The story begins like this: New Zealand famous chef Andy Hearnde decides to make patatas bravas. Peel the potatoes, cut them in half into cubes and place them in cold water. He dries them, salts them and fries them with olive oil. Next, prepare the sauce: more oil, smoked paprika, paprika and a little cornstarch; All are cooked over low heat. She adds chicken broth to this base, emulsifies it, and adds a splash of sherry vinegar to it.

Then he makes a big mistake: He uploads the video to social networks.

“No man, these aren’t patatas bravas. Not even close”, “As a Spaniard I don’t approve of them” or “Wow, how wrong, realize you’ve never been to Spain”: these are some of the most elegant of the Good Man from Andy Cooks The reactions he got because he didn’t put aioli in it.

The unstoppable growth of ‘gastronomic integrity’. There is a map circulating on the Internet that ‘collects’ the reactions of the people of each country when you try to speak in their native language. These reactions range from the Icelandic “Wow, thank you, but why are you doing this to yourself”, to the French “Please don’t do this”, to the British “(no reaction)”. It’s a meme, of course; a funny map

But it’s still intriguing that Spain falls into the “Oh my God, you just said a word in my language… we’re officially the best friends in the world” category. I don’t know if this continues in Spanish, but it certainly doesn’t apply to our gastronomy. For years, the level of aggression with which networks have adopted the slightest variations of our traditional recipes is anthological.

And of course it has caused constant problems (and many misunderstandings) beyond our borders.

What’s happening to us? When “gastronomic fundamentalism” is mentioned, it is inevitable that paella comes to mind. For decades, Valencian food has been a prime example of how complex it is to preserve certain gastronomic traditions (and related social practices) in the context of globalization, tourism, and folklorism.

But once we start researching, we see that the reluctance to accept kitchen changes is very old. For example, although boom “Rare nougats” might give us the impression that “nougat fundamentalism” is something new; We have evidence that as early as 1836 people were criticizing exotic innovations such as nougats “made from marzipan, snow, lemon, strawberry or egg yolk.”

Old and new. This leads us to think that much of the current aggression against gastronomic innovations is due to the fact that we can see it now (thanks to social networks) and not before.

However, there is something in the spirit of our age that also fits this: I am talking about the famous concept of ‘cultural appropriation’.

What is cultural appropriation? Can it be applied to food? Despite ongoing misinterpretations, cultural appropriation can be defined as “a lucrative practice in which the ethnic majority appropriates minority elements for their own benefit without any recognition.”

Normally, these criticisms are directed at people who use certain cultural practices for their own benefit in society “without identifying them or understanding their significance”. In this case, we are talking about food, but we see it very often in music or fashion.

As Meridien Mach explains when discussing Asian cuisine in the U.S., “When it comes to cultural food appropriation, it’s not about who can or can’t do something, it’s about how it’s made. Of course, you can enjoy and cook foods from cultures that aren’t your own. But while you do It’s a good idea to respect and learn where they’re coming from.”

The problem becomes more complex. Because after all, how can we be sure of Andy Hearnde’s intentions when he made the video? How do we know it’s not documented in depth? In fact, the truth is that there are many areas in Spain where patatas bravas are served without aioli. Isn’t it worth asking ourselves if we’ve lost our focus?

No matter how much we defend gastronomic freedom, it must be acknowledged that for many people food is “the closest link to their culture”, “part of their identity”, “personal”; Therefore, there is no harm in treating commercial products with a certain respect.

And it’s quite another to get into a spiral of aggression where anything can be ridiculed simply because it doesn’t fit our worldview. Most of all, because human beings have an endless capacity to find arguments to justify themselves and forget that we have been angry about the same things since the world began.

Image | Andy Cooks

in Xataka | The hardest truth for paella fundamentalists isn’t chorizo: it doesn’t have to be rice