Matters of Taste: Food and Drink in Seventeenth-Century Dutch Art and Life

by Donna R. Barnes, Peter G. Rose, Albany Institute of History and Art

Donna R. Barnes and Peter G. Rose provide a narrative to accompany this collection of Dutch art as it relates to images of food and drink. The sixty paintings presented in this volume are discussed individually from both an art history and a culinary history perspective, including authentic period recipes. An accompanying cookbook adapts these recipes for the modern kitchen.
Drawn exclusively from American museums, art galleries, and private collections, the works of art portray still lifes, Dutch tavern and market scenes, and festive occasions by forty-five Dutch artists such as well-known painters Jan Steen, Adriaen van Ostade, and Pieter Claesz, and their less famous contemporaries such as Quiringh Gerritsz. van Brekelenkam and Harmen van Steenwijck.

Genres: Food History

272 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 2002

Reviews

[Rebecca · Rating 5 out of 5]

My dream book - so sad I could never see the actual exhibition! Interesting essays, and the notes accompanying the paintings are very informative - an art historian and a food historian both write for each picture. My only annoyance is the way that Donna Barnes, for each painting, would give possibilities for how contemporary viewers would have interpreted the paintings in exactly the same way with each painting. It got very repetitive, I think after a few we all get that there's a big debate over whether they were meant to be full of symbolism or not!

The accompanying booklet of recipes is also very interesting. Anyone who liked it should also check out The Dutch Table: Gastronomy in the Golden Age of the Netherlands.