AMERICAN FOODWAYS: THE JEWISH CONTRIBUTION, 1660-2013

American Foodways: The Jewish Contribution, 1660-2013

Exhibit duration: September 4th – December 8th
Gallery, Hatcher Graduate Library, 2013

Two new events have been scheduled in conjunction with the ongoing American Foodways: The Jewish Contribution exhibit at the Hatcher Graduate Library.
Please don’t miss this compelling exhibition!

• Cooking Reform Judaism
  Discover what lay inside the covers of sisterhood cookbooks assembled by Jewish women who joined Reform Temples in the 20th century. What were the tastes of “Jewish cooking”? And why did women cook?
  On Tuesday, November 19, at 7pm, Deborah Dash Moore, director of U-M’s Frankel Center for Judaic Studies, takes you inside the cookbooks produced by members of the National Federation of Temple Sisterhoods, explores how Jewish women used recipes to reflect their understanding of “kitchen Judaism,” and charts the changing meanings attached to food over the course of the 20th century.

• Where Harry met Sally: the Jewish deli in America
  On Wednesday, November 20, at 7pm, Ted Merwin, professor of Religion and Judaic Studies at Dickinson College, explores the evolution of the deli, which came from Germany and Eastern Europe, and how it developed in America into a neighborhood institution on par with (or perhaps beyond) the synagogue. He also discusses how music, film, and television have formalized the deli as an icon of Jewish experience, redefining the boundaries between Jews and non-Jews in American society.
  Merwin is writing a history of delis in America called Pastrami on Rye: An Overstuffed History of the New York Jewish Delicatessen, slated for release in summer 2014.

Jan Longone, Adjunct curator of the University of Michigan Special Collections library has created a new exhibit that explores the contributions of Jewish Americans to our culinary history. The exhibit is on display through December 8th.

The exhibit showcases the role that Jews played in the formation of our culinary lineage from 1660 to 2013. The exhibit includes Jewish-American charity cookbooks representing all fifty states from the Janice Bluestein Longone Culinary Archive at the University of Michigan Hatcher Graduate Library. Other artifacts include the first Jewish cookbook published in America (1871). Early works will be on display in the Audubon Room, with examples of 20th and 21st century items in the North Lobby cases of the Hatcher Library.

Janice Bluestein Longone (photo by Steve Friess)

For more information about the exhibition, please visit the library’s information page.

Tablet magazine recently published a nice profile of Jan Longone’s invaluable contribution to American culinary history. Read the article here.