-
Your next favorite book
is waiting.
by Ian Crofton
Ever wondered where noodles came from? How Worcester Sauce was invented? Or even who the "Cucumber King of Burma" was? Beginning with the hippo soup eaten in Africa in 6000 BC, through to the dangerous blowfish enjoyed in contemporary Japan, A Curious History of Food and Drink reveals the bizarre origins of the food and drink consumed throughout history.
From the pheasant brains and flamingo tongues scoffed by the Roman emperor Vitellius, to the unusual uses of licorice (once a treatment for sore feet), Ian Crofton makes use of original sources - including journals, cookbooks and manuals - to reveal the bizarre, entertaining and informative stories behind the delicacies enjoyed by our ancestors.
Media reviews not yet available.
This information about A Curious History of Food and Drink was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Ian Crofton was formerly editor-in-chief of The Guinness Encyclopaedia, and has written a wide range of other general reference books, including Science Without the Boring Bits, Brewer's Britain and Ireland and Brewer's Dictionary of Modern Phrase and Fable (both with John Ayto), A Dictionary of Musical Quotations (with Donald Fraser) and A Dictionary of Art Quotations.
If you liked A Curious History of Food and Drink, try these:
by Boris Fishman
Published 2020
The acclaimed author of A Replacement Life shifts between heartbreak and humor in this gorgeously told, recipe-filled memoir. A family story, an immigrant story, a love story, and an epic meal, Savage Feast explores the challenges of navigating two cultures from an unusual angle.
Why Did the Chicken Cross the World?
by Andrew Lawler
Published 2016
From ancient empires to modern economics, veteran journalist Andrew Lawler delivers a sweeping history of the animal that has been most crucial to the spread of civilization across the globe - the chicken.
by Dana Goodyear
Published 2014
Anything That Moves is a highly entertaining, revelatory look into the raucous, strange, fascinatingly complex world of contemporary American food culture, and the places where the extreme is bleeding into the mainstream.
There is no worse robber than a bad book.
Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!
Can you name the title?
Test your book knowledge with our daily trivia challenge!
Your guide toexceptional books
BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.
