Continuing with the theme of Japanese food, I decided that I wanted to look at some of the history of Japanese food and how they developed into the modern day forms that we know (ramen, sushi, fried chicken, etc). However, I have to do more research to see exactly what materials are available in English. What little I do know is that Osaka is generally considered the “food capital” of Japan, and there is even a saying that Osaka is “bringing ruin upon oneself by extravagance in food.” I wanted to narrow down the idea even further to how Osaka became the center for “Japanese fried food” but I’ve hit a few dead ends in searching specifically about fried food and also pieces on Osaka specifically.

There is one book, “Sushi and Beyond: One Family’s Remarkable Journey Through the Greatest Food Nation on Earth,” by Michael Booth that I found via Google that seems to be about Japanese food in general. Michael Booth seems to be an accomplished writer for a variety of magazines and newspapers from what I can find, but I don’t really know what else could possibly make him a “qualified” writer. Is just being published in a magazine or newspaper enough?

Further searches on the UT libraries search engine seemed to show that looking for “Japan cuisine” and “Japanese food” will net me almost different results for the top 5. Is anyone else experimenting with their search queries? “Japanese food” seemed to give me, on average, older books in the top 5 while “Japan cuisine” gave me some results post-2000. I find it interesting that just synonyms can make a large difference.

What all goes into your morning cup of coffee?

I don’t know about you, but coffee is a big deal to me. It has been my constant companion since 9th grade. So when I was contemplating topic ideas, coffee instantly came to mind. I decided that I wanted to learn more about the coffee industry to know about the labor that goes into the beverage I consume on a daily basis. I want to be aware and informed of the slavery and unfair conditions that are going on in the coffee industry so that the decisions I make aren’t contributing to corruption. To begin, I am using Google to get basic information about the coffee industry and what all goes into the production. I am hoping to research more about the different countries where coffee is produced and learn about what kind of labor is going on in each country or I might narrow my focus to one or a few countries. I want to learn more about:

• how much slavery is involved in each country
• what the different types of labor are that are being used (child labor, forced labor)
• what all goes into the process of coffee production
• what does Fair Trade coffee entail (what are the benefits, what are the drawbacks)
• what companies ethically grow and manufacture coffee

http://www.foodispower.org/coffee/

http://campaign.worldvision.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/7280_DTL_Factsheet_Coffee_Web_Single.pdf

When thinking about what I wanted my topic to be, my mind immediately was drawn toward the idea of writing about sushi (one of my favorite foods). Once I knew that I wanted to write about sushi, I started to research and look for some resources that would point me in the right direction. With just “sushi” being too broad of a topic, I need to figure out exactly what it is that I’m going to focus on when writing about sushi. Do I want to write about the history of sushi? What about how sushi is made and the consumption of sushi? Maybe I want to look at how traditional Japanese sushi compares to the sushi we eat here in America. I began to rely on research in order to figure out which area of interest I would choose. I have done some research in different areas such as the history of sushi and the patterns of sushi consumption in Japan (the links to these two sources can be found below). Throughout the research I have done thus far, these two sources are the ones that I have found myself coming back to. Each of these articles contains sufficient and ample information on their designated topics. They also provide headings for different sections so it is easy for me to read.

For my research, I have been strictly using Google Scholar because it is what I have utilized most in the past and this means of research has proved successful for me. However, for this topic in particular, I have been having some trouble finding thorough resources that would be beneficial for my annotated bibliography. Having said this, I believe that I should look into other research engines such as the UT library database in order to find new information.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1541-4337.2011.00180.x/full

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1745-4506.2006.00021.x/full

I have had an extremely busy week so far in regards to scheduling, exams, and internships, so I haven’t had much time to work on my research project.  I think I am doing fine so far, though, because I have already decided on a topic.  The topic I wanted to do my research on is pretty broad yet specific at the same time, since it is an ingredient.  I decided to do my annotated bibliography on avocados.  I have already looked on amazon for some books concerning avocados, and I also am going to check Wikipedia’s sources on the avocado article.  I will go through the UT library website as well, so I’m confident I will have plenty of material for my topic.

One question I had for any of my class mates that read this:  What is your opinion on my chosen topic?  Is it too broad or too specific?  If it is too broad, how do you think I can narrow it down, and if it is too specific, what do you suggest?

If the topic is too broad, one change I considered making is to change the topic to the cultivation of avocados over history, or the versatility of avocados.  Everyone knows that avocados have many uses, such as extracting their oils, using them for cosmetic benefits, and of course eating them.  Maybe there are some uses that are not as publicized.

I spent past week thinking about what topic I will choose for the research. I had few things in mind, history of Italian foods such as pizza and pasta, origin of coffee, and Indian culture and food, especially curry. I started with all these topics and looked over  some recipes or videos to see which I am most interested. Then I remembered that the curry I had here in America such as Teji’s on Guadalupe street is different with the curry I make at home which is Korean curry. Curry that is sold at vietnamese restaurants also has different taste. This was pretty interesting and I began to question the diversity of curry and further more, Indian food history and origin. I guess I will stick with this topic. What I am thinking now is where I should start. Right now I am relying on google, but UT library search engine seemed helpful and had many books about curry, Indian food and culture. I have not seen them yet but after I narrow down how my research is going to be, I can use these sources to write my annotated bibliography.

