‘FOOD AMERICANA’
DAVID PAGE’S NEW BOOK HIGHLIGHTS CONNECTICUT CUISINE
As an Emmy-winning producer for “Diners, Drive-ins and Dives,” David Page certainly knows a thing or two about finding good food. In his recently published book, “Food Americana,” Page shares the backstory behind the foods Americans love to eat, including pizza, burgers, bagels and sushi, and explains how the dishes have evolved to suit American palates.
With an entire nation’s worth of food to chat about, Page’s book features a
few familiar Connecticut locations, including Louis’ Lunch and Miya’s Sushi in New Haven and Ted’s Restaurant in Meriden. Page also writes about Connecticut-style lobster rolls, how Lender’s Bagels in New Haven changed the bagel scene and shares a tale about an ice cream man from the Nutmeg state.
Page recently chatted with Hearst Connecticut Media about the nature of American cuisine, Connecticut’s contributions to the national menu and how he defines good food.
How would you describe your book, “Food Americana?”
“Food Americana” is a deep dive into how we made a cuisine of foods from so many other places and cultures, what we’re doing with it and where it’s going next. Sushi is now ubiquitous. I had a woman who is a high level executive for a company that produces millions of pieces of sushi a year explain to me that what was everyday food for her and her friends in their generation — hamburgers — is now sushi for her daughter and her daughter’s friends. Virtually everything that we think of as our everyday food was someone else’s first.
How does food tell a story?
In many cases, it starts with the poverty of a place, so much of the food that has developed into expensive or gourmet items began as the basic, cheapest food of the poorest population. When you look at the kinds of foods people eat, you get a sense for the geography of the place they live, the kind of life they live... In terms of getting a sense of what a culture is about, it is food that traditionally brings people together. I think one of the things we’re seeing over the past year now of Covid is a great loneliness, a yearning on the part of people to sit down together and shoot the bull over food. It’s the magnet.
You began writing it before the pandemic occurred. What was it like to see the impact the pandemic has had on the food industry?
Oh, it’s just been a tragedy. Restaurants closing, people losing their jobs. It’s been sad, especially watching individual restaurants go out of business.
You mention a number of New Haven area restaurants. How did you go about selecting the different restaurants for your book?
They were chosen because of their specifics. I was looking for
a representative, for example, of the growing sustainability movement in sushi, and Miya’s, when you do a Google search, comes up first. They really have led the way in that area. Obviously, when you’re going to talk about the debate over the first hamburger, you’re going to end up with Louis’ Lunch, because they claimed that they made it, and others claim that nothing on toast can be called a burger. But they’re famous for terrific food and a remarkable story that goes way back. Whether they were first or not, they have a history and a tradition that traverses the entire arc of the burger as an American favorite. So, of course I ended up there. You can’t talk about the nationalization of bagels without talking about Lender’s Bagels. There’s no question that they made the bagel part of our national American menu.
In your book you talk about Garrett “Sully” Sullivan, who is a Good Humor Ice Cream truck driver. How did you even find him?
I grew up with the Good Humor truck when I was young and living on Long Island, and to me when you’re talking about ice cream, that’s a memory. That’s something that’s deeply ingrained in my memories, so I went looking to see if there were any honest-to-god Good Humor trucks still working. It was not easy, because there are not many. I think I put out a Facebook message or some other kind of social media request looking for people with ice cream trucks and finally he popped up.
What was it like talking to him?
Oh, it was great. Here’s a guy that’s doing something that is a direct connection to the past. It’s something that makes people happy, something he apparently
did on the spur of the moment.
As someone who “lives to eat,” how do you define good food?
It depends on what you’re looking for. For me, good food is real food that starts with quality ingredients, made by hand and with a vision on the part of the person making it. I don’t care how minor the vision: if you have a hotdog cart and your vision is a steamed bun with just a little green relish on the hotdog, great. Do what it is you’re aiming to do. I am absolutely no fan of what has happened to much of America in that big chains serve us food that’s been defrosted or microwaved. I’m constantly stunned when that is what people choose.
Do you have any hard and fast rules when it comes to food?
No, I just want good food, and I want it to be what they claim it to be. You want a place that really cooks from scratch. I just don’t
understand preferring a chain over anything.
What was it like working on “Diners, Drive-ins and Dives?”
It was great. I got to create my baby, and when it turned into a hit, that was incredibly satisfying. It was just a remarkable experience.
What do you want readers to take away from your book?
I want them to appreciate the good food that makes up our national cuisine. I’d love them to think about where it came from, but more than anything else I want them to understand the wide range of items that we have ingested from other cultures and other cuisines. Not to get political, but I want them to remember that in a culture that is going through some crises over immigration that even our food came from someplace else.