As you can probably guess, I read a lot of cookbooks. Not as many in the form of books that I own, as of late: instead, I have come to love e-cookbooks on my tablet and borrowing – and xeroxing – copies of cookbooks from libraries. There are many wonderful books that I have found – the electronic version of Uyen Luu’s book on vegetarian Vietnamese cooking is a particular favorite, as is Hetty McKinnon’s Tenderheart.
Most of this reading is “comfort” reading or “research”: I get many ideas for recipes on and off the blog from these books, and it is helpful to be familiar with different recipes. Besides, I have somehow become a bit of a “go-to” person among my friends for cooking questions – and so it is helpful to know about lots of different recipes, even if I stick to my comfortable rotation. (Which includes several recipes on this blog.)
Authenticity used to be all the rage, and longtime readers will know that I am not a fan. Even five or six years ago, cookbook publishers were fawning over to prove their volumes as the most authentic, most unadulterated, or most “true” to a certain form of the cuisine. Note that I say publishers and not authors – because, in most cases, this was a marketing ploy for the consumer. Yet none of this fawning made authenticity any more real. And many of the most interesting things about culinary traditions – the use of new ingredients, or how social norms and practices have changed over time, or even some of the tastiest recipes – fell by the wayside.
Yet in recent years, I have seen newer cookbooks embrace authenticity less. Some flat out never use the word. Others, and especially those by people from the country whose cuisine is documented, often acknowledge – and celebrate – the “inauthentic” things they are doing. One example is Uyen Luu’s aforementioned cookbook. She uses capers to replace other, non-vegetarian ingredients common in Vietnamese cuisine, and encourages her readers to use the ingredients they actually have, with her recipes as a guide. Similarly, Naz Deravian’s fantastic Bottom of the Pot, which contains many delicious and fantastically photographed Iranian recipes, includes her own creations from common ingredients in North America, as well as recipes that push boundaries – like her sour cherry crostini. (Which I highly recommend.)
I think this is a good thing. Since I wrote my authenticity piece back in 2017, I have noticed something curious: authenticity, rather than guaranteeing the trueness of a cuisine, is often a prison. Food, and cooking, become something that has to be performed when you seek authenticity – often at great energy, expense, or waste. Seeking the “authentic” also often traps people in a time capsule – even as the purported owners of the cuisine are trying new things. For a particularly poignant example: while some may decry rainbow and cinnamon raisin bagels, many New York bagel shops now include quinoa in bagels for a healthier variety of the “everything” bagel. (I am mildly allergic to quinoa, so if someone could review these for me, that would be appreciated.) I would rather have a living Jewish cuisine, not a time capsule version thereof.
Every cuisine deserves room to grow and change – and people are creative! And so I hope instead of the strange and confining bounds of authenticity and nostalgia, we see cookbooks not only acknowledge the wonders of mixing, but also inspire new traditions. What will be Jewish cuisine in 50 years? I cannot wait to find out.
