- In America, gender-based food associations started after the Civil War (1870s) when more women began entering the workforce.
- Lunch time restaurants started opening to give women an alternative to rowdy workingmen’s cafes and free-lunch (after purchase of beer) bars.
- Magazines and newspapers then started labelling light foods such as fish, white meat cottage cheese and desserts as “dainty” or feminine.
- In the mid-1950s, cookbooks instructed women on foods to prepare that appeal to their husbands and boyfriends.
- Despite societal shifts, gender-based food associations remain.
