Inside the California Food Revolution
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In this authoritative and immensely readable insider’s account, celebrated cookbook author and former chef Joyce Goldstein traces the development of California cuisine from its formative years in the 1970s to 2000, when farm-to-table, foraging, and fusion cooking had become part of the national vocabulary. Interviews with almost two hundred chefs, purveyors, artisans, winemakers, and food writers bring to life an approach to cooking grounded in passion, bold innovation, and a dedication to «flavor first.» Goldstein explains how the counterculture movement in the West gave rise to a restaurant culture characterized by open kitchens, women in leadership positions, and a surprising number of chefs and artisanal food producers who lacked formal training. The new cuisine challenged the conventional kitchen hierarchy and French dominance in fine dining, leading to a more egalitarian and informal food scene.<br> <br> In weaving Goldstein’s views on California food culture with profiles of those who played a part in its development—from Alice Waters to Bill Niman to Wolfgang Puck—Inside the California Food Revolution demonstrates that, while fresh produce and locally sourced ingredients are iconic in California, what transforms these elements into a unique cuisine is a distinctly Western culture of openness, creativity, and collaboration. Engagingly written and full of captivating anecdotes, this book shows how the inspirations that emerged in California went on to transform the experience of eating throughout the United States and the world.<br>
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The publisher gratefully acknowledges the generous support of the General Endowment Fund of the University of California Press Foundation and the Chairman’s Circle of the University of California Press Foundation, whose members are:
Stephen A. and Melva Arditti
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Calling California cuisine a revolution implies a note of finality, as if it’s over and the changes are accomplished and goals achieved. But it continues to evolve. This history stops at 2000 because in the years that followed, food writers and food entrepreneurs, competing in an increasingly dense and crowded arena for the attention of diners and consumers, have tended to make every little change, every new chef or restaurant trend, every novel farm or ingredient seem important and groundbreaking. This has obscured the fact that the pace of change in the culinary world has slowed since the turn of the millennium. Compared to the revolutionary changes in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, what’s happened in the culinary world over the past fifteen years or so has been mostly evolutionary, with variations on and extensions of earlier innovations.
Over the years, California has influenced the rest of the country. In the early 1980s, when California chefs Nancy Silverton and Mark Peel were hired to revamp Maxwell’s Plum restaurant in New York, pickings were slim for seasonal vegetables. Today, the selection at the Union Square Greenmarket is much improved, although it still seems limited compared to the abundance and variety found at the San Francisco Ferry Plaza or Santa Monica farmers’ markets. In 1998, Suzanne Goin of Lucques reported that, after four days of dining out in New York, she despaired of getting a decent salad or seeing any vegetables on the plate. “They weren’t part of the dining culture. It was protein and sauce, protein and sauce,” a reflection of the lingering European influence on East Coast cooking.
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