THE
MELTING
POT: SPECIAL COLUMN: Ethnic Street Foods: Part 5 – The Kiosk Then and Now
Today, there are many kiosks around
the word. The word kiosk can be used
interchangeably with the terms: small booths, food carts, food
trucks, trailers or other on-the-go food businesses both portable and stationary offering goods, services, foods and other
items for sale.
In the US and other countries food
kiosks are generally used indoors in rented or leased spaces in malls, arenas,
conference centers, hotels, airports, and similar locations. Larger, outdoor
kiosks can be used at amusement parks and party sites. Also in many countries all you need is a sidewalk
where you can set up a kiosk.
Often, modern foods were invented
from street food offerings. French fries probably originated as a street food consisting of fried strips of
potato in Paris in the 1840s. Cracker Jack started as one of many street food exhibits at the (Chicago – 1893) Columbian Exposition. Ice cream cones
were the invention of a vendor at the St. Louis Exposition (1904). He ran out of containers to serve the ice
cream in and next door was a waffle stand so he housed the ice cream in the
waffles. Voila! The modern ice cream waffled cone came
about!!
Originally brought to Japan by
Chinese immigrants about a hundred years ago, ramen (noodles) began as a street food for laborers and students, but soon
became a "national dish" and even acquired regional variations. The street food culture of South East Asia
today was heavily influenced by coolie workers imported from China during the late 1800s.
In Thailand, although street food and
stands did not become popular among native Thai people until the early 1960s
when the urban population began to grow rapidly, by the 1970s it had "displaced home-cooking."
Street food vending is found around
the world, but has variations within both regions and cultures. For example, it has been said that the street food of Vietnam was "fresh and lighter than many of the cuisines in the
area" and "drawing heavily on herbs, chili peppers and lime",
while in contrast the street food of Thailand is "fiery" and
"pungent with shrimp paste ... and fish sauce".
In the 1950’s along came the United States Army wagon with
interior shelving and drawers, and stocked with kitchenware, food and medical
supplies. Food consisted of dried beans, coffee, cornmeal, greasy cloth-wrapped
bacon, salt pork, beef, usually dried or salted or smoked, and other easy to
preserve food stuffs. The wagon was also stocked with a water barrel and a
sling to kindle wood to heat and cook food.
In western PA in the
1950’s and 1960’s food cards aka kiosks came about: 1950’s – Ice cream trucks begin
selling their frozen treats and did until into the 1990’s. The 1960’s provided Roach Coaches (Mobile
food trucks, or "roach coaches," which have been around for years
giving the worker easy access to an affordable grab-and-go lunch).
Locally, one of the early ethnic
foods sold from kiosks included pretzels which originated in Germany and became
popular in the US. Lititz, a city
outside of Lancaster in Pennsylvania Dutch country is said to be the birthplace
of the American pretzel from a German recipe. William Sturgis, supposedly baked the first
American pretzel in 1861. Viable pretzel
products today sold in kiosks could be: Peanut Butter Pretzel Granola Bars, Peanut
Butter Chocolate Pretzel Truffles, Parmesan Ranch Snack Mix, Waffled Soft
Pretzels and Caramel Pretzel Popcorn.
No comments:
Post a Comment