Review: The Kitchen, Food, and Cooking in Reformation Germany

The Kitchen, Food, and Cooking in Reformation Germany

Volker Bach

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers

ISBN: 1442251271

Available from:

Amazon.com

My German is terrible. Don't get me wrong, I love languages and am always willing to try, but too many years of French and Latin and even Russian have permanently screwed my accent up to where any of the stock German phrases I have memorized are sure to make native speakers assume I'm talking in Klingon.

My ability with written German isn't much better, so when I want to know anything about the food history of Germany I turn to people like Volker Bach for help. His English translations of medieval German cookbooks are a mainstay of medieval re-enactment cooks and food researchers. So you can imagine how my ears perked up when I heard he was publishing a book on German food history.

Culinary history books are a tricky thing. They run from translations of centuries-old texts to fanciful speculations on the minutiae of kitchen work. Opening this book, I was greeted with something special. Instead of including only information on 16th century German dishes or cooking practices, Volker Bach provides the social, political, and economic context along with how it related to the food. He treats the subject of German cuisine as a complete system that can be better understood by examining the culture that created it. What's more, his clear and fluid writing style kept all that history from being dry and dusty.

Well researched, packed with information, and still pleasant to read - this book is a excellent resource for anyone interested in German food history.

Review: The Medieval Cookbook

Sometimes you need to go back and take a second look at a book.

I first came across references to The Medieval Cookbook sometime around 1998. At the time I was seriously getting into research and what I really wanted was access to unedited medieval sources. I wasn't especially interested in other people's interpretations of medieval recipes, and so I basically ignored this book. It simply didn't have what I needed.

Fast forward to the present. I now run a website devoted to medieval European cuisine which gets a huge number of hits from folks who are looking for authentic medieval recipes or basic information about cooking in the middle ages. Very few of them have experience in working from medieval sources, especially those written in languages other than modern English.

With that in mind, The Medieval Cookbook suddenly looks very different. It's a perfect starting place for someone with little to no background in medieval cooking. There are eighty recipes, all with their original source, and all worked out with modern measurements. The book is also broken into sections, like "Chaucer's Company", each with a section of text to help put the recipes into context.

Finally, there are lots of beautiful, full-color images taken from medieval manuscripts and paintings to illustrate the myriad aspects of medieval life and food. All of this is bound in a beautiful, high-quality book - the kind that bibliophiles like me love to hold.


The Medieval Cookbook
Maggie Black
J. Paul Getty Museum
ISBN: 9781606061091

Book Review: 21 French Medieval Cookery Recipes

21 French Medieval Cookery Recipes + 10 Unknown Facts 

About Medieval France: Tasty Medieval French Food

Bad Side:  Poorly edited. Little or no original work (almost all the recipes are modified versions of ones I have online for free).

Good Side:  At least she didn't break any copyright laws.

Conclusion:  Even at $0.99 this isn't worth the money.

Notes:  From reading it I would guess that Bethany Wilson is about 12 years old.  The "Unknown Facts" make my brain hurt.

Review - Cheese, Pears, and History in a Proverb

  

Cheese, Pears, and History in a Proverb
Massimo Montanari (Author), Beth Archer Brombert (Translator)
Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231152515

When I first heard about this book, all I could think was, "Just how much can someone say about the combination of cheese and pears?"  Perhaps they could come up with a paragraph on the origin of the proverb, and maybe a few more about cookbooks and recipes, but that's it, right?

It turns out that Montanari had a lot to say, and it was all worth reading.

The book not only goes into the history of the proverb and others like it, but it also examines them in the context of class divisions and diet in medieval Europe. It all turns out to be one of those complex, winding tales, full of odd turns and surprising twists.

As an added pleasure, Brombert's translation is clear and flowing, making for a very easy-to-read text.

For anyone interested in words and food and history, this book is guaranteed to be well worth reading.