Midwestern Regional Cookery: History

A great many of the people who originally settled this area came from New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, or they had paused there long enough to carry with them the cooking and eating patterns of the original British, German, and Dutch colonists. The same was true of Scotch Irish settlers coming from southern Appalachia to southern regions of the Midwest. Immigrants coming directly from northern Europe, especially Germans, Scandinavians, and Irish, soon followed. Many of the features that define the Midwest’s traditional foodways are due to the early northern European, especially German, influence. Some of this influence is general, affecting food preferences, cooking styles, and taste combinations. More specifically, the emphasis on pork in much of the region probably relates to the heavy settlement of Germans during the formative period, when eating patterns were being established. These patterns were bolstered by the traditions of later arrivals, for example, eastern Europeans. Similarly, the heavy influx of Scandinavians, with a high per-capita milk consumption, probably shaped the Midwest’s love of dairy products. By the late nineteenth century new waves of immigrants from origins farther south and east were enriching the cuisine with their diverse styles.