[Sca-cooks] Books of Possible Interest

[Johnna Holloway]

Food the History of Taste
I have to admit to rather liking it generally.
The important thing to remember about this book is that it is a 
collection of
essays. So here is what who get--
Introduction:; A new history of cuisine by Paul Freedman
 Hunter-gatherers and the first farmers: the evolution of taste in 
prehistory by Alan K. Outram
The good things that lay at hand: tastes of ancient Greece and Rome by 
Veronika Grimm
The quest for perfect balance: taste and gastronomy in imperial China by 
Joanna Waley-Cohen
The pleasures of consumption: the birth of medieval Islamic cuisine by 
H. D. Miller
Feasting and fasting: food and taste in Europe in the Middle Ages by C. 
M. Woolgar
New worlds, new tastes: food fashions after the Renaissance by Brian Cowan
 The birth of the modern consumer age: food innovations from 1800 by 
Hans J. Teuteberg
Chefs, gourmets and gourmands: French cuisine in the 19th and 20th 
centuries by Alain Drouard
Dining out: the development of the restaurant by Elliott Shore
Novelty and tradition: the new landscape for gastronomy by Peter Scholliers.


It's a pretty coffee table or gift book as it's an
oversized volume filled with very nicely chosen color illustrations and 
photos.
In many ways it's a limited volume in that it doesn't come close to 
covering everything in terms of food and food history, but what
it does cover is well written and interesting. Not ground breaking or 
earth shattering, but nice to read.
It's not a reference volume or encyclopedia. Recipes-- not really. Only 
in terms of being mentioned
in the text. Yes to a Bibliography arranged by chapters.

This is a book that you should be able to see at larger bookstores like 
Barnes & Noble
and Borders. Make them open up and let you take a look at it.

The editor Paul Freedman has another volume coming out in June 2008
titled Out of the East: Spices and the Medieval Imagination. Yale
is publishing that one. It looks like it may be most interesting.

Johnna, playing librarian
*

*Daniel & Elizabeth Phelps wrote:
> What is the consensus on Food, the History of Taste?  I have Food in 
> History, The History of Food and Fast and Feast.
>
> Daniel
>   
>