Andrew F. Smith

Cooking Equipment, Social Aspects of: Worldview

Appears in
Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America
Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America

By Andrew F. Smith

Published 2004

  • About
The prevailing philosophies of a society determine the significance of its material objects. Among many American colonists materialism was a high priority, and ownership of more objects of good quality was an important goal. Unfettered desire for wealth existed early among southern English tobacco, corn, and rice planters, the Spanish of the deep South, Northeastern Dutch, and French throughout the Mississippi River Valley, to name a few.

Culture dictated their choice of objects, and from group to group they did not carry the same value. For example, English-American colonists traditionally rejected the “excessive” richness and sensuality of French cookery and its accoutrements. Thomas Jefferson, of English descent, imported a French ice cream maker, a pewter sorbétière, and drew the admiration of his cosmopolitan peers who valued sophisticated dining as a cultural ideal, and the scorn of those with plainer orientations.