Library: Manchester Common Read: Notes from a Young Black Chef: Themes and Reading Guide

Themes

The hidden significance of what we eat
How we eat and talk about food are key parts of our identities. Three experts chat about the politics of pork, where meals teach egalitarian values, and the one food everyone agrees on: cake.
What food tells us about culture
Explores the connections between food and culture.
Why hunting down "authentic ethnic food" is a loaded proposition
How we value a culture's cuisine in our society often reflects the status of those who cook it.
A chef reclaims his Southern culinary history
Researching, celebrating and supporting African American food culture is Michael Twitty’s way to honor and heal those who came before.
For Black Jam Makers, the Power Is in Preserving
As the conversation turns to racial issues in the craft food movement, canning quality fruit is often the easy part.
The hidden significance of what we eat
How we eat and talk about food are key parts of our identities. Three experts chat the politics of pork, where meals teach egalitarian values and the one food everyone agrees on: cake.
The Joy of Food
Food is more than survival. With it we make friends, court lovers, and count our blessings.
A Nigerian Dish, Pieced Together From Our Bronx Pantry
Kwame Onwuachi on egusi stew, a labor of love.
Padma Lakshmi Wants Us to Eat More Adventurously
Part food travelogue, part exploration of the benefits and blind spots of multiculturalism, Hulu’s “Taste the Nation” finds Lakshmi cracking crab shells with South Carolina’s Gullah Geechee community, partaking of brats and beer at Oktoberfest in Milwaukee and comparing flour and corn tortillas along the border in El Paso.
The Profound Significance of ‘High on the Hog’
A new limited series on Netflix is a nuanced celebration of African Americans and their food.
Southern Foodways Alliance Oral History: Charleston Stories
Stories from the culinary luminaries of the Lowcountry filmed aboard the SFA Oral History Bus.
What food tells us about culture
Have you ever wondered what the food you eat everyday can tell you about where you come from? There is more of a connection between food and culture than you may think.
Why food memories are so powerful
Lured by a food from her childhood, a woman returns to a country that no longer exists to confront her family’s secret past.

Every time we gather around a table to eat we perform one of the most important social activities that we do as human beings. Eating is not only about nourishing our bodies, but our souls. Every bite is a bite of culture, of history, and knowledge that has passed from generations to us. For several reasons we have forgotten how important food is and all the symbolism that surrounds it.

Poor Americans are less likely to eat fast food than middle class Americans
Shares research on how often poor, middle class, and wealthy Americans eat fast food.
Shopping at the farmers' market on food stamps: 'Not just for white foodies'
Explains the challenges that lower-income people face when they try to find healthy food.
Social Privilege and Its Impact on Food Choices
Explores the ways in which food and food choices are cultural issues that are influenced by privilege.
What Food Says About Class in America
Highlights the foods that people in different social classes eat as well as American food policies.

Implicit Bias
Defines implicit bias and lists implicit bias resources.
Project Implicit
Measure your implicit bias with the Implicit Association Test (IAT). Select the Race IAT from the list of IATs.
A Jury of My Peers
Kwame Onwuachi asks "If there were more critics who are people of color, would things be different?"

The Culinary Institute of America
Learn about where Kwame Onwuachi studied to be a chef.
Don't Eat Before Reading This
Anthony Bourdain spills some trade secrets.
How These 5 Restaurateurs Are Establishing a Kitchen Culture That's Safe for Everyone
Examines misogynistic kitchen culture and what can be done about it.
Occupational Outlook Handbook: Chefs and Head Cooks
Explains what chefs and head cooks do, their work environment, how to become one, and more.
Tom Colicchio on Reinventing Kitchen Culture and Empowering a New Generation of Talent
The Top Chef judge and restaurateur calls on fellow chefs to change the bro culture in professional kitchens.
What is Kitchen Culture: How Can I Find My Place in a Professional Kitchen?
Explains the skills needed to work in a professional kitchen.
African American Culinary Chefs You Should Know
Today, a new wave of African American chefs safeguards southern foodways. As they reintroduce recipes in the nation’s top kitchens, they humanize how the public sees black chefs.
How These 5 Restaurateurs Are Establishing a Kitchen Culture That's Safe for Everyone
“Stop mumbling that you can't afford an HR dept. You can afford YOU. That's how you start."
A Jury of My Peers
"If there were more critics who are people of color, would things be different?" asks chef Kwame Onwuachi.
‘The Kitchen at Per Se Was a Clean Place but Hard and Heartless Too’
Kwame Onwuachi’s memoir, “Notes From a Young Black Chef,” reveals kitchen abuse at Thomas Keller’s NYC restaurant
Toxic Kitchen Culture: Reform Is Sorely Needed in 2020
Since their inception, kitchens in the restaurant world have been notoriously abusive toward cooks, especially for women and people of color. Is change on the horizon?

