, snacks, sodas, franchise restaurants of any stripe--promotes sameness. National and international brands of industrial foods value consistency almost above all. As a consumer, the idea is that the soda you find in Waukegan, Illinois, will taste the same as the one you find in Oahu, Hawaii.

So, is consistency bad? Well, no. I am an editor, for pete's sake, I crave consistency. But not in food. In food, it gets boring and generic.

More than boring though, consistency trains the public palate; consistency trains people to expect specific kinds of flavors and textures--most of which are nothing like the tastes and textures of home-cooked food made from seasonal ingredients. It takes away people's freedom to develop their own palates, to make their own judgments about how they think a food tastes. If the standard in taste is a fatty, salty snack with a vaguely chicken-y or cheesy flavor or a sugary, squishy-soft thing with a vaguely chocolate-y flavor, how are beets and turnips and quinoa supposed to hold their own? In other words, if a person were raised with a concept of bread as a ghastly white supersoft substance with a slightly chalky taste, how long would it take for him or her to cease to regard a loaf of home-baked, whole-wheat bread as kind of foreign?

And so millions of industrially trained palates continue to crave the same tastes and textures, with a slight tweak from time to time to keep things "interesting," themselves end up being the product of industrial food.

And it bothers me, because it comes back to this idea that people are incapable of taking care of themselves, of making things for themselves, of making decisions for themselves. We are continually sold the idea that this company can make that easier for you, can take away your concerns about this or that. We are continually trained to lack faith in ourselves. It comes back to this idea that people are just too dumb to take care of themselves. (Michael Ruhlman rails against the idea that Americans are too stupid to cook in this blog post.)

But, hey, maybe it's true. News used to be mostly facts, leaving the work of forming an opinion up to the news consumer. Now people are served prefab opinions. People used to (grow and) cook their own food. Now it's served up in boxes, cans, and freezer bags--all prefab because people can't do it for themselves. Most people used to make their own clothes and furniture--now most people are too scared to even try.

But I don't really believe people are incapable of doing and thinking for themselves. Well, to be completely honest, I don't want to believe they are incapable. I want to believe that ordinary people are capable of making their own meals; adapting to local conditions, flavors, and ingredients; developing their own palates and judgments based on real, natural, whole foods. If that belief is elitist, then I'm an elitist. Then local food is elitist.

But you know it's not. Believing people can do, make, and think for themselves is the antithesis of elitism; what it is is faith in everyperson.

So what is this thing called authenticity?

The idea of authenticity has been worming its way around my mind ever since I read Todd Kliman's article, "The Problem of Authenticity," in issue 1 of The Lucky Peach. I suppose the article resonated because authenticity has been a byword in my family for many years. The article made me realize I don't actually have a verbal definition of the term; basically, it's one of those gut-feeling, I-know-it-when-I-see-it kinds of things.

And I can't tell if I am comfortable with that or not. On the one hand, if you don't have a specific definition of a thing, you can make all kinds of exceptions that undermine the integrity of the thing, stretching its "truthiness" (to steal a term from Stephen Colbert) to the breaking point. On the other hand, you can make all kinds of exceptions that allow the thing to grow, to take into itself new perspectives. So, I don't know where to come down on defining authenticity.

Kliman addresses three questions regarding authenticity in food:

• "For one thing, how the hell do you define it?
• "For another, where the hell do you find it?
• "And another, having found it, how do you know that it's, in fact, it?"

And he presents some examples that show what a tricky problem this actually is, such as the now less authentic bagels made in New York City (where once they were made entirely by hand, now they are stamped out by machine), or the wide range of how to define a gumbo in New Orleans, or the "right" ways to make Szechuan food or Neapolitan pizzas. Some places have strict regulations that define specific dishes to ensure that tradition is not lost. (To be honest, I also see some defensiveness against encroaching pop culture in such regulation too, but that's another story.)

Authenticity in food is an interesting topic because it mirrors and illustrates changes in culture. I was an anthropology major in college, and one topic that came up a lot was this idea of culture loss--that people the world over are losing their traditions to adapt to a new world order of internationalism. That sodas and televisions and t-shirts are now found in the remotest areas of the world and are destroying traditional ways of life. That languages are being lost as the last speakers die off. And, yes, it is sad, it is awful because there is so much to learn from what is being lost. And yet, and yet, isn't that the way of the world? We think of these cultures and these particular dishes as coming down to us fully formed, sacrosanct, but they too evolved. Cultures adapt to changes in local conditions and have always done so.

In the same way, people have taken their food traditions to new places and adapted them to what's available. Is it inauthentic to change something you grew up with to suit your tastes and the ingredients you can get your hands on? Is it inauthentic to drop the stuff you never really liked anyway? Is it authentic to cling unyielding to old ways and traditional ingredients? There are foods I'd never make if I had to make them the way they are supposed to be made. I simply don't have the patience to make pesto using a mortar and pestle. I don't have the arm strength and coordination to make mayo without a food processor. I make Swedish meatballs with whatever ground meat I happen to have on hand, not the specific blend of beef and pork that's typical (except chicken, I don't think I'd ever use ground chicken for Swedish meatballs). Traditional dishes have to be open to adaptation, to the creativity and the imagination of the cook, to the ingredients that are available. The way a person makes food reflects his or her family history, personal history, the season, the location. It's a complex palimpsest of layer upon layer of thoughts, feelings, images, tastes, scents, and memories partially smudged and aged until no single influence is perfectly in focus. And really, isn't it more interesting that way?

So where do I finally come to rest on the topic of authenticity? I guess it comes down to the words of a pompous old fool of a character: "This above all: to thine own self be true." But I also suspect that my thoughts and feelings about the topic will evolve.  

(And if you didn't read my review of The Lucky Peach, here it is.)

UPDATE 6/7/12: Here's another take on authenticity in food. Francis Lam and Eddie Huang discuss the fairness of other chefs taking on other cultures' food. It's kind of a long discussion, but it raises a lot of issues.