Abstract

In the United States, there are two cable television networks dedicated wholly to food and cooking. In 2012, the Food Network had a nightly average of 1.1 million viewers. ¹ Small kitchen appliance expenditures continue to increase, ² and despite the demise of the venerable Gourmet Magazine in 2009, there are hundreds of print magazines and countless blogs to refer to when looking for recipes or food writing. These and many other indicators seem to incontrovertibly charge Americans with being a nation consumed, as it were, with food. But what does this evidence tell us? Is interest in food a modern-day phenomenon? Does all of this consumption around the subject mean that we are cooking more than ever before?