[Koukouvagia]

A point was brought up in another thread about meatballs, and it was mentioned that spaghetti and meatballs is considered an Italian dish but it is not made in Italy and Italians there view it as an American dish. So how did this dish come about?

Being Greek myself I see this often with many dishes that are misconceived, and I see it in other cultures too. I have Chinese friends who have never heard of a General named Tso! Along the same lines Greek salad doesn't exist in Greece in the manner it does here.

I have also always wondered how immigrants have changed authentic cuisines? Has anyone noticed that some Italians who have never been to Italy and don't speak a word of Italian call their marinara sauce gravy (which has been simmering for up to 10hrs)? I was once scolded by an American Italian friend for using oregano in my dish stating that oregano is never used in Italy.

Likewise I live in a predominantly greek community with lots of people here who immigrated from greece in the 1950's. Their idea of greek cuisine seems so foreign to what I know is being cooked and served in present day greece. I often hear that certain ingredients are NEVER used in greek cuisine which baffles me because those ingredients are most certainly used now. This leads me to believe that 50 yrs ago certain ingredients were simply not available, and greeks in greece are using them and the cuisine is evolving while greek immigrants here are holding on to the old country as they left it and hanging on to traditions that no longer exist. Is there a right way and a wrong way? Who knows, but the fact is that Greece has always had regional cuisines just like Italy, and now the regions expand outside of Greece.

[phatch]

Jeff Smith (The Frugal Gourmet) did a cookbook in this vein: The Frugal Gourmet on our Immigrant Ancestors. You can pick it up cheaply through most of the used book congregators online. bn.com, amazon.com, alibris.com, abebooks.com

He doesn't go back to the home countries much for information, but to the immigrant communities in America.

There are of course American influences in these cuisines. What was available to cook with here that was similar to what was available back home. But also what was cheap here that was expensive back home. Meat being the prime culprit there.

Further, there were social programs of the time to improve the health of these immigrants. In their view, how could a plate of spaghetti with tomato sauce be healthy? It needs protein. And so meatballs in spaghetti, heavy meat lasagne, milk based sauces. and such were born.

[Suzanne]

Here's one book that discusses that question from an Italian American perspective: The Lost Ravioli Recipes of Hoboken.

The short answers are:

1. Immigrants used what they could find, which differed from what they had in the "old country."
2. They changed recipes according to the prevailing "majority" ethos, to make others more comfortable with the foods they love.

But of course it's much more complicated than that. And it's a question that can never be answered definitively (imo). The world is constantly changing.

Among my Indian friends are two cookbook writers. One believes in complete "authenticity" and only preparing foods as they were prepared for generations. The other believes in "accessibility" and adapts recipes according to the time and ingredients available to her readers. Which of them offers the truest dishes? Both!

[siduri]

Hi Koukouvagia,
This is a really interesting thread for me, combining cooking and anthropology!
I think another thread was about Navajo fry bread, again a derivative recipe from what was available.

Phatch, i think you made a good point i hadn;t thought of. The american school system taught nutrition to many of the immigrant or first generation families, and they added lots of stuff to their traditional dishes, as well as a different way of eating.

I think often of the submarine sandwich (as it's called in boston, possibly grinder or poor boy in other places?) - which is, at least ijn boston, exquisitely "Italian" - four kinds of cold cuts, cheese, pickles, tomatoes, onions, hot pepper.... wherever in italy would anyone have made such a sandwich??!! I remember going for a hike with my husband from my inlaw's house, and my mother in law insisted on making the sandwiches - "what would you like, ham or cheese?" I said both, and she was quite taken aback! Never mind submarine sandwich! Certainly this is the product of hungry immigrants who finally had abundance of foods, and they enjoyed them.

Other strange recipes, i believe, are local variations, like ricotta in lasagna, which i've never encountered here, but is local to (?) sicily i think. Elsewhere it';s always bechamel.
Someone brings them over and then teaches them to everyone.

