1st Edition

Exotic Appetites Ruminations of a Food Adventurer

By Lisa Heldke Copyright 2003
    296 Pages
    by Routledge

    297 Pages
    by Routledge

    Exotic Appetites is a far-reaching exploration of what Lisa Heldke calls food adventuring: the passion, fashion and pursuit of experimentation with ethnic foods. The aim of Heldke's critique is to expose and explore the colonialist attitudes embedded in our everyday relationship and approach to foreign foods. Exotic Appetites brings to the table the critical literatures in postcolonialism, critical race theory, and feminism in a provocative and lively discussion of eating and ethnic cuisine. Chapters look closely at the meanings and implications involved in the quest for unusual restaurants and exotic dishes, related restaurant reviews and dining guides, and ethnic cookbooks.

    Acknowledgements Introduction: Leaving Home: One Girl's Story Part One: Let's Eat Chinese 1. The Quest for Novelty 2. The Pursuit of Authenticity 3. The Other as Resource Part Two: How I Ate Civet Cat and Lived to Tell the Tale 4. And Reader, We Ate It 5. What Do You Mean We Can't Film the Market Sequence Here? Part Three: Let's Cook Thai 6. Can the Dough Boy Be an Insider? 7. How to Stuff a Wild Zucchini 8. Aided by My Faithful Old Family Cook Part Four: Toward Anticolonialist Eating 9. Okay, Let's Stay Home 10. The Skeptical Palate 11. Eating in Context Epilogue: Returning to the Garden Notes Bibliography

    Biography

    Lisa Heldke is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Gustavus Adolphus College, where she also teaches in the Women's Studies department.