"Secret Ingredients"

[MarketStEl]

That's actually not the subtitle of this modest but rich scholarly work, which Carrot Top graciously lent to me. Its real subtitle is "Race, Gender and Class at the Dinner Table."

But I like my own invented subtitle better, for Sherrie A. Inness' book (Palgrave Macmillan, 2006) is an extended exploration of how women (with maybe one exception) used cookbooks, articles on food and cooking, and TV shows to challenge and subvert stereotypes and common assumptions about people and cultures.

Inness is catholic in her reach and scope. She points out that the vegan activists whose efforts moved totally plant-based diets out of the fringe and into the edge of the mainstream would probably squirm in the presence of the traditional rich dishes celebrated by the Two Fat Ladies. Yet both worked to challenge assumptions--the vegans, that an animal-free diet was unpalatable, and the Ladies, that women had to starve themselves half to death to be acceptable.

In addition to these folks, Inness' book looks at the ways that Chinese-Americans, African-Americans and "poor white trash" used cookbooks to argue for their proper place at the table, so to speak, and to challenge negative stereotypes about their respective groups. It's in the chapter on white trash food literature that the main exception to the all-female cast of actors in this book appears, thanks largely to the success and popular acceptance of Ernest Matthew Mickler's landmark White Trash Cooking (1986), a love letter to the common fare of the ordinary Southerner.

She also chronicles the natural-food revolution sparked by Frances Moore Lappé's Diet for a Small Planet and its progeny, linking these books back to a moral reform crusade that originated in England in the early 19th century when the vegetarian movement was born. (Inness goes on to note in her chapter on the Two Fat Ladies that while the Ladies and the natural-foods advocates also went in opposite directions over nutrition--the Ladies despised the healthy-eating crowd's asceticism--they both shared a passion for honest food, produced as close to the point of consumption and with as little processing as possible.)

But perhaps the most interesting chapters are the two that argue for mass-produced convenience foods as agents of women's liberation. The first chapter of Inness' book surveys articles in 1950s women's magazines that extolled the virtues of these new convenience foods as ways women could free up time for other pursuits. These articles still paid obeisance to the not-yet-discredited notion that women found their highest fulfillment in the domestic sphere by way of promoting "creativity" through dishes that incorporated these foods as ingredients, but the bigger point they made--that convenience foods gave women time to do other things--opened the door for women to challenge that notion completely.

Which Peg Bracken did in her acidly witty 1962 bestseller, the I Hate to Cook Book, the subject of Inness' third chapter. Inness argues that in its own way, Bracken's book was as significant as Germaine Greer's The Feminine Mystique in shattering the old notions about women's proper place and sphere of influence. (And as those magazine articles did, the I Hate to Cook Book unapologetically made use of convenience foods in its recipes for women who couldn't avoid having to cook something.)

Inness covers some of the same territory Janet Theophano did in her earlier book Eat My Words, but expands Theophano's argument into new areas. Some people may roll their eyes when the phrase "race, class and gender" is trotted out, but Inness' book shows that it's still a useful prism through which to view a period of profound social change -- and a useful device for teasing out messages that cooks, cookbook readers and Food Network viewers may have been completely unaware they were receiving.

Edited to properly identify the lender.

Edited March 30, 2007 by MarketStEl (log)

[Carrot Top]

Happening upon this book was certainly an eye-opener for me, Sandy, and I'm glad you found some things of interest in it too.

My own background as a "self-taught" chef whose formal education only went as far as the ninth grade in school did not offer me the varieties of cultural initiations to readings on race, gender, and class that are now more commonly found at the university level for those who attend.

Of course I learned a lot on my own, as we all do, in different ways and forms.

But the specific focus on the dinner table as expression of these things, and the impact of how the literature discussed in the book affected our culture, was absolutely scintillating reading.

I did not find the tone overly academic at all or boring in the least bit, as sometimes happens with me in terms of academic sorts of tomes.

