In recent generations most Americans, even farm kids, didn’t grow up on heirloom fruit and vegetables grown from traditional, naturally pollinated seed stock but on agribusiness produce. As UW-Milwaukee sociology professor Jennifer A. Jordan recounts in her book, Edible Memory: The Lure of Heirloom Tomatoes & Other Forgotten Foods, her self-reliant great-great aunt, living on a remote ranch with a wood-burning stove, made Jell-O molds and cakes from box mixes. Some proponents of the heirloom food movement have constructed a mythic culinary past that reflects the preoccupations of present-day foodies. And yet, this movement is a valuable pushback against the industrialization of agriculture and the standardization of our lives. Although she belabors her main points, which could easily have been contained in a magazine essay, Jordan writes beautifully and with enthusiasm, reminding us that the crops we cultivate and the food on our table have changed along with social conditions.
