Chicago A food biography

Daniel Block, 1967-

Book - 2015

Chicago began as a frontier town on the edge of white settlement and diverse indigenous populations. In this environment, cultures mixed, and many of the storefront ethnic restaurants catered specifically to passengers transferring from train to train between one of the five major downtown railroad stations. Becoming the second largest city in the US in 1890, Chicago itself and its immediate surrounding area was also the site of agriculture, both producing food for the city and for shipment elsewhere. Block and Rosing tell a story of not just culture, economics, and innovation, but also a history of regulation and regulators, and reveal Chicago to be one of the foremost eating destinations in the country.

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Subjects
Published
Lanham : Rowman and Littlefield [2015]
Language
English
Main Author
Daniel Block, 1967- (-)
Other Authors
Howard Rosing (-)
Physical Description
xiii, 326 pages : illustrations, map ; 24 cm
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references (pages 279-293) and index.
ISBN
9781442227262
  • Acknowledgments
  • Introduction
  • 1. The Material Resources: Land, Water, and Air
  • 2. Indigenous Foodways of Chicago
  • 3. Migration and the Making of Chicago Foodways
  • 4. Markets and Retail
  • 5. From Frontier Town to Industrial and Commercial Food Capital
  • 6. Eating at the Meeting Place: A Short History of Chicago's Restaurants
  • 7. Chicago Street Food, Recipes, and Cookbooks
  • Notes
  • Bibliography
  • Index
Review by Booklist Review

In so many diverse ways, Chicago is America's heart. The nation's waterways, railroads, highways, and air corridors converge on the city by the lake. Since the middle of the nineteenth century, Chicago has played a key role in food distribution throughout the nation. Its notorious stockyards and its massive grain storage towers moved the heartland's bounty to the coasts and around the world. Immigrants brought their foodways, making the city a melting pot for every world cuisine. Block and Rosing document economic and cultural forces that have made the city a top destination for everyday eaters and earnest gourmets. They inventory unique creations beyond Chicago pizza and other native dishes, illustrating how the city's cooks have influenced all of America, redefining Italian, Greek, and Mexican cuisine as well as manufacturing grain products, candy, and even popcorn. Through its stellar chefs, Chicago has lately revolutionized restaurant dining. Casual readers and scholars will both find something to savor here.--Knoblauch, Mark Copyright 2016 Booklist

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.