Project Title: Jewish History Cookbook

Essential Question(s):

How can I record history through food?

Statement of Purpose

For my senior project, I will conduct an in-depth examination of some of the most popular recipes, through first-person interviews and cooking experiences with relatives, community members and culinary experts.

Overview: Describe your topic and project to the committee.

My goal will be to create a Jewish History Cookbook that presents and records treasured recipes of those I meet with and that helps tell the story of where these dishes came from, what they mean and, if possible, what they can tell us about Jewish and American social, cultural and economic history.

The inspirations for this project are my love of cooking and my interest in unique aspects of history. It was also inspired by special meals with my grandfather and time with my grandmother learning how to, what she calls, “shtetl cook.”

How will you measure your success?

I will measure success by how many interviews and entries that I will have completed for the weeks that I need to interview people.

Personal Goals

• Organization
• Follow through
• Communication Skills

Resources

This project is very feasible. The main part of this project, the writing and cooking, can be done within my own home. To get the stories also requires an interview, so I can interview people over zoom.I mainly want to focus on the story and the history of the recipe in their family, and less on the recipe itself.

 

• Wider network of people to interview
• My kitchen
• The Nosher, Tablet and Jewish Food Society
• Online cooking lessons
• Research on Jewish food from cookbooks
• Background reading on cultural anthropology and the history of food
• Learning to use a book-making program
• Zoom