In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Reviewed by:
  • Northern Harvest: Twenty Michigan Women in Food and Farming by Emita Brady Hill
  • Dani M. Willcutt
Emita Brady Hill. Northern Harvest: Twenty Michigan Women in Food and Farming. Detroit, MI: Wayne State University Press, 2020. Pp. 256. Illustrations. Index. Paperback: $24.99.

If there is a single word to describe Emita Brady Hill's Northern Harvest, that word would be "delightful." Hill's text is a compilation of twenty stories, each documenting a different woman's culinary or agricultural experiences in northwestern Michigan.

Each of the twenty chapters features one woman's story being told through her own voice according to interviews conducted by Hill. The women have varying backgrounds. For example, some of Hill's characters are farmers, some of the women are cooks, and still others are classically trained chefs who have worked with some of the world's best chefs. What each of the women share is a dedication to and love for the culinary world in Leelanau, Grand Traverse, and Benzie counties in northwestern Michigan. All felt naturally drawn to the culinary world and many of them accidentally fell into their culinary professions. For women such as Jennifer Welty, cooking and baking were not necessarily their profession, but instead just work. Susan Odom, who owns a historical homestead, is driven by her passion to reconnect with Michigan's culinary history.

The women featured in Hill's monograph are likely to become historic culinary figures in their own right. A food revolution began in the 1960s and 1970s in the United States, and the women in Northern Harvest were among those leading the charge toward sustainable food systems. Only in the 2000s has eating "cleaner," minimally processed, whole foods become mainstream. Today, Traverse City is a nationally recognized foodie mecca and tourism hub, however it was the work of women like Anne Hoyt and Cheryl Kobernik who fostered this transition. Each woman in Hill's compilation were part of the revolution in and around Traverse City.

Northern Harvest also addresses systemic issues such as organic farming. Jenny Tutlis's story reveals that government licensing on items such as organic produce can sometimes hinder the farmer's ability to sell organic produce. This licensing can be expensive and, although a farm's practices may be organic in all but name, they still cannot label their [End Page 125] produce organic. Reading stories about women like Tutlis allows one to understand the struggles of Michigan's first organic farmers.

Many of the women are originally from the Detroit area and discovered Michigan's northern retreats as vacationers. In the current climate, it would seem almost irresponsible to ignore that the women in this book only represent white women of European descent who had the economic means to become acquainted with northwestern Michigan through traveling while growing up. There is a certain amount of privilege that has allowed these women to pursue their agricultural dreams, take cooking classes abroad, and travel the globe. Nonetheless, these women have fascinating stories and Northern Harvest should become a necessary text in Michigan's culinary history.

Hill conducted the interviews and compiled the stories, but it is these twenty women themselves and their culinary stories that make Northern Harvest a treat to read. These women each have so much appreciation for ingredients, terroir, and all that Michigan's northwestern Lower Peninsula has to offer. Northern Harvest is an accessible text with mass appeal. Anyone interested in Michigan's history, agriculture, or foodways more broadly, will find value in reading these vignettes.

Dani M. Willcutt
Michigan State University
...

pdf

Share