Contemporary Vestals in the Masterchef’s Kitchen Doing and Undoing Gender in Domestic Food Practices
##plugins.themes.bootstrap3.article.main##
##plugins.themes.bootstrap3.article.sidebar##
Published
10-04-2026
Agnieszka Maj
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5256-6901
Abstract
This article aims to analyse how domestic food practices, along with the associated motivations and behaviour patterns, either reinforce or challenge binary gender models in households. The theoretical framework is based on Harold Garfinkel’s (1967) concept of ‘doing gender’ and contemporary studies (Ehlert, 2021; Pettersson & Heldt, 2014; Szabo, 2014) that highlight tensions between cultural patterns defining gender roles in the kitchen and phenomena contributing to the blurring of gender inequalities in everyday life. Qualitative data (individual in-depth interviews) collected in two separate studies conducted in Poland between 2020 and 2022 were used as the research material. The analysis of this material reveals two key figures: the Vestal, referring to women who assume responsibility for others and are focused on the domestic hearth, and the Masterchef, who is typically male and engages in cooking only occasionally. Emerging trends, such as men’s increasing attention to the body and food, the growing importance of declaring shared responsibilities, and shifting attitudes towards cooking as a leisure activity, do not yet appear to be leading to fundamental changes in the processes through which gender is constructed or deconstructed in relation to domestic life and food practices.
How to Cite
Maj , A. , Goszczyński, W. and Wójtewicz, A. (2026) “Contemporary Vestals in the Masterchef’s Kitchen: Doing and Undoing Gender in Domestic Food Practices”, The International Journal of Sociology of Agriculture and Food, 32(1), pp. 149–167. doi:10.48416/ijsaf.v31i1.747.
##plugins.themes.bootstrap3.article.details##
Keywords
domestic food practices, doing and undoing gender, gastropolitics of the hearth
References
Adams CJ (1990) The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory. New York: Continuum.
Adler TA (1981) Making pancakes on Sunday: The male cook in family tradition. Western Folklore 40(1): 45–54. DOI: 10.2307/1499848
Altintas E and Sullivan O (2016) Fifty years of change updated: Cross-national gender convergence in housework. Demographic Research 35(16): 455–470. Available at: https://www.demographic-research.org/volumes/vol35/16/35-16.pdf
Appadurai A (1981) Gastro-politics in Hindu South Asia. American Ethnologist 8(3): 494–511. Available at: https://www.jstor.org/stable/644298
Bachórz A (2018) Hidden resources? Households’ strategies for maintaining control over food: Between continuity and discontinuity. Studia Humanistyczne AGH 17(2): 97–109. DOI: 10.7494/human.2018.17.2.97
Baszczak Ł, Lesiak M, Lewandowski M, Rozbicka I and Wincewicz A (2025) Podział obowiązków domowych i jego konsekwencje dla dzietności. Working Paper No. 2. Warszawa: Polski Instytut Ekonomiczny.
Belasco W (2008) Food: The Key Concepts. London: Bloomsbury.
Botreau H and Cohen MJ (2020) Gender inequality and food insecurity: A dozen years after the food price crisis, rural women still bear the brunt of poverty and hunger. Advances in Food Security and Sustainability 5: 53–117.
Brickell C (2005) Masculinities, performativity, and subversion: A sociological reappraisal. Men and Masculinities 8(1): 24–43. DOI: 10.1177/1097184X03257515
Bridges T and Pascoe CJ (2014) Hybrid masculinities: New directions in the sociology of men and masculinities. Sociology Compass 8(3): 246–258. DOI: 10.1111/soc4.12134
Brookes G and Chałupnik M (2022) Real men grill vegetables, not dead animals: Discourse representations of men in an online vegan community. Discourse, Context & Media 49(5): 100640. DOI: 10.1016/j.dcm.2022.100640
Buler M and Pustułka P (2020) Family practices across two generations of Poles: Between continuity and change. Przegląd Socjologiczny 69(2): 33–53. DOI: 10.26485/PS/2020/69.2/2
Butler J (2004) Undoing Gender. London: Routledge.
