Showing titles in Gastronomy

Chinese was the first truly global cuisine. When the first Chinese labourers began to sojourn and settle abroad, restaurants appeared in their wake. Yet Chinese has the curious distinction of being both one of the world's best-loved food cultures and one of the least understood. For more than a century, the overwhelming dominance of a simplified form of Cantonese cooking has ensured that few foreigners experienced anything of the richness or sophistication of China's local food traditions - but today that is beginning to change.

‘Delightfully different’ – Delia Smith Ed Balls was just three weeks old when he tried his first meal: pureed roast beef and Yorkshire pudding. While perhaps ill-advised by modern weaning standards, it worked for him in 1967, and from that moment on he was hooked on food. Appetite is a...

Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable, audiobook edition of the Work Clean, written and read by Dan Charnas. Night after night, chefs and their crews are able to multitask and produce in a way that puts deskbound workers to shame. In Work Clean, Dan Charnas uncovers their secret...

This new collection by the acclaimed novelist—and, according to Salon, “the best wine writer in America”—is generous and far-reaching, deeply knowledgeable and often hilarious. For more than a decade, Jay McInerney’s vinous essays, now featured in The Wall...

‘An absolute gem’ Sunday Times ‘A mouthwatering history’ The Guardian In this delicious history of Britain’s food traditions, Diane Purkiss invites readers on a unique journey through the centuries, exploring the development of recipes and rituals for mealtimes such as breakfast, lunch...

In times of plenty, we stuff ourselves. When the food runs out, we're stuffed too. How have people in the British Isles shared the riches from our fields, dairies, kitchens and seas, as well as those from around the world? And when the cupboard is bare, who steps up to the plate to feed the nation's hungry children, soldiers at war or families in crisis? Stuffed tells the stories of the food and drink at the center of social upheavals from prehistory to the present.

Winner of the prestigious André Simon Drink Book Award The first definitive reference book to describe, region-by-region, how the great wines of Europe should taste. This will be the go-to guide for aspiring sommeliers, wine aficionados who want to improve their blind tasting skills, and...

Steven Spurrier is one of the wine trade’s most important figures. Over the years, he took the role of wine merchant, buyer, wine educator, and lecturer; he wrote books, wine courses, and over 300 columns for Decanter magazine. He set up the breakthrough "Judgement of Paris" in 1976—a tasting in which outsider wines from California were pitched blind against Bordeaux’ finest, and won—which still sends reverberations through the wine trade today.

Long before the advent of conventional farming methods - which have focused on constant growth, human intervention, and genetic homogeneity - the apple had already grown to become the ubiquitous all-American symbol it is today. Known for their hardiness, ability to adapt to new environments, natural diversity, and plentiful bounty, wildly grown apples were once known as “America’s fruit” throughout the trading world.

Michael Pollan, the bestselling author of The Omnivore's Dilemma, Food Rules, and How to Change Your Mind, explores the previously uncharted territory of his own kitchen in Cooked. Cooked is now a Netflix docuseries based on the book that focuses on the four kinds of "transformations" that occur...

A book of the year for the Times, the Sunday Times, the Independent, the Guardian and the Daily Mail 'Charming . . . heartbreaking, sometimes both funny and unsettling, and always - from start to end - very, very good' RODDY DOYLE 'Magical . . . as scrumptious as the home-made mayonnaise...

'A fascinating, sometimes shocking, eye-opener that is also brilliantly funny' CLAUDIA RODEN 'Brilliant. I couldn't put it down' RUKMINI IYER 'Completely dazzling' JIMI FAMUREWA 'Endlessly inspirational' NIGEL SLATER The iconic New Yorker and Vittles food writer asks: Why do we eat the way we...

When first published in 1989, The Story of Wine won every wine award in the UK, and the USA. It is widely regarded as Hugh Johnson’s most ambitious and enthralling book. It is not just one story but a collection of many, scanning the wine world from Noah to Napa, from Pompeii to Pomerol, as illuminating to our understanding of civilization as it is to our appreciation of wine. Chronicling the making, merchandising, and drinking of wine through millennia, this new edition is fully updated to include Johnson’s view of the evolution of wine over the past 30 years.

Anna Del Conte brought Italian cooking to Britain at a time when the nearest most of us came to pasta was a Heinz spaghetti hoop. Sharply observant, evocative, full of tastes and talk of food, hers is a delicious, poignant memoir of an unusual life and the food she loves to cook, which launched a culinary revolution.She arrived in England in 1949 when much of Britain was a culinary wasteland, married an Englishman, and stayed on.

‘If only my Cantonese parents weren’t so allergic to the word love…’ ‘A wonderfully heart-warming memoir from the bottom of the stomach. ’ Xiaolu Guo ‘A real and delightful surprise, full of smart thought and deft words – and also very funny.’ Ella Risbridger 'Poetic, delicious...

Includes a new introduction written and read by Irvine Welsh When Chef Anthony Bourdain wrote "Don't Eat Before You Read This" in The New Yorker, he spared no one's appetite, revealing what goes on behind the kitchen door. In Kitchen Confidential, he expanded the appetizer into a deliciously...

Winner of the André Simon Food Award 2025 ‘Extraordinary’ TELEGRAPH ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 'Delightful' GUARDIAN 'Bee Wilson is one of my favourite writers and this may be her best book' CHRIS VAN TULLEKEN This strikingly original account from award-winning food writer Bee Wilson charts how...

From the New York Times bestselling author of Provence, 1970, a lively, dramatic account of the rise of French “nouvelle cuisine,” and the renegade chefs of the 1960s and 70s who revolutionized modern cooking. In The Secret History of French Cooking, Luke Barr takes readers inside the...

In this brilliant new book, one of the world’s leading restaurateurs shares wit and wisdom from a distinguished 40-year career and offers deep insight into some of life’s most intriguing issues. 'Wildly, warmly and wonderfully readable and revealing' Stephen Fry 'A true masterpiece that...

Comedian Jim Gaffigan reveals his most intimate food memories, opinions, and fantasies that will keep you laughing all the way to the refrigerator. “What are my qualifications to write this book? None really. So why should you read it? Here’s why: I’m a little fat. If a thin guy were to...