On my recent trip to New York City, one of the non-negotiable stops on my travels was the Tenement Museum. So much of what I read when I was young was set in a romanticized version of New York, or had characters who dreamed of New York, and a lot of it talked about life in tenements. Having grown up in wide open northern Canada, I have been fascinated by that world nearly my whole life. The museum was great, and had different themes focusing on different aspect of life the immigrant families living in these admittedly pretty grim buildings would have experienced. It was wonderful.
One of my favourite things about travelling is picking up books as souvenirs, and this one was in the gift shop. It focuses on five different immigrant families that lived in 97 Orchard Street, at different times and having different nationalities and cultures. Books that focus on food as a framework for examining our culture and experience, whether they are histories or cookbooks, are always really satisfying to me. This is one of those books, where the little we know about each family (Italian, German, Russian, Irish – Jewish or Catholic) to examine a wider experience of coming to America, through Ellis Island, trying to find work, and moving up to the middle class. Always, food is a way feel connected to home and to fellow immigrants, as well as sometimes to celebrate or even demonstrate your financial well being.
The book is well written, with considerable warmth and thought. There are a few pictures of the five families, where available, but the limited information that is likely available keeps specific discussion of the families relatively brief. The background information on street markets, the advent of delicatessens, the menus from the Ellis Island centres is excellent and fills in a lot of the gaps. Seeing how the native foods of the immigrants have been integrated into the wider North American diet is also interesting. This history of a single tenement helped me to better understand the tenement experience in general, and it was really interesting throughout. I am trying to decide who to give it to next.
