I find one of the strongest cultural connections we keep is the foods we eat, specifically during holidays. Many of us are several generations removed from our ancestors migration to what we now call home and we've lost most of those cultural markers, (language, dress, music, etc.). But if we keep any of the culinary traditions, it's often that "special dish" we make once or twice a year, and what's more special than Christmas in our culture?
Although living in Arkansas for almost 25 years, I still make oyster stew every Christmas Eve. Several of my friends from the Great Lakes area, even though they live in the South, also follow this tradition. Back in grad school, (a long, long time ago, I think my philosophy professor was some dude named Plato?) my roommate wrote a paper on food migration patterns, and he looked at why throughout the Great Lakes and into Central Minnesota, oyster stew is a relatively common holiday food. He traced it back to the English/European ancestry that landed in New England, having a traditional diet heavy in sea foods. Over the many generations, as they moved westward across the northern swath of the US, (many were like my ancestors, lumberjacks or railroad men) they carried their love of various sea foods. As they moved further and further from the coast, and refrigeration is a relatively new invention, it became more expensive and more of a "special" a treat.
Increasingly, a seafood dish became associated with Christmas. His paper showed, primarily through looking at historic railroad shipment invoices, that a variety of sea foods morphed into primarily oysters. Oysters were relatively inexpensive (until recently) and when packed on ice in an insulated box car in December, could last up to two weeks, more than enough time to move them from the East Coast into the heartland. My grandmother and mother would tell stories how everyone in Northern Wisconsin and the UP would place their oyster orders in early October, and a special box car would stop at each little lumber town in the North Country the week before Christmas with all the women rushing down to the depot to get their buckets of oysters.
So, what is that traditional dish your family has to have at Christmas, and is it unique to your family/ethnicity or your region?
Eat well this Christmas, my friends.
Natch
Although living in Arkansas for almost 25 years, I still make oyster stew every Christmas Eve. Several of my friends from the Great Lakes area, even though they live in the South, also follow this tradition. Back in grad school, (a long, long time ago, I think my philosophy professor was some dude named Plato?) my roommate wrote a paper on food migration patterns, and he looked at why throughout the Great Lakes and into Central Minnesota, oyster stew is a relatively common holiday food. He traced it back to the English/European ancestry that landed in New England, having a traditional diet heavy in sea foods. Over the many generations, as they moved westward across the northern swath of the US, (many were like my ancestors, lumberjacks or railroad men) they carried their love of various sea foods. As they moved further and further from the coast, and refrigeration is a relatively new invention, it became more expensive and more of a "special" a treat.
Increasingly, a seafood dish became associated with Christmas. His paper showed, primarily through looking at historic railroad shipment invoices, that a variety of sea foods morphed into primarily oysters. Oysters were relatively inexpensive (until recently) and when packed on ice in an insulated box car in December, could last up to two weeks, more than enough time to move them from the East Coast into the heartland. My grandmother and mother would tell stories how everyone in Northern Wisconsin and the UP would place their oyster orders in early October, and a special box car would stop at each little lumber town in the North Country the week before Christmas with all the women rushing down to the depot to get their buckets of oysters.
So, what is that traditional dish your family has to have at Christmas, and is it unique to your family/ethnicity or your region?
Eat well this Christmas, my friends.
Natch