A bit of the alternate universes of all sorts that co-exist as we all live together and dine together (or not) is shown in these chapters.

Funny, but since then - when expressing some of the things I read - I actually got called a "fast-food feminist". Which had the hint, when written by the person who wrote it, of the "N" word about it.

I have to admit that the only way that affected me, in the end run, was to finally say to myself, "Yes. I *will* be a feminist now. For *you* are an (ignorant) idiot."

My mother would be proud.

(Edited to add the word "ignorant". Meow. )

Edited March 30, 2007 by Carrot Top (log)

[Carrot Top]

But perhaps the most interesting chapters are the two that argue for mass-produced convenience foods as agents of women's liberation.  The first chapter of Inness' book surveys articles in 1950s women's magazines that extolled the virtues of these new convenience foods as ways women could free up time for other pursuits.  These articles still paid obeisance to the not-yet-discredited notion that women found their highest fulfillment in the domestic sphere by way of promoting "creativity" through dishes that incorporated these foods as ingredients, but the bigger point they made--that convenience foods gave women time to do other things--opened the door for women to challenge that notion completely.

Which Peg Bracken did in her acidly witty 1962 bestseller, the I Hate to Cook Book, the subject of Inness' third chapter.  Inness argues that in its own way, Bracken's book was as significant as Germaine Greer's The Feminine Mystique in shattering the old notions about women's proper place and sphere of influence. 

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I finally got Peg Bracken's "I Hate to Cook Book”. It was a very difficult thing to do for me. My feelings were very mixed. My finger went to hit the button to order it on Amazon so many times, then retreated. There was heavy trepidation in my mind and heart about this book. Regardless of the fact that I can and do and will stand up for the use of convenience foods for people that use them consistently and do realize that times exist when even people who would not "normally" use them, do use them in daily cooking. It seems, intellectually, that there should be no shame about anyone cooking this way if they need to, or want to. For not every meal in life is set at a table where fine, pure, luxurious, artisinal, or even “home-cooked” is possible, just as every dress worn is not a Donna Karan nor is every car driven a custom Ferrari.

The "I Hate to Cook Book" sat on my mother's bookshelf when I was a child. I have a first edition here, from 1960. Same dust cover. I remember it well. It sat there, and I looked at it, on that same bookshelf for years. I hated that book. I hated the "I Hate to Cook Book". It sat in between several books on art and lots of books on feminism. Lots of books on feminism. The other books were Agatha Christie paperbacks and Nero Wolfe paperbacks. I liked the mysteries. I loved the books on art that had lots of paintings shown stuck in between the thin rice paper sheets bound inside those tall precious books. The books on feminism did not register. I could have cared less about them, they seemed to just be rhetoric which a child does not care much for.

But the "I Hate to Cook Book" was a real thing sitting there in its periwinkle blue cover. It was the only cookbook my mother owned, and I do not know where she got it. I know she did not use it, for it never left the shelf. I know that it did, however, have a message that struck me directly in the heart each time I gazed upon it, and I did not like that message.

The message was "I hate to cook, Karen. I want to do other things besides make you a meal.” That message made me very unhappy in imagining it, when I did, as a child. For she did hate to cook, my mother. And that seemed so very wrong. That message made me very unhappy in imagining it, when I did, as a child.

Now that I am much older I can understand my mother's feelings. And I can certainly understand the social movement that was behind the writing of the book. If one is tied to being one thing, to standing in the shoes of only one role, that can be awfully, terribly, limiting. And not only emotionally but financially, intellectually and many other ways.

It's been forty-seven years since Peg Bracken wrote this book. It is a very humorous book. Peg Bracken herself seems like the sort of person that anyone would want for a good friend . . . easy-going, funny, encouraging.

And yet I look at the recipes, now, and still, I cringe. There is a sameness to them that lives in things boxed and canned and packaged, a taste that is curiously and solely of the industrialized world. I'm not crazy about that, at all. But then I remember why the book was written. It was written for a taste of freedom. It was written for expansion from rigidly defined roles that were actually painful for many people. But I still don't want to cook anything from it.