Charles N and Kerr M (1988) Women, Food and Families. Manchester: Manchester University Press.
Chen W (2016) From ‘junk food’ to ‘treats’: How parents talk about food and their children’s eating. Food, Culture & Society 19(1): 151–170. DOI: 10.1080/15528014.2016.1145008
Connell C (2010) Doing, undoing, or redoing gender? Learning from the workplace experiences of transpeople. Gender & Society 24(1): 31–55. DOI: 10.1177/0891243209356429
Counihan CM (2012) Gendering food. In: Pilcher J (ed.) The Oxford Handbook of Food History. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 99–116. DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199729937.013.0006
Counihan CM and Kaplan SL (1998) Food and Gender: Identity and Power. London: Routledge.
Crowther G (2013) Eating Culture: An Anthropological Guide to Food. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Deutsch FM (2007) Undoing gender. Gender & Society 21(1): 106–127. DOI: 10.1177/0891243206293577
DeVault ML (1991) Feeding the Family: The Social Organization of Caring as Gendered Work. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Dunn E (2004) Privatizing Poland: Baby Food, Big Business, and the Remaking of Labor. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
Ehlert J (2021) Food consumption, habitus and the embodiment of social change: Making class and doing gender in urban Vietnam. The Sociological Review 69(3): 681–701. DOI: 10.1177/00380261211009793
Garfinkel H (1967) Studies in Ethnomethodology. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Geist C and Ruppanner L (2018) Mission impossible? New housework theories for changing families. Journal of Family Theory and Review 10(3): 559–573. DOI: 10.1111/jftr.12245
Gherardi S (2005) Feminist theory and organization theory: A dialogue on new bases. In: Tsoukas H and Knudsen C (eds) The Oxford Handbook of Organization Theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 210–236. DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199275250.003.0008
Gronow J (2001) The Sociology of Taste. London: Routledge.
Haddaji M, Albors-Garrigós J and García-Segovia P (2017) Women chefs’ access barriers to Michelin stars: A case-study based approach. Journal of Culinary Science & Technology 15(4): 320–338. DOI: 10.1080/15428052.2017.1289133
Hammersley M (2010) Can we re-use qualitative data via secondary analysis? Notes on some terminological and substantive issues. Sociological Research Online 15(1): 47–53. DOI: 10.5153/sro.2076
Harman V and Cappellini B (2015) Mothers on display: Lunchboxes, social class and moral accountability. Sociology 49(4): 764–781. DOI: 10.1177/0038038514559322
Harman V and Cappellini B (2018) Boxed up? Lunchboxes and expansive mothering. Families, Relationships and Societies 7(3): 467–481. DOI: 10.1332/204674317X15009937780962
Hirschauer S (2001) Das Vergessen des Geschlechts: Zur Praxeologie einer Kategorie sozialer Ordnung. In: Heintz B (ed.) Geschlechtersoziologie. Wiesbaden: Westdeutscher Verlag, pp. 209–235.
Hollows J (2003) Oliver’s twist: Masculinity, nostalgia and television cooking. International Journal of Cultural Studies 6(2): 229–248. DOI: 10.1177/13678779030062005
Hryciuk R (2019) La alquimista de los sabores: Gastronomic heritage, gender, and the tourist imaginary in Mexico. RDC 24: 75–100. DOI: 10.36551/2081-1160.2019.24.75-100
Irwin S and Winterton M (2012) Qualitative secondary analysis and social explanation. Sociological Research Online 17(2): 1–12. DOI: 10.5153/sro.2626
ISSP Research Group (2022) International Social Survey Programme: Family and Changing Gender Roles V – ISSP 2022. GESIS Data Archive, Cologne. ZA10000 Data file Version 2.0.0. DOI: 10.4232/5.ZA10000.2.0.0
Jehlička P, Grīviņš M, Visser O and Balázs B (2020) Thinking food like an East European: A critical reflection on the framing of food systems. Journal of Rural Studies 76: 286–295. DOI: 10.1016/j.jrurstud.2020.04.015
Jensen W (2023) The strength to diet: If It Fits Your Macros dieting as masculine body work. Men and Masculinities 26(3): 398–414. DOI: 10.1177/1097184X231156160
Julier A (2014) Family and domesticity. In: Bentley A (ed.) A Cultural History of Food in the Modern Age, vol. 6. London: Bloomsbury Academic, pp. 145–165.
