From Cookbooks to Networks: A Framework for Comparing Multiethnic Ingredient Systems in Transylvania

TL;DR

This paper explores how different ethnic cuisines in Transylvania are connected through their ingredients and cooking methods.

Contribution

The study introduces a network-based framework to compare multiethnic culinary systems using recipe data.

Findings

Hungarian, Romanian, and Armenian cuisines show strong interethnic connectivity in ingredient use.

Main dishes reveal significant divergence between ethnic cuisines, suggesting cultural boundaries.

Shared dessert frameworks reduce ethnic distinctions in Transylvanian gastronomy.

Abstract

Cookbooks serve as structured records of both ingredient repertoires and the underlying processing logics that define a culture’s culinary identity. By modeling five Transylvanian ethnic traditions—Hungarian, Romanian, Transylvanian Saxon, Jewish, and Armenian—as weighted, undirected co-occurrence networks, we found that interethnic connectivity is driven primarily by technological processes rather than simple ingredient presence. Using purposive sampling, we compiled a harmonized corpus of 1409 recipes and applied explicit ingredient normalization (retention, aggregation, and deconstruction) and a 14-class functional taxonomy. We computed density, clustering, modularity, and centrality measures and compared cuisines with a binary Jaccard index, both at the category level and within four course types. Category networks reveal an exceptionally tight Hungarian–Romanian–Armenian triangle (J > 0.95), whereas course-level results show that main dishes exhibit the strongest divergence (J < 0.28). These results support a layered identity model of Transylvanian gastronomy: while shared confectionery frameworks in desserts dissolve ethnic boundaries (M < 0.17), main dishes actively guard cultural boundaries through distinct technological signatures.

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