And I wonder where that leaves me, or if there is an answer to it all. Is the book useful? Yes. Is it good? In ways. But it still doesn't taste just right. I wonder if I dare to use a recipe from it. That, would be very interesting somehow. While I cook, the book will be in my mind as it was back in 1963, on the second shelf up from the floor in the tall white-painted bookshelf, its pretty periwinkle blue cover peering out encouragingly, while I sat there cross-legged on the floor, staring back at it with resentment and a bit of fear for what it seemed to mean to me, what it meant in my life as the child of my own particular mother and of the particular times that spawned the book.

[Anna N]

Carrot Top:

That is a beautiful mini-essay on Peg's book and its meaning for you.

I owned it and used it! It wasn't so much that I hated cooking but that I hadn't a clue how to cook. Peg made it possible to put something edible together from easily obtained ingredients. And she made me laugh and thus feel less inadequate than I often did. I've since spurned copies at garage sales and such but now I know I have to have a copy if only for old time's sake.

[MaxH]

A side point from the flow of this thread so far, but maybe of interest among fans of food books:

Speaking of "alternate universes," I hope that the professional reviews of this book spelled out right away that it isn't (as I first thought, seeing this thread) related to

Secret Ingredients: The Magical Process of Combining Flavors (Michael Roberts, Bantam, 1988, ISBN 0553053205)

-- which created such interest, including online, including mentions on this site. Vanilla extract's effect on lobster, and all that. I even heard about the book on the radio. An important title, maybe, in what's now a crowded genre on the hidden science of foods, but wasn't in 1988. (Roberts even seems to be one of the people to document the trick of making a "roux" by separately cooking the flour and then adding the fat -- a home version of industrial sauce making.)

This sort of thing comes up when titles get re-used, especially titles that created buzz.

[Carrot Top]

I owned it and used it!  It wasn't so much that I hated cooking but that I hadn't a clue how to cook.  Peg made it possible to put something edible together from easily obtained ingredients.  And she made me laugh and thus feel less inadequate than I often did. 

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Her success as an author is shown by the fact that you so easily and affectionately call her "Peg", Anna.

It's fascinating how a (good) book can be different things to different people, far beyond what was probably ever intended when it was written.

I'm happy to have this copy here. It has a peculiar pull upon me. I think you'll enjoy reading it again too, if you do get a copy. This book does have a personality.

Speaking of "alternate universes," I hope that the professional reviews of this book spelled out right away that it isn't (as I first thought, seeing this thread) related to

Secret Ingredients:  The Magical Process of Combining Flavors  (Michael Roberts, Bantam, 1988, ISBN 0553053205)

-- which created such interest, including online, including mentions on this site.  Vanilla extract's effect on lobster, and all that.  I even heard about the book on the radio.  An important title, maybe, in what's now a crowded genre on the hidden science of foods, but wasn't in 1988. 

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"Secret" is a great word, isn't it, Max. Secret agents, secret gardens, secret ingredients. Curiosity can not help but rise about something when "secret" is invoked.

I remember that book and wonder why it might not make it onto the list of "books that age gracefully" if it would not. Lots of good stuff in it. Maybe it was timing, a bit too early in some ways or a bit slightly at the end of a certain edge in others? And that has to do more with when it was published more than content? Or would it be something else more intangible? I'm not sure.

Now I might have to buy it to find out.

[MaxH]

"Secret" is a great word, isn't it, Max.  /  I remember that book ...

Yes and (as I put it in the absinthe thread recently) if you see my larger point, which really is larger than the topic of this thread, a title clashing with a famous predecessor on the same subject creates at least a morsel of implied tension. (This situation has come up a lot lately, so I notice it.)

