RARE BITS: Unusual Origins of Popular Recipes By Patricia Bunning Stevens  In terms of geological time, good cooks are a young species. They've been evolving for a scant half a million years, since fire was first tamed and tended. Rare Bits is a delightful and illuminating account of humankind's progression from skewering meat to whipping up a batch of Strawberries Sarah Bernhardt. The range is wide, from Bismarcks to Green Goddess dressing. Stevens provieds much food for though as she delves always deeper, brushing aside spurious anecdotes to find the truth. This is culinary history at its most appetizing. Stevens brings serious historical research to a neglected field, her lively prose underscoring the fact that cooking may be one of the most civilized and civilizing of human activities. Ohio University Press© 1998, 320 pp., (7 x 9) illus.,paper $16.95t

Food in the Arts: Proceedings of the Oxford Symposium on Food and Cookery 1998.   Edited by Harlan Walker. This Symposium was held in September 1998 at Saint Antony's College, Oxford.  There are 27 papers in this volumn including: "Food in the Detective Novel," "Memorable Food Moments in American Film," "The Cook as Artist?," "The Food of the 'Arabian Nights'," "Food in Medieval Drama," "Gastronomy in the Still-Life Paintings of Luis Melendez," and "Depictions of the Last supper." Prospect Books, Devon. Paper. © 1999. 240 pages. $44.00

  A New System of Domestic Cookery by A Lady. Mrs. Maria Eliza Rundell's Original 1806 Classic.  Edited with Introduction and Glossary by R. A. Bowler.  The main part of this book is a modern reprint of the 1806 editionis theOld Fort Niagara Association. 320 pp. Hardcover. 1998. $14.95

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American Books on Food and Drink: A Comprehensive Bibliography and Collector's Guide.By William R. Cagle and Lisa Killion Stafford. Culinary historians and cookbook collectors will welcome this new comprehensive bibliography describing over 1,000 American works in gastronomic literature.  These books, part of the Gernon Collection, were donated to the Lilly Library at the Indiana University in 1979 by Dr. and Mrs. John Talbot Gernon.  The Gernons were avid collectors of works on agriculture and gardening, brewing, distilling and wine making, health and diet, household management, and the operation of restaurants and hotels.  Many 19th-C popular works are represented in multiple editions, providing bibliographers and culinary historians with publishing histories of these books.  The breadth and depth of the culinary information offered in this volume make it a must-have for historians and collectors in the culinary field.  Published by Oak Knoll Press. 764 pages. Hardcover © 1998 $95.00

Culinary Americana. By eleanor and Bob Brown. This book lists 4447 cookbooks in an attempt to catalogue one of the missing links of American culinary history: the personal and local cookbooks of women's clubs and church groups throughout the U. S. The listings are organized by region, then state.  All fifty states are included.  Also included are cookbooks of European and south American countries.  Also includes a price list for the books.  Foreword written by Clifton Fadiman. © 1996. Hardcover, 432 pages. $60.00

The Bakers of Paris and the Bread Question, 1700-1775.  By Steven Laurence Kaplan. In preindustrial Europe, dependence on grain shaped every phase of life from economic development to spiritual expression, and the problem of subsistence dominated the everyday order of things in a merciless and unremitting way. Steven Laurence Kaplan's The Bakers of Paris and the Bread Question, 1700-1775 focuses on the production and distribution of France's most important commodity in the sprawling urban center of eighteenth-century Paris where provisioning needs were most acutely felt and most difficult to satisfy. Kaplan shows how the relentless demand for bread constructed the pattern of daily life in Paris as decisively and subtly as elaborate protocol governed the social life at Versailles.
     Despite the overpowering salience of bread in public and private life, Kaplan's is the first inquiry into the ways bread exercised its vast and significant empire. Bread framed dreams as well as nightmares. It was the staff of life, the medium of communion, a topic of common discourse, and a mark of tradition as well as transcendence. In his exploration of bread's materiality and cultural meaning, Kaplan looks at bread's fashioning of identity and examines the conditions of supply and demand in the marketplace. He also sets forth a complete history of the bakers and their guild, and unmasks the methods used by the authorities in their efforts to regulate trade.
     Because the bakers and their bread were central to Parisian daily life, Kaplan's study is also a comprehensive meditation on an entire society, its government, and its capacity to endure. Long-awaited by French history scholars, The Bakers of Paris and the Bread Question, 1700-1775 is a landmark in eighteenth-century historiography, a book that deeply contextualizes, and thus enriches our understanding of one of the most important eras in European history. 784 pages 21 illustrations 1996 Cloth $49.95