[Dillbert]

the origin of the submarine sandwich is a debated topic.

one theory holds it originated in the Philadelphia area where immigrant wives "created" and "instant lunch" for their husbands working in the shipyards then known as Hog Island, hence "hoagie" - the area was once an island in the Delaware River, it has since been filled and the area is no longer an island.

aka submarine sandwich, zepp (from zepplin) - all relating to shape.
Philadelphia definition: a "grinder" is a hoagie grilled as a open faced sandwich

[elchivito]

"...the regions expand..." is exactly right. In this country we seem to stereotype how "authentic" recipes are prepared in other countries and cultures. What would a european writer write about if he came to this country to write about "authentic" barbecue? Every single person he talked to would give him a different "authentic, traditional" recipe. The same is true of food traditions that are brought here from Greece, Italy, anywhere. My family has lived in the same place in the southwest for over 250 years. My great, great, great grandparents lived in the same house I live in. We have many people, relatives, inlaws and friends who show up here from Mexico and New Mexico every year at holiday time, and each time they show up, there are lots of friendly, Negra Modelo and Presidente fueled arguments about the correct way to make the chicharrones, the calabacitas, the cabrito, the birria de borrego, the carne machaca and everything else. Recipes and traditions change with geography, economics and available ingredients. In the purest sense, there's no such thing as "authentic".

[DocSmith]

Originally Posted by phatch

Further, there were social programs of the time to improve the health of these immigrants. In their view, how could a plate of spaghetti with tomato sauce be healthy? It needs protein. And so meatballs in spaghetti, heavy meat lasagne, milk based sauces. and such were born.

Well there is some good logic there too.

In the 30's the average male height was 5'7" and now its 6'0". Being that we haven't evolved all that much in the last 70 years, most of the change is due to having more protein in our diets.

Of course we have taken it to an excess the other direction now.

[siduri]

The question of "authenticity" is an interesting one, Elchivito (and how wonderful to live in such a historical context!).

My question is, what is "authentic" and is that what we really want.

I find that while there is the "slow food" trend here i n italy that is trying to get back the goodness in food, sometimes it kind of backfires. If we are only going to try to make things as they used to be, then we lose the creativity of the cook. Someone must have invented it at SOME point, it wasn;t handed down from olympus! And each individual that cooked it did it better or worse. I don't like some dishes that are traditional and authentic anyway, even if others seem just perfect. So while i think you shouldn't CALL a dish with a traditional name if it isn;t that dish, there is no reason you have to make the traditional dish. Make food that is good, that's the real point.

Near us is a restaurant that specializes in researching old recipes and producing them exactly as they used to be done. I ate there once and was not impressed. One dish tasted like grass. The fact is, most peasants ate poorly, and had to make do, and yeah, maybe they made this poor food well, but as soon as they emigrated to lands of more abundance, changed their eating habits very quickly. In any case much of what i ate there was not, in my opinion, worth the high price tag for authenticity. (And it has a long waiting list for reservations).

I guess i'm frustrated by the Italian tendency to want to eat only what your mother cooked, exactly as she cooked it, so that for many years every restaurant I went to had exactly the same menu. I like to experiment, and particularly when i do get to eat out, i like to get something i would never do at home. Pasta e fagioli is easy, why should i pay a restaurant to do it? Even today, unless you have a lot of money, eating an original dish is not easy here. So i'm not so interested in authenticity.

On the other hand i'm very much in favor of the old fashioned way in terms of raw ingredients. I've witnessed a decline over the 35 years i'm here in the quality of produce, due to longer transport, more hothouse growing, more demand for stuff out of season, and importation from other european countries. Moreover, don;t expect to get great bread here any more. The bakeries in the city produce a product that is quickly risen and dry and too light, and the only reasonable bread to be bought comes from out of town. Even then, it's not like it used to be. A baker once told me that to do bread the old way, you have to work all night. Nobody wants to do the night shift any more, so they do shortcuts. There i do lament the old ways.

[Ishbel]

It's also interesting that you can eat the same food - made by the same company but in a different part of the world - and they taste absolutely different.!

My sister lives in Australia. I visit her on a fairly regular basis. Chocolate. Made in Australia by Cadbury - but tasting totally different from British made Cadbury chocolates, bearing the same name.