A dramatic example: In 1989 (?) the Atlantic Monthly ran a long and detailed article "The Cholesterol Myth," examining ways (some experts were arguing) cholesterol as a health topic had been oversold. The article created the largest volume of letters in the venerable magazine's history, some of them printed in later issues. (Article was illustrated with parody cartoons -- light bulbs advertised for low cholesterol, etc.)

Nine or 10 years later, a popular book appeared, titled The Cholesterol Myths, with (if I remember right) no connection to the magazine article, but also, no reference to it in the considerable bibliography. Now (as Fat guy mentioned in a similar but milder food-book case a couple years ago), the choice may be the publisher's. Or an unconscious inspiration. But it creates an implicit tension. (Did the author -- writing as an authority, remember -- know the earlier famous work? If not, why not? If so, why omit?)

[phaelon56]

In addition to these folks, Inness' book looks at the ways that Chinese-Americans, African-Americans and "poor white trash" used cookbooks to argue for their proper place at the table, so to speak, and to challenge negative stereotypes about their respective groups. 

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Can you elaborate on this a bit? I just checked my county library system and they don't have access to this book or any other work by the author so I'm flying somewhat blind in this discussion.

But my closest friend for the past 25 years happens to be African-American as is my significant other (a coincidence but it has given me an exposure to African-American family life that the typical Caucasian male rarely gets). If I think about his late mom, his sister, his aunts and cousins, my former and current girlfriends and their families etc. all of whom I've gotten to know pretty well... none of them owns or uses cookbooks - at least not a single one that I know of.

Am I working from such a statistically insignificant sampling that no conclusion can be drawn from those facts or are cookbooks written by African-American authors purchased mostly by white folks? And do you think such cookbooks were or are written with a conscious or sub-conscious recognition of who the likely reader is and would that possibility affect the sub-text of the writing?

[Carrot Top]

Now (as Fat guy mentioned in a similar but milder food-book case a couple years ago), the choice may be the publisher's.  Or an unconscious inspiration.  But it creates an implicit tension.  (Did the author -- writing as an authority, remember -- know the earlier famous work?  If not, why not?  If so, why omit?)

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I don't know what to think about this really. The larger topic is food, of course, but within that topic are so many sub-topics. The one book speaks of food preparation and/or of food science. The other book speaks of food sociology and/or culture. In that sense, the books may be thought to be on different topics with one overall link, therefore to be "indexed" under different headings, therefore the implication would be that the title would not be thought to create the implicit tension you describe. But it would take a librarian knowledgeable about indexing to really know this. Maybe there is one that will read this and comment. Not that the way a book is indexed in a library system always fully relates to what is felt or seen by the reader out in the "real world", of course.

I have to go back to thinking of how one is supposed to treat information used in formal writing, i.e., if it is considered to be "general knowledge" one does not have to find an authority to name as source within the bibliography, whereas if it is not considered "general knowledge" or the idea or concept or quote does directly spring from a known source that has shaped it in some way to their own idea, then it should be credited.

Maybe "secret" this or that was considered a general enough phrase to allow for the omission of credit in this case . . .(?)

[Carrot Top]

Can you elaborate on this a bit?  I just checked my county library system and they don't have access to this book or any other work by the author so I'm flying somewhat blind in this discussion.

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This is a book written mostly for an academic audience, I think, Owen. I happened across it when researching something else in food "history", on Amazon, and ordered it from there. You can find most books that speak of these topics (rather than the more general books on food science, food recipes, food stories i.e. "how to cook" or "what we or they eat") in university libraries. Here is a link (I hope it works) to one section on food history in our university library here. There are lots of other ways to search for these sorts of books, you just have to sort of putter around a bit. The amount and the variety of texts available are astounding, and not the general sort of thing one finds in a bookstore or in a regular sort of library.

Am I working from such a statistically insignificant sampling that no conclusion can be drawn from those facts or are cookbooks written by African-American authors purchased mostly by white folks?  And do you think such cookbooks were or are written with a conscious or sub-conscious recognition of who the likely reader is  and would that possibility affect the sub-text of the writing?

