We have been reticent about things and that’s just who we are. I also think naturally Midwesterners are not the kind of people who seek out the spotlight. I think as a nation we are just starting to look at our regional cuisines. It’s not that the media hasn’t looked at it. Q: Why do you think the Midwest is under-represented in our discussions about regional American cuisines?Ī: It’s really nobody’s fault. Then I knew I wanted to write the book, which would have been my take on what Midwestern food might have been, what it is now and what it could be in the future. Then coming home, everything came full circle. Then I moved to New York and was completely immersed in the fine-dining scene and I worked in the kitchens of fine dining for seven years. I was finding a lot of common experiences in the rural experience and old recipes. I had thought it was a bit under-represented and at that time I was obsessed with old cookbooks, church community cookbooks, anything, not just the Midwest but from rural experiences basically across the U.S. Q: What motivated you to write this book?Ī: When I had first moved back home to Minnesota right after college in 1997 I had always thought it would be cool to do a Midwestern cookbook. ![]() ![]() Midwestern cooking and her mother’s grease eggs. Thielen spoke to Reuters about the uniqueness of U.S. She had spent seven years in New York as a chef at the fine-dining restaurants of Michelin-star chefs David Bouley, Daniel Boulud and Jean-Georges Vongerichten. The 39-year-old chef reconnected with her fondness for the region’s cuisine after she and her family moved back to Minnesota, where she was born, several years ago. But, based on the popularity of sushi there, I wouldn't be surprised if the recipe included wasabi.NEW YORK (Reuters) - Amy Thielen offers her updated twists on beef pot roast, fried smelt and other classic dishes from her childhood in her first cookbook “The New Midwestern Table.” Despite living in Southern California most of my life, I somehow never made it to one of these events, so I can't confirm what today's preferred grunion preparation is (or if it's even advisable to eat anything that comes from certain L.A. At the time the article was written (pre-WWII) the fish were usually deep fried whole. When the grunion are running (figuring out when, and where, the event will occur is an inexact science), the fishing frenzy begins-in this case, "fishing" means grabbing the little suckers with your bare hands. The grunion is a type of sardine-size fish that comes ashore at night during spring and summer to spawn, creating a wriggling, silvery spectacle. The section on the Southwest, while skimpier than the other regions' chapters, includes one peculiar California tradition: the grunion run. Those who preferred ash-cakes took the skillet the ones who went for dumplings followed the pot." ![]() With but one frying pan, and a single pot in the whole caravan, the division was accomplished by counting off those who preferred ash-cake to boiled dumplings. The Midwest was also pioneer territory, and several of the articles in that section of the book refer to the foods that helped sustain the hardscrabble lives of the settlers: Nebraska buffalo barbecue (which is actually bison, Kurlansky explains, misidentified as its distant relative by the explorer Hernando de Soto in 1544) Montana fried beaver tail and Illinois vinegar pie, developed to fulfill the craving for tartness when no fruit was available.Ī piece written by novelist Nelson Algren, who went on to win the first National Book Award, in 1950, includes this amusing tale: "One legend has it that, on an occasion when an unusually long train of Conestoga wagons was crossing the plains of Kansas, it was found necessary to separate into two trains. ![]() Despite a funny anecdote about Wisconsin Norwegians forming a protective association to guard the suppers from Germans and Irish "invading the sacred lutefisk domains," the writer of the essay confesses, "Nobody likes lutefisk at first. According to Kurlansky, the tradition faded in the decades following World War II, but saw a resurgence in the late 20th century. It's cold-weather fare by necessity-the preparation requires the fish be left out for days-served up at holiday meals and church-sponsored suppers. The food traditions of the western part of the United States, as elsewhere in the country, often reflect the immigrant communities that settled there. In Wisconsin and Minnesota, Scandinavians brought lutefisk, a dish of dried codfish cured in lye. As the collection of WPA-commissioned articles in Mark Kurlansky's book The Food of a Younger Landshows, however, the country does have quite an array of regional specialties and peculiarities, due in part to its size and diversity of both terrain and population. The United States is not usually credited with having a rich national cuisine.
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