Longreads Best of 2018: Food Writing

Zahir JanmohamedCo-host, The Racist Sandwich Podcast.

查希尔·詹穆罕默德 (Zahir Janmohamed) 种族主义三明治播客联合主持人。

## There Is No Dalit Cuisine (Sharanya Deepac, Popula)

## 没有达利特美食（Sharanya Deepac，Popula）

Sharanya Deepak is one of the most promising, and inspiring food writers, to emerge from India in as long as I can remember.

莎兰娅·迪帕克（Sharanya Deepak）是我记忆中印度最有前途、最鼓舞人心的美食作家之一。

So often, food and travel reporting, both from India and from outside of India, evades questions of caste, gender, and state violence.

来自印度和印度以外的食品和旅行报道常常回避种姓、性别和国家暴力问题。

But Deepak dives right into these topics.

但迪帕克直接深入探讨了这些话题。

In 100 Cups of Tea, for Taste Cooking, she talks about how food traditions are fighting on, even thriving in the midst of India’s brutal violence in the disputed area of Kashmir.

在《品味烹饪》的《100 杯茶》中，她谈到了饮食传统如何在印度克什米尔争议地区的残酷暴力中继续生存，甚至蓬勃发展。

In a lesser writer, this type of story might come off as hokey, but Deepak complicates the narrative, both for Indian and non-Indian readers.

对于一个水平较低的作家来说，这种类型的故事可能会显得做作，但迪帕克使故事变得复杂，无论对于印度还是非印度读者来说都是如此。

My favorite piece of hers, though, is on Dalit cuisine in India for Popula.

不过，我最喜欢她的作品是 Popula 的印度达利特美食。

The word Dalit means “broken” and refers to about 16 percent of the Indian population who are excluded from the Hindu caste system and are often relegated to the most menial jobs in India, such as trash collection.

达利特（Dalit）一词的意思是“破碎的”，指的是约 16% 的印度人口，他们被排除在印度教种姓制度之外，并且经常被降级到印度最卑微的工作，例如垃圾收集。

Deepak shows us how food politics—such as the banning of cow slaughter—has been used by upper-caste Brahmins to preserve their hegemony and to deny Dalits agency.

迪帕克向我们展示了上层种姓婆罗门如何利用食物政治（例如禁止屠宰牛）来维护他们的霸权并否认达利特人的代理权。

She even calls out one of India’s most celebrated food journalists, Vir Sanghvi, who she says, “reveres the upper-class and colonial vision of Indian cuisine.” This piece, and all of her pieces, is journalism at its best: uncomfortable, layered, and fearless

她甚至点名了印度最著名的美食记者之一维尔·桑格维（Vir Sanghvi），她说他“崇尚上层阶级和殖民时期对印度美食的看法”。这篇文章以及她的所有文章都是新闻业的最佳表现：不舒服、层次分明、无所畏惧

Naz RiahiWriter, Consultant, Founder of Bitten.

Naz Riahi 作家、顾问、Bitten 创始人。

## Can We Honor Your Service with a Steak, Malibu Chicken, or the Jumpo Crispy Shrimp?

## 我们可以用牛排、马里布鸡或 Jumpo 脆皮虾来回报您的服务吗？

(Erin Clare Brown, Eater)

（艾琳·克莱尔·布朗，《食者》）

This piece encompasses so much that is lovely and so much that is brutal.

这件作品包含了太多可爱的东西，也包含了太多残酷的东西。

On its surface Brown and her father go to Sizzler’s on Veterans’ Day for the free steak, a promotion to honor those who’ve served.

表面上看，布朗和她的父亲在退伍军人节那天去 Sizzler's 餐厅享用免费牛排，这是一项向退伍军人致敬的促销活动。

In that, we are placed in midst of all that is heartbreaking about America, with its promise of opportunity juxtaposed against its exploitative reality.

在这一点上，我们置身于美国令人心碎的一切之中，它的机会承诺与它的剥削现实并存。

Brown and her father, in brief moments that punctuate long silences on the subject, discuss his service in the Vietnam War.

布朗和她的父亲在这个话题上的长时间沉默中短暂地讨论了他在越南战争中的服役经历。

In this essay, Brown explores her complicated feelings on the subject, her relationship with her father and, perhaps, the marketing machine he inadvertently fought for.

在这篇文章中，布朗探讨了她对这个主题的复杂感受、她与父亲的关系，或许还有他无意中为之奋斗的营销机器。

John T.

约翰·T.

EdgeAuthor of The Potlikker Papers, Columnist, Oxford American.

Edge 《Potlikker Papers》作者、专栏作家、牛津美国大学。

## Houston Is the New Capital of Southern Cool (Brett Martin, GQ)

## 休斯顿是南方酷派的新首都（Brett Martin，GQ）

This piece gave me new perspective on a city I dearly love, a place I wrote about for the Oxford American — early in this era of Houston-is-Cool revelations.

这篇文章让我对这座我深爱的城市有了新的视角，这是我为《牛津美国人报》写的一个地方——在这个“休斯顿很酷”时代的早期。

I was proud of that piece and the insights I offered.

