Four Fish: The Future of the Last Wild Food


Paul Greenberg - 2010
    He visits Norwegian megafarms that use genetic techniques once pioneered on sheep to grow millions of pounds of salmon a year. He travels to the ancestral river of the Yupik Eskimos to see the only Fair Trade–certified fishing company in the world. He makes clear how PCBs and mercury find their way into seafood; discovers how Mediterranean sea bass went global; challenges the author of Cod to taste the difference between a farmed and a wild cod; and almost sinks to the bottom of the South Pacific while searching for an alternative to endangered bluefin tuna.Fish, Greenberg reveals, are the last truly wild food — for now. By examining the forces that get fish to our dinner tables, he shows how we can start to heal the oceans and fight for a world where healthy and sustainable seafood is the rule rather than the exception.

The Language of Food: A Linguist Reads the Menu


Dan Jurafsky - 2014
    Thirteen chapters evoke the joy and discovery of reading a menu dotted with the sharp-eyed annotations of a linguist.Jurafsky points out the subtle meanings hidden in filler words like "rich" and "crispy," zeroes in on the metaphors and storytelling tropes we rely on in restaurant reviews, and charts a microuniverse of marketing language on the back of a bag of potato chips.The fascinating journey through The Language of Food uncovers a global atlas of culinary influences. With Jurafsky's insight, words like ketchup, macaron, and even salad become living fossils that contain the patterns of early global exploration that predate our modern fusion-filled world.From ancient recipes preserved in Sumerian song lyrics to colonial shipping routes that first connected East and West, Jurafsky paints a vibrant portrait of how our foods developed. A surprising history of culinary exchange—a sharing of ideas and culture as much as ingredients and flavors—lies just beneath the surface of our daily snacks, soups, and suppers.

Get It Ripe: A Fresh Take on Vegan Cooking and Living


Jae Steele - 2008
    unprocessed and unrefined) ingredients. Jae Steele is a registered holistic nutritionist; she has also been a professional vegan baker and has worked on an East Coast organic farm. Her life experiences and her love of vegan whole foods are at the heart of Get It Ripe, which not only includes uncomplicated yet delicious animal-free recipes, but advice and information on various aspects of holistic vegan living, including cleansing and detox programs, yoga and meditation, ethical consumerism, and the connections among mind, body, and spirit.The two hundred recipes include Butternut Risotto, Chipotle Black-Eyed Peas with Maple Mashed Sweet Potatoes, Cauliflower Chickpea Curry, Pad Thai, Fettuccini No-Fredo, Cinnamon Pumpkin Soup, Banana Creem Pie, and Cowgrrrl Cookies. Two-color throughout, the book also includes sixteen full-color recipe photographs.Get healthy and energetic with Get It Ripe.In addition to being a registered holistic nutritionist, Jae Steele has authored numerous vegan cookzines and runs the blog Domestic Affair. She lives in Montreal.

The Art of Eating


M.F.K. Fisher - 1954
    Fisher, whose wit and fulsome opinions on food and those who produce it, comment upon it, and consume it are as apt today as they were several decades ago, when she composed them. Why did she choose food and hunger she was asked, and she replied, 'When I write about hunger, I am really writing about love and the hunger for it, and warmth, and the love of it . . . and then the warmth and richness and fine reality of hunger satisfied.

Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human


Richard W. Wrangham - 2009
    But in Catching Fire, renowned primatologist Richard Wrangham presents a startling alternative: our evolutionary success is the result of cooking. In a groundbreaking theory of our origins, Wrangham shows that the shift from raw to cooked foods was the key factor in human evolution. when our ancestors adapted to using fire, humanity began.Once our hominid ancestors began cooking their food, the human digestive tract shrank and the brain grew. Time once spent chewing tough raw food could be used instead to hunt and to tend camp. Cooking became the basis for pair bonding and marriage, created the household, and even led to a sexual division of labor.Tracing the contemporary implications of our ancestors' diets, Catching Fire sheds new light on how we came to be the social, intelligent, and sexual species we are today. A pathbreaking new theory of human evolution, Catching Fire will provoke controversy and fascinate anyone interested in our ancient origins--or in our modern eating habits.--from the dustjacket

