Dining Through the Decades: Foods of the 1910s by David Leite

1910-19

< back Immigration was at an all-time high during these years, bringing new flavors to the kitchen. Italian, German, Jewish, Chinese and Eastern European foods filled millions of tables, mostly in ethnic enclaves in large cities. As a result the 1910s became the "hyphenate decade." Merrill Shindler describes in American Dish (Angel City Press, 1996) how food descriptors such as Italian-American, Chinese-American and Jewish-American began popping up. Spaghetti and Meatballs, Chop Suey, Chow Mein, Swedish Meatballs and goulashes of every sort crowded specials boards in

neighborhood restaurants.

In addition, says Kraig, the 1910s saw the beginning of the proliferation of processed foods. In a scant 10 years, Hellmann's mayonnaise, Oreo cookies, Crisco, Quaker Puffed Wheat and Puffed Rice, Marshmallow Fluff and Nathan's hot dogs took a bow. Aunt Jemima's smile was already imprinted upon the American culinary psyche, as were the Kellogg's and C.W. Post's brand names. And lucky Clarence Birdseye — who on an ice-fishing trip noticed that a fish left out in the cold froze instantly and tasted good when cooked weeks later — set about perfecting his "Frosted Foods," which he would introduce to the world in 1930.

We needed a place to purchase such bounty, and the self-service market was born. Instead of having to hand a list to a clerk and wait as he fetched the items from the back, a customer could amble through the shop's aisles at her leisure. Stores such as A&P offered up to a thousand items (29,000 fewer than today's supermarkets), boggling the minds of housewives everywhere.

With such variety and availability, the over-indulgence of the first decade prevailed — at least among the wealthy. Restaurant menus remained chockfull of meats, shellfish, pâtés and mousses, and the girth of the upper classes remained formidable. "Before World War I it was chic to look plump,'' says Ruth Adams Bronz, author of Miss Ruby's American Cooking (Harper & Row, 1989). "Round was in.'' The poster boy of the times: our then president, William H. Taft, a hefty 300-pounder. Is it any wonder his favorite meal was Lobster Newburg?

A wildly popular dish of the day was Vichyssoise. Dreamed up in 1917 by Chef Louis Diat of New York City's Ritz-Carlton Hotel, Vichyssoise is a heavenly chilled soup of puréed leeks, onions, potatoes and cream.

Vichyssoise's enduring popularity has as much to do with its superb taste as with its relatively democratic ingredients. It could be made in the most well-to-do as well as the most simple of homes. Granted, leeks weren't common at the time, but that wasn't something a resourceful cook couldn't fix with an extra onion or two.

A death knell sounded in January 1919, when the Eighteenth Amendment — otherwise known as Prohibition — was ratified. Scheduled to go into effect on January 16, 1920, Prohibition was going to save those poor souls whose moral compasses had gone awry. Or so self-satisfied politicians told one another over glasses of port after dinner. more >

Recipe
Vichyssoise