Best of
Food-History
2020
In Search of the Wild Tofurky: How a Business Misfit Pioneered Plant-Based Foods Before They Were Cool
Seth Tibbott - 2020
Success doesn’t happen overnight. Except for Seth Tibbott, to whom it does—but only after fifteen years of intrepid failure. In Search of the Wild Tofurky tells the triumphant tale of how a self-described hippie with no business training but plenty of enterprising goals grew a $2,500 startup into a global brand and ushered in a plant-based foods renaissance along the way. Tibbott took home a grand total of $31,000 in his first nine years of striving to bring to the people a nearly unknown soy product—tempeh—he knew in his gut was revolutionarily tasty. He eschewed a buttoned-up lifestyle and resided in tipis, trailers, and a treehouse; rented workspace to piano-repairing circus clowns; and even briefly counted the infamous Rajneeshees as clients. Tibbott was never one to chase the money or try to fit in. Instead, he built a business that fit him. Thus Tibbott discovered the “secret sauce” ingredients that took his now-international brand from fameless to fame-ish to famous: bootstrapping, building business intuition, and staying true to his belief in eco-friendly practices. In Search of the Wild Tofurky proves that a good idea can change the world and make money, no matter the naysayers or the sometimes harsh twists and turns of the unconventional path. Look no further for a delightfully unexpected $100 million story of hope and hustle.
Eating the Empire: Food and Society in Eighteenth-Century Britain
Troy Bickham - 2020
Bickham reveals how trade in the empire’s edibles underpinned the emerging consumer economy, fomenting the rise of modern retailing, visual advertising, and consumer credit, and, via taxes, financed the military and civil bureaucracy that secured, governed, and spread the British Empire.
The British Baking Book: The History of British Baking, Savory and Sweet
Regula Ysewijn - 2020
With over 100 iconic recipes, The British Baking Book tells the wonderfully evocative story of baking in Britain - and how this internationally cherished tradition has evolved from its rich heritage to today’s immense popularity of The Great British Bake Off.With lavish imagery and evocative narrative, the expert-baker author details the landscape, history, ingenuity, and legends - and show-stopping recipes - that have made British baking a worldwide phenomenon. From cakes, biscuits, and buns to custards, tarts, and pies, authentic recipes for Britain’s spectacular sweet and savory baked goods are included here - like pink-frosted Tottenham cake, jam-layered Victoria sandwich cake, quintessential tea loaf, sweet lamb pie, Yorksire curd tart, and more.Illustrating the story of how British baking evolved throughout the country, many of the recipes have a sense-of-place heritage like Dorset apple cake, Whitby lemon buns, Cornish cake, Grasmere gingerbread, and Scottish oatcakes. Evocative and fascinating, this cookbook offers a guided tour of Britain’s best baking.
Abalone: The Remarkable History and Uncertain Future of California's Iconic Shellfish
Ann Vileisis - 2020
Prized for iridescent shells and delectable meat, these unique shellfish inspired indigenous artisans, bohemian writers, California cuisine, and the popular sport of skin diving, but also became a highly coveted commercial commodity. Mistakenly regarded as an inexhaustible seafood, abalone ultimately became vulnerable to overfishing and early impacts of climate change.As the first and only comprehensive history of these once abundant but now tragically imperiled shellfish, Abalone guides the reader through eras of discovery, exploitation, scientific inquiry, fierce disputes between sport and commercial divers, near-extinction, and determined recovery efforts. Combining rich cultural and culinary history with hard-minded marine science, grassroots activism, and gritty politics, Ann Vileisis chronicles the plight of California’s abalone species and the growing biological awareness that has become crucial to conserve these rare animals into the future.Abalone reveals the challenges of reckoning with past misunderstandings, emerging science, and political intransigence, while underscoring the vulnerability of wild animals to human appetites and environmental change. An important contribution to the emerging field of marine environmental history, this is a must-read for scientists, conservationists, environmental historians, and all who remember abalone fondly.
Columbus Pizza: A Slice of History
Jim Ellison - 2020
This history goes back to the 1930s, when TAT Ristorante began serving pizza. Today, it is the oldest family-owned restaurant in the city. Over the years, a specific style evolved guided by the experiences and culinary interpretations of local pizza pioneers like Jimmy Massey, Romeo Sirij, Tommy Iacono, Joe Gatto, Cosmo Leonardo, Pat Orecchio, Reuben Cohen, Guido Casa and Richie DiPaolo. The years of experimentation and refinement culminated in Columbus being crowned the pizza capital of the USA in the 1990s. Author and founder of the city's first pizza tour Jim Ellison chronicles one of the city's favorite foods.
Diet for a Large Planet: Industrial Britain, Food Systems, and World Ecology
Chris Otter - 2020
Our reliance on unsustainable dietary choices and agricultural systems is causing problems both for human health and the health of our planet. Solutions from lab-grown food to vegan diets to strictly local food consumption are often discussed, but a central question remains: how did we get to this point? In Diet for a Large Planet, Chris Otter goes back to the late eighteenth century in Britain, where the diet heavy in meat, wheat, and sugar was developing. As Britain underwent steady growth, urbanization, industrialization, and economic expansion, the nation altered its food choices, shifting away from locally produced plant-based nutrition. This new diet, rich in animal proteins and refined carbohydrates, made people taller and stronger, but it led to new types of health problems. Its production also relied on far greater acreage than Britain itself, forcing the nation to become more dependent on global resources. Otter shows how this issue expands beyond Britain, looking at the global effects of large agro-food systems that require more resources than our planet can sustain. This comprehensive history helps us understand how the British played a significant role in making red meat, white bread, and sugar the diet of choice—linked to wealth, luxury, and power—and shows how dietary choices connect to the pressing issues of climate change and food supply.
The Biscuit: The History of a Very British Indulgence
Lizzie Collingham - 2020
Custard Creams. Rich Tea. Jammie Dodgers. Chocolate Digestives. Shortbread. Ginger snaps. Which is your favourite?British people eat more biscuits than any other nation; they are as embedded in our culture as fish and chips or the Sunday roast. But biscuits are not only tasty treats to go with a cup of tea, the sustenance they afford is often emotional, evoking nostalgic memories of childhood.Lizzie Collingham begins in Roman times when biscuits - literally, 'twice-baked' bread - became the staple of the poor; she takes us to the Middle East, where the addition of sugar to the dough created the art of confectionery. Yet it was in Britain that bakers experimented to create the huge variety of biscuits which populate our world today. And when the Industrial Revolution led to their mass production, biscuits became integral to the British diet. We follow the humble biscuit's transformation from durable staple for sailors, explorers and colonists to sweet luxury for the middling classes to comfort food for an entire nation. Like an assorted tin of biscuits, this charming and beautifully illustrated book has something to offer for everyone, combining recipes for hardtack and macaroons, Shrewsbury biscuits and Garibaldis, with entertaining and eye-opening vignettes of social history.