What did you have for breakfast this morning? What are you going to eat for dinner tonight? Food may be important to everyone, but it takes on a whole new dynamic in the lives of New Yorkers. It is essential to the city’s identity. Nowhere else could you find a Halal stand in front of a Thai restaurant across the street from an Armenian cuisine on the outskirts of Chinatown. But what is the history behind New York’s food? Food has always been critical to New Yorkers, but nearly every aspect regarding what we eat has changed over time, from where our food is obtained to the types of food offered. This book offers a brief overview of food provisioning in New York City throughout time.

One of the main focuses of this book is production and its role in New York City. Production over this extensive time period saw a great number of changes. As time marched on, production moved farther and farther away from New York City, the main area of consumption. Over the time period considered, local water supplies, such as the collect pond, became less important as new feats of engineering, such as the Croton Aqueduct, paved the way for New York to grow exponentially. Grains also moved in a similar fashion, going from the fields of Manhattan to the surrounding region and ultimately, with the wide development of railroads in the Eastern United States by the middle of the 19th century, to the heartland of the country. Similar trends can be observed for the production of meat, fish, and shellfish. Even early in New York City’s history a wealth of foods were produced. Local oyster beds provided seemingly limitless shellfish supplies until overfishing and pollution drove the beds into terminal decline by the early 20th century. With the improvement of both rail technology and shipping vessels, the importation of endless varieties of fish put nutrient rich food on the table of those too poor to afford meat. The establishment of the Meatpacking District and the High Line in lower Manhattan helped consolidate the production of meat for the entire region. Great varieties of grain and vegetables and corn became an important part of nearly every New Yorkers’ diet. Lastly, one cannot discuss New York food production without mentioning beverages. From the earliest settlers of New Amsterdam, alcohol played an important role. Beverage production would also see great changes over this time period as prohibition helped reformulate the now global beverage that is Coca-Cola.

Another main focus is the evolution of New York City’s marketplaces over the course of history. What were markets like? Where were they physically located? How many points of exchange were there? These questions give a general framework to determine how food and beverages made their way from the producers to the consumers. The actual exchange is an intriguing idea to explore as well. What role did middle men play in getting food from the producer to the consumer? At what points did the number of middlemen increase or decrease, and how did these changes affect the economics of food production? These questions are vital to examining the changes of New York City’s food system. Perhaps the most dynamic aspect of the food system, though, is technology. Innovation is the one factor of production whose growth is seemingly random, yet whose effects are massive. This book will seek to examine these effects on the food supply and demand. How did advanced transportation change the way materials got to the producers, and how food got to the market? How did the location of production change because of new methods of transportation? What technological changes made food production more efficient or more effective? Did advanced technology change the setting of the marketplace? These questions are not only pertinent to the past, but also the present and the future. Technology is forever changing, and thus the implications stand to affect the dynamics of New York City’s food system for years to come.

A third focus of this book is to look at how food production can effect how we live and the way we think about what we eat. Studying the agricultural system in our nation can help change the way we look at farming and food in the future. Although agricultural policy has become more efficient and healthy, there are still many things that need to be fixed and changed regarding the food we eat and the industry that produces it. For starters, farming subsidies must be managed better, and the government must ensure that farmers are not receiving subsidies when they are making more than the cutoff point required for the government to step in. We need to focus on giving support to local communities, and represent the actual consumers in all communities, rather than just a focus on farmers and the agricultural business. Studying past laws and policies allows us to figure out what needs to change and how we can begin to go about managing our food system. We also need to focus on a decentralized food system and a revival of local agriculture, which can be easier with support from the government for more organic food markets. Agriculture is currently the largest contributor to greenhouse gases, and the reason we as Americans suffer from obesity, heart disease, and other major health problems. Ultimately, when environmental factors and increasing health care costs are considered, cheap fast food markets are more expensive for our country. The main focus of this research is to learn about our past and therefore see how we can make our country healthier in the future by being more conscious of the effects of our food production and consumption.

The history of food and nutrition in New York City is an extensive one, and to truly understand its evolution we must consider a number of sources for research. If this text were focused on one specific time period, then the range in types of information presented would be rather small. For example, the earlier decades of New York City would most likely be explored using primarily historical texts or even archaeological evidence, depending on how far back one looks. On the other hand, food culture is becoming an increasingly popular subject of research; as a result, there is a much wider selection of research to explore.