Jurczyk K, Jentsch B, Sailer J and Schier M (2019) Female-breadwinner families in Germany: New gender roles? Journal of Family Issues 40(13): 1731–1754. DOI: 10.1177/0192513X19843149
Jurik NC and Siemsen C (2009) Doing gender as canon or agenda: A symposium on West and Zimmerman. Gender & Society 23(1): 72–75. DOI: 10.1177/0891243208326677
Kessler SJ and McKenna W (1978) Gender: An Ethnomethodological Approach. New York: John Wiley.
Kopczyńska E (2021) Jedzenie i inne rzeczy. Kraków: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego.
Kopczyńska E and Zielińska K (2016) Feeding the body, feeding the gender: Cultural dimensions of food practices in Poland. East European Politics and Societies and Cultures 30(1): 147–168. DOI: 10.1177/0888325415570964
Król KE (2020) ‘We have all lived and breathed tea’: Gendered moral economies of factory tea production in Western Georgia. Ethnologia Polona 41: 93–111. DOI: 10.23858/ethp.2020.41.2415
Krywult-Albańska M (2024) Przemiany rodzin i gospodarstw domowych w Polsce w świetle danych ze spisów powszechnych. Wychowanie w Rodzinie 31(1): 107–131.
Levenstein HA (2012) Fear of Food: A History of Why We Worry About What We Eat. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Lewin K (1947) Frontiers in group dynamics. Human Relations 1(2): 5–41. DOI: 10.1177/001872674700100103
Lupton D (1996) Food, the Body and the Self. London: Sage.
Maciel A (2017) The cultural tensions between taste refinement and middle-class masculinity: A case study of craft beer aficionados. In: Chapman NG, Lellock S and Lippard CD (eds) Untapped: Exploring the Cultural Dimensions of Craft Beer. Morgantown: West Virginia University Press, pp. 203–221.
Matel A (2024) Stay or move out? Young adults’ housing trajectories in Poland over time and throughout economic cycle. Housing Studies 39(8): 2043–2065. DOI: 10.1080/02673037.2022.2153107
McIntosh A and Zey M (1992) Predicting intent to consume beef: Normative versus attitudinal influences. Rural Sociology 57(2): 250–265. DOI: 10.1111/j.1549-0831.1992.tb00466.x
Mol A (2021) Eating in Theory. Durham and London: Duke University Press.
Mroczkowska J (2019) Pork politics: The scales of home-made food in Eastern Poland. Appetite 140: 223–230. DOI: 10.1016/j.appet.2019.04.022
Murdock GP and Provost C (1973) Measurement of cultural complexity. Ethnology 12(4): 379–392. DOI: 10.2307/3773367
Nath J (2011) Gendered fare? A qualitative investigation of alternative food and masculinities. Journal of Sociology 47(3): 261–278. DOI: 10.1177/1440783310386828
Nentwich JC and Kelan EK (2014) Towards a topology of ‘doing gender’: An analysis of empirical research and its challenges. Gender, Work & Organization 21(2): 121–134. DOI: 10.1111/gwao.12025
Nielsen HB (2017) Feeling Gender: A Generational and Psychosocial Approach. London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 281–300. DOI: 10.1057/978-1-349-95082-9_10
O’Connell R and Brannen J (2016) Food, Families and Work. London: Bloomsbury Academic.
