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Something from the Oven

Reinventing Dinner in 1950s America

Author Laura Shapiro
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Paperback
$24.00 US
Penguin Adult HC/TR | Penguin Books
On sale Mar 29, 2005 | 336 Pages | 9780143034919
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Author of the forthcoming What She Ate: Six Remarkable Women and the Food That Tells Their Stories (Summer 2017)

In this captivating blend of culinary history and popular culture, the award-winning author of Perfection Salad shows us what happened when the food industry elbowed its way into the kitchen after World War II, brandishing canned hamburgers, frozen baked beans, and instant piecrusts. Big Business waged an all-out campaign to win the allegiance of American housewives, but most women were suspicious of the new foods—and the make-believe cooking they entailed. With sharp insight and good humor, Laura Shapiro shows how the ensuing battle helped shape the way we eat today, and how the clash in the kitchen reverberated elsewhere in the house as women struggled with marriage, work, and domesticity. This unconventional history overturns our notions about the ’50s and offers new thinking on some of its fascinating figures, including Poppy Cannon, Shirley Jackson, Julia Child, and Betty Friedan.
Introduction: Do Women Like to Cook?

1. The Housewife's Dream
2. Something from the Oven
3. Don't Check Your Brains at the Kitchen Door
4. I Hate to Cook
5. Is She Real?
6. Now and Forever

Epilogue

Notes
Bibliography
Permissions and Credits
Index

© Ellen Warner
Laura Shapiro was an award-winning writer at Newsweek for more than fifteen years. Her articles have appeared in many publications, including The New York Times, Rolling Stone, Granta, and Gourmet. She is at work on a book about how women's attitudes toward food in the late '40s to early '60s presaged the cultural and culinary revolutions to come. She lives in New York City. View titles by Laura Shapiro

About

Author of the forthcoming What She Ate: Six Remarkable Women and the Food That Tells Their Stories (Summer 2017)

In this captivating blend of culinary history and popular culture, the award-winning author of Perfection Salad shows us what happened when the food industry elbowed its way into the kitchen after World War II, brandishing canned hamburgers, frozen baked beans, and instant piecrusts. Big Business waged an all-out campaign to win the allegiance of American housewives, but most women were suspicious of the new foods—and the make-believe cooking they entailed. With sharp insight and good humor, Laura Shapiro shows how the ensuing battle helped shape the way we eat today, and how the clash in the kitchen reverberated elsewhere in the house as women struggled with marriage, work, and domesticity. This unconventional history overturns our notions about the ’50s and offers new thinking on some of its fascinating figures, including Poppy Cannon, Shirley Jackson, Julia Child, and Betty Friedan.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Do Women Like to Cook?

1. The Housewife's Dream
2. Something from the Oven
3. Don't Check Your Brains at the Kitchen Door
4. I Hate to Cook
5. Is She Real?
6. Now and Forever

Epilogue

Notes
Bibliography
Permissions and Credits
Index

Author

© Ellen Warner
Laura Shapiro was an award-winning writer at Newsweek for more than fifteen years. Her articles have appeared in many publications, including The New York Times, Rolling Stone, Granta, and Gourmet. She is at work on a book about how women's attitudes toward food in the late '40s to early '60s presaged the cultural and culinary revolutions to come. She lives in New York City. View titles by Laura Shapiro

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