The History of Cooking
I recently caught part of a documentary on the history of cooking classes (yes, I was watching the Food Network). I was struck by how the story behind something as basic as cooking revealed gender inequalities. Essentially in pre-WW2 America, cooking was seen as woman's work. There was nothing glamorous or special about preparing food, it was just a means to the end of getting fed. The first cooking classes were offered to poor women to teach them a skill they could use to earn a meager living (generally as a cook/maid for a wealthy family). But after WW2 all of that changed. The men who had learned to cook as soldiers returned home from war and sought to earn a living using their new-found skills. All of a sudden cooking and working in newly created restaurants became a respectable middle class occupation that earned a decent living. But of course it was only after men blessed the cooking world with their presence that cooking earned respect as a profession. Even still everyday cooking is still considered woman's work and gathers little respect, while professional cooking is dominated by men and is highly respected.
Hearing stories like that frustrates me. To be reminded of what low value women have been given historically is sobering. Our accomplishments and our work are deemed unimportant and not worthy of respect or decent pay (until men decide to join in as well). The cynical side of me wants to call for more men to be stay-at-home parents to see if that will actually raise the respect level for that particular occupation. I'm sure if enough men start doing it, they'd somehow start being paid to be a dad as well.
Not that I think any profession should ever be restricted to just men or women. We all should be given equal respect (and pay) for whatever job we undertake no matter our gender. But given the realities of history and our world today, that doesn't always happen. Women often don't receive respect for their work and are still the minority in many fields dominated by men. Often men don't want to share the respect of their particular career with women (are they selfish or do they think we are not worthy?) or they don't understand the difficulties women find when trying to enter those fields. So as unfair as some have called it, it takes men sponsoring/encouraging/endorsing/apprenticing women to help us break into those fields as equals for women to even begin to be respected in the same way men are. And while I don't full agree that it is unfair to help others, in these situations the inequality is even more unfair than the assistance, so why not "be unfair" in a positive way instead of a negative way?
I know this is just a typical gender issues rant, but the documentary irked me. It of course presented the evolution of the cooking profession as a good thing no matter how telling it was of the rampant sexism in our country's history. I just wish the story would be different every once in awhile.
julieclawson(at)gmail(dot)com 
I've often wondered if, contrary to the idea that it's learned behavior, humans aren't sexist (and possibly racist) by nature. Whether humans are or not,, though, I do suspect that sexism is so engrained into our collective unconscious (or wherever) that it's not going to change in our lifetime regardless of how much we try to educate the species.
Keep in mind that I say all this as a liberal, and while feeling sadness for our species, and I do believe we should continue to fight sexism and racism and all the other "isms," even if just for the sake of future generations.
julie. i've been reading your blog since nick did the podcast with you. and i have to say . . . you're one of the better bloggers out there. consistently blogging good content as opposed to what you ate for dinner and where you traveled. really good stuff. thanks.
I get being irked. I guess the documentary's call is to show us what was. And that's what was, I guess. Also, as unpleasant as it is, people can only be what they can be in a given time of history. I'm glad things are changing.
Julie,
As a professional cook I've worked for chefs of both genders who were egalitarian in the way they dealt with their staff and those who were Napoleonic. As someone who has loved to cook since I was a kid, thanks to my mother, I've been struck by how few women I've encountered in professional cooking. Thanks for the thoughtful post.
Peace,
Milton
I hear you. I empathize with your frustration and then some. It's just so … so … yeah. And then you think, "Why bother?"
I think you're asking the wrong question. You seem to be frustrated by the fact that people who cook at home for themselves get no respect, while professional chefs do.
In America, I think of fine dining as a form of entertainment, and in my experience, when it comes to entertainment, there is no gender-bias. (JK Rowling, Oprah, Jolie, Streisand, etc.)
Maybe… men are just better chefs.
The profession of "chef" has been around for many centuries — and if you look back in history, one finds that while the industry has been dominated by men, a number of women have reached the same level of fame (Julie Child, Kat Cora, etc.)
You seem to be assuming that men and women are "wired" the same way when it comes to cooking… but I think we can all agree that the Lord has designed men and women to be different.
Maybe its just possible that the growth of the restaurant business in post WWII America has more to do with the growing economy and less with a gender bias. But maybe that's just a guy's perspective… and I didn't see the documentary.
