Page 120 - SOM FALL 2017 BOOK
P. 120
chow | local habit
I am going to suggest a elements would be too Euro- It has to be remembered that the
combination of these two centric, ignore some basic food English only realized they could
possibilities, because the truths from the era, and hold eat raw fruits and vegetables in
evolution of food is always onto 500-year old prejudices. the mid 17th Century. The first
somewhere between col- Contrary to the beliefs of most English settlers were basically
laboration and appropriation. It European colonists of the time, starving to death because they
seems most reasonable to me that the indigenous people of this didn’t think that crabs, lobsters,
when distinct cultures interact, continent ate remarkably well, in shellfish, and corn were suitable
they trade food ideas, and that both nutritional value and flavor. foods for civilized people. They
chowder—in its many forms—is It was only by learning what the fed clams, oysters, and native
a story of that interaction. natives were eating that the set-
tlers survived.
To assume that chowder is noth-
ing more than a French dish that
ended up with some New World
New England Clam Chowder
118 www.southernoregonmagazine.com | fall 2017
