[Sca-cooks] Re:Larousse

[Daniel Phelps]

Johnnae llyn Lewis so sagely wrote:

I wouldn't
>recommend Larousse to anyone less than expert level
>because of the number of food history mistakes and
>errors that are in the work. Classic, it might be
>but accurate it isn't. Save your money and buy
>the Alan Davidson THE OXFORD COMPANON TO FOOD
>and I would price that through some online sources
>for the best buy.

Indeed my lady I've been meaning to take a look at the Oxford.  I suggested
Larousse because it has such an encyclopedic approach to food and its
preparation and second hand older editions are so cheap.  I use it to check
a redaction against a modern standard for the same foods.   I didn't realize
that its forays into food history were so flawed.  Francocentric and
Anglophobic I recognized as a given, ...presumedly its remarks about Henry
VIII and "Sir Loin" and the "Baron of Beef" in the 1961 copy I own are to be
taken with a grain of salt. :-P

Daniel Raoul