Recreating Food Traditions via the Internet

There is good and bad about the relationship between food and the internet.  I can talk to fellow food bloggers around the world, experience the spice markets of Morocco, or see a patisserie in Paris, or "attend a street festival in LA, all in the same day.  I can use resources like Food Blog Search, Epicurious, Food Network, to find that perfect dish to make with the fresh brussels sprouts I picked up at the Farmer's Market, or something different to do with my Thanksgiving leftovers. I can drool over food "porn" at Tastespotting and Foodgawker, and establish new relationships with the foodies who have posted there.

All of these things are great, but recently, I have seen a couple of examples that illustrate the value of the internet as a means to preserve and share food traditions.  Just a couple of days ago a co-worker of mine came to me and asked if I know where she could find a recipe for something her mom used to make called Texas Cake.  She described it to me as a rich and moist chocolate cake that was made with cocoa with chocolate frosting all made from scratch.  She went on to recount how if she came home from school and her mom had made Texas cake she knew that someone was coming over.  This friend has cookbooks and recipe cards from her mother, who had passed, but a search through them had not yielded the prized recipe. I told her that she should do an internet search since it is likely that someone else on the world wide web also had fond memories of that cake. About 15 minute later she IM'd me saying she had found a recipe online that sounded like her mom's cake that held such fond memories, but of course I knew this already because her food memories had prompted me to look up the recipe as well so I could add it to my list of recipes to try.

Only 20 years ago this recipe and the memories with it could have been passed on a recipe card to family, neighbors, church groups, but now people in Kansas City and Kabul can find it via a simple search. With extended families the exception rather than the rule in modern industrialized society, the internet provides a high tech way to continue and even recreate old food traditions.I guess we are a new generation since the computer and internet has become an instrument to preserve and restore food traditions and making the world our recipe box!