DANN WOELLERT Livres

Wine and Cincinnati were once a perfect pairing, so much so that the Queen City nickname was inspired by Sparkling Catawba Wine, the delectable libation that sparked the Catawba Craze of the mid-1800s. Longworth's Golden Wedding Sparkling Catawba was the most celebrated, but Werk's Golden Eagle and Red Cross, Corneau's Cornucopia, Thompson's Hillside, Bogen's Diamond, Mottier's National Premium and Schumann's Queen Victoria also bolstered the city's reputation as the American Rhineland. These winemakers passed their knowledge on to Lake Erie, the New York Finger Lakes, Pennsylvania, Missouri and California. Today, that knowledge has returned home, as Henke, Skeleton Root, Meier and Vinoklet hope to make the city a wine haven once again. Food historian Dann Woellert leads a tour through Cincy's storied past and promising future with the grape and the vine.

Seeking asylum after the failed German Revolution of 1848, refugees flocked to Cincinnati's Over-the-Rhine Neighborhood. They brought their Germanic culture language, literature, music, art, dance, drink, celebration or gemutlichkeit" AND, their love for gymnastics. It was here in the small tavern, "Hecker Haus," that the American Turners were born, founded by a group of 14 German speaking immigrants. This movement rapidly spread, influencing a growing nation in education, progressive thought, politics, human rights, health, literature and the arts. This is the story of that organization, born and raised in Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky, which fostered a great German-American movement."

Cincinnati loves goetta.Since its arrival with nineteenth-century Germanic immigrants, this humble dish has evolved from peasant staple to ubiquitous delicacy. Once upon a time, Cincinnatians found goetta mostly in neighborhood butcher shops, in Over-the-Rhine's so-called Goetta Alley and through Sander Packing, its first commercial producer. Now hungry locals scarf it down at diners and white-linen establishments alike and in everything from egg rolls to Reuben sandwiches. Tracing goetta from its Germanic origins and its first stop in Greater Cincinnati to its largest commercial producers, Queen City Sausage and Gliers, food etymologist and "Goettevangelist" Dann Woellert explores goetta's history in the city that made it regionally famous.

Cincinnati is the home to food inventions, rivalries and restaurants that stand the test of time.The Queen City boasts the invention of both Cincinnati chili and goetta. Mecklenburg Gardens, Arnold's, Izzy's and Scotti's have all operated for over a century. The French restaurant Maisonette was the epitome of fine dining, and Wong Yie's Famous Restaurant took Chinese cuisine from street fare to an exotic experience. Busken Bakery and Frisch's vied for Cincinnati pumpkin pie supremacy by taking digs at each other through billboards and redecorating a Big Boy statue in Busken attire. Author Dann Woellert explores the most iconic eateries, the German influence on Queen City food and what makes dining so unique in Cincinnati.

"For more than a century, Cincinnati's candy industry satisfied our national sweet tooth. Stick and drop candies appeared here long before their Civil War popularity. Opera creams, rich fondant-filled chocolate candy brought here by Robert Hiner Putman, provided decadence. Candy corn, which the Goelitz Company introduced to the United States before World War I, remains a ubiquitous treat. Marpro Products created and popularized the marshmallow cone candy. Doscher invented the French chew and made caramel corn a baseball concession at Redland Field decades before Cracker Jack became synonymous with our national pastime. The city's many Greek and Macedonian immigrants influenced the unique Queen City tradition of finishing a Cincinnati-style 'threeway' of spaghetti, chili and cheddar with a chocolate mint. Local food etymologist Dann Woellert tells these stories and more in this delectably sweet history"--Back cover