我为那篇文章和我提供的见解感到自豪。

But this essay is so dang much better.

但这篇文章真是太好了。

It’s smart and circuitous and searching, a string of observations that could be used to describe Houston itself.

它聪明、迂回、探索，一系列的观察可以用来描述休斯顿本身。

Irina DumitrescuProfessor of English Medieval Studies at the University of Bonn, whose work has appeared in Best Food Writing and Best American Essays.

伊琳娜·杜米特雷斯库 (Irina Dumitrescu) 波恩大学英语中世纪研究教授，其作品曾出现在《最佳美食写作》和《最佳美国散文》中。

## Crying in H Mart (Michelle Zauner, The New Yorker)

## 在 H Mart 哭泣（Michelle Zauner，《纽约客》）

Those of us who like to read food writing are probably all tired of the Great Cliché: misty memories of grandma in the kitchen, stirring a pot of fragrant, utterly authentic stew from the Old Country.

我们这些喜欢阅读美食写作的人可能都厌倦了伟大的陈词滥调：关于奶奶在厨房里搅拌一锅香喷喷、完全正宗的故国炖菜的模糊记忆。

At the same time, food remains such a useful symbol of our entangled connections to the families and cultures that made us.

与此同时，食物仍然是我们与造就我们的家庭和文化之间纠缠不清的联系的有用象征。

The reminiscence of a meal includes barely recoverable flavors and scents, ephemeral gestures of care, and, occasionally, flashes of perfect belonging.

一顿饭的记忆包括几乎无法恢复的味道和气味、短暂的关怀姿态，以及偶尔闪现的完美归属感。

Michelle Zauner stumbles across her memories in H Mart, the Korean American supermarket chain.

米歇尔·扎纳 (Michelle Zauner) 在韩裔美国连锁超市 H Mart 偶然发现了自己的记忆。

She mourns her mother among dumpling skins and refrigerators stocked with banchan.

她在饺子皮和装满半禅的冰箱中哀悼她的母亲。

Her madeleine is the puffed-rice snack ppeongtwigi, which she used to nibble after school.

她的玛德琳蛋糕是爆米花零食 ppeongtwigi，她放学后经常吃。

A grandmother slurping jjamppong noodle soup in the food court reminds Zauner of the old age her own mother never reached.

一位祖母在美食广场里大口吃着炸酱面汤，这让扎纳想起了她母亲从未达到过的晚年。

This beautiful, delicately observed essay shows how many stories are still left to be told about food, what rich associations are still to be found in immigrant restaurants and strip malls and suburban kitchens, in places “where you can find your people under one odorous roof.”

这篇优美、观察细腻的文章展示了还有多少关于食物的故事有待讲述，在移民餐馆、露天购物中心和郊区厨房，在“在一个有气味的屋顶下你可以找到你的人民”的地方，仍然可以找到丰富的联系。

Melissa ChadburnEssayist, Novelist.

梅丽莎·查德伯恩 (Melissa Chadburn) 散文家、小说家。

## The Tyranny and the Comfort of Government Cheese (Bobbi Dempsey, TASTE)

## 政府奶酪的暴政和舒适（Bobbi Dempsey，TASTE）

I grew up in poverty.

我是在贫困中长大的。

I grew up with my mother’s bounced check, a scarlet letter, taped to a wall behind the check-out at the Food King.

我是在母亲的退回支票的陪伴下长大的，这张支票是一张红字，贴在美食之王收银台后面的墙上。

I grew up washing out stains in the bathroom sink with hot water and a bar of soap, scrubbing until my knuckles bled, sharpening pencils with a steak knife, sucking on Kool-Aid and Country Time Lemonade off my licked wet fingers dipped into a sandwich bag.

我从小就用热水和肥皂清洗浴室水槽里的污渍，擦洗直到指关节流血，用牛排刀削铅笔，从浸入三明治袋的湿手指上吮吸酷爱饮料和乡村柠檬水。

I want to tell these stories, these stories need to be told, these stories are my bones, and I’m so delighted that food outlets like TASTE are publishing them.

我想讲述这些故事，这些故事需要被讲述，这些故事是我的骨头，我很高兴像 TASTE 这样的食品店能够出版它们。

## Dear Baby Witch (Sara Finnerty, r.kv.r.y.)

## 亲爱的小女巫（Sara Finnerty，r.kv.r.y.）

I read this wrapped in grief.

我怀着悲伤的心情读到了这篇文章。

We’d just unexpectedly had to put a magical dog down.

我们只是出乎意料地不得不放下一只神奇的狗。

And I was going through a phase of hating myself taking diet pills and checking my weight frequently.

我正在经历一个讨厌自己服用减肥药和经常检查体重的阶段。

The idea of eating seemed too close to letting love in, and letting love in seemed like it was reserved for someone who was not me, and Sara Finnerty wrote this beautiful essay and came to my door bearing a platter of homemade Chicken Parmesan and very specific heating instructions, and reading about a young girl kneading gnocchi in the basement with her grandmother was just the reminder I needed to continue to reach for whatever neat thing might be around the corner.

