WHERE DOES IT ALL COME FROM?

Where does it all come from? What’s your source of information? Readers who write to my blog often ask this question—for instance, if I provide some kind of statistical quote – how do I know this is true? Well, just for starters I never quote anything of a statistical nature without checking my information.

Near my computer there are 3 medium sized bookcases – no cookbooks in any of these; they are all “food history” books and one of my greatest treasures. So, if it’s ok with all of you, this post will be about food history books. This may be a mammoth undertaking and the area around my desk is already heavily cluttered with letters, newspaper clippings, cookbooks I plan to write about, cookbooks that I have already written about but haven’t put away yet – always an assortment of recipes, generally the ones I plan to try “next” but also a pile of my sister Becky’s recipes that I am trying to get typed up so the family can publish a cookbook of her recipes.
For instance –

6001 FOOD FACTS AND CHEF’S SECRETS – Dr. Myles H. Bader

A COOK’S ALPHABET OF QUOTATIONS – Maria Polushkin Robbins

A FEAST FOR WORDS/For Lovers of Food & Fiction – Anna Shapiro

*A FOOD LOVER’S COMPANION – Selected and Edited by Evan Jones

A HISTORY OF COOKS AND COOKING – Michael Symons

A MEDIEVAL HOME COMPANION/Housekeeping in the Fourteenth Century – Translated and edited by Tania Bayard

*A NICKEL’S WORTH OF SKIM MILK – Robert Hastings

*A TASTE OF HISTORY/10,000 years of food in Britain –Maggie Black

A THOUSAND YEARS OVER A HOT STOVE- a History of American Women told through Food, Recipes and Remembrances – Laura Schenone

ALEXANDRE DUMAS’ DICTIONARY OF CUISINE – Edited, Abridged & Translated by Louis Colman

ALICE, LET’S EAT/On Food Calvin Trillin

AMERICA EATS- Nelson Algren

AMERICAN APPETITE/The Coming of Age of a Cuisine – Leslie Brenner

AMERICAN DISH/100 Recipes from Ten Delicious Decades – Merrill Shindler

*AMERICAN HOME COOKING – Cheryl Alters Jamison & Bill Jamison

AMERICAN PIE/Slices of Life (and pie) from America’s Back Roads – Pascale Le Draoulec

AN ALPHABET FOR GOURMETS – M.F.K. FISHER

ARE YOU REALLY GOING TO EAT THAT? – Robb Walsh

AROUND THE TABLE/Women on Food, Cooking, Nourishment, Love…and the Mothers who dishes it up for Them – Lela Nargi

BETTER THAN HOMEMADE/Amazing Foods that changed the way we eat – Carolyn Wyman

BEYOND THE HOUSEHOLD/Women’s Place in the Early South 1700-1835

*BOOKS & MY FOOD/Literary Quotations & Original Recipes for Every Day in the Year –Elisabeth Luther Cary & Annie M. Jones

BRING HOME THE BACON & CUTTING THE MUSTARD/The Origins & Meanings of the Food we speak

CAN SHE BAKE A CHERRY PIE?/American Women and The Kitchen in the Twentieth Century – Mary Drake McFeely

*CARAMEL KNOWLEDGE – AL SICHERMAN

*COOKS, GLUTTONS & GOURMETS/A History of Cookery – Betty Wason

CAN YOU TRUST A TOMATO IN JANAURY- Vince Staten

COOKING AMERICAN – Sidney W. Dean

DICTIONARY OF WORD ORIGINS/The Histories of more than 8000 English Language Words

DIGGING IN & PIGGIN’ OUT/The Truth about Food and Men – Roger Welsch (2)

EAT MY WORDS/Reading Women’s Lives through the Cookbooks They Wrote – Janet Theophano

EATING MY WORDS/An Appetite for Life – Mimi Sheraton

FADING FEAST/a Compendium of disappearing American Regional Foods – Raymond Sokolov