I'm sure that Sandy will have his own answer for this, but I have to point you to the original discussion that he and I had, that led to my sending this book on to him. It's in this topic. He pointed out to me that I had been thinking in solely a heterosexual way when writing my little story, and that indeed there were other sub-texts in the Gourmet magazine writings, as there are for those who seek them, in many other places.

(From Post 14)

2. Confidential to Carrot Top: Who said they had to be bachelorettes dining with those bachelors? Back in the bad old days, before "the love that dare not speak its name" found its voice, men of a certain character had to rely on codes and subtle clues to find kindred spirits, and the taste for the finer things in life that continues to be a character trait among a certain stratum of gay male society was no less prevalent back then. Tips on how to win over such men, being incitements to illegal and immoral activity in most of the 50 states even in the late 1960s, were not likely to be found in the pages of Esquire, Playboy, GQ or the other men's magazines of the day, so it's highly likely that a male homosexual looking to impress a would-be date or life partner might well turn to columns like "The Bachelor Chef" for advice and counsel. This territory having been usurped by Genre, Out and a slew of 1-900 lines, it is no longer necessary for a publication like Gourmet to offer this service; besides, we read Martha Stewart Living just like you do. But maybe we should be grateful that, however sub rosa, there was a place of sorts for us in the pages of Gourmet as well.

I honestly hadn't thought about that before. And then the juxtaposition with the fact that I'd just ordered this other book on Amazon was a lucky and interesting happenstance.

Maybe, if you are interested, Sandy can send the book on to you after he's finished with it. I like the idea of books being out and about, travelling the world to all sorts of places and all sorts of minds and readings.

[thecuriousone]

Owen-

African american food is so intricately linked to survival of African american culture that to change one is often considered an insult to the other.

The people you know probably never used cookbooks becasue the recipes were passed down orally and for a people who were ripped from their own history, cooking was THE expression of culture.

A perfect example can be found in Saveur Magazine (issue #9) which offers an article on the food of Mama Lou's. If you get a chance to read the article, notice the focus on food as tradition. One of the cooks states at one point, that people would be upset if she did something different (i.e. experimented with the food) because they are expecting tradition. I use her recipe for coconut cake to this day, but this article is a powerful testament to how food in the african american community represents so much more than just food.

The implication of this is important. I work in the public health field and there is much discussion now on how to target healthier food choices without insulting the culture that is associated with the poor food choices. Check out the American Public Health Association web site and search for african american eating habits. Some very scholarly articles have been presented on this topic because its a real issue.

I can remember attending a culinary historians meeting in Chicago. They were planning an african american restaurant crawl. At the time there were some African american chefs doing some really creative things, however The society only wanted to deal with the perceived "traditional african american food". It was unfortunate because there was a lot of support that was never realized.

I am reading secret ingredients right now and I am very curious to read what is said about the contribution of african american cookbooks. I collect them and read them as historical non-fiction. I know one other woman who collects them in souther Illinois, but no others.

In addition to these folks, Inness' book looks at the ways that Chinese-Americans, African-Americans and "poor white trash" used cookbooks to argue for their proper place at the table, so to speak, and to challenge negative stereotypes about their respective groups. 

←

Can you elaborate on this a bit? I just checked my county library system and they don't have access to this book or any other work by the author so I'm flying somewhat blind in this discussion.

But my closest friend for the past 25 years happens to be African-American as is my significant other (a coincidence but it has given me an exposure to African-American family life that the typical Caucasian male rarely gets). If I think about his late mom, his sister, his aunts and cousins, my former and current girlfriends and their families etc. all of whom I've gotten to know pretty well... none of them owns or uses cookbooks - at least not a single one that I know of.

Am I working from such a statistically insignificant sampling that no conclusion can be drawn from those facts or are cookbooks written by African-American authors purchased mostly by white folks? And do you think such cookbooks were or are written with a conscious or sub-conscious recognition of who the likely reader is and would that possibility affect the sub-text of the writing?

