Best of
Food-History

2009

Food Production Operations


Parvinder S. Bali - 2009
    The book covers the basics of all the kitchens Western, Indian, and pastry, along with new tools and technologies that are being used today. The concepts are illustrated with the help of photographs, videos, charts, layouts, tables, etc.Beginning with an introduction to cookery, the book goes on to discuss basic menu planning, principles and methods of cooking, and imparts to the readers an understanding of meats, vegetables, fruits, pastries, and so on. It explores the history and evolution of Indian cuisine and delves into the basics of Indian gravies. The book also includes sections on food safety, ergonomics, internal and external customers, and modern cooking equipment, new concepts in wine and pairing, game and poultry.The book would be very useful to hotel management students and aspiring chefs in understanding the basics of kitchen operations and also their practical applications, which are illustrated with photographs and videos.

The City Tavern Cookbook: Recipes from the Birthplace of American Cuisine


Walter Staib - 2009
    City Tavern was the social, political, and economic center of late 18th-century Philadelphia. Called the “most genteel” tavern in America by John Adams, it gained fame as the gathering place for members of the Continental Congresses and the Constitutional Convention, and for officials of the early Federal Government.With more than 300 tempting, simple-to-make recipes and full-color photography, City Tavern will help home chefs and history buffs alike recreate the same dishes enjoyed by George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and Benjamin Franklin. Featuring traditional favorites such as West Indies pepperpot soup, roasted duckling with chutney, Martha Washington’s recipe for chocolate mousse cake, and Thomas Jefferson’s own recipe for sweet-potato biscuits, this book’s recipes are sure to entice adults and children alike, while simultaneously providing them with a wealth of fascinating American and culinary history!More than just a cookbook, City Tavern is a treasury of American history.

The Opera of Bartolomeo Scappi (1570): L'Arte Et Prudenza D'Un Maestro Cuoco (the Art and Craft of a Master Cook)


Bartolomeo Scappi - 2009
    1500-1577) was arguably the most famous chef of the Italian Renaissance. He oversaw the preparation of meals for several Cardinals and was such a master of his profession that he became the personal cook for two Popes. At the culmination of his prolific career he compiled the largest cookery treatise of the period to instruct an apprentice on the full craft of fine cuisine, its methods, ingredients, and recipes. Accompanying his book was a set of unique and precious engravings that show the ideal kitchen of his day, its operations and myriad utensils, and are exquisitely reproduced in this volume.Scappi's Opera presents more than one thousand recipes along with menus that comprise up to a hundred dishes, while also commenting on a cook's responsibilities. Scappi also included a fascinating account of a pope's funeral and the complex procedures for feeding the cardinals during the ensuing conclave. His recipes inherit medieval culinary customs, but also anticipate modern Italian cookery with a segment of 230 recipes for pastry of plain and flaky dough (torte, ciambelle, pastizzi, crostate) and pasta (tortellini, tagliatelli, struffoli, ravioli, pizza).Terence Scully presents the first English translation of the work. His aim is to make the recipes and the broad experience of this sophisticated papal cook accessible to a modern English audience interested in the culinary expertise and gastronomic refinement within the most civilized niche of Renaissance society.

Gourmet Patisseries of Paris


Caroline Mignot - 2009
    Temptations abound for the sweet tooth in Paris, from the hottest culinary trends to time-honored classics. Pâtisserie is an integral part of the city’s culinary tradition and the source of countless delectable creations that combine fruit, cream fillings, icings, frostings, mousses, and pastry. Readers will yield to sweet temptation as they discover the best pastries and cakes the city has to offer, including macarons, éclairs, baba au rum, tarts, mont blanc, polonaises, and oriental cakes. Twenty pastry chefs show off their artful creations and share their signature recipes, which are described in the context of their historical tradition, composition, and gastronomic properties. The evolution of the pastry art is also explained, focusing in particular on the new generation of Parisian pâtissiers and chocolatiers, buzzing with the creativity and ingenuity that are redefining their craft. The book includes an address book of the best pâtisseries and tea rooms in Paris along with twenty recipes from the city’s most respected pastry chefs.

Save the Deli: In Search of Perfect Pastrami, Crusty Rye, and the Heart of Jewish Delicatessen


David Sax - 2009
    As a journalist and lifelong deli lover, he watched in dismay as one beloved deli after another closed its doors, only to be reopened as some bland chain restaurant laying claim to the cuisine it just paved over. Was it still possible to save the deli? He writes about the food itself?how it?s made, who makes it best, and where to go for particular dishes?and, ultimately, what he finds is hope: deli newly and lovingly made in places like Boulder, Colorado, longstanding deli traditions thriving in Montreal, and the resurrection of iconic institutions like New York's 2nd Avenue Deli. No cultural history of food has ever tasted so good.

The Medieval Cook


Bridget Ann Henisch - 2009
    An excellent book and a delight to read, written with panache and entirely convincing.' Professor PETER COSS, Cardiff University. This book takes us into the world of the medieval cook, from the chefs in the great medieval courts and aristocratic households catering for huge feasts, to the peasant wife attempting to feed her family from scarce resources, from cooking at street stalls to working as hired caterers for private functions. It shows how they were presented in the art, literature and moral commentary of the period (valued on some grounds, despised on others), how they functioned, and how they coped with the limitations and the expectations which faced them in different social settings. Particular use is made of their frequent appearance in the margins of illuminated manuscript, whether as decoration, or as a teaching tool.

