Fourteenth International Conference on Food Studies

Abstract

What gives a place a cultural identity? Perhaps it is the landscape or how people define rituals as well as how and what people eat. Beyond a code of conduct, every place has an intrinsic aesthetic based on what grows there, how the light falls in that place on the earth, a location’s climate and what materials surround them. In other words, there is a pallet for every place on earth and one that contributes to territorial food heritage. When you look down at a table and see an assortment of your childhood favorite foods, the aesthetics of those foods articulates both the flavor and culture of what feels like home. Yet as our climate changes, so do these pallets. In this workshop presentation, the aesthetics of food will be explored from the perspectives of color and design theory, flavor, food science, environment and cultural identifiers. Participants will be encouraged to explore their own aesthetic flavor biases and challenged to envision changing food culture as the climate shift progresses.