This item was written by Małgorzata Lombarowicz, a Gimnazjum teacher from Warsaw

All over the world people are looking for suggestions of the past and their roots, if they cannot be found, they desperately restore or rebuild. They are looking for things in an older style: objects, furniture or indeed forgotten dishes.

For many countries of Europe, World War II is a dividing line - life as it existed before has vanished. Many places, Warsaw for example, were terribly damaged and some communities, like the Jewish ones in Poland and other parts of Europe, virtually ceased to exist. But people seem to long for things they have lost. Although Warsaw was destroyed (see Should we restore heritage?) and the Jewish community in Poland no longer exists, there is a very strong need to restore these places and the past.

Food is a way of enabling the past to be alive in the present. One example is the Szemrana Restaurant in Warsaw where local traditional food is served. If you come to Kraków and visit the Jewish Quarter, Kazimierz (click to read about the Kazimierz District of Kraków), you can try a wide range of dishes in restaurants serving traditional Jewish food and in summer attend the Jewish Festival.

In Britain food became ‘nationalised’ and industrialised during the war, and in the rationing which followed for several years afterwards. It never returned to its pre-war form and at first was largely accepted as inevitable ‘progress’. Many people lost their links with former traditions and although interest has returned it has to compete with the great surge of enthusiasm for the cooking styles of other parts of the world and a multicultural fusion at home. For many young people it seems a foreign style of cooking and with not always a very good reputation.

Read two interviews with English natives about food and nostalgia:

Note: These are authentic ‘live’ interviews therefore you will find some small slips of language

Food from the past in the present

Some ideas for discussion:

• What do you understand by the saying: ‘you are what you eat’?
• Do you particularly identify with any food? If yes, in what way?
• How important is food from the past to you?
• What do traditional dishes mean - are they connected only with certain festivals or something more e.g. your identity?
• How do you feel about the food you ate as a child?
• Will people still feel nostalgic about food from the past in the future?
• How would you express your feelings about traditional Polish food in English to someone who did not speak Polish?

Information on traditional food and recipes from different parts of Britain can be found on our Useful Links page

Teacher’s note: appropriate for intermediate level and older school students