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[MarketStEl]

Somehow this discussion fell off my radar screen....

In addition to these folks, Inness' book looks at the ways that Chinese-Americans, African-Americans and "poor white trash" used cookbooks to argue for their proper place at the table, so to speak, and to challenge negative stereotypes about their respective groups. 

←

Can you elaborate on this a bit? I just checked my county library system and they don't have access to this book or any other work by the author so I'm flying somewhat blind in this discussion.

But my closest friend for the past 25 years happens to be African-American as is my significant other (a coincidence but it has given me an exposure to African-American family life that the typical Caucasian male rarely gets). If I think about his late mom, his sister, his aunts and cousins, my former and current girlfriends and their families etc. all of whom I've gotten to know pretty well... none of them owns or uses cookbooks - at least not a single one that I know of.

Am I working from such a statistically insignificant sampling that no conclusion can be drawn from those facts or are cookbooks written by African-American authors purchased mostly by white folks? And do you think such cookbooks were or are written with a conscious or sub-conscious recognition of who the likely reader is and would that possibility affect the sub-text of the writing?

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thecuriousone beat me to this, but I can tell you that my relatives who cooked in the soul food tradition had nary a cookbook to their name. On the other hand, Grandma Smith, whose cooking was more Middle American, did have a few cookbooks, though I can't recall ever seeing her actually consult one before starting work.

And I grew up with a copy of the Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book on hand -- purchased by my father, who was the bigger cook in our family. (There was a copy of the I Hate to Cook Book and its sequel, the I Hate to Housekeep Book, in the headboard of the bed in my parents' bedroom. My guess is that both of these entered our library via Mom.)

Most of the soul food cooking I remember from childhood took place on Mom's side of the family. This recollection goes a long way towards explaining phaelon56's confusion over the existence of African-American cookbooks, for my mom's family was one step up from the farm, while my dad's family were solidly (old) black middle class -- Granddad was a servant for one of Kansas City's most prominent families and Grandma was a nurse's aide at a Catholic hospital in the city. Cookbooks were not alien to black middle class households, even if they were few in number and rarely consulted; they could nonetheless provide inspiration -- and the African-American cookbook was a permanent reminder of the tradition that we inherited (whether or not we stayed true to it).

The principal African-American cookbook discussed in Secret Ingredients is Freda DeKnight's A Date With a Dish (1948). Ebony readers will immediately recognize the title as that of the magazine's long-running recipe feature--there's been one in every issue since the magazine launched in 1945--and DeKnight issued an updated version, The Ebony Cookbook: A Date With a Dish, in 1977. (DeKnight's successor as Ebony's food editor, Charlotte Lyons, produced The New Ebony Cookbook in 1999.)

Since this post was largely inspired by phaelon56's query about whether African-Americans consulted cookbooks, I hope that Amazon.com customer Dean Brassfield of North Hollywood, California, doesn't mind my sharing his review of the 1977 edition with all of you:

My step dad is a retired chef who cooked for 20 years at the Sands Hotel in Las Vegas. He grew up in Kansas City and knew the Gates family and Mr. Bryant through school and his music career in a famous African-American singing group in the 1940's and 50's. Last night I was discussing my search for new BBQ sauces and mentioned a couple of cookbooks I had obtained. I was surprised when he admitted he hadn't always been a BBQ master chef. Because of the people he was raised around I figured he just always knew the secret of how to BBQ. Dad read me six cookbook titles that he had never shown me or told me about, even though over a ten year period he gave me the recipe for his "secret sauce" little by little. The cookbook he said to get first is The Ebony Cookbook, by Freda DeKnight. He read me the ingredients for BBQ sauces 1-4 and I knew right then why I had to get this book first.

My step dad knows BBQ like few others, and he can cook anything you name to perfection. If he said to get this book first well that's good enough for me. I don't need pretty pictures, I want to learn more about good Q and I'm confident this is the place to start.

