Browsing by Subject "ruoanvalmistaja"

Objectives The purpose of the study is to find out how the 14 cookbooks selected for research help homemakers towards a more ecological and sustainable future. Research questions are divided into three themes: sustainable development, ecology and ecological choices. This study examines the pictures, recipes and texts for cookbooks as well as the functionality of their instructions. In general, very few studies have been conducted on cookbooks. Methods The study focuses on 14 Finnish cookbooks, each containing a structure of recipes according to different seasons. Cookbooks were published during years 2010-2013 and were written by food professionals, amateurs, musicians, and other people familiar with the topic. The data were analyzed by using qualitative content analysis with the help of key questions: what, why and how. Books within the same theme were compared against each other, and recipes and pictures were evaluated for how they support the homemaker. Results and Conclusions Originally, the cookbooks studied here were supposed to be ecological, however, the seasonal separation was not sufficient to describe ecological qualities, since ecology is the sum of many factors as defined by the theoretical part of the thesis. The cookbooks studied here help the homemaker to move towards a more ecological and sustainable future to varying degrees. Only two cookbooks emerged as more informative on the topic. When the homemaker is ready to make sustainable changes, he or she can get new ideas for everyday life, such as dining instructions, from the ecological cookbooks. Thus it can be said that ecological cookbooks play a role in helping the homemaker to move towards a more ecological and sustainable future.