Many texts have been written pertaining to the general diets of the native people of the United States. The books that attempt to describe the lives of the natives pre-contact consist largely of archaeological evidence; for example, the locations of various sites and the items found in those locations, or photos of tools and items found at dig sites. Though these texts provide some of the only information we might find about this time period, as secondary sources a researcher must analyze them carefully; as objective as a scientist might try to be, it is impossible to truly eliminate one’s voice from a text. As time has progressed, attempts have been made to analyze the developing food culture of New York City using more convincing data and statistics. These studies and research, however, are also secondary sources and often seek to make connections and correlations, which may or may not have existed. Because of these stipulations, authors have tried to distinguish between fact and opinion to form their own observations about the topic in question. From these early time periods, some primary sources do exist in the form of archived newspaper articles and preserved journals of some unknown Dutch colonists. While these sources can give us a glimpse into the past, they are not abundunt enough to form an entire history.

One idea which seems to prevail throughout this history of food in New York City is that as time has passed, things have grown more complex—market locations, regulations, and even the diversity of the foods themselves. With this increasing complexity there has also been a surge in the amount of information available to the people. For example, records concerning the consumption of various goods  exist from as early as the colonial era. With this information, one could attempt to find trends in the consumption of foods or beverages, such as the huge intake of alcohol by the people of  18^th century New York City. As markets developed, they made a name for themselves and found their way onto maps which still persist today, thus allowing students to learn about the movement and distribution of these markets. Government interference into the food culture of New York City created additional records in the form of official rules and regulations which can be found today by anyone with internet access.

The history of food production, consumption and distribution in New York have revealed compelling repeating patterns that have been grouped into themes for the purpose of this book. The overarching themes include complexity, geographic spreading, diversification and technological advances.

From the early colonial era to the present day world, the production, distribution and consumption of food has become highly complex in an attempt to meet the needs and demands of a growing and diverse population. From the mere process of growing crops to the methods of distribution and marketing, the New York City food system has developed intricate rules and regulations to comply with the growth in size of the city. Historically, New Yorkers have purchased food that was grown on a farm near the city, transported in caravans to the local open-air markets and sold straight to the customers. As New York City transformed into a melting pot of millions of different people, however, this simple process grew in complexity as food began to go through multi-processing steps before being transported through complex transportation arrangements to get to large distributors before they reached the consumers.

The food process also went through a pattern of geographic spread. With the convenience of quick transportation, New York began to import food from other states that was not grown and processed in the city due to climate issues and lack of land. The production of wheat, for instance, shifted away from New York into the Midwest because of better agricultural conditions for growing the wheat.  In general, the city was capable of importing food from various areas around the globe.

As food processing increased in complexity and moved further away from New York, food types and sources also diversified. The open-air markets and specialized food stalls were replaced by large supermarkets that carried meats, produce, sea food and dry good all in one place. The food types also increased as complexity in processing allowed for a greater variety of the same product. Beverages, for instance, began to be offered in a variety of favors. The irony of diversity was that as food types diversified, the markets for these foods became increasingly conglomerated into single supermarkets.

Lastly, all of the themes discussed above cannot be qualified without considering the role of technological advancements in food production, distribution and consumption. Compared to the simpler technology of the past, today almost 80 to 90% of all food produced in America goes through some sort of processing. Technology has allowed food to be processed to increase the diversity of flavors; it has also allowed the food system to spread geographically through advancements in transportation and made the production of food more complex through mechanization.

This book will cover food production and trade within New York City from the pre-colonial era to present day. It is divided into 14 chapters, each covering a different aspect of food consumption during the city’s history. The chapters are then divided into categories that cover more specific features of this topic.

Chapters two and three are grouped together under the time period of the pre-colonial era until the American Revolution, or from 1500 to 1790. Chapter two discusses how and where native New Yorkers used technology to produce food, and what foods they frequently ate. Chapter three explores the colonial era, and how new food technologies affected the foods that were consumed. It also examines where markets were located in New York City at that time.

Chapters four and five cover the time period from 1790 to 1860. Chapter four discusses the changes in technology that subsequently led to changes in food production and consumption. Chapter five explores where different markets opened up in the city as the population grew.

The years of 1860 to 1940 are grouped together in chapters six, seven, eight, and nine. Chapter six examines the different agricultural policies that were put in place during this time. Chapter seven covers the changes in food distribution as technology advanced. The production of various foods during the early industrial era is discussed in chapter eight. Chapter nine focuses on urban food markets during the Industrial Era. This book’s last time period focuses on the year 1940 until present day, and is grouped together by chapters ten, eleven, twelve, and thirteen. Chapter ten covers the development of agricultural and food safety policies in New York City during this time. Chapter eleven discusses the changes that occurred in distribution technologies, such as those seen in freights and trucks. Chapters twelve and thirteen explore the evolution of food production and food markets and how they have changed during the global era.

This book will focus mainly on how patterns of food consumption, production, and technology have changed throughout the history of New York City and how these past events will effect how we approach the city’s future.