Hello all, this is Dakota. Things are progressing well over here at UNCA, and this post will serve to give you a bit of a look where we are at.

The site itself will probably remain static for a few more days until we have some more concrete information to actually put up on the site. So no new pages will probably appear until the end of the week.

We have appointments set up with our archivists so that we can really get into specific books and pick out a subset to work more in detail with. Granted, a subset may only mean a handful that we do close readings of given the time constraints, but there will be a mix of looking at large data sets and smaller ones.

On the note of larger data sets, I am working on transferring the cookbook data into Zotero to be manipulated. This is taking longer than I anticipated as the online catalogue section that contains just the cookbooks is down. I am having to search for the cookbooks in the larger collection and then add them, which, while it is working, leaves a larger margin for error in terms of what is included in the data set. It is hoped that our meeting with the archivists will clear this up.

As far as interviews go, Kinsey and I are still waiting to hear back from Pam Allison. Initial introductions were made, but she has not responded to our request for a meeting. Requests for meetings with local restaurants go out tomorrow. However, despite the lack of current interviewees, Kinsey and I did draft a basic list of questions for both the restaurants and Ms. Allison. Kinsey will post those later in a blog update, and yes there is editing that needs to be done.

Finally, I wish to update everyone on my correspondence with Dr. Locklear concerning food history.  There were a few things she mentioned that were already on our list such as looking at the differences between large press cookbooks and small press cookbooks. Some of the things she mentioned that are new and we might want to consider are:

1.  The difference between “special occasion” foods and everyday foods. What types of foods make it into the cookbooks we are looking at? Are these cookbooks a viable representation of everyday food? If not, what can we deduce from the recipes that are there?

2. Janet Theophano: Eat my Words: Reading Women’s Lives through the Cookbooks they Wrote (https://www.amazon.com/Eat-My-Words-Reading-Cookbooks/dp/1403962936/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1489623872&sr=8-1&keywords=Janet+Theophano)

3. Elizabeth Engelhardt et al, The Larder (https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_2?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=The+Larder)

Until next time!