Iowa Place-based Foods

As people around the world increasingly use the Internet as their library, news source, entertainment, and personal diary, food has emerged there as a popular topic. Numerous sites offer recipes, culinary histories, restaurant reviews, accounts of “weird” food experiences, personal blogs, and other formats devoted to food topics. It is a delight and something of a relief, then, to see a Web site that is not only interesting, reliable, well-written, and well-documented, but also developed by a folklorist. Iowa Place-Based Foods by Rachelle (Riki) H. Saltzman illustrates key folklore concepts and folkloristic approaches to research, analysis, and public programming of food for anyone with access to the Internet.

Folklife coordinator of the Iowa Arts Council, Saltzman also directed the Iowa Place-Based Foods Project, in which she conducted extensive fieldwork with farmers, food producers, and consumers throughout the state. This ethnographic documentation is the “meat” of the Web site, and it is framed by solid folklore scholarship on regional identity, tourism, and foodways theory, making the Web site more than just informational. Rather than attempting to define Iowa as a region or simply identifying the foods of the state, the site focuses on “place-based foods,” those that “have a unique taste related to the soil, water, air, and climate of a region as well as with the ethnic or regional heritage of their producers” ( http://www.iowaartscouncil.org/programs/folk-and-traditional-arts/place_based_foods/index.htm , accessed June 10, 2008). Through this definition, the site also addresses contemporary ecological and economic issues and demonstrates how a folkloristic perspective contributes to understanding (and perhaps resolving) those issues.

The project behind the Web site is itself unusual in its cross-disciplinarity and its combination of humanities scholarship, agricultural practice, and economic development. Saltzman worked closely with the Iowa-based Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture, which, according to the vision statement on its Web site, “explores and cultivates alternatives that secure healthier people and landscapes in Iowa and the nation” ( http://www.leopold.iastate.edu/about/leopoldcenter.htm , accessed June 10, 2008). The center focuses on a range of areas, including marketing, ecology, policy, the sponsoring of research and outreach through education, programming, and publications. Although the Iowa Place-Based Foods Web site is part of that outreach, it includes material from sources in both the public and private sectors. Quotations from people working in tourism, economic development, government, education, and farming give voice to this variety.

Iowa Place-Based Foods is very user-friendly. It has a reasonable amount of text, good images, some wonderful audio clips from interviews, and clearly marked subsections. The site’s main page offers concise and accessible descriptions of the project, but it also provides links to longer reports, so that individual readers can go into more depth as they wish. It also provides links to the other six pages, allowing the reader to browse at will.

The “Foods at a Glance” section offers “Visual Overview of Iowa Place-based Foods,” listing iconic foods of Iowa and giving a photograph, description, and brief history of each. Included are Maasdam sorghum, Maytag blue cheese, pork tenderloin, both rhubarb wine and dandelion wine from the Amana Colonies, K&K popcorn, mettwurst, Dutch letters pastry, kringla, Meskwaki maple syrup and black walnuts, pawpaws, and Muscatine melons. This list is indicative of the difficulties of identifying regional foods. Some of the foods are raw; others are prepared dishes. Frequently, foods listed on the site might be found throughout the country, but they carry an association with Iowa because of how they are processed or consumed, or even because of where they can be obtained commercially (for example, maple syrup, popcorn, or pork). Recognizing the realities of contemporary forms of cultural production, Saltzman offers a variety of information about the foods, making clear whether they are “grown in Iowa”; “processed or prepared in Iowa”; of “Iowa heritage”; linked to “artisan production” in Iowa; “organic, sustainable, hormone free, chemical free”; or “place-based [tied to] ecological factors” in the state ( http://www.iowaartscouncil.org/programs/folk-and-traditional-arts/place_based_foods/visov.htm , accessed June 10, 2008). These categories are listed across the page, and each food then has a flower marking the categories that characterize it. For example, Dutch letters (an almond paste filled, S-shaped pastry) are processed in Iowa, reflect Iowa heritage, and are found in artisan production. So is kringla (a large ring pastry associated with Christmas). Pawpaws, however, are organically grown in Iowa and reflect the state’s ecology, but they are not a part of Iowa heritage.