I wanted to find a topic that particularly fit my taste in food. So what I did was start going to establishments and trying different genres of food to see what I was the most interested in choosing for my topic. The first thing that came to mind was my love of donuts. This appealed to me, because it’s one of those things that helps “Keep Austin Weird.” Round Rock donuts has the “Texas Donut” which is bigger than a football, Ken’s Donut’s keeps with the tradition of Texas with the “Longhorn Donut”, and finally there are Voodoo Donuts, which is as weird as it sounds. So I went to their websites first which can be found by just typing their names into Google.

Then I thought to myself maybe I should do something completely original to Austin. So I went online in search of truly Austin establishments. What I found is that a lot of the famous ones were Tex-Mex which makes sense given this is Texas. The ones that stuck out to me the most were Juan-in-a-Million for breakfast and Matt’s El Rancho.

I think I want to stick with Tex-Mex, but unfortunately between Math theory test last week, career fair, SOA qualifications, and my econ test tomorrow I haven’t had much time yet. So any suggestions on where to go with this topic are welcome.

Due to being sick last week, I had a late start to my research. I felt a little behind, because I have so many topics that I still want to explore before deciding on one. My initial interests are something having to do with Memphis famous restaurants, the history/rise of Starbucks, and different Tel Aviv restaurants.

I am spending my summer in Tel Aviv, so I think that would be very beneficial to me but since I don’t speak Hebrew so finding sources would be harder and have only been there once before. I don’t think this topic will make the cut. I would probably be more qualified to write about it after this summer.

When pursuing my idea about making my project about Starbucks, I went to the most trustful source I could think of, starbucks.com. Starbucks is a very popular company, and I think that it would be interesting to write about their globalization, and progress since they first opened in 1971. When using the UT Library search engine, stout, I was able to find many EBooks about the company. I think this would be a good topic to pursue. If I do this, I can include sources about the history of coffee, and Starbuck’s effects of popularizing this drink.

When doing research on certain Memphis foods, I thought of narrowing it down to either famous restaurants of just BBQ in general. I think that this topic would be very easy to find articles on reviews and about the different options of BBQ, and the history.

I think that I am in a good place in regards to my research process. I have two good possible options that I think I would enjoy learning more about.

Over the past two weeks, I have been looking at different websites online and thinking about a topic that would interest me. I finally decided to research about the cuisines and culture of East Asia, particularly Taiwan and China, since my parents are from Taiwan and I grew up eating food from those cuisines. I have mostly been using Google to help me find sources that are related to my topic. I also looked on the UT library website but most of the results are books that are actually located in the library, so I need to find a chance to take a look around the PCL sometime. I found a recipe book for Chinese dishes on the UT library website (http://ebookcentral.proquest.com.ezproxy.lib.utexas.edu/lib/utxa/reader.action?docID=903067), so this can help me get an idea of what kind of dishes are part of the Chinese cuisine. I also found another book called The Land of the Five Flavors that explains the cultural history of the Chinese cuisine (http://ebookcentral.proquest.com.ezproxy.lib.utexas.edu/lib/utxa/detail.action?docID=1531172). I have a Google Doc to help me keep track of my citations and every time I find something new, I’ll put the link in there so I have a list of my sources that I might use.

The research I have been working on over the past few weeks has been rough but is now coming along nicely. At first, my biggest challenge was coming up with a topic. I decided to go with a topic that I enjoy so that I will not be bored while researching. Learning about the history of my favorite kind of food is going to be very interesting to me and something that I believe I can benefit from in life. Asian food and I have always had a great connection and we meet around 5 times a week. http://www.asian-recipe.com/cuisine-evolution.html is a site that shows me the history of Asian food along with information on more delicious recipes I can learn. I feel like the history of Asian food is a broad topic so getting more deep into it and maybe finding better and more detailed topics would be nice. If I’m going to be honest, my research skills overall are pretty pathetic and bad. My go to move is google but beyond that I struggle when it comes to researching and I look forward to learning more skills as the semester unfolds. To conclude, I like where I am at now but more work is going to be needed for me to feel comfortable and confident in my work.

I have narrowed down my topic to two main ideas. The first is pickles, specifying the pickling practices of Jews. The second is Rooibos Tea; a tea from South Africa. I have connections to both of these foods; the first being one of my favorite foods and the second being my favorite tea.  My research process so far has been brainstorming ideas and then briefly researching them. As a rule if I could find more than three articles on the topic it would make the shortlist. From their I narrowed it down by what I would genuinely enjoy researching. Some of the things that did not make the cut were poke, mole, and matzah ball soup.

I have entered the next steps of my research process which includes going into academic and non academic texts on rooibos tea and pickles. I think I am leaning more towards pickles currently as they follow my interest in immigrant stories and how cultures mix in the ‘new country’.

Some of the sources I have looked at so far are blog posts, and while this is not an academic source it does give a good description of the main ideas that I am starting to research. I also have found a recipe from bon appetit. I have used the UT library research tool online but have yet to access these resources. I mainly have used the google search tools so far. I have used my writer’s notebooks for narrowing down topics and organizing my research along with Zotero.