Oláh LS, Kotowska IE and Richter R (2018) The new roles of men and women and implications for families and societies. In: A Demographic Perspective on Gender, Family and Health in Europe. Cham: Springer, pp. 41–64. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-72356-3_4
Parasecoli F, Bachórz A and Halawa M (2025) The Pierogi Problem: Cosmopolitan Appetites and the Reinvention of Polish Food. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Pawelec A (2021) Analiza struktury wydatków konsumpcyjnych polskich gospodarstw domowych według typu biologicznego. Metody Ilościowe w Badaniach Ekonomicznych 22(3): 87–96.
Pettersson K and Heldt Cassel S (2014) Women tourism entrepreneurs: Doing gender on farms in Sweden. Gender in Management: An International Journal 29(8): 487–504. DOI: 10.1108/GM-02-2014-0016
Poggio B (2006) Editorial: Outline of a theory of gender practices. Gender, Work & Organization 13(3): 225–233. DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-0432.2006.00305.x
Poulain J-P (2017) The Sociology of Food: Eating and the Place of Food in Society. London: Bloomsbury.
Risman B (2018) Gender as a social structure. In: Risman B, Froyum CM and Scarborough WJ (eds) Handbook of the Sociology of Gender. Cham: Springer, pp. 19–44. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-76333-0_2
Ross-Plourde M and Lachance-Grzela M (2025) The gendered division of housework in North America: A systematic review from 2014 to 2024. Journal of Family Theory and Review 17(3): 691–720. DOI: 10.1111/jftr.70000
Ruggiano N and Perry TE (2019) Conducting secondary analysis of qualitative data: Should we, can we, and how? Qualitative Social Work 18(1): 81–97. DOI: 10.1177/1473325017700701
Storz MA (2022) Current sex distribution of cooking and food shopping responsibilities in the United States: A cross-sectional study. Foods 11(18): 2840. DOI: 10.3390/foods11182840
Straczuk J (2016) Dawne i obecne strategie życiowe Polaków: wzory i realia społeczne. In: Kurczewska J and Karkowska M (eds) Przemiany kulturowe we współczesnej Polsce: ramy, właściwości, epizody. Warszawa: IFiS PAN Publishing.
Straczuk J (2018) Risk and trust: Food-related concerns and ‘good’ food procurement strategies. From research into eating practices in Poland. Studia Humanistyczne AGH 17(2): 111–123.
Sumpter KC (2015) Masculinity and meat consumption: An analysis through the theoretical lens of hegemonic masculinity and alternative masculinity theories. Sociology Compass 9(2): 104–114. DOI: 10.1111/soc4.12241
Suwada K (2021) Parenting and Work in Poland. Cham: Springer International Publishing.
Szabo M (2014) Men nurturing through food: Challenging gender dichotomies around domestic cooking. Journal of Gender Studies 23(1): 18–31. DOI: 10.1080/09589236.2012.711945
Taylor DE, Lusuegro A, Loong V, et al. (2022) Racial, gender, and age dynamics in Michigan’s urban and rural farmers markets: Reducing food insecurity, and the impacts of a pandemic. The American Behavioral Scientist 66(7): 894–936. DOI: 10.1177/00027642211013387
Thomas M (2016) Are vegans the same as vegetarians? The effect of diet on perceptions of masculinity. Appetite 97: 79–86. DOI: 10.1016/j.appet.2015.11.021
Trubek AB (2013) Kitchen work: 1920–present. In: Bentley A (ed.) A Cultural History of Food in the Late Modern Age. London: Bloomsbury, pp. 127–145.
Twigg J (1986) Vegetarianism and the meaning of meat. In: Murcott A (ed.) The Sociology of Food and Eating: Essays on the Sociological Significance of Food. Aldershot: Gower, pp. 18–30.
Van Dyke C (2018) Eat y’self-fitter: Orthorexia, sex and gender. In: Barnhill A, Doggett T and Budolfson M (eds) The Oxford Handbook of Food Ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 553–571.
