Food in the Immigrant Story
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Food played a major role in the lives of New York Indians. Many of the Bengali ex-seamen who settled in places like Harlem started out their employment journeys in the US as line cooks and dishwashers - this made them familiar with the workings of the restaurant industry on a deeper level. Those who craved more independence set up shop as street food vendors pushing hot dog carts - the quintessential American food was adapted by immigrants for survival - selling hotdogs was a step on their way to achieving the American dream. When they had acquired enough capital, they set up restaurants of their own, like Habib and Victoria Ullah’s Bengal Garden. These were places of sanctuary that served not only to introduce the residents of New York to Indian cuisine but also to serve as safe spaces for Bengali migrants away from home. Bengal Garden unfortunately shut down 2 years after its opening due to intense competition from neighbouring Indian restaurants, but the experience of opening and running a restaurant was invaluable and soon enough Habib Ullah became a counselor to any other Indian migrant who wanted to start their own. Prior to there being a sizeable Indian community in New York, South Asian Muslims used to rely on meat from kosher butchers, showing their relationship to the Jewish community in the city. When many Indian restaurants started popping up they became some of the only places where halal meat was served, so they were flocked to by African American Muslims and South Asian Muslim migrants alike, serving as important sites of cultural exchange between the 2 groups.
Although Indian restaurants and cuisine served to unite the various communities of colour in New York city (African American, Caribbean, South Asian and Latine) through their palettes, white people largely did not engage with them. This could be viewed as a dying down of the ‘curry craze’ or just because a vast majority of white Americans could not bring themselves to get over their unfamiliarity with ethnic food - Indian food was simply too spicy or new for them to try. This definitely affected the revenues of Indian restaurants and their business-models - with many of them opting to serve ‘American food’ like chops, fried chicken and steak alongside traditional Indian curries, in order to cater to white people. This shows that in order for ethnic restaurants to truly succeed in the West, a white stamp of approval is required by them - something familiar even in the modern era when it comes to cultural appropriation of traditional foods.