Corn Meal Cookery: A Collection of Heirloom Corn Meal Recipes Dating from 1846. Originally Published as the Indian Meal Book, by Eliza Leslie. Lawrence Burns has faithfully copied this little book and added a small glossary.  "It contains 50 recipes for corn which were meant to introduce the British Isles to maize meal, an interesting turn-around, considering that much colonial maize cookery derived from English oat cookery." – Sandy Oliver, Food History News, 1998. Paper. Spiral bound, 58 pages. $5.95 ($2.00 shipping)

The Gardens of Adonis: Spices in Greek Mythology. Second Edition. M. Detienne and J. Lloyd., Trans. Rich with implications for the history of sexuality, gender issues, and patterns of Hellenic literary imagining, Marcel Detienne's landmark book recasts long-standing ideas about the fertility myth of Adonis.  The author challenges Sir James Frazer's thesis that the vegetation god Adonis – whose premature death was mourned by women and whose resurrection marked a joyous occasion – represented the annual cycle of growth and decay in agriculture.  Using the analytic tools of structuralism, Detienne shows instead that the festivals of Adonis depict a seductive but impotent and fruitless deity – whose physical ineptitude led to his death in a boar hunt, after which his body was found in a lettuce patch.  Contrasting the festivals of Adonis with the solemn ones dedicated to Demeter, the goddess of grain, he reveals the former as a parody and negation of the institution of marriage.

     Detienne considers the short-lived gardens that Athenian women planted in mockery for Adonis's festival, and explores the function of such vegetal matter as spices, mint, myrrh, cereal, and wet plants in religious practice and in a wide selection of myths.  His inquiry exposes, among many things, attitudes toward sexual activities ranging from "perverse" acts to marital relations.  Princeton University Press. 1994, Paper. 256 pages. $17.95

The Art of Uzbek Cooking By Lynn Vison.  A historical crossroads in Central Asia, Uzbekistan and its cuisine reflect the range of nationalities that form the country and continue to flourish there. The 175 authentic Uzbek recipes in this book shows the influence of many cultures, for grape leaves from the Middle East, Turkish quinces and lamb dishes, Persian rice pilafs, noodles from China, the flaky pastries of India and composed salads of Russia have all left their mark on Uzbek cuisine. Rice appeared in Central Asia as early as 4,000 BC, and is indispensable for the plovs, stews and soups of Uzbek cooking. Now these dishes can be tasted without having to circle the globe, since the preparation of Uzbek specialties does not require rare ingredients, complex utensils, or long hours at the stove. 278 pages. Hardback $24.95

The History of the Melton Mowbray Pork Pie by Trevor Hickman. This is a new title in "The Best of British in Old Photographs" series and it is a joy to page through. In 1831 Edward Adcock began wholesaling his pork pies in London. He made use of the daily Leeds to London stagecoach to convey his pies to the city. In 1840 Enoch Evans set up a rival business, and the fame of the pork pie began to spread. In the 1840's John Dickinson started making pies close to the railway station in Melton Mowbray. Pies are still made there today. This book is highly illustrated with a fine collection of photographs, and offers the reader a fascinating record of the people and places associated with the development and production of this famous foodstuff. Sutton Publishing Limited, England. 160 pages. Paper. $17.95

Cod:A Biography of the fish That Changed the World By Mark Kurlansky This book is quickly becomming one of the more important food books of the year. A history for sure but not quite a cookbook but, it does have recipes. The Latin name for cod fish is Gadus morhua. It is a greedy fish, omnivorous, and swims with its mouth open and swallows whatever will fit – including other cod. The Vikings were the first to cure cod. They traveled from Norway to Iceland to Greenland to Canada, and it is no coincidence that this is the exact range of the Atlantic cod. They were able to travel to these distant shores because they had learned to preserve codfish by hanging it in the frosty winter air until it lost four-fifths of its weight and became a durable woodlike plank. They could break off pieces and chew them, eating it like hardtack. Walker and Co. ©1997. Hardcover. $21.00

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