Vester K (2015) A Taste of Power: Food and American Identities. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Watson-Mackie K, McKenzie H and McKay F (2023) Are mothers under lunchbox pressure? An exploration of the experiences of Victorian mothers preparing lunchboxes for their children. Health Promotion Journal of Australia 34(1): 91–99. DOI: 10.1002/hpja.681
West C and Zimmerman DH (1987) Doing gender. Gender and Society 1(2): 125–151.
West C and Zimmerman DH (2009) Accounting for doing gender. Gender and Society 23(1): 112–122.
Williams-Forson PA (2006) Building Houses Out of Chicken Legs. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.
Adler TA (1981) Making pancakes on Sunday: The male cook in family tradition. Western Folklore 40(1): 45–54. DOI: 10.2307/1499848
Altintas E and Sullivan O (2016) Fifty years of change updated: Cross-national gender convergence in housework. Demographic Research 35(16): 455–470. Available at: https://www.demographic-research.org/volumes/vol35/16/35-16.pdf
Appadurai A (1981) Gastro-politics in Hindu South Asia. American Ethnologist 8(3): 494–511. Available at: https://www.jstor.org/stable/644298
Bachórz A (2018) Hidden resources? Households’ strategies for maintaining control over food: Between continuity and discontinuity. Studia Humanistyczne AGH 17(2): 97–109. DOI: 10.7494/human.2018.17.2.97
Baszczak Ł, Lesiak M, Lewandowski M, Rozbicka I and Wincewicz A (2025) Podział obowiązków domowych i jego konsekwencje dla dzietności. Working Paper No. 2. Warszawa: Polski Instytut Ekonomiczny.
Belasco W (2008) Food: The Key Concepts. London: Bloomsbury.
Botreau H and Cohen MJ (2020) Gender inequality and food insecurity: A dozen years after the food price crisis, rural women still bear the brunt of poverty and hunger. Advances in Food Security and Sustainability 5: 53–117.
Brickell C (2005) Masculinities, performativity, and subversion: A sociological reappraisal. Men and Masculinities 8(1): 24–43. DOI: 10.1177/1097184X03257515
Bridges T and Pascoe CJ (2014) Hybrid masculinities: New directions in the sociology of men and masculinities. Sociology Compass 8(3): 246–258. DOI: 10.1111/soc4.12134
Brookes G and Chałupnik M (2022) Real men grill vegetables, not dead animals: Discourse representations of men in an online vegan community. Discourse, Context & Media 49(5): 100640. DOI: 10.1016/j.dcm.2022.100640
Buler M and Pustułka P (2020) Family practices across two generations of Poles: Between continuity and change. Przegląd Socjologiczny 69(2): 33–53. DOI: 10.26485/PS/2020/69.2/2
Butler J (2004) Undoing Gender. London: Routledge.
Charles N and Kerr M (1988) Women, Food and Families. Manchester: Manchester University Press.
Chen W (2016) From ‘junk food’ to ‘treats’: How parents talk about food and their children’s eating. Food, Culture & Society 19(1): 151–170. DOI: 10.1080/15528014.2016.1145008
Connell C (2010) Doing, undoing, or redoing gender? Learning from the workplace experiences of transpeople. Gender & Society 24(1): 31–55. DOI: 10.1177/0891243209356429
Counihan CM (2012) Gendering food. In: Pilcher J (ed.) The Oxford Handbook of Food History. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 99–116. DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199729937.013.0006
Counihan CM and Kaplan SL (1998) Food and Gender: Identity and Power. London: Routledge.
