Taking a Culinary Journey through the Pages of Cookbooks Published during the People’s Republic of Poland

During the People’s Republic of Poland (1945-1989), food production, distribution and prices were strictly controlled by the communist authorities. Also freedom of movement, especially to western countries, was limited due to the severe restrictions imposed on foreign travel. Such a situation had an immense effect on the Polish food culture, which at the time underwent some major transformations. Cooking and eating started to be viewed as a part of a wider social endeavour, rather than a personal matter. On the one hand, such issues as socialist culinary science, rationality, modernisation, avoidance of waste and product substitution were emphasised in the culinary discourses. On the other hand, a proliferation of cookbooks devoted entirely to foreign cuisines as well as an invention of numerous dishes implying a foreign origin brought some exoticism to this often dull reality of the communist era. The number of publications, as well as impressive print runs of over 100 000 copies and multiple editions, show that people were very willing to reach for such publications to take a short imaginary culinary trip during the time when their movement to western countries was highly restricted. In line with Bracewell’s observation, this research aims to show that rather than viewing cookery books as practical culinary guides, such publications ‘can be read as prompts to fantasy and desire, perhaps especially in the absence of the required ingredients’ (2012, p. 170).