My sister puts it down to the different quality of milk - but I'm not sure what it is that causes the same product to taste absolutely unlike the 'home' variety. I thought she was exaggerating, but having eaten the stuff, I have to agree.

[elchivito]

I traveled through Italy many years ago and have longed to go back. Your perspective, while not surprising, is pretty sad.

[shroomgirl]

interesting thread.

The products where ever you immigrate to may not be the same....ie, chanterelles from the NW USA do not taste like the small Scottish ones, or the large MO. ones.
Truffles from Burgundy are different than Oregan and Tuscan....

Soil or terrier (sp) makes a difference. I can tell a sungold tomato grown on a specific farm in Illinois from sungolds grown by other farmers within a 200 mile circumference. Same with meats, there is a difference between not only the breeds but whomever is raising and feeding them....well and cutting them.

So, if you took a recipe and made it using these products it would be similar to the others but they'd all be different and that's just using products from this area grown on different land. One of the culinary camps I taught was, "Not every tomato is the same".

[DocSmith]

Originally Posted by Dillbert

Philadelphia definition: a "grinder" is a hoagie grilled as a open faced sandwich

In Chicago a grinder is a sandwich using two pieces of garlic bread.

Its also awesome

[deltadoc]

This story is probably not true, but I read it once a long time ago.

The "hero" sandwich, aka as hoagie, submarine, etc., was when a Greek was describing to an American a "gyro sandwich" as sliced meat in pita bread.

The way "gyro" is pronounced the story said, sounded like "hero" to the American. Hence that is how sliced meat in bread became a "hero sandwich".

doc

[Dillbert]

Originally Posted by elchivito

I traveled through Italy many years ago and have longed to go back. Your perspective, while not surprising, is pretty sad.

I'm not able to identify which perspective is so sad, but I would not agree that any specific perspective can be considered sad.

I have spent (collectively) a fair amount of time in Italy and traveled to many regions. for example, I have not encountered anything in Italy I would define as a USA hoagie/zep/sub anywhere in Italy. that said, I would not presume my experience is 100% "accurate, the truth, the whole truth, without exception."

aside: Doc - fascinating Hero sandwich story - true or not, it has a proper "ring" to the story!

who was the first person to put the first "cold cuts" in an "oblong roll" is certainly lost to history.

same for pizza - who first put anchovy on "tomato pie?"
or pepperoni?
or sausage?
or green pepper?

growing up the the Philadelphia area, I had my favorite sub shops - some were "better" (in my opinion, only) than others - question of cold cut mix, cheeses, seasonings, etc.
there was one shop that made a knock'em dead tuna hoagie - only place I would buy one.... is that a tuna hoagie or just a tuna fish salad sandwich....?

grinders were an entirely different story - some shops put the lettuce & tomato on before grilling, some after. I personally liked the lettuce and tomato applied after grilling - that provided a nice hot/cold/crisp contrast in the sandwich. your tastes may vary! have it your way - I'll support your assertion / preference!

there are hundreds - if not thousands - of "dishes" that have evolved from a basic concept. getting to "authentic" is a tall task - first the historical "accuracy" bit - if even known / documented - and then the regional (considering all the world is just a compiled heap of regions) differences. the Earl of Sandwich is credited for the "invention" - but I bet he just said "bring me something to eat" and it is an unknown cook that slapped a slice of meat between the slices of bread . . .

example: Hawaiian pizza - ham & pineapple toppings. was it really "invented" in Hawaii? I doubt it; hawaiian pizza is largely unknown in Hawaii. more likely a pizza shop looking for a new&different menu item (a frequent question around here....) and since pineapples came from Hawaii, bingo - a "name"

example 2: french fries - appeared first in Spain. popularized in Belgium. the cooking term "frenched" refers to (semi) thin strips. I'd put money on the Inca's having deep fried cut up potatoes centuries before the potato even got to Europe.

so what is "authentic?"

[elchivito]

What's sad is that Siduri is seeing a gradual shift from old ways to quicker, yet more generic new ways, even in Italy. The WalMartization of the world. Sad is a personal term. Siduri "laments" it. So do I. Sad.