by Phyllis Pray Bober (1999)
"In Art, Culture, and Cuisine, Phyllis Pray Bober examines cooking through the dual lens of archaeology and art history. Bober seeks to understand the minds and hearts of those who practiced cookery or consumed it as reflected in the visual art of the time."--BOOK JACKET. "Art, Culture, and Cuisine describes prehistoric eating in ancient Turkey; traditions of the great civilizations of Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece, and Rome: and rituals of the Middle Ages and the "Late Gothic International" period. To satisfy the adventurous reader, Bober has included old menus and recipes with contemporary adaptations."--BOOK JACKET.
Andrea Chesman
Welcome to a world of chivalry, danger, legends, and love. These four original novellas bring to life all the romance and adventure of the Middle Ages, with the common thread of a rich medieval tapestry woven through each tale.
Gil Marks
To most Americans, Jewish cooking evokes images of Eastern European fare such as chicken soup with matza balls. But scattered across the globe, in cultural communities of varying sizes and antiquity, there are many distinctive, delicious, and authentic Jewish cuisines to be savored. Gil Marks serves up a collection of kosher recipes and histories of Jews throughout the world. He delights and enlightens readers with traditional recipes from Italian, Yemenite, Ethiopian. Indian, Romanian, Hungarian, Georgian, Ukrainian, Moroccan, German, Alsatian, and Middle Eastern Jewry; culinary conversations with contemporary members of these ancient and medieval communities; and fascinating commentary on Jewish food and Jewish history.
Cathy Luchetti
This colorful account of cooking on the frontier from 1700 to 1915 describes the foods, preparation techniques, and recipes of pioneers by providing excerpts from their diaries, journals, and letters. Every kind of pioneer seems included: seafarers, trappers, military personnel, cowboys, homesteaders, clerics, mountain men, boarding-house cooks, chuck wagons on the cattle drives, various ethnic groups, etc. By profiling selected individuals in each category and weaving together their stories, recipes, and photographs (unseen), the author illustrates how the pioneering process democratized cooking and contributed to the culinary pluralism of the Old West. Dependent upon the weather, which determined available crops and food sources such as deer, wild fowl, and fish, many settlers subsisted on meager rations. Many original recipes are given, such as "A Recite for Peach Cordial," which calls for two gallons of "good old whiskey," and for cake made from flour and water shortened with coon oil and fried in coon fat, complete with actual spellings and abundant capitalizations. Documented throughout with primary sources, this well-researched history is amusing as well as educational. Black-and-white photographs poignantly and emphatically illustrate the harshness of their lives and the primitiveness of their facilities.
Ilaria Gozzini Giacosa
Modern Italians still refer to an elaborate dinner as "a meal worthy of Lucullus," commemorating a Roman general famous more for culinary prowess than any apparent military skill. And our images of ancient Rome usually do include one of an outrageous feast of camel and flamingoes and nightingales' tongues. But, as Ilaria Giacosa reminds us in this fascinating book, Romans did not eat the exotic every day. Here are the real foods of Rome - the rustic and the refined - in more than 200 tested recipes adapted for today's kitchen. Drawing on the writings of Apicius, Cato, Martial, Petronius, Juvenal, and other observers, Giacosa recreates a 2,000-year-old cuisine, from a hearty winter soup of barley and ham to an elegant salad of truffles in an herbed vinaigrette, from appetizers to desserts. Each recipe includes the original (in Latin and translation) and a modern rendering, with substitutions for difficult-to-find ingredients. The repertoire is wide and includes along with more exotic creations solid, satisfying dishes that still grace many Italian tables: a frittata or omelet of young asparagus and sharp Romano cheese; roast chicken with leeks and a garden of green herbs; a salad with peasant bread and cracked olives; and a fresh cheese pie scented with bay and honey. You'll find recipes for breads, porridges, and sauces, including the ever-present garum, which, Giacosa notes, is not very different from the soy and fish sauces of Asia; a guide to preserving fruits and vegetables; seasonal menus for everyday and elegant dining; and a rich social history of Roman eating, drinking, shopping, and entertaining. This is cooking before tomatoes, pasta, oranges, lemons, or even coffee entered the Mediterranean diet. Yet with its intriguing sweet-sour flavor combinations, its lavish use of fresh herbs and fragrant spices, and its base in whole grains and fruits and vegetables, the foods of Rome will be a revelation to serious cooks ready to create new dishes in the spirit of an ancient culture.