By Khalida Sarwari
The U.S. map, as re-imagined by Andrea Blum, contains more than just border lines, state capitals and major cities. Her map is dotted with recipes that celebrate American food and stories about its crafters.
“I’m kind of obsessed with maps,” the culinary fellow at Montalvo said. “I’ve always been obsessed with maps, since I was a kid, and now I’m making my own map.”
Blum is in the midst of developing her national photography project, aptly named My American Pantry (MAP for short), an interactive digital atlas of American food and drink that celebrates local traditions around the preparation and sharing of food. The project is an extension of Blum’s longtime quest to follow food back to where it’s made.
One of the more recent photo shoots took place on Montalvo’s Great Lawn, where about two dozen people dropped by on Sept. 29 to participate in a community picnic and aerial photo shoot. They brought along with them stories and a basket of dishes prepared from family recipes.
The event marked the first time Blum involved the general public. Previous photo shoots have focused on professional artisan food and drink producers, including cheese makers, vintners and farmers.
Blum launched the MAP project, initially a startup idea, in January. As part of the project, she travels around the country, gathering stories from artisans about their practices, products and their craft and then documenting the traditions native to the different geographic areas. She shoots her subjects and the tools of their trade using a remote-controlled aerial camera, similar to a drone, built by her brother, Kenny Blum.
The participants encompass all types of craftspeople, ranging from cider, beer and wine makers to people who make jams and olive oils and wild mushroom foragers–“all kinds of people out there who are creating small businesses that have to do with food, whether it’s tradition, or culture or something they made up,” Blum said.
For Blum, whose background is in journalism and art history and restoration, the experience has been nothing if not educational.
“I’m learning something each time I go to a shoot. Every time I go, I learn more about what people care about, why food is so important, why storytelling is so important.”
The project began in California and so far spans four locations in the state, one of which was of a nonprofit in Santa Cruz that started a homeless garden project. The other photo shoots took place in Marin and on the rooftop of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art prior to its temporary closing. In mid-September, Blum took a detour in Massachusetts to shoot a 48-acre apple orchard. “Every place I take a picture actually has a meaning,” she said.
Before continuing her travels across the country, Blum plans to raise money through crowdfunding sites Kickstarter or Indiegogo. So far, she’s been funding the project out of her own pocket. In the meantime, Blum said she’ll also focus on finding additional communities to explore and searching for grants.
“It will be a never- ending project,” she said.
The ultimate goal, said Blum, is to create a map that would allow viewers to interact with the images and stories, with an embedded marketplace that allows people to buy specialty food sold by any of the featured artisans around the country.
Blum said she hopes to bring the finalized project from all 50 states to the World’s Fair in Milan in 2015–and while she’s at it, to change the perception some folks have about American food.
“When you travel outside the U.S., people think of American food as hot dogs or hamburgers, but actually we have a very rich cultural tradition,” she said. “The value of having a map like this is pretty much celebrating American food and entrepreneurship.”
For more information about the MAP project, visit myamericanpantry.com.
Blum creates ‘My American Pantry’ as an interactive atlas of American foods
