{'fraction_non_alphanumeric': 0.026889903602232368, 'fraction_numerical': 0.008117706747843734, 'mean_word_length': 5.105263157894737, 'pattern_counts': {'":': 0, '<': 0, '<?xml version=': 0, '>': 0, 'https://': 0, 'lorem ipsum': 0, 'www.': 0, 'xml': 0}, 'pii_count': 0, 'substrings_counts': 0, 'word_list_counts': {'cursed_substrings.json': 0, 'profanity_word_list.json': 0, 'sexual_word_list.json': 0, 'zh_pornsignals.json': 0}}
What Makes American Cuisine?

In the winter of 1871–1872, the Russian Grand Duke Alexis, fifth child of Tsar Alexander II, toured the United States. The Duke hunted buffalo on the Great Plains, called on President Ulysses Grant at the White House, reveled at Mardi Gras in New Orleans, and dined at Delmonico’s in New York City, long the most famous restaurant in America. To fête the Duke, Delmonico’s chef, Charles Ranhofer—born in Alsace and classically trained in French cuisine—prepared a twelve-course menu and even created a “consommé au Grand Duc” in his honor. Haute-cuisine classics like woodcocks in pie crust and aspic and partridge filets à l’Aquitaine anchored the meal, which also included regional American delicacies such as terrapin à la Maryland, canvasback duck, and California salmon (Freedman, pp. xxi–xxxii). When the Duke later stated that there was no such thing as American cuisine and that the best food the young country had to offer were imitations of French dishes, Americans were understandably hurt. The Duke became the latest in a long tradition of European visitors to wound American pride and offend Americans’ notions of their own good hospitality (the author Charles Dickens was also prominently featured on this list following derogatory remarks he made about American food culture during an 1842 tour of the United States). Does America, in fact, have a unique and notable culinary tradition of its own? This is the major historical question behind two recent books in the burgeoning field of culinary history: Ten Restaurants that Changed America by Paul Freedman and Joy Santlofer’s Food City. Both writers answer in the affirmative, though Santlofer’s “yes” is more enthusiastic than Freedman’s. For Santlofer, American culinary identity is primarily distinguished by its sense of entrepreneurialism and inventiveness. Since the establishment of the first Dutch brewery in New York in the early decades of the 1600s, she examines