The Making of James Beard, An American Legend

Posted on April 14, 2021 by Catherine Lambrecht

Presented by John Birdsall, Author,
The Man Who Ate Too Much

View presentation on Facebook and YouTube

Food of the past that comes to us through recipes and cookbooks can appear to be fixed evidence of what generations before us ate, their tastes and preferences. John Birdsall says that his research for The Man Who Ate Too Much: The Life of James Beard (Norton, 2020) challenged all his assumptions about that. Continue reading →

Mock Goose and Lord Woolton’s Pie: Shopping, Eating, and Cooking ‘On the Ration’ in World War II Britain

Posted on April 8, 2021 by Catherine Lambrecht

Annette Laing,
Author, Academic, Public Historian

When war broke out in 1939, the British people, long dependent on imported foods, found themselves thrown back on their own resources. Sure, they had a little help from their American friends, much of it in the form of powdered eggs and Spam. Continue reading →

A Curious, Secret Spice in your Masala?

Posted on March 13, 2021 by Catherine Lambrecht

Stoney Curry Lichen — Stone Curry Lichen

Presented by Priya Mani
Live from Denmark

This will not be simulcast on Facebook nor hosted on YouTube.
If you are missing the meeting and wish to watch it later,
please email culinaryhistorians@gmail.com for a link.

A talk by Priya Mani on gathered, edible lichens from the Indian subcontinent. It is hardly imaginable that a lichen scraped off tree barks in the sub-Himalayan forests is the decisive and defining ingredient of what we know and imagine as “spicy-Indian.” Continue reading →