Do people think about food more in times of scarcity than in times of plenty? Married culinary historians Jane Ziegelman and Andy Coe think so. Ziegelman and Coe are the authors of A Square Meal, which examines the impact of the country’s decade-long Great Depression on American diets.
Ziegelman tells Fresh Air‘s Terry Gross that the Depression was one of the “most important food moments” in U.S. history. Coe agrees: “The Great Depression was a time when Americans had food front and foremost in their minds and were worrying about it every day.”
Cheap, nutritious and filling food was prioritized — often at the expense of taste. One recipe, which Ziegelman describes as “wrong in every possible way,” combined canned corned beef, plain gelatin, canned peas, vinegar and lemon juice.
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