Food History

Was The Mimosa Invented in S.F.?

By Anna Roth Wed., Apr. 3 2013 at 4:05 PM
Categories: Food History, SF Food History

3073903042_eef3c69ee5_b_flickr_mimosa.jpg
Flickr/allaboutgeorge
The Bold Italic has a fun blog post today with six things you never knew were invented in San Francisco, and one of them took us completely by surprise: the mimosa. As the cited story goes, everyone's favorite brunch drink was invented by the Master of Suspense himself, Alfred Hitchcock, on a rough morning after a night of drinking at Jeanty at Jack's. (He must've been in town a lot -- Vertigo, The Birds, and Shadow of a Doubt were all filmed in or near San Francisco.)

See also: Re-Visiting the Hangtown Fry, the Dish That Epitomizes Gold Rush California
The 20 Most Significant Food Inventions in History
Step Inside S.F.'s Oldest Restaurants With New Interactive Book

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Food History

Talking Life, Work, and Herring With Mark Russ Federman of Russ and Daughters

By Jesse Hirsch Thu., Mar. 14 2013 at 8:40 AM
Categories: Books, Food History

russ daughters cover.jpg
Russ and Daughters is one of those iconic New York food spots that has cultural capital well outside the five boroughs. From its uber-humble beginnings as a herring pushcart in 1907, the "appetizing store" has become a Jewish food juggernaut, shipping millions of fish around the world, gaining the die-hard loyalty of foodies ranging from Anthony Bourdain to Calvin Trillin, and making a guest appearance this season on Louie.

Mark Russ Federman, author of the new memoir Russ and Daughters: The House That Herring Built, recently hosted a brunch at the JCCSF. The event sold out well in advance, a testament to the dearth of appetizing stores in the Bay Area. SFoodie caught up with Federman, a "born schmoozer," for a lengthy discussion of smoked fish, perceptions of ethnic food, and gentrification.

See also: Q&A with Evan Bloom of Wise Sons Jewish Deli
Beauty's Bagel Shop Begins Baking Montreal-Style Bagels


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Food History

Nerding Out With an Heirloom Seed Catalog

By Anna Roth Wed., Jan. 23 2013 at 12:15 PM
Categories: Farm Fresh, Food History

heirloom seeds.jpg
Even if you don't have a green thumb, the Baker Creek Seed Catalog is a fascinating read. Bear with me. Now in its 15th year, the catalog contains listings for 1,450 seeds for vegetables, flowers, and herbs from more than 70 countries, many of them with super-interesting backstories. For a food history nerd such as myself, just reading entries at random is enough transport you to the markets of nineteenth century Paris or Thomas Jefferson's gardens at Monticello, emphasizing the way food acts as a through-line between present and past civilizations.

See also: Revisiting My Side of the Mountain in the Locavore Era
Re-Visiting the Hangtown Fry, the Dish That Epitomizes Gold Rush California

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Food History

Re-Visiting the Hangtown Fry, the Dish That Epitomizes Gold Rush California

By Anna Roth Mon., Jan. 14 2013 at 1:30 PM
Categories: Eat This, Food History

hangtown fry Brendas.jpg
Anna Roth
The excellent Hangtown Fry at Brenda's French Soul Food.
I woke up this morning with Hangtown Fry on the brain. On the way to and from Tahoe last weekend I passed through the original Hangtown, now called Placerville (the town's first name came from the dubious distinction of being the first spot in Gold Country to hang some desperadoes, and when it incorporated in 1854 the residents opted for a more genteel moniker). It reminded me of the dish that still bears the Old West name.

Legend has it that a prospector came into the now-defunct El Dorado Hotel one day hot off a lucky strike and asked for the most expensive meal in the house, which the cook obligingly made from the priciest ingredients in the kitchen: eggs (which had to be transported overland from San Francisco), oysters (which had to be packed in ice and shipped every day from San Francisco Bay), and bacon (which was shipped by sea from back East). The resulting concoction became known as the Hangtown Fry, and is one of the first culinary inventions of U.S.-owned California.

But truth be told, though I've spent my entire life in the West I've never eaten this particular dish -- something about the texture of cooked oysters and eggs always turned me off. I was determined to change all that this morning.

See also:
- Step Inside S.F.'s Oldest Restaurants With New Interactive Book
- New Cookbook Explores California's Culinary Past
- The 20 Most Significant Food Inventions in History

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Food History

Turkey Leftovers Inspired the Invention of the TV Dinner

By Anna Roth Fri., Nov. 23 2012 at 10:35 AM
Categories: Food History, Holidays

tvdinner_swanson.jpg
As you stare into the abyss of your refrigerator today, contemplating days of turkey leftovers with equal parts glee (as long as the stuffing and gravy hold out) and dread (everything that happens after that), be glad that you don't have 520,000 pounds of frozen turkeys to dispose of, like Swanson did in 1953. As the story goes, the frozen food company had massively overestimated the number of turkeys Americans would buy and eat that year and didn't know what they were going to do with the surplus. The only way to keep the turkeys frozen was to keep them on refrigerated railroad cars, which needed to remain in constant motion to keep their electricity on. Clearly, something needed to be done, so the company challenged its employees to come up with a solution.

