I was recently invited to a potluck and asked to bring a dish that reflected my cultural background. I was stymied about what to bring. Which culture? What background?

What was I in the mood for? A southern dish, to remind me of growing up black and working class in the Midwest? Seafood, to reflect the years of my life lived on islands and along the coast? Perhaps a vegetarian dish, rooted in my farming and gardening days and in my back-to-the-land past, present and future? What about all of those countries I’ve learned to love through their food – Mexico, India, Thailand, China, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Vietnam, Japan, Italy, France and Spain? To me, they’re as much a part of my cultural background as my childhood home. After all, they represent an adulthood spent traveling and my eternal sense of wanderlust.

My musings led to an epiphany about food and culture: the connections can be fluid. Food choice reflects the cultures that one has experienced just as much as cultural background defines food choice. 

These thoughts have caused me to expand my definition of the term “oral history” to include telling the story of the foods and culinary experiences that shape you as a person. The next time you find yourself craving a certain food or trying to explain to someone why you aren’t even willing to try an unfamiliar dish, take a moment to consider your own oral history; it’s as much a part of you as your ethnic group or where you grew up.

I am still not sure what dish to bring to the potluck. But I know that whatever I choose, there will be a rich story to tell about the history of the dish in the development of my personal culture.