World Whiskey


Charles MacLean - 2009
    Whiskeys Worth the Wait directory spreads make up the body of the book, marrying together distillery history, in-depth tasting notes, and a photograph. Guiding you through every important distilling nation - starting with the rich varieties in Scotland, going on to woody bourbon and rye in the US, and finishing with the range of varieties available in Asia and Australasia - you're sure to find a satisfying dram wherever you are.

Living Paleo for Dummies


Melissa Joulwan - 2012
    Humans were thriving on this diet high in animal fat and proteins and low in carbohydrates, but things changed when we introduced unnatural and processed foods to our bodies. The Paleo movement is one of today's hottest diet and healthy-eating approaches. Its appeal comes from the fact that it is a sustainable alternative to more restrictive diets that often lead to burnout and failed weight loss efforts. The Paleo diet is about using natural foods to achieve great health and a perfect physique.Living Paleo For Dummies shows you how to adopt the Paleo lifestyle and improve your health and longevity. Offering more than 40 recipes for every meal of the day, and providing tips for getting around common roadblocks such as eating out, this essential guide to adopting a primal diet also provides the latest, cutting edge research from genetics, biochemistry, and anthropology to help you look, feel, and perform your best.-The details of eating the foods that our bodies were designed to eat-A complete introductory plan to kick start the Paleo journey-Tricks to save on the food bill while adhering to a primal meal planLiving Paleo For Dummies is for anyone looking for a fun and informative guide that simplifies the complexities of the Paleo Diet while outlining and explaining the science behind the benefits.

How to Eat Out


Giles Coren - 2012
    From a lonely childhood spent in pub car parks, peering in at a magical world of chickens in baskets and butter in little foil squares, to belching his way through taste clouds of prawn gas and chocolate air at 'the best restaurant in the world', to mock dog in Shoreditch, sperm sushi in Tokyo and delicious fricasseed field mouse in 'Ancient' Rome, Coren has experienced pretty much everything a restaurant can throw at you, and thrown it right back. Or at least caught it, sniffed it, and bagged it up for later. Bad waiters, bum tables, little rip-offs, big cons, old fish, cheap meat, yesterday's soup and tomorrow's gastroenteritis... Coren tells you how to avoid the lot, and even come out of it with free champagne and a dish named after you by way of apology. It doesn't matter if it's fish and chips, takeaway pizza, a medieval banquet with Sue Perkins or a slap-up nosh at the Hotel de Posh, there is always a right way and wrong way to do it.How To Eat Out is a bit of both.

Natural Wine: An introduction to organic and biodynamic wines made naturally


Isabelle Legeron - 2014
    Isabelle Legeron MW is leading the campaign for natural wine – wine made as nature intended. There is no official description of natural wine, but a rough definition is that it is made from grapes that are farmed organically or biodynamically and harvested manually, and that the wine should ideally be made without adding or removing anything during the vinification process. It is basically good old-fashioned grape juice fermented into wine, just as nature intended. Isabelle is a crusader for the natural wine movement: she has her own show on the Travel Channel, organizes a hugely successful annual natural wine festival (RAW), and acts as adviser to several leading restaurants. Just as the craft beer movement has taken off across the globe, the demand for natural wine is growing and will continue to do so.

