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Carregando... Three Squares: The Invention of the American Meal (2013)de Abigail Carroll
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Registre-se no LibraryThing tpara descobrir se gostará deste livro. Ainda não há conversas na Discussão sobre este livro. A great social history of the ultimate social event - eating. This book traces the development of the American meal, from the messy subsistance meals of the colonists to the more genteel English-insprired meals, from French influences in the multiple-course meal, to a midday "dinner" that turned into the quick lunch of today. 16193688 It's all here, from how utensils and plates developed, how snacking and TVs affected the picture, and more. As with most things "American," the influences came from all over, and got turned into a unique national style. Whether your breakfast is tea and toast, or coffee, eggs, bacon and pancakes, Carroll explains how you got there. See more of my reviews on Ralphsbooks. While the author has a variety of topics she wants to consider in this examination of American food ways, the real point is to consider the social freight that particular meals have carried. To put it another way, Ms. Carroll started out writing a history of the American snack, but found that if she really wanted to write about the snack she'd have to write about dinner. So in the war between the snack and dinner, while the snack, with its emphasis on convenience and cheapness seems to be carrying the day, Carroll winds up with the reminder that none of our conventions about appropriate eating are set in stone and that there is a viable median state between the poles of rigidly following a fixed set of meal times and giving into to ad hoc convenience. sem resenhas | adicionar uma resenha
We are what we eat, as the saying goes, but we are also how we eat, and when, and where. Our eating habits reveal as much about our society as the food on our plates, and our national identity is written in the eating schedules we follow and the customs we observe at the table and on the go. In Three Squares, food historian Abigail Carroll upends the popular understanding of our most cherished mealtime traditions, revealing that our eating habits have never been stable--far from it, in fact. The eating patterns and ideals we've inherited are relatively recent inventions, the products of complex social and economic forces, as well as the efforts of ambitious inventors, scientists and health gurus. Whether we're pouring ourselves a bowl of cereal, grabbing a quick sandwich, or congregating for a family dinner, our mealtime habits are living artifacts of our collective history--and represent only the latest stage in the evolution of the American meal. Our early meals, Carroll explains, were rustic affairs, often eaten hastily, without utensils, and standing up. Only in the nineteenth century, when the Industrial Revolution upset work schedules and drastically reduced the amount of time Americans could spend on the midday meal, did the shape of our modern "three squares" emerge: quick, simple, and cold breakfasts and lunches and larger, sit-down dinners. Since evening was the only part of the day when families could come together, dinner became a ritual--as American as apple pie. But with the rise of processed foods, snacking has become faster, cheaper, and easier than ever, and many fear for the fate of the cherished family meal as a result. The story of how the simple gruel of our forefathers gave way to snack fixes and fast food, Three Squares also explains how Americans' eating habits may change in the years to come. Only by understanding the history of the American meal can we can help determine its future. Não foram encontradas descrições de bibliotecas. |
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In the times before the Industrial Revolution when most of the United States was agrarian, lunch was a much more important meal with heartier dishes that could sustain manual labor for the rest of the day. Meals mainly consisted of stews, called pottages, as these could be made easily in a large pot over a fire. Not until the late 1700s, taking cues from the British, did Americans begin to serve meat, vegetables, and grains separately on a single plate.
As the Industrial Revolution took hold and more people moved from working on farms to working in factories, eating lunch at home became more difficult. People had to eat smaller meals that they could easily carry to work and eat between shifts. At this point, dinner became more important because it was the only time of the day when the whole family could gather together for a meal.
Historically, snacking was problematic because it might spoil ones appetite for dinner and threaten the togetherness of the family. Beginning in the early 1900s, commercially and mass produced foods began to creep into American life. As these foods became more ubiquitous, the idea of snacking began to change, in no small part due to advertising.
In the conclusion, the author makes a succinct and insightful statement. “How we eat in the future will reflect who we are today, and how we eat today will determine in part who we will become tomorrow. Whether we know it or not, the state of the American meal is in our hands” (p. 219).