Robert Appelbaum challenges John Lanchester’s recent New Yorker piece on foodie culture, writing, “there is a huge discrepancy Lanchester overlooks—a discrepancy between the culture that even a moderately paid professional like Lanchester experiences and critiques, and the culture that the majority of the people in the advanced world (probably not the kind of people who read The New Yorker) are actually experiencing”:
What is missing in Lanchester’s piece is an attempt to draw correlations. Is there not a connection between the flourishing of foodie culture—both in the media and in the business of fine dining—and the degradation of diets, labor conditions, and wages among the masses? You bet there is. Online and on television, we are regaled by a demanding food culture that rewards and celebrates star chefs, fetishizes the value of a rare and expensive meal, and finds itself eating better than ever. But this is only one face of our culture; flip the coin over, and you reveal the side that marginalizes the majority of eaters and impoverishes the majority of food workers. For this is a culture that works by generating social distinctions and segregating incomes, all in the interest of what appears to be glamorous, heroic, virtuous, and delicious efforts. There is a direct connection between foodies getting “out of hand,” and food workers living from hand to mouth.
The Dish 