Food is more than itself

Culinary memories past and future

“Everywhere the same message: food is more than itself. It is not everything, but it is touched by almost everything: memory, weather, dirt, hunger, chemistry, and the universe.” –Bill Buford

(As you’re reading this, I’m sitting in Dublin awaiting my appointment for my Irish Residence Permit. Wish me luck!)

Throughout the culinary memories series, I’ve discussed various aspects of cookbook history, of food writing, and of our relationship to food through time, through the lens of two very different anchoring texts (Brillat Savarin and Salvador Dali), to hopefully help us think about food history in some new ways.

But I’ve also shared some glimpses into my life in libraries and museums: And some of the joys and challenges that come with designing programs and exhibitions around the history of the book, or using books in an exhibition to explore other histories.

In this last issue in the series, we’re bringing it all together, looking at past, and future, and perhaps even situating ourselves within that story.

I often talk about each of us as being a bridge between the past and the as-of-yet-unwritten future. We reach back to the past and carry things forward into the future by bringing them into the present moment. Through our daily actions, we decide what we carry forward and leave behind: Whether it’s a food tradition, a favorite flavor, or a social norm.

Never is this more true than in our exploration of the history of food writing.