Digesting Cultural Identity

One of my oldest friends grew up believing she was Italian because her family frequently ate spaghetti. To her, the tomato sauce was all the proof she needed. This made me wonder: can food truly define our culture? Do we, in a way, eat our identity? After all, the old saying goes, "you are what you eat."

It turns out, the history of many common foods is more complex than we think. Take the tomato, for instance, which is often a symbol of Italy in North America. It isn't originally Italian. It's native to South America and was brought to Italy through trade. This pattern holds true for many staples around the world. The chili pepper traveled from South America to Asia, and the apple spread from Kazakhstan to the United Kingdom and eventually to the Americas. Food moves because it's delicious and adaptable, not because it's tied to one specific culture.

Interestingly, my friend is actually of Irish descent, a fact that didn't occur to her despite her family eating potatoes. But perhaps it shouldn't have. We strongly associate potatoes with Ireland, yet they're also native to South America. Like the tomato, the potato was introduced to Europe and became a dietary staple.

This all leads to a fascinating contradiction. The most incredible, intensely tomato-flavored tomato I ever ate was in Rome, just outside the Sistine Chapel. And while potatoes may not be originally Irish, the **Irish potato famine** is a defining moment in history. These examples show how a food can become deeply ingrained in a culture, even if it wasn't there from the beginning.

So, are we what we eat? If we are, it's only for a short time—about 12 to 24 hours before it's digested. Maybe we should think of cultural identity not as something fixed and permanent, but as something that's constantly changing, being processed and absorbed. It's fluid, much like the way food travels and evolves.

In that spirit, I encourage you to eat some delicious food you love from a culture that isn't your own. You might find that when a dish becomes a part of you, a little part of someone else becomes part of you too.

So put a little pig in your kitchen to remind you that food is best when shared!!