The Shaker Food Trend’s Second Appearing
And other food moments from film this year.
When Rita Sodi and Jody Williams opened their Shaker-inspired Commerce Inn in the West Village five years ago, I didn’t know much about the Shakers beyond the fact that they were the “furniture Christians” (as one New York Times Magazine writer put it). Soon after Commerce Inn opened, Claire de Boer opened Stissing House in Pine Plains with a similarly Shaker-flavored menu, and Eater interviewed one of the two remaining Shakers alive at the time about what he made of the religion becoming a food trend.
Now, as The Testament of Ann Lee plays in theaters, and the religion continues to waver on the edge of extinction, we’re romanticizing Shaker culture more than ever — as much for its utopian ideals of egalitarianism and collectivism as for its impact on interior design. This weekend, the Institute of Contemporary Art in Philadelphia is opening a major exhibit about the art and design of the Shakers, and the Shaker Museum in Chatham, NY is in the process of building a new $18 million complex.
While Shaker design is easy to identify and replicate, the question of what constitutes “Shaker food” is stickier. For both Commerce Inn and Stissing House, it seems to just be a synonym for Colonial-era New England dishes packed with fish, butter, and orchard fruit. Lemon pie, famously, can be Shaker.
