Who Owns Authenticity?

Is there even such a thing?

I’ve been ruminating on authenticity and what makes food or cuisine “authentic” and I really haven’t gotten many answers. If you look at it in a very black + white sort of way, you can say authenticity lies in the country of origin of a dish, ingredient, or cuisine but does this ring true in the U.S.?

I plan out in advance the restaurants that I visit for my Eating A-Z in NYC series and try to pick the most authentic looking ones. My idea of authenticity is the food being cooked by the people who are from the cuisine’s country, but is that even fair? Lots of dishes + cuisines are gentrified...we all know what those kinds of restaurants look like, but what if you grew up your whole life eating Colombian food, aren’t Colombian but can make an arepa that rivals one from Colombia? Does that make it any less Colombian because it’s not made by an actual Colombian?

This then brings me to my next thought on ingredients. I’m pretty lucky to live in a city where most spices, uncommon veggies + condiments can be found to make anything your heart desires, but sometimes substitutions must be made. If a dish is made with slightly different ingredients but still has the same characteristics as the original can it still be considered authentic? I find that authenticity is actually a deeply personal subject. How one person interprets a dish may completely differ from another person + both of these people may have been eating it all their lives just slightly different. Now, whose food holds the key to authenticity?

Complicated, am I right?! I would love to hear folks chime in on this. 

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This week’s newsletter is short + sweet because I’m doing A LOT of traveling these days, lots of writing + soooo much more. Next week you’ll be getting a dose of Antigua + Barbuda in your inbox + maybe a little Argentina too!

Here are some snaps of what I’ve been doing/eating lately:

Celebrated my birthday with ceviche at Brother’s Fish + Chips in Ossining, NY

Also ate the most delicious “crab roll” + yuca fries. The crab was sitting on a slice of fluffy squid ink sponge cake. It was absolutely DIVINE!!!!

Ube cake! Ube is a delicious purple yam and is often used in Asian desserts.

Foraging in the woods in upstate NY, but found zero edible mushrooms :(

We did find many bushes of wild raspberries though! This bounty was over 2 hours of picking/searching.

Our foraging goods.

Exceptionally delicious mocktail that I have no clue what was inside. I just asked the waiter to surprise me + surprise he did. SO. FREAKIN. GOOD.

Cook. Eat. Repeat.

Natalie