*FASHIONABLE FOOD/Seven Decades of Food Fads – Sylvia Longren

*FEAST HERE AWHILE/Adventures in American Eating – Jo Brans

FOOD – Ogden Nash

*FOOD IN HISTORY – Reay Tannahill

FOOD MANIA – Nigel Garwood & Rainer Voight

*FOOD OF THE FRONTIER, 1776 – 1976 – Gertrude HarrisFOOD ON THE FRONTIER/Minnesota Cooking from 1850 to 1900 – Marjorie Kreidberg

FOOD/AN OXFORD ANTHOLOGY – Edited by Brigid Allen

FOODBOOK/The Enriched, Fortified, Concentrated, Country-Fresh, Lip-Smacking Finger-licking, International, Unexpurgated – James Trager

FROM HARDTACK TO HOMEFRIES/An Uncommon History of American Cooks and Meals – Barbara Haber (2)

*FRUITCAKES & COUCH POTATOES – Christine Ammer

GLUTTONY/Ample Tales of Epicurean Excess – Edited by John Miller and Benedict Cosgrove

GRANNIE’S REMEDIES – Mai Thomas

HAMLYN’S ILLUSTRATED COOK’S DICTIONARY – Marion Howells

HOW TO BE A BETTER FOODIE/A BULGING LITTLE BOOK FOR THE TRULY EPICURIOUS – Sudi Pigott

IN PRAISE OF TOMATOES – Steven Shepherd

KITCHEN AND TABLE/A BEDSIDE HISTORY OF EATING IN THE WESTERN WORLD – Colin Clair

*KITCHEN CULTURE/Fifty Years of Food Fads – Gerry Schrempt

KITCHEN WISDOM/A COMPENDIUM OF FOOD AND COOKING LORE, EXPANDED AND REVISED FROM THE AUTHOR’S THE COOK’S COMPANION –
Frieda Arkin

*LADY FINGERS AND NUN’S TUMMIES – Martha Barnette

LAROUSSE GASTRONOMIQUE –The Encyclopedia of Food, wine, and cookery – Prosper Montagne

LET US EAT CAKE/Adventures in Food and Friendship – Sharon Boorstin

LONG AGO IN FRANCE/THE YEARS IN DIJON – M.F.K. FISHER

M.F.K. FISHER AND ME/a Memoir of food and friendship – Jeannette Ferrary

*MARGUERITE PATTEN’S CENTURY OF BRITISH COOKING- Marguerite Patten

*MARTHA WASHINGTON’S BOOK OF COOKERY –Transcribed by Karen Hess

MORE HOME COOKING – Laurie Colwin

NEAR A THOUSAND TABLES/A History of food – Felipe Fernandez Armesto

NOT IN FRONT OF THE SERVANTS/A True Portrait of English Upstairs/Downstairs life – Framk Dawes

OUT TO LUNCH – Paul Levy

PARADOX OF PLENTY/a Social history of Eating in Modern America – Harvey Levenstein

PASS THE POLENTA – Teresa Lust

PEARLS OF KITCHEN WISDOM – Deborah S. Tukua

POTIONS, REMEDIES & OLD WIVES TALES – W.W.BAUER, M.D.

QUOTABLE QUOTES/THE COOK

*RARE BITS/UNUSUAL ORIGINS/POPULAR RECIPES – Patricia Bunning Stevens

RECIPES FOR READING/Community Cookbooks, Stories, Histories –Edited by Anne L. Bower

SEVEN CENTURIES OF ENGLISH COOKING/a COLLECTION OF Recipes by Maxime de la Falaise

SINCE EVE ATE APPLES – Selected & edited by March Egerton

*SIX THOUSAND YEARS OF BREAD – H. E. JACOB

SLAVE IN A BOX/The Strange Career of Aunt Jemima – M.M. Manring

SOMETHING FROM THE OVEN/Reinventing Dinner in the 1950s America- Laura Shapiro

STAND FACING THE STOVE/The Story of the Women who Gave America The Joy of Cooking – Anne Mendelson

THE RITUALS OF DINNER/The Origins, Evolution, Eccentricities nd Meaning of Table Manners – Margaret Visser