Crowther G (2013) Eating Culture: An Anthropological Guide to Food. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Deutsch FM (2007) Undoing gender. Gender & Society 21(1): 106–127. DOI: 10.1177/0891243206293577
DeVault ML (1991) Feeding the Family: The Social Organization of Caring as Gendered Work. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Dunn E (2004) Privatizing Poland: Baby Food, Big Business, and the Remaking of Labor. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
Ehlert J (2021) Food consumption, habitus and the embodiment of social change: Making class and doing gender in urban Vietnam. The Sociological Review 69(3): 681–701. DOI: 10.1177/00380261211009793
Garfinkel H (1967) Studies in Ethnomethodology. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Geist C and Ruppanner L (2018) Mission impossible? New housework theories for changing families. Journal of Family Theory and Review 10(3): 559–573. DOI: 10.1111/jftr.12245
Gherardi S (2005) Feminist theory and organization theory: A dialogue on new bases. In: Tsoukas H and Knudsen C (eds) The Oxford Handbook of Organization Theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 210–236. DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199275250.003.0008
Gronow J (2001) The Sociology of Taste. London: Routledge.
Haddaji M, Albors-Garrigós J and García-Segovia P (2017) Women chefs’ access barriers to Michelin stars: A case-study based approach. Journal of Culinary Science & Technology 15(4): 320–338. DOI: 10.1080/15428052.2017.1289133
Hammersley M (2010) Can we re-use qualitative data via secondary analysis? Notes on some terminological and substantive issues. Sociological Research Online 15(1): 47–53. DOI: 10.5153/sro.2076
Harman V and Cappellini B (2015) Mothers on display: Lunchboxes, social class and moral accountability. Sociology 49(4): 764–781. DOI: 10.1177/0038038514559322
Harman V and Cappellini B (2018) Boxed up? Lunchboxes and expansive mothering. Families, Relationships and Societies 7(3): 467–481. DOI: 10.1332/204674317X15009937780962
Hirschauer S (2001) Das Vergessen des Geschlechts: Zur Praxeologie einer Kategorie sozialer Ordnung. In: Heintz B (ed.) Geschlechtersoziologie. Wiesbaden: Westdeutscher Verlag, pp. 209–235.
Hollows J (2003) Oliver’s twist: Masculinity, nostalgia and television cooking. International Journal of Cultural Studies 6(2): 229–248. DOI: 10.1177/13678779030062005
Hryciuk R (2019) La alquimista de los sabores: Gastronomic heritage, gender, and the tourist imaginary in Mexico. RDC 24: 75–100. DOI: 10.36551/2081-1160.2019.24.75-100
Irwin S and Winterton M (2012) Qualitative secondary analysis and social explanation. Sociological Research Online 17(2): 1–12. DOI: 10.5153/sro.2626
ISSP Research Group (2022) International Social Survey Programme: Family and Changing Gender Roles V – ISSP 2022. GESIS Data Archive, Cologne. ZA10000 Data file Version 2.0.0. DOI: 10.4232/5.ZA10000.2.0.0
Jehlička P, Grīviņš M, Visser O and Balázs B (2020) Thinking food like an East European: A critical reflection on the framing of food systems. Journal of Rural Studies 76: 286–295. DOI: 10.1016/j.jrurstud.2020.04.015
Jensen W (2023) The strength to diet: If It Fits Your Macros dieting as masculine body work. Men and Masculinities 26(3): 398–414. DOI: 10.1177/1097184X231156160
Julier A (2014) Family and domesticity. In: Bentley A (ed.) A Cultural History of Food in the Modern Age, vol. 6. London: Bloomsbury Academic, pp. 145–165.
Jurczyk K, Jentsch B, Sailer J and Schier M (2019) Female-breadwinner families in Germany: New gender roles? Journal of Family Issues 40(13): 1731–1754. DOI: 10.1177/0192513X19843149
Jurik NC and Siemsen C (2009) Doing gender as canon or agenda: A symposium on West and Zimmerman. Gender & Society 23(1): 72–75. DOI: 10.1177/0891243208326677
Kessler SJ and McKenna W (1978) Gender: An Ethnomethodological Approach. New York: John Wiley.
Kopczyńska E (2021) Jedzenie i inne rzeczy. Kraków: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego.
