Di Balik Dapur Kolonial: Interaksi Juru Masak Pribumi Dengan Orang Eropa di Hotel dan Restoran Hindia Belanda (1870–1942)

Abstract

The development of hotels and restaurants in the Dutch East Indies since the late 19th century encouraged the formation of new workspaces for indigenous workers, including hotel and restaurant cooks (Koksvak) who previously worked mostly in the domestic sector. Hotel and restaurant kitchens became meeting places for indigenous cooks and Europeans, filled with social, cultural, and colonial power relations. This study aims to analyze the forms of work interaction between indigenous cooks and Europeans in Dutch East Indies hotel and restaurant kitchens during the period 1870–1942 and explain its impact on the transformation of the role of cooks. This study uses historical methods, including heuristics, source criticism, interpretation, and historiography, using a role theory and social class theory approach. The results show that hotel and restaurant kitchens were hierarchical work spaces oriented towards European standards, where indigenous cooks were in a subordinate position under the supervision of European chefs and management. The interactions that took place included work supervision, discipline, and the transfer of culinary knowledge, especially in Western cooking and serving techniques. However, these interactions also reveal racial and class inequalities that limit the mobility and position of indigenous cooks. Nevertheless, indigenous cooks play an important role in the formation of Indis cuisine and experience a change in status from domestic workers to professionals in the colonial hotel and restaurant sector.