Let's Eat France!: 1,250 specialty foods, 375 iconic recipes, 350 topics, 260 personalities, plus hundreds of maps, charts, tricks, tips, and anecdotes and everything else you want to know about the food of France


François-Régis Gaudry - 2018
    Here are classic recipes, including how to make a pot-au-feu, eight essential composed salads, pâté en croûte, blanquette de veau, choucroute, and the best ratatouille. Profiles of French food icons like Colette and Curnonsky, Brillat-Savarin and Bocuse, the Troigros dynasty and Victor Hugo. A region-by-region index of each area’s famed cheeses, charcuterie, and recipes. Poster-size guides to the breads of France, the wines of France, the oysters of France—even the frites of France. You’ll meet endive, the belle of the north; discover the croissant timeline; understand the art of tartare; find a chart of wine bottle sizes, from the tiny split to the Nebuchadnezzar (the equivalent of 20 standard bottles); and follow the family tree of French sauces. Adding to the overall delight of the book is the random arrangement of its content (a tutorial on mayonnaise is next to a list of places where Balzac ate), making each page a found treasure. It’s a book you’ll open anywhere—and never want to close.

The United States of Arugula: How We Became a Gourmet Nation


David Kamp - 2006
    Kamp, a writer and editor for GQ and Vanity Fair, chronicles the amazing transformation from the overcooked vegetables and scary gelatin salads of yore to the current heyday of free-range chickens, extra-virgin olive oil, Whole Foods, Starbucks, and that breed of human known as the foodie.

The Mushroom Hunters: On the Trail of Secrets, Eccentrics, and the American Dream


Langdon Cook - 2013
    . . and one of nature’s last truly wild foods: the uncultivated, uncontrollable mushroom.Within the dark corners of America’s forests grow culinary treasures. Chefs pay top dollar to showcase these elusive and beguiling ingredients on their menus. Whether dressing up a filet mignon with smoky morels or shaving luxurious white truffles over pasta, the most elegant restaurants across the country now feature an abundance of wild mushrooms. The mushroom hunters, by contrast, are a rough lot. They live in the wilderness and move with the seasons. Motivated by Gold Rush desires, they haul improbable quantities of fungi from the woods for cash. Langdon Cook embeds himself in this shadowy subculture, reporting from both rural fringes and big-city eateries with the flair of a novelist, uncovering along the way what might be the last gasp of frontier-style capitalism. Meet Doug, an ex-logger and crabber—now an itinerant mushroom picker trying to pay his bills and stay out of trouble; and Jeremy, a former cook turned wild food entrepreneur, crisscrossing the continent to build a business amid cutthroat competition; their friend Matt, an up-and-coming chef whose kitchen alchemy is turning heads; and the woman who inspires them all. Rich with the science and lore of edible fungi—from seductive chanterelles to exotic porcini—The Mushroom Hunters is equal parts gonzo travelogue and culinary history lesson, a rollicking, character-driven tour through a world that is by turns secretive, dangerous, and tragically American.

The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science


J. Kenji López-Alt - 2015
    Kenji López-Alt has pondered all these questions and more. In The Food Lab, Kenji focuses on the science behind beloved American dishes, delving into the interactions between heat, energy, and molecules that create great food. Kenji shows that often, conventional methods don’t work that well, and home cooks can achieve far better results using new—but simple—techniques. In hundreds of easy-to-make recipes with over 1,000 full-color images, you will find out how to make foolproof Hollandaise sauce in just two minutes, how to transform one simple tomato sauce into a half dozen dishes, how to make the crispiest, creamiest potato casserole ever conceived, and much more.

Holy Sh*t: A Brief History of Swearing


Melissa Mohr - 2013
    With humor and insight, Melissa Mohr takes readers on a journey to discover how "swearing" has come to include both testifying with your hand on the Bible and calling someone a *#$&!* when they cut you off on the highway. She explores obscenities in ancient Rome and unearths the history of religious oaths in the Middle Ages, when swearing (or not swearing) an oath was often a matter of life and death. Holy Sh*t also explains the advancement of civility and corresponding censorship of language in the 18th century, considers the rise of racial slurs after World War II, examines the physiological effects of swearing and answers a question that preoccupies the FCC, the US Senate, and anyone who has recently overheard little kids at a playground: are we swearing more now than people did in the past?A gem of lexicography and cultural history, Holy Sh*t is a serious exploration of obscenity.