Kopczyńska E and Zielińska K (2016) Feeding the body, feeding the gender: Cultural dimensions of food practices in Poland. East European Politics and Societies and Cultures 30(1): 147–168. DOI: 10.1177/0888325415570964
Król KE (2020) ‘We have all lived and breathed tea’: Gendered moral economies of factory tea production in Western Georgia. Ethnologia Polona 41: 93–111. DOI: 10.23858/ethp.2020.41.2415
Krywult-Albańska M (2024) Przemiany rodzin i gospodarstw domowych w Polsce w świetle danych ze spisów powszechnych. Wychowanie w Rodzinie 31(1): 107–131.
Levenstein HA (2012) Fear of Food: A History of Why We Worry About What We Eat. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Lewin K (1947) Frontiers in group dynamics. Human Relations 1(2): 5–41. DOI: 10.1177/001872674700100103
Lupton D (1996) Food, the Body and the Self. London: Sage.
Maciel A (2017) The cultural tensions between taste refinement and middle-class masculinity: A case study of craft beer aficionados. In: Chapman NG, Lellock S and Lippard CD (eds) Untapped: Exploring the Cultural Dimensions of Craft Beer. Morgantown: West Virginia University Press, pp. 203–221.
Matel A (2024) Stay or move out? Young adults’ housing trajectories in Poland over time and throughout economic cycle. Housing Studies 39(8): 2043–2065. DOI: 10.1080/02673037.2022.2153107
McIntosh A and Zey M (1992) Predicting intent to consume beef: Normative versus attitudinal influences. Rural Sociology 57(2): 250–265. DOI: 10.1111/j.1549-0831.1992.tb00466.x
Mol A (2021) Eating in Theory. Durham and London: Duke University Press.
Mroczkowska J (2019) Pork politics: The scales of home-made food in Eastern Poland. Appetite 140: 223–230. DOI: 10.1016/j.appet.2019.04.022
Murdock GP and Provost C (1973) Measurement of cultural complexity. Ethnology 12(4): 379–392. DOI: 10.2307/3773367
Nath J (2011) Gendered fare? A qualitative investigation of alternative food and masculinities. Journal of Sociology 47(3): 261–278. DOI: 10.1177/1440783310386828
Nentwich JC and Kelan EK (2014) Towards a topology of ‘doing gender’: An analysis of empirical research and its challenges. Gender, Work & Organization 21(2): 121–134. DOI: 10.1111/gwao.12025
Nielsen HB (2017) Feeling Gender: A Generational and Psychosocial Approach. London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 281–300. DOI: 10.1057/978-1-349-95082-9_10
O’Connell R and Brannen J (2016) Food, Families and Work. London: Bloomsbury Academic.
Oláh LS, Kotowska IE and Richter R (2018) The new roles of men and women and implications for families and societies. In: A Demographic Perspective on Gender, Family and Health in Europe. Cham: Springer, pp. 41–64. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-72356-3_4
Parasecoli F, Bachórz A and Halawa M (2025) The Pierogi Problem: Cosmopolitan Appetites and the Reinvention of Polish Food. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Pawelec A (2021) Analiza struktury wydatków konsumpcyjnych polskich gospodarstw domowych według typu biologicznego. Metody Ilościowe w Badaniach Ekonomicznych 22(3): 87–96.
Pettersson K and Heldt Cassel S (2014) Women tourism entrepreneurs: Doing gender on farms in Sweden. Gender in Management: An International Journal 29(8): 487–504. DOI: 10.1108/GM-02-2014-0016
Poggio B (2006) Editorial: Outline of a theory of gender practices. Gender, Work & Organization 13(3): 225–233. DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-0432.2006.00305.x
Poulain J-P (2017) The Sociology of Food: Eating and the Place of Food in Society. London: Bloomsbury.
