Cooking Up Change: Food and Gentrification in The Bear (2022-)

Emerging as a terrain where gentrification’s impacts and conflicts are vividly illustrated, the interconnectedness between food and gentrification serves as a lens through which scholars can study the shifting landscapes of neighborhoods. Food is not just a symbol of gentrification, seen as “a harbinger of things to come” (Alkon et al. 5), it manifests as a tangible force in the form of ‘fancy’ coffee shops, restaurants, or grocery stores that can actively contribute to changes in a city’s neighborhood. A notable example for studying the relationship between food and gentrification is FX’s The Bear (2022–), a critically acclaimed kitchen ‘dramedy’ that deals with a young chef struggling to uphold the family restaurant in the changing Chicago neighborhood of River North. Through an analysis of the changing Italian beef sandwich shop and its effect on the neighborhood, I demonstrate that the transformation of the restaurant represents the processes of retail gentrification, a form of gentrification that changes neighborhoods through the upscaling of businesses (Hubbard 296). To examine the representation of this specific form of gentrification in The Bear, this article focuses on three key aspects: the restaurant, the neighborhood, and the characters.