J. Kenji López-Alt - The Best American Food Writing 2020

Copyright 2020 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company

Introduction copyright 2020 by J. Kenji Lpez-Alt

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ISSN 2578-7667 (print) ISSN 2578-7675 (ebook)

ISBN 9780-358344582 (print) ISBN 9780-358346494 (ebook)

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Open Wide by Burkhard Bilger. First published in The New Yorker, November 18, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Burkhard Bilger. Reprinted by permission of Burkhard Bilger and The New Yorker.

We All Scream by Charlotte Druckman. First published in Eater, April 9, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Vox Media, Inc. Reprinted by permission of Vox Media, Inc.

The Man Whos Going to Save Your Neighborhood Grocery Store by Joe Fassler. First published in Longreads/The Counter, April 2019. Copyright 2019 by The Counter. Reprinted by permission of The Counter.

Kitchen Shift (originally published as Kitchen Shift: The Chefs Behind North Americas Most Hedonistic Restaurant Quit Drinking) by Hannah Goldfield. First published in The New Yorker, May 20, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Cond Nast. Reprinted by permission of Cond Nast.

A Real Hot Mess: How Grits Got Weaponized Against Cheating Men by Cynthia R. Greenlee. First published in Munchies, February 14, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Cynthia R. Greenlee. Reprinted by permission of Cynthia R. Greenlee and Vice Media.

Heres What the Governments Dietary Guidelines Should Really Say by Tamar Haspel. First published in Washington Post, March 26, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Tamar Haspel. Reprinted by permission of Tamar Haspel.

Fare Access: DC Restaurants Could Do More to Welcome Diners with Disabilities by Laura Hayes. First published in Washington City Paper, April 4, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Washington City Paper. Reprinted by permission of Washington City Paper.

Yelp Reviewers Authenticity Fetish Is White Supremacy in Action by Sara Kay. First published in Eater, January 18, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Vox Media, Inc. Reprinted by permission of Vox Media, Inc.

Wet n Wild by Katy Kelleher. First published in Topic, April 2019. Copyright 2019 by Katy Kelleher. Reprinted by permission of Katy Kelleher.

Whered You Go, Rocco DiSpirito? by Kat Kinsman. First published in Food & Wine, October 25, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Kat Kinsman. Reprinted by permission of Kat Kinsman.

The Provocations of Chef Tunde Wey by Brett Martin. First published in GQ, March 6, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Brett Martin. Reprinted by permission of Brett Martin.

Whatever Happened to Portland? by Meghan McCarron. First published in Eater, June 5, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Vox Media, Inc. Reprinted by permission of Vox Media, Inc.

New Coke Didnt Fail. It Was Murdered by Tim Murphy. First published in Mother Jones, July 9, 2019. Copyright 2019 by the Foundation for National Progress. Reprinted by permission of the Foundation for National Progress.

Hard Times for a Hot Commodity, the Prized New Mexico Chile by Amelia Nierenberg. First published in the New York Times, December 16, 2019. Copyright 2019 The New York Times. Reprinted by permission.

What the Heck Is Crab Rangoon Anyway? by Dan Nosowitz. First published in Atlas Obscura, August 14, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Dan Nosowitz. Reprinted by permission of Dan Nosowitz.

The Kitchen at Per Se Was a Clean Place but Hard and Heartless Too, adapted from Blood on the Eggshells, as published on eater.com, March 26, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Kwame Onwuachi; from Notes from a Young Black Chef: A Memoir by Kwame Onwuachi with Joshua David Stein. Used by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, an imprint of the Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. All rights reserved.

The Demand for Authenticity Is Threatening Kansas Citys Homegrown Tacos by Jos R. Ralat. First published in Eater, April 23, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Vox Media, Inc. Reprinted by permission of Vox Media, Inc.

Its Not Always Easy to Be Jamie Oliver (originally titled Its Not Always Excellent to Be Jamie Oliver) by Kim Severson. First published in the New York Times, August 20, 2019. Copyright 2019 The New York Times. Reprinted by permission.

Easy, Peasy, Japanese-y: Benihana and the Question of Cultural Appropriation by Sho Spaeth. First published in Serious Eats, February 13, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Serious Eats Inc. Reprinted by permission of Serious Eats Inc.

When Jacques Ppin Made All the World an Omelet by Joshua David Stein. First published in Taste, April 23, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Taste. Reprinted by permission of Taste.

Lean Cuisine Doesnt Want to Be Part of Diet Culture Anymore. Does It Have a Choice? by Kaitlyn Tiffany. First published in Vox, July 24, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Vox Media, Inc. Reprinted by permission of Vox Media, Inc.

I Just Want to Eat Her Up! by Alex Van Buren. First published in the New York Times, May 27, 2019. Copyright 2019 The New York Times. Reprinted by permission.

Peter Luger Used to Sizzle. Now It Sputters by Pete Wells. First published in the New York Times, October 29, 2019. Copyright 2019 The New York Times. Reprinted by permission.

The Spice Trade by Paige Williams. First published in The New Yorker, January 28, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Paige Williams. Reprinted by permission of Paige Williams.

A Critic for All Seasons by Korsha Wilson. First published in Eater, February 20, 2019. Copyright 2019 by Vox Media, Inc. Reprinted by permission of Vox Media, Inc.

The world has changed so much so fast since the pieces in this volume were written and published that Im convinced the book will read like a time capsule. Of course, in some ways thats very much the purpose of an anthologya highlight reel from the past yearbut this time it feels different. The year in which these 25 stories were told, 2019, feels radically distant; but in 2020 our project remains the same, if not all the more relevant.

We are here to champion voices and stories by highlighting the best writing about one of the biggest topics. As Ruth Reichl wrote in this series inaugural edition, food writing used to be considered trivial, relegated to lifestyle publications and cookbook sections. But Americans have finally recognized that food is everywhere and touches everyone and everything. That will only become clearer, and our job will become more urgent, as the consequences of this global event unfold.

As I write this, we are in the thick of a pandemic, and we dont yet know the full extent of its destruction. All around the world, weve lost lives and livelihoods. The new coronavirus has had an especially grave effect on our food systems. For now, our lives have been stripped down to the basics: Do we have what we need to survive? And if we do not, how do we get it? A word continuously heard during these times is essentialwho is an essential worker, what is essential travel? In Daniel Defoes