SC - Fat Pig, Lean Pig

[Daniel Phelps]

Ras quoted me:

For further information on this and other nuts check out
>> "The Book of Edible Nuts" by Fredrick Rosengarten, Jr.  I have a signed
>> copy, it's a great book.


And asked:

 Would this be a good book on use
>of nuts in Medieval Europe? Or is it more oriented toward modern times?


Yes all though it is oriented to modern times it would in in selected cases
be a good general secondary source and a possible source of primary quotes.
The text is broken down into two main sections, Twelve Selected Edible Nuts
and Thirty Other Edible Nuts.  The entries in the first section are, as
might be expected, more extensive and generally start with roughly 2 to 5
pages of history of which, depending on the nut, usually two thirds to half
is period or pre-period European.  The first section consists of entries for
almonds, brazil nuts, cashew nuts, chestnuts, coconuts, filberts
(hazelnuts), macadamia nuts, peanuts, pistachio nuts, sun flower seeds, and
Persian walnuts.  Each entry ends with a page or two of tasty, if modern,
sounding recipes.  A couple of caveats, yes I suppose some of these "nuts"
are not true nuts, i.e. peanuts, or not period, i.e. macadamia nuts, but
even the non-period entries are quite interesting.

The entries in the second section for acorns, beechnuts, betel nuts, sesame
seeds, and water melon seeds contain some excellent historical information
as well.

The book's ISBN and LCCCN's are: 0-8027-0769-9 and 83-40389 respectively.
The books fly leaf indicates that he also wrote  "The Book of Spices" and
"Freebooters Must Die!"  I presume that the first would be of interest to
the list but I have never seen it.

The book also contains a seven page glossary, an extensive bibliography, a
multi-page "Illustration Acknowledgements" and a recipe index.  As numerous
period wood cuts are reproduced in the book it is nice that their sources,
for the purpose of documentation of a primary source, are revealed.

Daniel Raoul

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