today my kid and i shared breakfast--charro beans, eggs, corn tortillas. it was a good hearty meal, and one that got us talking about how miraculous the mix of finally flavored pinto beans, eggs and corn tortillas truly is.

we've had pinto beans almost every day since this shut down began, and it's something we've never gotten tired of. a fine pot of pinto beans can be eaten so many ways--and each and every way is delicious and hearty and soul reviving.

we got to trying to figure out food that is considered 'typical american' that you could eat every day and not get sick of (or sick from)--hamburgers, mac and cheese, french fries, chicken fingers--that sort of thing.

and we couldn't think of single thing. but when we started thinking regional food and cultural food--there were tons of things. but so much of our regional food/meals have been lost to 'get the same thing at every mc donald's' corporate convenience.

i think i've talked abt one of my favorite books ever: The Food of a Younger Land: A portrait of American food from the lost WPA files

WPA workers were sent out across the US to learn and document how people ate. they collected recipes and menus and wrote articles abt how they saw people cooking at eating food.

theres tons of nerdy fascinating info on food and culture--even the write ups contain a ton of fascinating cultural information. why did some people just take a menu from local restaurant and call it a day when others wrote entire detailed articles abt the cooks, food, community?

but the thing on my mind right now is how in the era before corporate restaurant chains, when people travelled, they stopped at local farmhouses and often as they stopped a diners.

and there were clearly defined regions of food and ways of cooking food. you could only get X food in michigan, this is how they cooked it. alongside--X food is everywhere, this is how they cooked it in tennesse, georgia, texas.

i wonder what would happen if they sent WPA workers out to do the same thing these days. would there be as much regionality in our food in US?

it's in my Gen X memory not being able to get particular food in the US except seasonally--i don't think my kids have ever had a world where they decide they want strawberries and they cant find them at a grocery store.

with regionality comes 'lack of convenience.' I think it's worth questioning what positives there are with regionality.