Food And Expertise: My Research on Oaxacan Food

Andrew Mitchel
PhD Candidate
The Ohio State University

What does it mean to be an expert on food? This piece will argue that my scholarly work and the knowledge and labor of Oaxacan chefs should both be acknowledged as forms of expertise. I am a PhD student studying the success, adaptation, and identity of Oaxacan chefs in Columbus, Ohio, Los Angeles, California, and Oaxaca City, Mexico. I ask whether doing and possessing expertise as a scholar or chef are the same; describe experts’ specialized knowledge; examine the lasting and ephemeral products of experts; and conclude by considering everyday expression of expertise in food.

The definition of expert to describe a person or expertise to describe the skill or knowledge a person has mastered warrants investigation. Writers on expertise in sociology and anthropology show how scientific experts have pushed forward their discipline by developing new ways of understanding the world around us: germ theory, plate tectonics, the theory of relativity, the list goes on [1]. I argue that this conception of expertise demands further expansion, as the work of a highly successful and talented chef is also expertise. These masters of cuisine meet the tastes of consumers by perfecting their use of ingredients and their cooking techniques. The expertise of a Oaxacan chef is visible in the provisioning, preparation, and presentation of a dish like mole.

Anthropology, my field, and the culinary arts, the focus of my dissertation, demand and value expertise. The literature on experts emphasizes knowledge can be innate or learned, often through consumption of theory, and through mentorship and/or apprenticeship. Academics receive PhDs, whereas chefs go to culinary school, or, in locales like Oaxaca, learn from a traditional chef (cocinero/a tradicional). Forms of certification vary: apprenticeships and externships are still common for most chefs, and are not unlike post-doctoral fellowships for academics. This model results in extensive training and practice for chefs, but can stifle their creativity and innovation. Young chefs may find processes and techniques exist simply because of tradition, or because a superior said so [2]. Expertise, in turn, determines hierarchies: labor in restaurants is organized, often racially and linguistically, based on skills like tortilla-making and English proficiency to determine who works in front of the house and back of the house.

Carr’s review of existing work on expertise argues for the naturalization of enactment and abilities, where what people do and the skills they possess are conceived as one and the same [3]. Carr’s construction leads to an emphasis of expert status within language, or via speaking and writing. This understanding devalues experts who work with their hands like chefs, but also artisans, machinists, and tradespeople like plumbers and electricians. Demonstrations of expertise arise not solely in the ways I, as an anthropologist, put into practice what I know (an article, a conference presentation, and, in due time, my full dissertation), but also in every dish a chef prepares. What is ironic is that I rely on the labor of chefs to demonstrate my expertise as an academic.

Experts train so as to enact their specialty knowledge. To obtain my doctorate and show my mastery of anthropology, I must show my understanding of relevant theory and that I can put my ideas and hypotheses into practice to advance the field, in my case, of transnationalism research and food anthropology. My expertise is shown via my use of theory and analysis of a case study on Oaxacan chefs. Meanwhile, chefs and restauranteurs I work with must not only know and execute cooking methods techniques, recipes, and ingredients, but also balance their wishes to cook known and culturally relevant foods with the need to tie their cooking and restaurants to the desires of their consumers. Their expertise is a balancing act of running a successful restaurant while maintaining high-quality, authentic food.

Chefs must, at some level, conform even as they innovate: they have a difficult time due to stringent outside expectations. Chefs produce material for mostly non-expert consumers, who nevertheless judge their culinary creations based on their tastes and standards. Meanwhile, the work of an academic is, for the most part, not judged by non-experts, as scholarly work is written by and for academics.

The ability to advance and build experience is also distinct between academia and participants working in restaurants. Academics, once awarded their PhD, can study whatever they find interesting: they have the flexibility to branch their knowledge into areas of research outside of their dissertation, such as my Master’s research on baseball in the Dominican Republic. Meanwhile, chefs are assigned expertise but often beholden to consumer expectations of particular cuisines. This is especially true for chefs of color in the United States, who struggle to cook anything that is not ‘their food,’ as opposed to what they choose. Such culinary experts are largely forced to cook based on trends, such as South Asians making dosas, or savory dough pancakes. A Mexican example of this is birria, which consists of birria de res (either beef or goat), which is stewed meat served in tacos with the consommé on the side. Consumers assume this dish is cooked by all Mexicans; however, it is primarily made in the state of Jalisco and the city of Tijuana.

While scholarly experts create lasting documents like books and articles, the work of chefs results in ephemeral products to be eaten in the moment. This is, of course, an imperfect distinction; academics can produce temporary products like conference talks and public performances, and some chefs produce permanent documents in the form of cookbooks. These books allow chefs to demonstrate their mastery and write down how to produce their food, be it family recipes, of which there are countless Oaxacan examples, or fusion recipes created by Roy Choi, founder of Mexican-Korean fusion taco truck Kogi. Chefs, however, primarily establish their initial expertise not via writings, but through the consistent recreation of old recipes, shifting the reputations of current eateries, and fickle consumer opinions.

What, then, of everyday expressions of expertise? Knowing a great deal about food as a scholar of ‘food’ is to be the called-upon expert knowledgeable not solely about origins and histories of food, but one relied upon to recommend eateries. My personal expertise derives largely from who I have judged to be an expert based on my categorizations and tastes, leading to value judgements of eateries and lists of the ‘best’ Oaxacan restaurant in a space like Columbus, Ohio. The intellectual labor of reading, writing, and interviewing must stand on equal footing with the physical labor of the chefs and restauranteurs that are organizing their businesses, executing cooking techniques, and displaying their food for their customers. My dissertation, and indeed all writing in food anthropology, should strive to acknowledge, uplift, and valorize unique forms of mastery which transform a plate of delicious food into an understanding that its creator has, and enacts, their expertise.

[1] Collins, H. and R. Evans. 2019. “Studies of Expertise and Experience: A Sociological Perspective on Expertise”, in Paul Ward, and others (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Expertise, Oxford Library of Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198795872.013.4.

[2] Borkenhagen, C. “Evidence-Based Creativity: Working between Art and Science in the Field of Fine Dining.” Social Studies of Science 47, no. 5 (2017): 630–54. https://www.jstor.org/stable/48590463.

[3] Carr, E. S. 2010. “Enactments of Expertise.” Annual Review of Anthropology 39 (1): 17-32. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.anthro.012809.104948.