Evolving antinomies of culinary practice: Britain 1968-2016

ABSTRACT

This paper examines continuity and change in the bases of recommendations about dishes to prepare and serve in the household in Britain between 1968 and 2016. Employing a content analysis of recipes in widely circulating women’s magazines, it compares a sample of recipes from 2015–16 with ones from 1968 and 1992 analyzed previously. In this follow-up study, new data are collected, using the same coding frame, with findings interpreted through the same conceptual framework, to classify recommendations about domestic food preparation with reference to four “culinary antinomies” expressing symbolic, structural oppositions between (1) health and indulgence, (2) economy and extravagance, (3) convenience and care, and (4) novelty and tradition. The changing prevalence of these principles of recommendation is described. Discussion revolves around interpretation of the social significance of changing recommendations, modification of the conceptual framework, and methodological aspects of the measurement of social change.

KEYWORDS:

• Antinomies of culinary taste
• Britain
• cultural change
• fashions in food
• food discourses
• food preparation
• measurement of social change
• recipes
• recommended dishes
• women’s magazines

Acknowledgments

We gratefully acknowledge comments on this paper from Ulrike Ehgartner, Lydia Martens, Jessica Paddock and Sue Scott.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

1. Better methods exist for examining the actual behavior of households at a specific point in time, including interviews and observation, food diaries, video recordings by web-cam, etc., but they are mostly unable to demonstrate systematically changes over time. Documentary sources can serve that purpose.

2. Now visual mass media and social media play a greater role in public reflection about what to eat (Rousseau 2012). However, as Favaro (2020) points out, women’s magazines continue to be influential as they themselves issue electronic versions.

3. This project is a re-study in the sense that we rely on reported findings from the earlier project because the raw data is no longer accessible.

4. Due to limited resources and a wish also to examine some specialist periodicals we selected seven women’s magazines: Woman, Woman’s Own, best, Bella (weekly); Good Housekeeping, prima, Woman and Home (monthly). Of these, four were present in the samples for both 1968 and 1992: Woman, Woman’s Own, Good Housekeeping and Woman and Home. Others included previously were ignored for several reasons, having either gone out of production, ceased having a regular recipe column, or whose circulation figures were low or unavailable. (In addition we selected three specialist food periodicals widely purchased in 2016, BBC Good Food, Delicious and Jamie, which are referred to briefly).

5. 16% of recipes in 2016 are for dishes that are explicitly both home-made and convenient. This is the same proportion as in 1968 but significantly greater than in 1992. Dishes “cooked from scratch” which can be prepared in a short period of time are symbolically at a premium.

6. The cuisines were: Asia, Bangladesh, France, Greece, India, Iran, Ireland (2), Mexico (2), North Africa, Portugal (Madeira), Scandinavia, South Africa, Spain, Texas, Thailand (3), and UK (2).

7. Few dishes are explicitly identified as “British” but by implication those which are “unmarked” would be taken for granted to be so (see Zerubavel 2018).

8. Monthlies always sold many fewer copies but their market share has held up better (Warde 1997; NRS, 2015).

9. The proportion of the content of “women’s interest” magazines devoted to food fluctuates. In the seven women’s magazines in the sample in 2016, the number of recipes printed has reduced since 1992 to roughly the same levels as 1968. Coverage of food in the monthlies fell very significantly between 1992 and 2016. For example, Good Housekeeping in November 2015 devoted 12% of its 284 pages to food-related items (recipes, commentary and advertisement) compared to 32% in November 1991 and 25% in November 1967. In the four weekly magazines the trend was weaker, but each had proportionately fewer pages devoted to food in 2016 than in 1992.

10. The mean number of antinomial concepts referred to by each recipe in 2016 is 2.4, compared to 1.7 for both earlier years. (Multiple attributions occur because, for example, a recipe might be described as convenient and cheap, but also some are described as convenient and home-made (16% in 2016) or novel and traditional (19%).) If this were due to differences in coding, the score for every antinomy would potentially be overestimated and would exaggerate the degree of change over time. However, increased attributions probably result from complexity introduced by referring to both poles of one or more antinomies, which characterized almost half of all recipes in 2016.

11. It is important to note that convenience does not only refer to the use of ready-made meals (Gofton and Ness 1991, 20–1). Also, recommendations do not re-describe actions; compromises in practice often defy logical contradictions.

12. In 1968, the one notable exception in the sample was She which was not attuned to housewifery having instead an iconoclastic proto-feminist stance. It included only one recipe per issue among which was a paella cooked in 15 minutes.

13. A few recipes are for one or two persons (9% in 2016 – more than in 1992 but slightly fewer than in 1968) so still most dishes are designed for household meals.

14. If tradition implies longevity, origins in the mists of time, and regular repetition without reflection, calculation, criticism or reevaluation, then it plays a limited role in contemporary culinary discourse.

15. If funds and time permitted, the earlier years might be reexamined using a refined coding frame using different terms (additional, and distinguishing between tradition and authenticity, and probably between the innovative and experimental as opposed to re-interpretations of traditional recipes).

16. Almost half of all recipes (47%) in 2016 contain a reference to both poles of a single antinomy.