Eat American!

• Share

(9 of 9)

Maybe so, but this rediscovery is a consequence of having such tangled roots and of confronting the new ethnic and regional combinations that emerge with each generation. Waters regrets the use of the word cuisine because she feels it indicates that we think our cooking has arrived. She thinks the country is not ready for that term. Others long for a codification or standardization of our dishes so that gumbo in California will mean exactly the same thing as it does in Boston. But Evan Jones, author of American Food: The Gastronomic Story (E.P. Dutton), hopes that will never happen. Says he: "It is essential not to arrive, for that means we have stopped growing and developing. American food has been developing since the Indians and English Pilgrims first traded recipes. I'd hate to see it stop now." It is to be hoped that he is right, for in confusion there is fun; in diversity, richness. --By Mimi Sheraton. Reported by William Blaylock/Los Angeles and Elizabeth Rudulph/NewYork