吃东西的想法似乎与让爱进来太接近了，而让爱进来似乎是为不是我的人保留的，莎拉·芬纳蒂写了这篇美丽的文章，带着一盘自制的帕尔马干酪和非常具体的加热说明来到我家门口，读到一个年轻女孩和她的祖母在地下室揉面疙瘩的故事只是提醒我需要继续寻找任何可能在拐角处的好东西。

Sara B.

萨拉·B.

FranklinWriter and professor of food studies at NYU based in Kingston, NY.

富兰克林作家，纽约大学食品研究教授，总部位于纽约州金斯顿。

## A Cajun Seasoned Boil for a Big Party (Samin Nosrat, The New York Times Magazine)

## 为大型派对准备的卡津调味煮菜（Samin Nosrat，《纽约时报》杂志）

I love Samin Nosrat’s approach to writing, cooking, and life.

我喜欢萨明·诺斯拉特的写作、烹饪和生活方式。

Nosrat knows a lot —she is, after all, a bestselling cookbook author and a Netflix personality.

诺斯拉特知道很多——毕竟，她是一位畅销烹饪书作者和 Netflix 名人。

But in her column for the Times, she approaches her subjects with great openness and genuine curiosity; you can tell she’s still hungry to learn.

但在《泰晤士报》的专栏中，她以极大的开放性和真正的好奇心来探讨她的主题。你可以看出她仍然渴望学习。

In an industry whose celebrities often distinguish themselves by asserting their status with obnoxious, meaningless language like “toothsome,” “mouthfeel,” and “unctuous,” Nosrat aims for approachability and humility.

在这个行业中，名人常常通过使用“牙齿好”、“口感好”和“油腻”等令人讨厌的、毫无意义的语言来维护自己的地位，从而使自己脱颖而出，诺斯拉特的目标是平易近人、谦虚。

Nowhere is this better demonstrated than in her column about Mississippi River boat pilot-cum-home cook extraordinaire, Jared Austin.

她关于密西西比河船领航员兼杰出家庭厨师贾里德·奥斯汀的专栏最能体现这一点。

In just 1,000 short words, she captures Austin in his full humanity — as idiosyncratic, unique, and hospitable as his hometown of New Orleans.

她用短短 1000 个简短的文字，展现了奥斯汀的完整人性——就像他的家乡新奥尔良一样独特、独特和热情好客。

(I mean, “And yes, ‘bead’ is a verb.” Come on!) In this moment when we’re questioning all the characteristics traditionally associated with power and authority, Nosrat reminds us that humility is an asset, and for that, I’m thankful.

（我的意思是，“是的，‘珠子’是一个动词。”来吧！）在这一刻，当我们质疑传统上与权力和权威相关的所有特征时，诺斯拉特提醒我们，谦逊是一种资产，对此，我很感激。

Aaron GilbreathLongreads Editor, Essayist.

亚伦·吉尔布雷斯（Aaron Gilbreath）长篇读物编辑、散文家。

## Hazardous Cravings (Alex McElroy, Tin House)

## 危险的渴望（Alex McElroy，Tin House）

In a genre that includes celebrity chef profiles, best of lists, and Yelp reviews, personal essays like Alex McElroy’s prove how deep food stories can go.

在包括名人厨师简介、最佳榜单和 Yelp 评论的类型中，亚历克斯·麦克埃尔罗伊 (Alex McElroy) 等个人文章证明了美食故事的深度。

Growing up overweight, McElroy had a very American predicament: surrounded by food, he ate too much, and people made fun of him for it, and yet, as his weight made him a target of ridicule, his eventual dieting threatened them, and people both encouraged him to lose weight and pressured him to share in their gluttony.

麦克尔罗伊在超重的过程中遇到了一种非常美国式的困境：在食物的包围下，他吃得太多，人们因此取笑他，然而，由于他的体重使他成为嘲笑的目标，他最终的节食威胁到了他们，人们既鼓励他减肥，又迫使他分享他们的暴食。

While working at a Dairy Queen, he became eating disordered and bulimic.

在冰雪皇后工作期间，他出现饮食失调和暴食症。

In this powerful, intelligent, devilishly funny essay, McElroy calls dieting “a paradox of masculinity and emasculation.” By exploring his relationship with food and his own flesh, he shows how people mistake his large personal space for public space, and how he struggled to value what others, including himself, had mistreated for so long.

在这篇有力、聪明、极其有趣的文章中，麦克尔罗伊将节食称为“男子气概和男性化的悖论”。通过探索他与食物和自己肉体的关系，他向人们展示了人们如何将他巨大的个人空间误认为是公共空间，以及他如何努力重视他人（包括他自己）长期以来所虐待的东西。

It’s an incredible, memorable portrait of a journey in the land of too much food, constrictive gender norms, and body shaming, and it’s unusual to hear it told by a man.

这是一幅令人难以置信、令人难忘的描绘，描绘了在这片食物过多、性别规范狭窄和身体羞辱的土地上的旅程，而且由一个男人讲述这一切是很不寻常的。

It’s also about identity: how our past selves cast an inescapable shadow over our future selves, despite who we become.

它还与身份有关：无论我们成为谁，过去的自己如何给未来的自己投下不可避免的阴影。