*THE AMERICAN CENTURY COOKBOOK/The Most Popular Recipes of the 20th Century – Jean Anderson

THE AMERICAN TABLE/A celebration of the Glories of American Regional Cooking – Ronald Johnson

THE BEST THING I EVER TASTED/The Secret of Food – Sallie Tisdale

*THE CENTURY IN FOOD/AMERICAN’S FADS AND FAVORITES- Beverly Bundy

THE COMFORTS OF HOME/The American House and the Evolution of Modern Convenience – Merritt I. Erley

*THE COOK’S TALE/Origins of famous foods & recipes – Lee Edwards Benning

*THE QUOTABLE BOOK LOVER edited by Ben Jacobs & Helena Hjalmarsson

*THE QUOTABLE FEAST/Savory Sayings on Cooking, Eating, Drinking and Entertaining

*THE WISE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF COOKERY – Wm. H. Wise & Co, Inc.

THE COOK’S COMPANION/A Dictionary of Culinary Tips and Terms – Frieda Arkin

*THE COOK’S TALES/Origins of famous foods and recipes – Lee Edwards Benning

*THE DELECTABLE PAST – Esther B. Aresty

THE DESCRIBER’S DICTIONARY/A TREASURY OF TERMS & LITERARY QUOTATIONS FOR READERS & WRITERS – David Grambs

THE DICTIONARY OF AMERICAN FOOD AND DRINK –John Mariani

THE EATEN WORD/THE LANGUAGE OF FOOD/THE FOOD IN OUR LANGUAGE – Jay Jacobs

THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN FOOD & DRINK- John Mariani

THE FINE ART OF FOOD – Reay Tannahill

THE FOOD CHRONOLOGY/A Food Lover’s Compendium of Events and Anecdotes from prehistory to the Present – James Trager

*THE FOUNDING FOODIES – Dave DeWitt

THE GREAT HOUSEHOLD IN LATE MEDIEVAL ENGLISH – C.M. Woolgar

THE HORIZON COOKBOOK and Illustrated History of Eating & Drinking through the Ages –William Harlan Hale & Editors of
Horizon Magazine

THE JOY OF EATING- Katie Stewart

THE KITCHEN – Nicolas Freeling

THE LOST ART OF REAL COOKING/Rediscovering the Pleasures of Traditional Food one Recipe at a Time- Ken Albala and Rosanna Natziger

THE MAN WHO ATE EVERYTHING – Jeffrey Steingarten

THE NIGHT 2000 MEN CAME TO DINNER AND OTHER APPETIZING ANECDOTES – Garnered and Garnished by Douglas G. Meldrum

THE PRIMAL CHEESEBURGER/A GENEROUS HELPING OF FOOD HISTORY SERVED UP ON A BUN – Elisaeth Rozin

THE QUOTABLE COOK – edited by Kate Rowinski

THE SENSIBLE COOK/Dutch Foodways in the Old and the New World –Translated and Edited by Peter G. Rose

THE TASTE OF AMERICA – John & Karen Hess

THE TUMMY TRILOGY – Calvin Trillin

THE WAY WE ARE – Margaret Visser

THROUGH THE KITCHEN WINDOW/Women Explore the Intimate Meanings of Food and Cooking – edited by Arlene Voski Avakian

WE ARE WHAT WE EAT – Edited by Mark Winegardner

*WHERE DID THAT WORD COME FROM/Fascinating and Curious Origins of Everyday Words –edited by A.M. MacDonald

WHY WE EAT WHAT WE EAT/How the encounter between the new old and the old changed the way everyone on the planet eats – Raymond Sokolov

WIT, WISDOM, AND PRACTICAL ADVICE/USEFULL RIPS AND FASCINATING FACTS FOR EVERY DAY OF THE YEAR – Editors of the Old Farmer’s Almanac

• Asterisks denote some of my very favorite books.

A special thank you to my daughter in law, Keara, who walked me through putting these in alphabetical order over the telephone!

Happy Cooking & Happy Cookbook Collecting!

Sandy

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