PS: My wife does most of the cooking in my family, but when we host a dinner party she passes the apron on to me.
PPS: Enjoyed your post, though. I agree with Josh… always something to think about at 'one hand clapping'. Thanks!
Ed – Thanks for reading and for your comments here. Sorry, but I don't think we can all agree that God wired men and women to be different. In fact there are some serious disagreements on that issue. To just say that "men are better chefs" because there are more male chefs doesn't logically follow. Almost any profession could be substituted for "chef" by that sort of logic. What it ignores are the socio-cultural assumptions that prevent women from entering into those fields in the same numbers as men. When women are told that certain jobs aren't for them, or they aren't given the same educational opportunities, or they aren't mentored in the same way as men, or they face sexual discrimination at work – these are barriers to women being able to enter into professions. So sure it can be easy to look and see only men in a profession and assume that therefore men must be better at it than women, but that assessments falls apart when one examines the multitude of reasons why women aren't able (culturally, not physically or mentally) to do that job. For instance with chefs, until just very very recently chefs were trained through apprenticeships not schools. If a headchef wouldn't take on a woman as an apprentice (for whatever reason), women didn't have a chance to become a chef. As you mentioned more women are currently becoming chefs now that the system has changed and they are being trained in schools. So there is a lot more at play here than God making men better cooks.
Barriers in professions? Did you not see the diversity present at the CNN/You Tube debate last night?
I didn't catch the debate last night so I'm not for sure what you are referring to. I just know from my experience as a woman and from working with women that there still exist many barriers to women entering many professions. Sure there are some women who manage to overcome those barriers and are helping encourage other women to break through them as well, but the problems still exist. Certain barriers like "women can preach" are based on idealogies. Others such as the fact that women who work are still expected to manage the house and the kids (and so therefore do triple the work as men) are cultural norms that must be changed.
The world sure was a better place when women stayed home and raised the kids. Now the kids raise themselves and we get stuck with a bunch of little monsters who grow up to become gangsters. This is what we get for allowing them to vote.
i don't disagree with you julie, my presidential debate post was just a joke referring to the seven balding white guys standing on stage. oh, i stand corrected, romney has a full head of hair.
Julie,
I understand your point, but you also have to realize that us women dont get the respect that men get is because of the generations from the past back until WW2 and WW1 those men weren't raised to respect women. I know that because my Grandfather always told me that they wern't raised to respect women so these days it is hard to teach this generation of men to respect us because their fathers weren't and so they think that they dont have to teach their sons to respect women and their rights.
i'm happy to your history for cooking i want to see you bcuese i'm your fan
i want learned the other cook and the all desert for my life
hey well that is cool!!!! COOKING IS THE BEST BECAUSE U LEARN THINGS 4RM IT!! AND WHEN U ET OLDER U WELL NO BETTER
HIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!!!!!!! COOKING IS THE BEST OF ALL!!!! PEOPLE SHOULD TRY IT!!!!!!!!WOW!!!!!!!!!
COOKING ROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOCKS MY WORLD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Now I am working in cooking verbs in Tamil language I want the cooking verbs classifications in English books/ dictionary please give me information.
Dr.s.sundarabalu
assistant professor
Department of Linguistics
Bharathiar University
Coimbatore-46
Tamilnadu
India
Now I am working in cooking verbs in Tamil language I want the cooking verbs classifications in English books/ dictionary please give me information. Dr.s.sundarabalu assistant professor Department of Linguistics Bharathiar University Coimbatore-46 Tamilnadu India
Hi Julie!
I'm doing some research on the interesting topic of a woman's role in the kitchen in 2010 (I mean a home kitchen). I grew up with a single mom who was proud that she didn't know how to cook. I think she felt it was "beneath her" in an "Alexis Colby" kind of way. Needless to say, I was pretty clueless in the kitchen and didn't make anything of it until I got married and felt a huge burden to take on the role of main cook in the house. My husband didn't know how to cook either, but he wasn't running to the stove. Oh – and by cooking, I mean: organizing the kitchen, shopping, meal-planning and actually cooking meals that are edible – all things which I did not know how to do, but are now very important in terms of our budget, health and sanity on many nights. Your blog post is a couple years old, but very timely, I think.
