[Sca-cooks] Albala teaching one of The Great Courses

[Katja]

Greetings,

Just in case no one else has mentioned this, the Teaching Company catalog that came in today's mail heralded this new WONDERFUL course! I am so jazzed to get this to listen to on our next road trip!


(I've purchased several history, nutrition, and other courses on CD from this company to listen to while driving, and most of them have been fascinating. They can be pricey, but fortunately some libraries lend them.) 


http://www.thegreatcourses.com/tgc/courses/course_detail.aspx?cid=9180 

Food: A Cultural Culinary HistoryEating is an indispensable human activity. As a result, whether we realize it 
or not, the drive to obtain food has been a major catalyst across all of history, from prehistoric times to the present. Epicure Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin 
said it best: "Gastronomy governs the whole life of man."  
In fact, civilization itself began in the quest for food. Humanity's 
transition to  agriculture was not only the greatest social revolution 
in history, but it directly produced the structures and institutions we 
call "civilization." 
In  every era, the unfolding of history 
has been intimately tied to the need for  food, the production of food, 
and the culture of food. In all major religions, food choice has been an integral part of religious identity. The quest for  spices and exotic 
foodstuffs led to the European discovery of the New World, as well as to the connecting of the entire globe through trade. In 1840s Ireland a  
single food—the potato—changed the course of history. Modern warfare, 
from  Napoleon's conquests to World War II, was made possible by 
advances in food technology. 
In our own times, more people 
worldwide now recognize the McDonald's "golden  arches" than the 
Christian cross. Beyond feeding our bodies, food choices and ideologies 
express social distinctions, as well as our values, concerns, and 
aspirations. For all of these reasons, food offers a deeply insightful 
lens on human history, shedding new light on the evolution of social and political systems, on cultural  interactions, economic empires, human 
migrations, and more. Through food culture, we see how primary 
biological needs have shaped all human lives through the ages. The 
history of food is the history of human life at its most  elemental, its most intimate, its most essential. It's also a story of ingenuity, 
creativity, and remarkable human behavior to rival any other aspect of 
culture.
In Food: A Cultural Culinary History, 
award-winning Professor Ken Albala of the University of the Pacific puts this  extraordinary subject on the table, taking you on an enthralling 
journey into the human relationship to food. With this innovative 
course, you'll travel the world discovering fascinating food lore and 
culture of all regions and eras—as an eye-opening lesson in history as 
well as a unique window on what we eat today. 
Incorporating  
extensive study of historical recipes, food preparation techniques from 
around  the world, and activities you can try at home, these 36 colorful lectures take you through the entire spectrum of food history, from the cuisine of ancient Egypt to the great flowering of European cookery in 
the Middle Ages, and from  the celebrity chefs of 18th-century France to our own Zagat- and Michelin-rated restaurant culture. Along the way, 
you learn in depth about food  production and technology in each era; 
the social, economic, and political factors surrounding food culture; 
and thinking on diet and eating through the centuries. The result is a 
compelling inquiry that will change the way you look at both history and food itself. 
Food as a Driver of Human History 
As context for exploring humanity's remarkable food cultures, you observe 
the integral role of food in the unfolding of civilization. From 
prehistory to our own era, your study includes these seminal subjects: 
	* The revolutions of agriculture: Learn how agriculture arose in the prehistoric world and how it spurred the 
development of urban organization, political systems, social classes, 
militaries, and trade. 
	* Food and faith: Grasp how food practices became core expressions of religious faith in 
Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, as well as  in the Eastern traditions 
of Buddhism, Hinduism, and Taoism. 1492 and food globalization: Track the great trading empires of the Venetians, Portuguese, and Spanish, 
and the "Columbian exchange," where plants and animals from five 
continents were transplanted across the world.
	* Coffee, tea, sugar, and slaves: Discover how the trade in a group of superfluous luxury items in the 
era of European colonialism altered the focus of the global economy.
	* Eating in the Industrial Revolution: Learn how capital-intensive, mass food production in the Industrial Revolution forever changed human diet and nutrition.
	* Big business and food imperialism: Observe the vast industrialization of food production in the late 19th and 20th centuries; its economic and human consequences; and the ideologies, 
movements, and practices that arose to oppose it.    
A Global Richness of Culinary Cultures
At the heart of the course, you delve deeply into classic food traditions 
around the world. Among civilizations of Europe, Asia, Africa, and the 
Americas, your inquiry highlights these traditions:  
	* Status and ritual in ancient Rome: Learn how Roman food reflected social rank, wealth, and sophistication, and 
investigate  the dining habits of the upwardly mobile as well as the 
gastronomic eccentricities of the emperor Heliogabalus.
	* The exquisite flavors of medieval Islamic cuisine: In a culture with no injunction against pleasure, learn how the medieval 
Muslims' sensual dishes—richly spiced, colored, or perfumed—reflected 
visions of a paradise on earth.
	* Aztec food culture: In this unique New World tradition, discover the Aztec way of life—the 
indigenous foodstuffs, eating rituals, and "signature" foods, from 
chilies to chocolate.
	* Sumptuous dining in the Renaissance: Study the sophistication and complexity of Renaissance-era food culture in 
the writings of Platina, Ficino, and Messisbugo, and witness the 
extravagance of banquets at the court of  Ferrara.   
	* The genesis of French haute cuisine: Grasp the aesthetics of French 17th-century cookery, based in refinement and 
pureness of flavors and study four Gallic cookbooks that revolutionized 
culinary history. 
	* "Scientific" cooking in the 21st century: In our own diverse era, encounter the phenomenon of "molecular 
gastronomy"—technology-enhanced food creations designed to titillate and amaze the palate.
A Colorful and Diverse Learning Experience
Expanding on the lectures and in-studio demonstrations of food preparation 
techniques,  the course guidebook presents a series of 39 hands-on 
activities—where you can learn how to make everything from Egyptian beer to Elizabethan "Chickin Pye"—that give you direct experience of how 
people cooked, ate, and thought about food in  past eras. You also 
practice medieval eating rituals, track the rich evocation of food in 
art, and immerse yourself in the poetic ambiance of classic Japanese 
dining. 
Across the span of the centuries you sample important 
food writing from many cultures, from the world’s first surviving 
recipes written in cuneiform to the lavish dishes of Apicius of Rome, 
and from the classic medieval cookbooks of  Taillevent and Chiquart to 
the 19th-century Guide Culinaire by Escoffier. 

