Rachel Laudan tells the remarkable story of the rise and fall of the world's great cuisines-from the mastery of grain cooking some twenty thousand years ago, to the present-in this superbly researched book. Probing beneath the apparent confusion of dozens of cuisines to reveal the underlying simplicity of the culinary family tree, she shows how periodic seismic shifts in culinary philosophy -beliefs about health, the economy, politics, society and the gods-prompted the construction of new cuisines, a handful of which, chosen as the cuisines of empires, came to dominate the globe.
Cuisine and Empire shows how merchants, missionaries, and the military took cuisines over mountains, oceans, deserts, and across political frontiers. Laudan's innovative narrative treats cuisine, like language, clothing, or architecture, as something constructed by humans. By emphasizing how cooking turns farm products into food and by taking the globe rather than the nation as the stage, she challenges the agrarian, romantic, and nationalistic myths that underlie the contemporary food movement.
By:
Rachel Laudan
Imprint: California Uni Pr Trade
Country of Publication: United States
Volume: 43
Dimensions:
Height: 229mm,
Width: 152mm,
Spine: 28mm
Weight: 635g
ISBN: 9780520286313
ISBN 10: 0520286316
Series: California Studies in Food and Culture
Pages: 488
Publication Date: 03 April 2015
Audience:
General/trade
,
ELT Advanced
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active
List of Illustrations List of Tables Acknowledgments Introduction 1. Mastering Grain Cookery, 20,000--300 B.C.E. 2. The Barley-Wheat Cuisines of the Ancient Empires, 500 B.C.E.--400 C.E. 3. Buddhist Cuisines, 260 B.C.E.--4800 C.E. 4. Islam Transforms the Cuisines of Central and West Asia, 800--1650 C.E. 5. Christianity Transforms the Cuisines of Europe and the Americas, 100--1650 C.E. 6. Prelude to Modern Cuisines: Northern Europe, 1650--1840 7. Modern Cuisines: The Expansion of Middling Cuisines, 1810--1920 8. Modern Cuisines: The Globalization of Middling Cuisines, 1920--2000 Notes Bibliography Index
Rachel Laudan is the prize-winning author of The Food of Paradise: Exploring Hawaii's Culinary Heritage and a coeditor of the Oxford Companion to the History of Modern Science.
Reviews for Cuisine and Empire: Cooking in World History
During my forty year culinary career, there have been a select number of books that became touchstones, volumes that seemed to arrive just when inspiration was needed or direction was appropriate, books that somehow enhanced my sense of having found my calling. The newest addition to the list is a work of culinary history by Rachel Laudan. -- Virginia B. Wood The Austin Chronicle, on the range It seems like every time you hear someone mention processed food, it's accompanied with the words 'bad' or 'unhealthy,' plus a shaking finger. Unless you're author Rachel Laudan. Los Angeles Times Daily Dish Magnificent ... Some of Laudan's 'diffusion maps' of particular styles of cuisine are miniature masterpieces of cultural history. TLS Epic in range... Its solidity and substance make a change from the day-to-day scatter of information delivered and consumed in tweets and sound bites. The Daily Spud A fascinating account of the rise and fall of cuisines... Touching on all parts of the globe, Rachel explores human development through the vastly understated tool of food. Blue Lifestyle Minute A new standard for global culinary history. Repast