I've started on a journey to learn how to cook for the reasons listed above (budget, sanity, etc.) but share the burden with my husband – I don't really touch the dishes when I cook! It's all him. That makes me feel pretty empowered as does educating myself on kitchen basics which I hope to pass on to my son so he won't be clueless like I was.
Any thoughts? I think this is a fascinating topic. Thanks for your blog.
Julie,
Im doing some research on cooking and how it started and Iv looked at alot of websites and this one is the best out of all, you gave me so much information on cooking.
Thank You
This whole post and the comments crack me up. I'm all for equality believe me but the whole notion that women do most of the cooking yet get little credit in the professional field of cooking baffles me. Here is why. Im nearly 30 and have dated plenty of women… out of all of them I think a total of 2 even knew HOW to cook let alone had any desire to do so. In contrast almost ever single one of my guy friends can cook up a frickin storm on a moments notice. Be it a backyard BBQ or a nice pasta dish or even something as simple as Shepard's pie.
Maybe women where the primary kitchen masters in the 50's but its been a long time since that was the case. Many women not only don't know how to cook but they simply don't even WANT to know. They have taken the gender role reversal so far that as one poster above mentioned.. they are actually PROUD about lacking the ability to make a decent meal (which btw is frickin pathetic. Who in their right mind is proud about NOT being able to do something?)
I don't doubt that there are some sexist chefs out there creating road blocks. But for every asshole making it difficult for women there are 2 more guys trying to wait on women hand and foot. Did it occur to you that there aren't many women in the profession not because they are incapable of being great cooks or because men are "making it difficult" but simply because there are not as many women who WANT to cook professionally as there are men with the same desire? Not everything is about gender inequality.
Hi there. I think that your blog is very interesting and agree that no profession should be limited to a female or male. Yeah there are some things that one sex can do better than the other, but that doesn't mean that both sex's shouldn't have the equal opertunity to at least try and experience something new. It's also interesting learning these things about cooking. I am going to Northern Michigan University in the fall to become a chef. So I really find these facts interesting……and on that note..right now I am in my Senior year of high school (YYYYIIIPPPEEEE
) and i have to write a MLA style paper and i need any kind of information i can get about the history of cooking. I have been having a hard time finding the information I need so if you could would you be able to E-mail me some websites for some good information….if you could that would be awsome…….Thanks for the interesting read.
Hey, just wanted to let you know in Opera, your site is showing 3 errors based around dhtml – just thought you should know
I started out chopping vegetables in the kitchen of a French restaurant 27 years ago. I'm a female chef and I have worked in the business on and off for most of my life. In commercial kitchens there is a lot of camaraderie, you work in close quarters, in high heat and very quickly. Getting along with the guy on the line next to you is very important, one screwed up relationship can ruin an entire dinner service. When I started out, there were almost no female chefs, except for Alice Waters, who was the most notable. At the time, some of the male chefs on the line were going to culinary school. I was interested in going too. They said, you won't make it, you'll be the only woman there, and anyway, women don't belong in the kitchen-you're our token. It was hard for a long time, there were many who actually felt that women did not belong in commercial kitchens and they were not shy about it. Gradually, it has gotten much better at least, it seems that way. I eventually went to culinary school, in 2008 at the age of 43. I went just for the paper and because it was on my life list. Man was I surprised by these 25 year old little boys that worked in pizzerias or delis and their tremendous sexist attitudes toward the 5 women in our 38 person class. The best revenge for me was my skill. You can't say anything to someone who really knows how to cook. The way to get around bias of any kind toward men or women is to just do what you want, do what drives you-everyone has an opinion-does it really matter? Someone posted that they are doing research in this area, try the book A Woman's Place is in the Kitchen, the evolution of women chefs, by Ann Cooper.
I HATE U PPL HATE U ALL!!!
Julie Clawson, you know what's good.
Whoever said "maybe men are just better chefs?"..fuck you.
Hey Julie,
Very interesting post, however it just seems like another post where someone is complaining about women's rights. I'm not saying that I am against womens rights, its just that is the way the world is right now, because that is the way it has been for such a long time. Everyone knows about the hardships that women have suffered, and I can completely sympathize with you on that point because sexism are horrible. But, on a more positive note, the world is changing it's ways. I am beginning a Culinary Arts program in the coming September semester and after asking for class list, I found out there are 15 females and 13 males in the class. So when everything is changing there is no need to keep complaining. But I don't want you to feel like this is an attack on you because it is not.