Career Vs. Vocation: Are You Doing Work That Matters?
Explores the differences between finding a career and finding a vocation.

24 Organizations Finding Food Justice
With a focus on participation and inclusivity, these groups use food justice to empower communities to control how they grow, distribute, access, and eat food.
America at Hunger's Edge
A shadow of hunger looms over the United States. In the pandemic economy, nearly one in eight households doesn’t have enough to eat.
The New Face of Hunger
Millions of working Americans don’t know where their next meal is coming from. We sent three photographers to explore hunger in three very different parts of the United States, each giving different faces to the same statistic: One-sixth of Americans don’t have enough food to eat.
People of Color are at Greater Risk of COVID-19. Systemic Racism in the Food System Plays a Role.
Food apartheid and economic inequality are among the factors leading to high rates of infections and deaths of Black and brown Americans.
Poor People Deserve To Taste Something Other Than Shame
"My mom was already ashamed and sorry. She deserved to also eat pie."
What Is Food Justice and Why Is It Necessary?
For all people who care about a sustainable food system, food justice is an imperative, and there are many inspiring models to follow and support.
What We Eat During a Plague
Over the past months, Americans have embraced comfort food with a renewed fervor. But this isn’t the first time culinary habits have shifted during a pandemic.

America's Long Overdue Awakening to Systemic Racism
For many of those who have spent their lives fighting for racial justice, this is a moment of reckoning that has been a long time coming.
Breaking Poverty: Crime, Poverty Often Linked
Explores the reasons that poverty and trauma often go hand in hand.
Charleston Tourism Is Built on Southern Charm. Locals Say It’s Time to Change.
A powerful visitors’ bureau has pushed the South Carolina city to the top of “best” lists by selling gentility. Critics say that has come at the expense of history and the city’s Black population.
How We Should Talk About Racial Disparities
By naming what creates and maintains racial disparities, we can challenge harmful narratives.
I was a fast-food worker. Let me tell you about burnout.
As technology ratchets up the stress, low-wage jobs have become some of the hardest in America.
The racial wealth gap: A stark reflection of structural inequality: Lessons learned from two decades of work
Rigorous scholarly research has underscored the powerful consequences of lacking wealth, as opposed to merely lacking income, and called out the stark racial wealth gap that persisted in America.
What is systemic racism? Here's what it means and how you can help dismantle it
Systemic racism impacts nearly ever facet of life for people of color. Activists and advocates say more work needs to be done to dismantle it.

Jerry Shannon (2021) Dollar Stores, Retailer Redlining, and the Metropolitan Geographies of Precarious Consumption, Annals of the American Association of Geographers, 111:4, 1200-1218, DOI: 10.1080/24694452.2020.1775544

Black In Business: Celebrating The Legacy Of Black Entrepreneurship
The black community’s long history of entrepreneurship is marked by ebbs and flows, but the black community demonstrates a collective ability to persevere against all odds.
Grit (effortful persistence) can be measured with a short scale, shows little variation across socio-demographic subgroups, and is associated with career success and career engagement
Grit...has received considerable attention as a personality trait relevant for success and performance. However, critics have questioned grit’s construct validity and criterion validity. Here we report on two studies that contribute to the debate surrounding the grit construct.
The Importance Of Perseverance
Perseverance and persistence are equally crucial in the work required to turn a business into a viable enterprise, given the challenges and roadblocks thrown up along the way.
Unpacking grit: Motivational correlates of perseverance and passion for long-term goals
Two cross-sectional studies explained that explored the motivational orientations correlates of the character strength of grit and its two component facets: perseverance of effort and consistency of interests over time.
What Makes a Successful Entrepreneur? Perseverance.
Success is about not giving up and being the last man or woman standing when everyone else has fallen by the wayside.

Manchester Campus Library

Manchester Common Read: Notes from a Young Black Chef

Themes