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- Author or Editor: Anikó BÁti x
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Bread plays an outstanding role even by European standards in Hungarian diet, mainly in the everyday food of the lower social strata. From the second half of the 20th century, changes can be documented in this pattern both in home bread baking and consumption. Behind the changes in food culture are macro socio-economic processes transforming the traditions. The study traces the general course of this process, drawing mainly on rural examples and comparing them with the situation in Budapest.
Organic farm, organic food steps towards a sustainable agriculture (with Hungarian and Slovenian examples)
An introduction to the thematic block
From Hernádszentandrás to BioSzentandrás
An example of a sustainable bio-farm in Hungary
Sustainable agriculture is the re-production of resources, which has a positive impact on the natural environment, assists in the survival of rural communities, and improves the quality of life through food production. The job opportunities can also positively influence the population retention of the communities. The study seeks to answer why a farming community in a traditionally agricultural area may have to re-learn the foundations of crop production on a social agricultural farm created by the local government. In this case study based on my fieldwork, I present the operation of an organic farm established with the help of external resources and specialists as a sustainable agricultural model, its effect on community life, and briefly referring to food culture and lifestyle changes that occurred in Hungary in the second half of the 20th century.
School Meals on the Menu
Studies on the Practices of Children's Catering
Abstract
In Hungary, about half of the 3–18 age group has regularly used school food service. This paper focuses on the operation and social embeddedness of school canteens and the at-home eating habits of the families involved. My conclusions are based on the findings of my interdisciplinary research group. Ethnographers from the RCH Institute of Ethnology and dietitians from the National Institute of Pharmacy and Nutrition have been studying school food from 2018 to 2023. We selected a few model settlements: in addition to the capital, Budapest, three smaller towns, and two villages. Through questionnaires, interviews, and fieldwork observations, we investigated cooking, serving, meal courses, meal time, eating habits, preferences, as well as the nutritional knowledge of students, teachers, kitchen staff, and parents. Our goal, among other things, is to collect best practices and facilitate communication between participants. Some examples from our research highlight the special role of the centrally regulated school food in local food culture, and difficulties with social and historical roots can occasionally hamper school lunches in becoming a socially accepted model of a healthy diet. The school canteen works best at sites where cooking takes place within the school premises. There is a strong connection between the kitchen staff and the teachers, and they work together in the interest of the children. The value of food and its appreciation is demonstrated by how it is treated and how it is talked about. Communication about food in the canteen should be based on food preparation at home, where parents and children work together. The operation of canteens has become particularly problematic following the measures introduced during the coronavirus pandemic. A sustainable, enjoyable canteen can only be realized through the regular communication of schools and school kitchens, as well as children and their parents. Our findings are presented to our respondents, along with providing them with a comparison of different examples.
Abstract
Food culture has played, and continues to play, an important role in the definition of identity and community cohesion. Food is not just a matter of sustenance but is also a cultural element with myriad links to the material world and to festive and everyday customs. Meals and individual dishes also function as mediators, providing a means and a channel of communication. Local communities select, reconstruct, or construct their common food heritage through their social discourse on the past, belonging, and locality. This paper presents the institutional framework for the management, preservation, and transmission of food-related traditions at the national and local levels in Hungary and looks at the practice of heritagization through one specific local example.
Abstract
The growth in Budapest's population at the end of the 19th century was based on the influx of migrants from the countryside, mostly industrial workers. The examination of the social tensions generated by their arrival provides a good illustration of the changes in social policy, one element of which was the operation of soup kitchens. In the mid-19th century, the main driving force behind the founding of soup kitchens was individual religious charity, although by the end of the century, social solidarity and state involvement also contributed to the relief efforts. The present study examines the development of soup kitchens in Budapest based on the historical sources: official documents, and the contemporary press. Using the ethnographic findings of food culture research, it seeks to explain why official soup kitchens were not popular. From an ethnographic point of view, the process of lifestyle change among workers newly breaking away from peasant life and moving to Budapest and its metropolitan area has been little explored to date, and the same applies to the embourgeoisement of the peasantry. When interpreting the processes that accompany labor migration, parallels can be drawn between the eating habits of the workers' regions of origin, the value systems connected with work and food, and the common meals organized for agricultural workers when working away from home. Through a historical and ethnographic approach, the transitional, evolving features of urban foodways emerge in the context of soup kitchens in parallel with the change in lifestyle.