By the way Dad sang with the Ink Spots and by mentioning his name and our family relationship, Winnie Gates, at the 12th and Brooklyn Gates' BBQ, treated my wife and I like visiting royalty when we passed through KC in 1974. We were served drinks in her office and she comped our ribs! So please feel confident in Dad's view that this book is the place to begin a serious study of BBQ. He said there are lots of other valuable recipes as well.

(emphasis added; I assume I don't need to tell you who the Gates family or Mr. Bryant are)

I suspect this might just be a bit more common than we suspect. Which can only mean that even among some African Americans, there was a need for written references, which became "secrets" of their own.

BTW and FWIW, among the titles in my own cookbook collection is a mass-market paperback called A Pinch of Soul, published in the late 1970s. The chili recipe in this book is very close to the chili I ate growing up -- which was thicker and meatier than most chili I've eaten since.

Edited July 20, 2007 by MarketStEl (log)

[thecuriousone]

Actually, MarketStEl, there are some very interesting ones available. I've been able to find ones published by african american caterer, Bessie M. Gant in the 1940's. Also, Lena Richards, published one in 1939. According to Toni Morrison the editor of Creole Feast, published in 1978, Lena Robert actually had a TV cooking program in the 1950's, in Louisiana.

I originally thought that these books were designed document recipes to be used by African American women as they cooked in white households. Now, I'm not so sure. Its possible that they reflect the larger culture in moving away from the concept of cooking just being a "natural outgrowth" of what women do, towards trying to give a respectability to the work.

If you look at a comtemporar;y, Jessie Marie DeBooth, she spendt a lot of time stressing the "scientific-ness" of cooking. I assume that it is an attempt to upgrade the work of women, but I dont know that for sure.

I often pursue the cookbooks for the history that they offer than the recipes, although the recipe for baking power detailed in Edna Lewis book has transformed my cakes.

the curiousone

Somehow this discussion fell off my radar screen....

In addition to these folks, Inness' book looks at the ways that Chinese-Americans, African-Americans and "poor white trash" used cookbooks to argue for their proper place at the table, so to speak, and to challenge negative stereotypes about their respective groups. 

←

Can you elaborate on this a bit? I just checked my county library system and they don't have access to this book or any other work by the author so I'm flying somewhat blind in this discussion.

But my closest friend for the past 25 years happens to be African-American as is my significant other (a coincidence but it has given me an exposure to African-American family life that the typical Caucasian male rarely gets). If I think about his late mom, his sister, his aunts and cousins, my former and current girlfriends and their families etc. all of whom I've gotten to know pretty well... none of them owns or uses cookbooks - at least not a single one that I know of.

Am I working from such a statistically insignificant sampling that no conclusion can be drawn from those facts or are cookbooks written by African-American authors purchased mostly by white folks? And do you think such cookbooks were or are written with a conscious or sub-conscious recognition of who the likely reader is and would that possibility affect the sub-text of the writing?

←

thecuriousone beat me to this, but I can tell you that my relatives who cooked in the soul food tradition had nary a cookbook to their name. On the other hand, Grandma Smith, whose cooking was more Middle American, did have a few cookbooks, though I can't recall ever seeing her actually consult one before starting work.

And I grew up with a copy of the Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book on hand -- purchased by my father, who was the bigger cook in our family. (There was a copy of the I Hate to Cook Book and its sequel, the I Hate to Housekeep Book, in the headboard of the bed in my parents' bedroom. My guess is that both of these entered our library via Mom.)

Most of the soul food cooking I remember from childhood took place on Mom's side of the family. This recollection goes a long way towards explaining phaelon56's confusion over the existence of African-American cookbooks, for my mom's family was one step up from the farm, while my dad's family were solidly (old) black middle class -- Granddad was a servant for one of Kansas City's most prominent families and Grandma was a nurse's aide at a Catholic hospital in the city. Cookbooks were not alien to black middle class households, even if they were few in number and rarely consulted; they could nonetheless provide inspiration -- and the African-American cookbook was a permanent reminder of the tradition that we inherited (whether or not we stayed true to it).

