corn syrup composing a large part of so many manufactured food products, America’s nineteenth-century visitors noticed the same thing. The entire American diet seemed to have a common origin: cornbread, corn-fed meat, and corn-based drink were an American’s “common necessaries,” one English traveler noted. TheEnglish writer Frances Trollope, whose book
Domestic Manners of the Americans
was an enormous best seller, claimed that what little culinary creativity America had was reserved for inventing new ways to serve corn. If not converted into whiskey, it was often served in some sort of mush or pancake form. “All bad,” Trollope sniffed.
Corn that wasn’t eaten or distilled was fed to pigs. In the 1820s, foreign visitors nicknamed Cincinnati “Porkopolis” because of all the corn-fed meat slaughtered there (the city was also a leading whiskey stronghold). When Trollope visited Cincinnati she commented on the “extraordinary quantity of bacon” consumed by Americans living in the Ohio River Valley, and was shocked at the number of pigs wandering the streets. She soon decided that she liked the pigs—in cities with scarce public services, they ate the trash out of the gutters. Once the pigs were done eating the trash, Americans ate the pigs, consuming an estimated pound of meat per person each day, certainly one of the highest proportions in the world. Much of the pork was preserved with salt, adding to the great thirst for whiskey, which helped cut through all the starch and fat.
Americans certainly could have had a more varied and interesting diet, but they seemed to actively reject it, the foreigners noted. Even when fresh vegetables were in season, many Americans chose their salted pork and spirits instead. “The luxury of whiskey is more appreciated by the men than all the green delicacies from the garden,” Trollope observed. When Prince Maximilian of Wied visited Missouri, he also was startled to find garden foods ignored in favor of “salt pork, biscuits, and whiskey.”
The Europeans quickly learned that the American diet was an act of defiance. It was simple fare and nonfussy, emblematic of how the Americans wanted to be seen. Meals stood in stark contrast to what many of these Europeans, who tended to hail from society’s upper crust, were accustomed to eating. To Americans, “Obsession with the delights of the palate was considered a symptom of Old World decadence,” the historian Daniel Boorstin would write of American eating habits many years later.
Americans took great pride in drinking the whiskey that helped distance them from the Old World’s cultural protocols. Many of these wealthy European visitors, alongside their prosperous American counterparts, looked down on whiskey, including those styles made on their home continent (this attitude would eventually change, but not until later in the century). Many preferred wine instead, leading some Americans to associate it with the snobbish elite. Nor was wine’s reputation helped by the fact that it regularly cost roughly four times as much as whiskey because the drink needed to be imported (Thomas Jefferson’s attempts to establish a domestic wine industry had failed). Thus the subtle pleasures of wine were often mocked in favor of inexpensive everyman favorites like whiskey and cider. Just as Americans had thrown off political and economic colonialism in the preceding century, they rejected it once again in its culinary form. Frenchman Barthélemi Tardiveau noted that Kentuckians hostile to foreign ideas and drinks had pledged to “drink no other strong liquor than whiskey.”
Not only was whiskey an expression of egalitarian credentials and national unity, it also complemented the fast, intense hustle of America’s work ethic. A quick shot of whiskey versus a leisurely mug of ale was the choice of fast over slow food. British writer Archibald Maxwell observed that America’s national motto could have been “Gobble, gulp, and
Domestic Manners of the Americans
was an enormous best seller, claimed that what little culinary creativity America had was reserved for inventing new ways to serve corn. If not converted into whiskey, it was often served in some sort of mush or pancake form. “All bad,” Trollope sniffed.
Corn that wasn’t eaten or distilled was fed to pigs. In the 1820s, foreign visitors nicknamed Cincinnati “Porkopolis” because of all the corn-fed meat slaughtered there (the city was also a leading whiskey stronghold). When Trollope visited Cincinnati she commented on the “extraordinary quantity of bacon” consumed by Americans living in the Ohio River Valley, and was shocked at the number of pigs wandering the streets. She soon decided that she liked the pigs—in cities with scarce public services, they ate the trash out of the gutters. Once the pigs were done eating the trash, Americans ate the pigs, consuming an estimated pound of meat per person each day, certainly one of the highest proportions in the world. Much of the pork was preserved with salt, adding to the great thirst for whiskey, which helped cut through all the starch and fat.
Americans certainly could have had a more varied and interesting diet, but they seemed to actively reject it, the foreigners noted. Even when fresh vegetables were in season, many Americans chose their salted pork and spirits instead. “The luxury of whiskey is more appreciated by the men than all the green delicacies from the garden,” Trollope observed. When Prince Maximilian of Wied visited Missouri, he also was startled to find garden foods ignored in favor of “salt pork, biscuits, and whiskey.”
The Europeans quickly learned that the American diet was an act of defiance. It was simple fare and nonfussy, emblematic of how the Americans wanted to be seen. Meals stood in stark contrast to what many of these Europeans, who tended to hail from society’s upper crust, were accustomed to eating. To Americans, “Obsession with the delights of the palate was considered a symptom of Old World decadence,” the historian Daniel Boorstin would write of American eating habits many years later.
Americans took great pride in drinking the whiskey that helped distance them from the Old World’s cultural protocols. Many of these wealthy European visitors, alongside their prosperous American counterparts, looked down on whiskey, including those styles made on their home continent (this attitude would eventually change, but not until later in the century). Many preferred wine instead, leading some Americans to associate it with the snobbish elite. Nor was wine’s reputation helped by the fact that it regularly cost roughly four times as much as whiskey because the drink needed to be imported (Thomas Jefferson’s attempts to establish a domestic wine industry had failed). Thus the subtle pleasures of wine were often mocked in favor of inexpensive everyman favorites like whiskey and cider. Just as Americans had thrown off political and economic colonialism in the preceding century, they rejected it once again in its culinary form. Frenchman Barthélemi Tardiveau noted that Kentuckians hostile to foreign ideas and drinks had pledged to “drink no other strong liquor than whiskey.”
Not only was whiskey an expression of egalitarian credentials and national unity, it also complemented the fast, intense hustle of America’s work ethic. A quick shot of whiskey versus a leisurely mug of ale was the choice of fast over slow food. British writer Archibald Maxwell observed that America’s national motto could have been “Gobble, gulp, and
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