In preparation for a summer dedicated to all things food, I had meticulously researched must eat places in the D.C. area before arriving. Family and friends’ recommendations, magazines’ top ten lists, instagram’s foodie feeds were all cross referenced with Yelp reviews to make sure I didn’t miss out on the next best thing in the local food world. Walking around the streets, my food bucket list has grown as I add new discoveries. “I just found the coolest new place…” is a recurring line in my conversations.
Last weekend, some Foodwork fellows and I dined at Keren Restaurant for a taste of Ethiopian food. Apparently, Ethiopian food is a must eat when in D.C. The restaurant received 4.5 stars on Yelp with reviews that declare the place: “one of the best authentic Ethiopian restaurants that D.C. has to offer.” Expectations were met above and beyond. I tried tibsi, enjera, and fuhl, all seasoned with spices and flavors completely new to my taste buds. The meal was even more delicious, because I felt like it was tied to a unique place that I could drum up in the mind’s eye.
Trubek’s exploration of terroir has made me question my recent experience. Terroir encompasses the culture, history, and landscape enrooted in place. Meals epitomizing terroir encapsulate the place’s complex narratives, its people’s stories, and the community’s traditions. All of which probably cannot be fully experienced in a 30 minute meal one Friday night.
Turns out Keren isn’t even Ethiopian. With further inquisition, I found out the restaurant actually serves Eritrean dishes. The two types of food are apparently very similar in taste. Yet, there are subtle differences: Eritrean dishes are typically lighter, there are more tomatoes, the spice blends differ.^2 Plus, Trubek’s terroir goes beyond taste. Eritrea has its own culture and history. In fact, Eritrea and Ethiopia have historically been enemies since Eritrean independence.
However, Keren has been branded on Yelp as Ethiopian, probably because it’s good for business. The tourists want Ethiopian food. All of social media is telling the sight-seers of D.C. that they must try it. The tourists come, sit for 30 minutes to an hour, eat the food, and leave feeling culturally fulfilled and empowered to tell their friends that they branched out and tried something different. What they/I experienced was not Ethiopian culture or Eritrean culture, but some new blend created to please the American appetite and instagram feed. This is not terroir.
Are my explorations and obsessions with food discoveries belittling cultures? Am I ‘Columbusing,’ as some are now calling it?[1]
As a counterpoint, isn’t there some value left for discovery? I still tried something new; my tastebuds still exposed to distinct flavors currently lacking from my diet. Or how about fusion restaurants? The spirit of cooking lies in innovation, and cultural fusion dishes (like Mexican Korean tacos from Kogi as an example) have often led the way in American culinary discovery, expanding the recipe realm of possible tastes. Do small French coastal towns miss out by guarding their community too closely from new influences? I suppose the best thing to do is eat consciously and thoughfully. Mindful eaters go forth!
[1] http://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2014/07/06/328466757/columbusing-the-art-of-discovering-something-that-is-not-new
2 http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/articles/36663/mild-frontier
I love that you brought up the subject of authenticity. I’m not really sure if we can have authentic food anywhere; even visiting a country, finding authentic food is extremely difficult due to the fact that foreign countries will often cater to tourists’ tastes. Furthermore, everyone in every culture, as Lucy Long would say, has a bit of an obsession with the exotic or other. If you go to China or France, individuals there are obsessed with McDonald’s and some other fast food places. They really think they are taking part in American cuisine, but most Americans would say we don’t eat burgers and fries everyday. Furthermore, many fast food places overseas do not have the same menu and may even have higher quality food to cater to the cultures and customs of a particular country.
Just like the Ethiopian restaurant that markets itself in a particular way, “American” restaurants do the same thing in other countries. Lisa Heldke would call this cultural food colonialism and looks at the way culinary cultures are exploited for cookbooks. Many restaurants or cookbooks will omit items that are too disagreeable or that the author chooses to dislike. Furthermore, the recipes in a cookbook or at a restaurant are used for capital, and the context the dishes are supposed to be eaten in is completely disregarded; in a way, this butchers someone else’s culture. Another factor that complicates the issue of authenticity even more is the fact that cuisine is constantly changing. The way Americans eat has changed, and in other countries it’s changing as well.
I don’t have an answer for food that is authentic in terms of ethnicity, but it’s not going to stop me from trying different foods. I just might need to do a little research like you, Grace, to better understand the motive behind the dish I’m eating and hope that one day I get my hands on something “authentic.”
Hannah, this is a wonderfully written, insightful, thought-provoking blog post! Good for you for doing more research on the restaurant.
I have the same conflicting emotions about “branching out” while also recognizing that what I am eating may or may not be culturally demonstrative of the cuisine and that it certainly is not accurate in terms of experience. I feel this acutely every time I go to a Thai restaurant that sets out chopsticks (the Thai invented the fork) and I ask for the pad thai to be mild.
I recognize that this is in no way representative of an entire country’s cuisine; however, I do think that this interplay between cultures is important. Like Petrini argued, what is good for one culture may not be good for another, and therefore there is definitely a place for adapting food fit cultural preferences. If we start out introducing America to Chinese food through greasy, MSG filled chow mein, we can start to open the door down the road for more “authentic” cuisine. And that is what we are beginning to see happening. The thought of an Ethiopian (even a pseudo-Ethiopian) restaurant surviving much less thriving in the nation’s capital 60 years ago is ludicrous. I’m not saying we should applaud ourselves for being mediocre but I do think that through this intermingling of tastes we are moving towards a much more culturally appreciative society.