The principal African-American cookbook discussed in Secret Ingredients is Freda DeKnight's A Date With a Dish (1948). Ebony readers will immediately recognize the title as that of the magazine's long-running recipe feature--there's been one in every issue since the magazine launched in 1945--and DeKnight issued an updated version, The Ebony Cookbook: A Date With a Dish, in 1977. (DeKnight's successor as Ebony's food editor, Charlotte Lyons, produced The New Ebony Cookbook in 1999.)

Since this post was largely inspired by phaelon56's query about whether African-Americans consulted cookbooks, I hope that Amazon.com customer Dean Brassfield of North Hollywood, California, doesn't mind my sharing his review of the 1977 edition with all of you:

My step dad is a retired chef who cooked for 20 years at the Sands Hotel in Las Vegas. He grew up in Kansas City and knew the Gates family and Mr. Bryant through school and his music career in a famous African-American singing group in the 1940's and 50's. Last night I was discussing my search for new BBQ sauces and mentioned a couple of cookbooks I had obtained. I was surprised when he admitted he hadn't always been a BBQ master chef. Because of the people he was raised around I figured he just always knew the secret of how to BBQ. Dad read me six cookbook titles that he had never shown me or told me about, even though over a ten year period he gave me the recipe for his "secret sauce" little by little. The cookbook he said to get first is The Ebony Cookbook, by Freda DeKnight. He read me the ingredients for BBQ sauces 1-4 and I knew right then why I had to get this book first.

My step dad knows BBQ like few others, and he can cook anything you name to perfection. If he said to get this book first well that's good enough for me. I don't need pretty pictures, I want to learn more about good Q and I'm confident this is the place to start.

By the way Dad sang with the Ink Spots and by mentioning his name and our family relationship, Winnie Gates, at the 12th and Brooklyn Gates' BBQ, treated my wife and I like visiting royalty when we passed through KC in 1974. We were served drinks in her office and she comped our ribs! So please feel confident in Dad's view that this book is the place to begin a serious study of BBQ. He said there are lots of other valuable recipes as well.

(emphasis added; I assume I don't need to tell you who the Gates family or Mr. Bryant are)

I suspect this might just be a bit more common than we suspect. Which can only mean that even among some African Americans, there was a need for written references, which became "secrets" of their own.

BTW and FWIW, among the titles in my own cookbook collection is a mass-market paperback called A Pinch of Soul, published in the late 1970s. The chili recipe in this book is very close to the chili I ate growing up -- which was thicker and meatier than most chili I've eaten since.

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[Carrot Top]

A side point from the flow of this thread so far, but maybe of interest among fans of food books:

Speaking of "alternate universes," I hope that the professional reviews of this book spelled out right away that it isn't (as I first thought, seeing this thread) related to

Secret Ingredients:  The Magical Process of Combining Flavors  (Michael Roberts, Bantam, 1988, ISBN 0553053205)

-- which created such interest, including online, including mentions on this site.  Vanilla extract's effect on lobster, and all that.  I even heard about the book on the radio.  An important title, maybe, in what's now a crowded genre on the hidden science of foods, but wasn't in 1988.  (Roberts even seems to be one of the people to document the trick of making a "roux" by separately cooking the flour and then adding the fat -- a home version of industrial sauce making.)

This sort of thing comes up when titles get re-used, especially titles that created buzz.

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Looks like there's going to be another food book with the title "Secret Ingredients" coming out soon (October 30, hardcover), Max: "Secret Ingredients - The New Yorker Book of Food and Drink" edited by David Remnick. A compilation of

Humor, cartoons, profiles of chefs and eaters, memoirs, shorts stories, poems, offerings from every age of the NY'ers eighty-year history.