Best American series.

Includes contributors' and other notable food writing from 2019

The year's top food writing, from writers who celebrate the many innovative, comforting, mouthwatering, and culturally rich culinary offerings of our country

Kitchen at Per Se was a clean place but hard and heartless too / Kwame Onwuachi and Joshua David Stein -- "I just want to eat her up!" / Alex van Buren -- A critic for all seasons / Korsha Wilson -- A real hot mess: how grits got weaponized against cheating men / Cynthia R. Greenlee -- Open wide / Burkhard Bilger -- Fare access: DC restaurants could do more to welcome diners with disabilities / Laura Hayes -- Kitchen shift / Hannah Goldfield -- Lean cuisine doesn't want to be part of diet culture anymore. Does it have a choice? / Kaitlyn Tiffany -- Demand for "authenticity" is threatening Kansas City's homegrown tacos / José R. Ralat -- Man who's going to save your neighborhood grocery store / Joe Fassler -- Provocations of Chef Tunde Wey / Brett Martin -- What happened to Portland? / Meghan McCarron -- When Jacques Pépin made all the world an omelet / Joshua David Stein -- Where'd you go, Rocco DiSpirito? / Kat Kinsman -- Easy, peasy, Japanese-y: Benihana and the question of cultural appropriation / Sho Spaeth -- It's not always easy to be Jamie Oliver / Kim Severson -- New coke didn't fail. It was murdered / Tim Murphy -- Wet 'n wild / Katy Kelleher -- Peter Luger used to sizzle. Now it sputters / Pete Wells -- Hard times for a hot commodity, the prized New Mexico chile / Amelia Nierenberg -- Here's what the government's dietary guidelines should really say / Tamar Haspel -- Spice trade / Paige Williams -- We all scream / Charlotte Druckman -- What the heck is crab rangoon anyway? / Dan Nosowitz -- Yelp reviewers' authenticity fetish is white supremacy in action / Sara Kay