Food, Drink and Celebrations of the Hudson Valley Dutch


Peter G. Rose - 2009
    The Hudson River Valley is what he discovered instead, and along its banks Dutch culture took hold. While the Dutch influence can still be seen in local architecture and customs, it is food and drink that Peter Rose has made her life's work. From beer to bread and cookies to coleslaw, Food, Drink and Celebrations of the Hudson Valley Dutch is a comprehensive look at this important early American influence, complete with recipes to try.

New Orleans Cuisine: Fourteen Signature Dishes and Their Histories


Susan Tucker - 2009
    Devoting each chapter to a signature cocktail, appetizer, sandwich, main course, staple, or dessert, contributors from the New Orleans Culinary Collective plate up the essence of the Big Easy through its best-known export: great cooking. This book views the city's cuisine as a whole, forgetting none of its flavorful ethnic influences--French, African American, German, Italian, Spanish, and more.In servings of such well-recognized foods as shrimp remoulade, Creole tomato salad, turtle soup, and bread pudding, contributors explore a broad range of issues. Essays consider the history of refrigeration and ice in the city, famous restaurants, cooking schools, and the differences between Cajun and Creole cuisines. Biographical sketches of New Orleans's luminaries--including Mary Land, Corinne Dunbar, and Lena Richard--give personality to the stories. Recipes for each dish or beverage, drawn from historical cookbooks and contemporary chefs, complete the package.New Orleans Cuisine shows how ingredients, ethnicities, cooks, chefs, and consumers all converged over time to make the city a culinary capital.

What the Slaves Ate: Recollections of African American Foods and Foodways from the Slave Narratives


Herbert C. Covey - 2009
    The authors connect African foods and food preparation to the development during slavery of Southern cuisines having African influences, including Cajun, Creole, and what later became known as soul food, drawing on the recollections of ex-slaves recorded by Works Progress Administration interviewers. Valuable for its fascinating look into the very core of slave life, this book makes a unique contribution to our knowledge of slave culture and of the complex power relations encoded in both owners' manipulation of food as a method of slave control and slaves' efforts to evade and undermine that control.While a number of scholars have discussed slaves and their foods, slave foodways remains a relatively unexplored topic. The authors' findings also augment existing knowledge about slave nutrition while documenting new information about slave diets.

Steeped in History: The Art of Tea


Beatrice HoheneggerBarbara G. Carson - 2009
    In ancient China tea was regarded as one of the seven daily necessities of life; for many Japanese it has served as a ritual element in the quest for enlightenment. In England afternoon tea holds an immutable place in the popular imagination, while in the United States it is often associated with the American Revolution.While various teas have been prepared in an assortment of ways and have played parts in countless culinary practices, it is also important to note that tea is and nearly always been a highly important commodity. As such, it has played a variety of striking and often paradoxical roles on the world stage--an ancient health remedy, an element of cultural practice, a source of profound spiritual insights, but also a catalyst for brutal international conflict, drug trafficking, crushing taxes, and horrific labor conditions.In the course of Steeped in History, editor Beatrice Hohenegger and eleven distinguished historians and art historians trace the impact of tea from its discovery in ancient China to the present-day tea plantations of Assam, crossing oceans and continents in the process. In so doing, they examine the multitude of ways in which tea has figured in the visual and literary arts. These include not only the myriad vessels fashioned for the preparation, presentation, and consumption of tea but also tea-related scenes embellishing ceramics and textiles and forming the subject of paintings, drawings, caricature, songs, and poetry.

Food and Cooking in Ancient Rome


Clive Gifford - 2009
    Now your readers can experience the culture of this wide spread empire though the foods that sustained them during their massive expansion across Europe. Recipes, interesting facts, and lots of cultural information make this a fascinating way to learn about the culture of ancient Rome.

Eat Right for Your Body Type: The Super-Healthy Diet Inspired by Ayurveda. Anjum Anand


Anjum Anand - 2009
    Featuring 75 delicious recipes from East and West for healthy eating, Anjum Anand outlines her methods for maintaining a perfect body weight and optimum health.

The Evolution of Hominin Diets: Integrating Approaches to the Study of Palaeolithic Subsistence


Jean-Jacques Hublin - 2009
    The objective of the volume is to explore if there is a consensus between the different methods, allowing us to better understand the nature of hominin dietary strategies through time. Contributions focus on modern studies, faunal studies, physical anthropology, archaeological studies, and isotopic studies, all aimed at answering the major questions of the evolution of hominid diets, such as: meat-eating emergence, hunting vs. scavenging, hunting technologies, and resource intensification in later humans.‘Assembling a rich blend from the realms of archaeology, paleoanthropology and isotopic analysis, this excellent text confronts the perennial question: what was our ancestral diet?’ --Henry Schwarcz, McMaster University, Ontario, Canada'This masterful multidisciplinary synthesis of human dietary evolution is simply a must-have reference for all biological anthropologists, archaeologists and palaeoanthropologists interested in our past.' --Leslie Aiello, Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research