Kitchen Kulture

At home, the kitchen is where the best parties end, the wildest affairs begin, food trends are set, small culinary businesses are founded, and the perfect strangers of a supper-club are catered to. Whether large or small, modern or rustic, the kitchen has become the center of all the action. What was once a pragmatically designed place for food preparation has now become a stage on which the act of cooking and eating is celebrated as a social event. At the same time, the kitchen is being opened up to become a living space and pivotal meeting point in the home. Kitchen Kulture is an insightful survey of new, established, and unconventional ideas in contemporary kitchen design. From small-scale multifunctional cupboard kitchens to expansive living and cooking environments, the book features kitchens that are as individual and charismatic as the personalities that use them. It includes high-tech innovations by well-known kitchen manufacturers, surprising approaches for everyday life, pop-up cooking sites for special events, and futuristic design concepts that let the kitchen dissolve entirely and become fully integrated into living spaces.

At supermarkets across the nation, customers waiting in line—mostly female—flip through magazines displayed at the checkout stand. What we find on those magazine racks are countless images of food and, in particular, women: moms preparing lunch for the team, college roommates baking together, working women whipping up a meal in under an hour, dieters happy to find a lowfat ice cream that tastes great. In everything from billboards and product packaging to cooking shows, movies, and even sex guides, food has a presence that conveys powerful gender-coded messages that shape our society. Kitchen Culture in America is a collection of essays that examine how women's roles have been shaped by the principles and practice of consuming and preparing food. Exploring popular representations of food and gender in American society from 1895 to 1970, these essays argue that kitchen culture accomplishes more than just passing down cooking skills and well-loved recipes from generation to generation. Kitchen culture instructs women about how to behave like "correctly" gendered beings. One chapter reveals how juvenile cookbooks, a popular genre for over a century, have taught boys and girls not only the basics of cooking, but also the fine distinctions between their expected roles as grown men and women. Several essays illuminate the ways in which food manufacturers have used gender imagery to define women first and foremost as consumers. Other essays, informed by current debates in the field of material culture, investigate how certain commodities like candy, which in the early twentieth century was advertised primarily as a feminine pleasure, have been culturally constructed. The book also takes a look at the complex relationships among food, gender, class, and race or ethnicity-as represented, for example, in the popular Southern black Mammy figure. In all of the essays, Kitchen Culture in America seeks to show how food serves as a marker of identity in American society.

'Kitchens' takes the reader into the robust, overheated, backstage world of the contemporary restaurant. In this portrait of the real lives of kitchen workers, the author brings their experiences, challenges, and satisfactions to life.

Being at the centre of home life, where food is prepared and hospitality emanates, every kitchen needs to be carefully planned in order to offer flexibility within the home space. Kitchen Culture provides a wealth of practical advice and new thinking, and its sumptuous photographs of contemporary kitchens and architectural plans provide visual inspiration for how to create wonderful kitchens within the shell of your own home. Johnny Grey covers everything from fascinating context –for example, the historical model of the kitchen as being the fabric of family and domestic life- to practical, design orientated considerations of lighting, space and layout, body movement and storage in the creation of the ideal personal living and working space. The book is divided into five sections: ‘Reinventing Home Space’, tracing the historical model of the kitchen and its transformation through cultural, culinary and social influences; ‘The Core of Kitchen Design’, case studies of real kitchens, focusing on key design elements for planning the ideal personal living and work space; ‘Communicating Between Space and People’, showcasing specific designs to accommodate sociable activities; ‘Design Analysis’, heralding the many design options for creating true space-efficiency; and ‘Whole Environment’, providing practical guidance to kitchen owners looking to extend their existing interior space and maximise natural light. Featuring the striking photography of Alex Wilson on almost every page, Kitchen Culture is replete with visual inspiration to compliment Grey’s contemporary, ergonomic style and expert instruction.

Who cooks dinner in American homes? It's no surprise that “Mom” remains the overwhelming answer. Cooking and all it entails, from grocery shopping to chopping vegetables to clearing the table, is to this day primarily a woman's responsibility. How this relationship between women and food developed through the twentieth century and why it has endured are the questions Sherrie Inness seeks to answer in Dinner Roles: American Women and Culinary Culture. By exploring a wide range of popular media from the first half of the twentieth century, including cookbooks, women's magazines, and advertisements, Dinner Roles sheds light on the network of sources that helped perpetuate the notion that cooking is women's work. Cookbooks and advertisements provided valuable information about the ideals that American society upheld. A woman who could prepare the perfect Jell-O mold, whip up a cake with her new electric mixer, and still maintain a spotless kitchen and a sunny disposition was the envy of other housewives across the nation. Inness begins her exploration not with women but with men-those individuals often missing from the kitchen who were taught their own set of culinary values. She continues with the study of juvenile cookbooks, which provided children with their first cooking lessons. Chapters on the rise of electronic appliances, ethnic foods, and the 1950s housewife all add to our greater understanding of women's evolving roles in American culinary culture.

This reader reveals how food habits and beliefs both present a microcosm of any culture and contribute to our understanding of human behaviour. Particular attention is given to how men and women define themselves differently through food choices.

Since the 1980s, China has developed a broader and deeper connection with the world. One of the most intriguing aspects of Chinese culture is its rich cuisine and fascinating cooking.China is a nation with a long history of food culture, and food has become an essential part of Chinese culture.This book tells in sprightly and straightforward language about the structure of traditional Chinese food, food customs for festivals and celebrations in China, Chinese dining etiquette, traditional food and cooking methods, healthy and medicinal diets, as well as historical exchanges of foods between China and other nations. It can present to the readers a complete and truthful picture of the summarized history and culture of Chinese food.Published by SCPG Publishing Corporation and distributed by World Scientific for all markets except China

"Since the 1980s, China has developed a broader and deeper connection with the world. One of the most intriguing aspects of Chinese culture is its rich cuisine and fascinating cooking. China is a nation with a long history of food culture, and food has become an essential part of Chinese culture. This book tells in sprightly and straightforward language about the structure of traditional Chinese food, food customs for festivals and celebrations in China, Chinese dining etiquette, traditional food and cooking methods, healthy and medicinal diets, as well as historical exchanges of foods between China and other nations. It can present to the readers a complete and truthful picture of the summarized history and culture of Chinese food."--