And, throughout the series, the lectures pulsate with surprising and intriguing details of the human adventure with food:
	* Dinner knives with rounded tips were developed to reduce the threat of violence at the table. 
	* The English word  "dinner," from the Latin disjejunare, literally means "break-fast."   
	* The banana, which we know as a single fruit, actually exists in hundreds of diverse varieties.
	* The world's first restaurant-based food culture was Edo-era Japan.
	* The separation of sweet and savory flavors that we know today is relatively recent  historically. Before the 16th century, meat and fish were often cooked with sugar, fruit, and syrups. 
	* The Middle Ages  produced some of history's most outlandish and theatrical 
presentations of  food, such as gilded boars' heads; "invented" 
creatures, mixing parts of different animals; and cooked peacocks 
spewing flames.
Food: A Cultural Culinary History offers you an insightful and startlingly different view of our 
civilization  that you won't find anywhere else, revealing the 
development of societies and cultures through the single factor that has driven human life more than any other. In the process, you discover the stunning richness of world cultures as seen in their distinctive food 
traditions, and greatly broaden your own enjoyment of fine food.

Dr. Ken Albala is Professor of History at the University of the 
Pacific in Stockton, California, where he teaches food history and the 
history of early modern Europe. He is also a Visiting Professor at 
Boston University, where he teaches an advanced food history course in 
the gastronomy program. He earned an M.A. in History from Yale 
University and a Ph.D. in History from Columbia University.
Professor Albala is the author or editor of 16 books on food. His 
four-volume Food Cultures of the World Encyclopedia was published in 
2011. He is also coeditor of the journal Food, Culture & Society and general editor of the series AltaMira Studies in Food and Gastronomy, 
for which he has written a textbook titled Three World Cuisines: 
Italian, Mexican, Chinese, which won the 2013 Gourmand World Cookbook 
Award for Best Foreign Cuisine Book in the World. In 2009, he won the 
Faye and Alex G. Spanos Distinguished Teaching Award at the University 
of the Pacific. 
Other books include Eating Right in the Renaissance; Food in 
Early Modern Europe; Cooking in Europe, 1250–1650; The Banquet: Dining 
in the Great Courts of Late Renaissance Europe; and the award-winningBeans: A History. He also coedited Food and Faith in Christian Culture andA Cultural History of Food in the Renaissance, among other books.