Risman B (2018) Gender as a social structure. In: Risman B, Froyum CM and Scarborough WJ (eds) Handbook of the Sociology of Gender. Cham: Springer, pp. 19–44. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-76333-0_2
Ross-Plourde M and Lachance-Grzela M (2025) The gendered division of housework in North America: A systematic review from 2014 to 2024. Journal of Family Theory and Review 17(3): 691–720. DOI: 10.1111/jftr.70000
Ruggiano N and Perry TE (2019) Conducting secondary analysis of qualitative data: Should we, can we, and how? Qualitative Social Work 18(1): 81–97. DOI: 10.1177/1473325017700701
Storz MA (2022) Current sex distribution of cooking and food shopping responsibilities in the United States: A cross-sectional study. Foods 11(18): 2840. DOI: 10.3390/foods11182840
Straczuk J (2016) Dawne i obecne strategie życiowe Polaków: wzory i realia społeczne. In: Kurczewska J and Karkowska M (eds) Przemiany kulturowe we współczesnej Polsce: ramy, właściwości, epizody. Warszawa: IFiS PAN Publishing.
Straczuk J (2018) Risk and trust: Food-related concerns and ‘good’ food procurement strategies. From research into eating practices in Poland. Studia Humanistyczne AGH 17(2): 111–123.
Sumpter KC (2015) Masculinity and meat consumption: An analysis through the theoretical lens of hegemonic masculinity and alternative masculinity theories. Sociology Compass 9(2): 104–114. DOI: 10.1111/soc4.12241
Suwada K (2021) Parenting and Work in Poland. Cham: Springer International Publishing.
Szabo M (2014) Men nurturing through food: Challenging gender dichotomies around domestic cooking. Journal of Gender Studies 23(1): 18–31. DOI: 10.1080/09589236.2012.711945
Taylor DE, Lusuegro A, Loong V, et al. (2022) Racial, gender, and age dynamics in Michigan’s urban and rural farmers markets: Reducing food insecurity, and the impacts of a pandemic. The American Behavioral Scientist 66(7): 894–936. DOI: 10.1177/00027642211013387
Thomas M (2016) Are vegans the same as vegetarians? The effect of diet on perceptions of masculinity. Appetite 97: 79–86. DOI: 10.1016/j.appet.2015.11.021
Trubek AB (2013) Kitchen work: 1920–present. In: Bentley A (ed.) A Cultural History of Food in the Late Modern Age. London: Bloomsbury, pp. 127–145.
Twigg J (1986) Vegetarianism and the meaning of meat. In: Murcott A (ed.) The Sociology of Food and Eating: Essays on the Sociological Significance of Food. Aldershot: Gower, pp. 18–30.
Van Dyke C (2018) Eat y’self-fitter: Orthorexia, sex and gender. In: Barnhill A, Doggett T and Budolfson M (eds) The Oxford Handbook of Food Ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 553–571.
Vester K (2015) A Taste of Power: Food and American Identities. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Watson-Mackie K, McKenzie H and McKay F (2023) Are mothers under lunchbox pressure? An exploration of the experiences of Victorian mothers preparing lunchboxes for their children. Health Promotion Journal of Australia 34(1): 91–99. DOI: 10.1002/hpja.681
West C and Zimmerman DH (1987) Doing gender. Gender and Society 1(2): 125–151.
West C and Zimmerman DH (2009) Accounting for doing gender. Gender and Society 23(1): 112–122.
Williams-Forson PA (2006) Building Houses Out of Chicken Legs. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.
Section
Articles
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
CC BY 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/
You are free to:
Share — copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format
Adapt — remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially.
This license is acceptable for Free Cultural Works.
The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms as long as you follow the license terms.
Under the following terms:
Attribution — You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.
No additional restrictions — You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.
How to Cite
Maj , A. , Goszczyński, W. and Wójtewicz, A. (2026) “Contemporary Vestals in the Masterchef’s Kitchen: Doing and Undoing Gender in Domestic Food Practices”, The International Journal of Sociology of Agriculture and Food, 32(1), pp. 149–167. doi:10.48416/ijsaf.v31i1.747.
Funding data
-
Narodowe Centrum Nauki
Grant numbers 2017/26/D/HS6/00869 ;;2018/31/D/HS6/02215