See also:
- The 20 Most Significant Food Inventions in History
- Great Moments in San Francisco Food History: Popsicles
- Was Diet Responsible for the Salem Witch Trials?


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Books

Step Inside S.F.'s Oldest Restaurants With New Interactive Book

By Anna Roth Fri., Nov. 16 2012 at 12:30 PM
Categories: Books, Food History, SF Food History

TablesFromRubble final coversmall.png
Tandemvines Publishing
Food history buffs, take note: a new digital book available for the iPad through Apple's iBookstore takes a behind-the-scenes look at some of the city's oldest restaurants that opened in the years after the 1906 earthquake. In Tables From the Rubble, author Denise E. Clifton steps inside five iconic San Francisco restaurants -- Swan Oyster Depot, Liguria Bakery, Sam Wo, The Palace Hotel, and House of Shields bar -- and tells their stories through historic and new photographs, menus, recipes, stories, and more.

See also:
- San Francisco is Home to Two of the Oldest Bars in the U.S.: Can You Guess Which Ones?
- Great Moments in San Francisco Food History: Green Goddess
- Cookbook Explores California's Culinary Past


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Holidays

Was Diet Responsible for the Salem Witch Trials?

By Anna Roth Thu., Oct. 18 2012 at 4:45 PM
Categories: Food History, Holidays

salem witch trial commons.jpg
Witchcraft at Salem Village, 1876
All this could have potentially been avoided on a gluten-free diet.
Because Halloween is coming up and we're all feeling extra-spooky this time of year, Bon Appetit has dredged up the original thesis from the 1970s that suggested a bad crop of rye was the culprit behind the "bewitched" villagers during the Salem Witch Trials.

See also:
- Yes, the Gluten-Free Movement Has Finally Reached Your Halloween Bucket
- Best S.F. Neighborhoods for Trick-or-Treaters
- Halloween Hangover: Candy's Hateful History


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Tags:

food history, rye, salem witch trials
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Kickstarter

Intriguing New Food Atlas Looking for Kickstarter Funding

By Anna Roth Thu., Oct. 11 2012 at 5:00 AM
Categories: Books, Food History, Kickstarter

MapCollage.jpg
Map slices from the book: Los Angeles' lost agrarian landscape, West Oakland's City Slicker Farms' backyard garden program, California's world almond trade, US farmers' markets and food stamp access, SF Bay Area potential food resiliency.
Remember those rad children's atlases that had cartoonish representations of the major exports of every region around the world, kinda like the map mural at Kate's Kitchen? Well, get excited: a group of Berkeley cartographers and more than 80 volunteers around the globe have banded together to create the grownup version. Food: An Atlas will be a visual representation of food systems around the world, with more than 60 maps covering everything from the United States "beershed" (where our beer ingredients come from) to the global distribution of California almonds. The crowdsourced project is one of the first of its kind. And it needs your help, via Kickstarter, to become a reality.

See also:
- How Christopher Columbus Changed the Way We Eat
- New Cookbook Explores California's Culinary Past
- The 20 Most Significant Food Inventions in History


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Tags:

Berkeley, food history, food: an atlas, kickstarter
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Food History

How Christopher Columbus Changed the Way We Eat

By Anna Roth Mon., Oct. 8 2012 at 11:50 AM
Categories: Food History, Talking Points

The First Voyage Columbus.jpg
"The First Voyage", chromolithograph by L. Prang & Co., 1893
Christopher Columbus bids farewell to the Queen of Spain in 1492.
Imagine an Italy without tomato sauce, Ireland without potatoes, Belgium without chocolate. Regardless of your feelings about Christopher Columbus and colonialism, the fact remains that the man irrevocably changed the culinary world when he crossed the ocean blue and made the first major contact with the New World.

See also:
- New Cookbook Explores California's Culinary Past
- How Taco Bell, Now 50, Changed America
- The 20 Most Significant Food Inventions in History


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Tags:

christopher columbus, columbus day, explorers, food history, New World
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Talking Points

The 20 Most Significant Food Inventions in History

By Anna Roth Tue., Sep. 18 2012 at 11:30 AM
Categories: Food History, Talking Points

3531781689_a293365830_z_plow_flickr.jpg
Flickr/archer10
Where did the plow end up on the list?
Science may not be the first thing you think about when it comes to the development of culinary culture over time, but The Royal Society of the UK has put out a list of the top 20 most significant inventions for food and drink in history. You'd immediately think the plow would be way up there, but to our surprise it barely makes the top 10 -- the top four are all relatively modern inventions (the fifth is irrigation, which we know hearkens back to the first civilizations thanks to a comprehensive sixth grade unit on the Fertile Crescent).

See Also:
- New Cookbook Explores California's Culinary Past
- The Food World 30 Years Ago, Old Apples, and New Cheese
- Before the Mission Burrito Came the San Francisco Tamale: An Interview with Gustavo Arellano


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