In the Kitchens of '68. The Impact of Student Protest and Counter-Culture on Attitudes Towards Food'

Among the big issues of the 1968 movement, food patently figured not at all. But in many ways it was a very political topic. Deep criticism of consumerism turned into criticism of production, preparation and consumption of foodstuffs. Eating spaces and manners were subverted, along with traditional gastronomic canons and meal structures. Young people travelling and living in communes discovered new foods and recipes by cooking together, while discovering a new relation to more natural ingredients.

On the one hand, the critique of conventions and conservative habits led to experimental practices in the field of both cooking and eating. On the other, the critique of industrial civilization and protest against the consumerism induced by a capitalist economy – including the consumption of industrially processed food – encouraged the ‘discovery’ of a new, more authentic relation to nature and genuine products.

Thus a new kind of food heritage took shape in various ways: from Nouvelle cuisine to a new appreciation of ‘natural’ food in Berkeley, to the Slow Food Movement which emerged twenty years later.