Summary
"A Down Home Meal For These Difficult Times" begins with two Ethiopian women, Jazarah and Yeshi, meeting at an event at Riverside Church in Manhattan. They talk about adjusting to life in America. They become good friends and bond over their shared interest in trying to understand American culture. They seek out the "quintessential'' American cookbook and purchase The Good Housekeeping Illustrated Cookbook. They make a pineapple-upside down cake for their first dish.
Over time, they come to rely on the recipes in the book as a source of comfort. They make various dishes from it when things in life become difficult. These hard moments include personal problems, like the departure of Yeshi's husband or the illness of Jazarah's daughter, but also bigger historical events like 9/11 and the 2008 recession. After 9/11 they make these recipes and bring them to relief workers and first responders. They view these meals as offerings that provide momentary relief.
After they both lose their receptionist jobs, they are uncertain about what to do next. They decide to open a restaurant together. They purchase a van and make it into a food truck. They make many of the dishes from their cookbook. People love the restaurant and feel that the food is a great comfort to them. It is also celebrated for its "authentic" approach to food. Their clientele is a wide mixture of different groups of people, including cab drivers, college students, priests, and businesspeople.
As their business expands, they begin to upgrade the truck and eating area. They feel happy that they can provide people with support and connection in challenging times. They seek to capture the feeling of sitting at a family dinner table. When the 2020 pandemic occurs, people flock to the outdoor seating for a safe place to convene. The truck itself begins to sink into the ground and tree roots grow around it. Jazaraha and Yeshi feel this reflects how they have been accepted into the community.
"Preludes'' is the story of an immigrant community in Washington state. It begins with a man named Amare having to leave his home. A woman named Marla, who knows everyone in the community, tries to comfort him. The story then shifts focus to a married couple, Eteye Amsala and Gashee Ayeloo, who live in a floating house. People speculate about whether or not the house has magical properties. Eteye Amsala is disturbed, but Gashee Ayeloo enjoys the peculiarity of his home.
The story then describes the lives of two brothers, Hirwi and Mamush, who share a car and work as cab drivers. They have a long conversation about the meltdown of a nuclear reactor in Japan. They talk about how different political systems handle tragedy and how, in Ethiopia, there were often coverups of terrible events. The fourth part of the story describes a woman named Aida who arrives and takes up residence in the community. She thinks about her brother and attempts to call him. A man moves into Amare's home and Amare's son Jonathan climbs on top of it and refuses to get down. Eventually they coax him down and everyone gets on the bus they've been waiting for. Marla shares some advice about being an immigrant, but then changes the topic when a large group of white passengers gets on.
"Swearing In, January 20, 2009" starts with the narrator traveling to Washington, D.C. during the inauguration of President Barack Obama. The narrator feels an incredible sense of pride and joy at this historical moment. He watches a father talk to his son about this new hopeful feeling. He says that he clung to this sense of optimism in moments of fear where he felt pursued by frightening racial prejudice. In the present, he walks back to his apartment and prepares to make a spreadsheet to determine how much money he can send home. He recalls the overwhelming joy of that day.
Analysis
Immigration is a major theme in "A Down Home Meal For These Difficult Times." Jazarah and Yeshi attempt to use food as a way to better understand American culture. They gradually perfect all of the recipes in the book as they go to it for solace in challenging moments. After they lose their jobs, they decide to attempt to run a food truck and purchase a used van. They make the recipes from the cookbook and people fall in love with their business. A diverse swath of individuals is drawn to their restaurant, and they slowly build a community of vastly different people. Like the truck itself, which sinks into the ground and becomes rooted in place, Yeshi and Jazarah succeed in using food to establish firm roots in their new home.
The comfort of food is a recurring motif in "A Down Home Meal For These Difficult Times." People are drawn to Jazarah and Yeshi's restaurant because its paper bag containers, familiar recipes, and communal atmosphere remind them of childhood. In the same way that Jazarah and Yeshi find some respite from hard moments in these recipes, many of their customers experience the same sense of nostalgic reassurance. For this reason, they even call the restaurant "A Down Home Meal For These Difficult Times" as they try to give their customers a measure of comfort. This aspect of the story shows food's potential to be a source of joy.
Immigration is the central theme of the story "Preludes." The story depicts different characters as they adjust to life in America. A man named Amare struggles with the loss of his home. Aida, a recent addition to the community, attempts to contact her brother while getting settled. Two brothers, Hirwi and Mamush, listen to a tragic news story and think back on the political oppression they experienced in Ethiopia. In all of these smaller narratives within the larger story, the characters attempt to make sense of their past while also coming to terms with change. As they navigate loss, they also try to move forward and become enmeshed in their small collective.
Hope and fear are the main themes of the final story, "Swearing In, January 20, 2009." The narrator describes the joy he feels while watching Barack Obama be sworn in as president. He stands next to a Black father and his young son as they talk about how the country feels different. He contrasts this with moments when he is harassed by the police or hears hateful comments on public transit. He captures the constant conflict of these emotions, as on the one hand he feels excited by the possibility of what the country could be for people of color, while on the other hand he is painfully aware of how bleak things still are for people of color in the present. He holds to the memory of that day as evidence that a better, more accepting country is attainable, even if it feels distant in hard times.
As with almost all of the book, the stories in this section show characters trying to keep a sense of hope alive. Jazarah and Yeshi use food as a means of comforting themselves and, later, of giving joy and community to their customers. Members of the community in "Preludes" find support in one another. In the last story, the narrator is able to recall the jubilation of Obama's inauguration and uses that memory to stay optimistic about the future of the country, even as he witnesses and experiences brutal racism. In this final section, Hadero is interested in examining how people endure in the face of these challenges and in drawing out the sources of their strength to keep going.