The last category, “place-based,” is somewhat confusing, since it uses the same phrase as the overall Web site. It is actually defined more narrowly here, focusing on the ecological features of the state (soil types, water sources, climate, natural resources), rather than on the human or cultural features. Saltzman’s strategy of identifying these items allows for a more realistic view of the state’s foods. It also emphasizes the issue of historical continuity, so that examining these foods connects the viewer in some way to a sense of place. The sorghum, for example, is produced by a family that has been making it for seven generations. Pork tenderloin (a piece of pork that has been a flattened, breaded, and fried, and that is similar to schnitzel) has long been an icon of Iowa. Available in restaurants and at fairs, it is usually served on a bun with mustard, pickles, and fries.

The photo of each food leads into another section, “Food Stories,” that describes the people behind the food, along with full histories of each food. Saltzman’s extensive fieldwork shows here. Various individuals tell their own stories, describing the processes behind producing these foods and the connections that food has for them. Photographs and audio samples help fill out the more historical and “academic” information. Addresses of local family-run restaurants and businesses are given for those who want to seek out these foods on their own.

The section “Culinary Tourism” offers a folkloristic approach to exploring Iowa food. The tourism industry frequently focuses on the most exotic or gourmet foods, ignoring the seemingly familiar or everyday. Saltzman, instead, suggests learning about the history behind local foods, hearing the stories of the people who make them, and then tasting those foods in the places where they are made. It is a respectful exploration of cultural traditions that in turn makes the food more interesting to a potential consumer. Three itineraries for day trips are offered. One goes through central Iowa and another to Des Moines’s ethnic markets. A third (not completed as of May 10, 2008) takes the reader from Waterloo to Waverly.

This section is followed by one that logically should be read first. Titled “About this Project,” it contains another brief statement on place-based foods, describing them as having “a unique taste that often has to do with an ecological niche and/or the ethnic or regional heritage of their producers.” It describes the project as seeking “to identify and document those foods that can be distinguished as uniquely Iowan in heritage (whether historical, ethnic, ecological, or geographic)” ( http://www.iowaartscouncil.org/programs/folk-and-traditional-arts/place_based_foods/aboutb.htm , accessed June 10, 2008).

One of Saltzman’s challenges in developing this Web site was to somehow condense years of folklore scholarship into brief paragraphs that are accessible to the general public. Occasionally, the result is definitions that some scholars might criticize as vague; however, Saltzman’s emphasis on place and the many ways in which food can be connected to it literally grounds the project and the resulting Web site in ethnographic realities. This is especially significant when we read further in this section that the project was funded by the Leopold Center because of its interest in creating new markets for Iowa farmers. The project suggests ways to encourage and allow for historical identities and traditions to coexist with economic development and globalization. As the site explains, the project is meant to create more than an interesting exhibit about food; it is intended to demonstrate ways in which place-based food carries an “added value” that translates into economic value and also “differentiates itself from impersonal commodity markets,” as Ken Meter, president of the Crossroads Resource Center, states at the bottom of the “Foods at a Glance” page. The intent also is that this added value will in turn create deeper awareness of the meanings of these foods and the cultural processes supporting them.

“Questions & Answers” follows the “About the Project” section and goes into more depth on various concepts, including historical background on some of the legal issues behind place-based foods and their role in contemporary ecological and economic trends. Saltzman identifies herself here as a folklorist, offers tips on conducting this type of research, and suggests that readers look into the American Folklife Center. It is refreshing to see the author’s folklore identity so clearly stated. The links section lists numerous Web sites that might be relevant to readers, and Saltzman does a thorough job throughout the site of suggesting additional resources and contacts.

Overall, this Web site is excellent. It is easy to navigate, and the wealth of information it contains is useful to individuals from a variety of backgrounds. As one observer has asked, who would have thought that Iowa food, which is so often stereotyped as offering nothing more than bland, Midwestern, “meat-and-potatoes” family traditions, could be so interesting? It is work like Saltzman’s that whets the appetite for more folklore research on food and demonstrates what we as a discipline have to offer.