History of Cookbooks: From Kitchen to Page over Seven Centuries

California Studies in Food and Culture #64

by Henry Notaker

A History of Cookbooks provides a sweeping literary and historical overview of the cookbook genre, exploring its development as a part of food culture beginning in the Late Middle Ages. Studying cookbooks from various Western cultures and languages, Henry Notaker traces the transformation of recipes from brief notes with ingredients into detailed recipes with a specific structure, grammar, and vocabulary. In addition, he reveals that cookbooks go far beyond offering they tell us a great deal about nutrition, morals, manners, history, and menus while often providing entertaining reflections and commentaries. This innovative book demonstrates that cookbooks represent an interesting and important branch of nonfiction literature.

Genres: Food, History, Nonfiction, Food History, Food and Drink, Cookbooks, Food Writing

400 pages, Hardcover

Published September 5, 2017

Reviews

[Danielle T · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5, rounding to 4- intensely thorough for the very specific subject it covers: European cookbooks from 1300-modern era. This very much felt like academic papers converted into books, which is what I've heard happens in the humanities side of academia (I'm a scientist by training). If you're ever curious about the grammar used when instructing how to cook something, or the way recipes are classified, or even how useful or useless the "gastronomic literature" category is, Notaker supplies research for you with extensive footnotes. Not exactly popular audience reading, but fascinating nonetheless.

I was a little irritated that it only covered European cookery books; however, given the density of information this would be a mighty tomb if it attempted to detail global cooking literature across seven centuries. The most interesting/easy to digest chapters are in the third section where the role of cookbooks in society as teaching method, art, gender role enforcement is discussed, but reading the first and second parts really give you a sense of how much goes into putting together a cookbook, much less books in general. I'm tickled to know there are researchers that examine the tenses and usage of nouns across time- always an expert for something!

[Steve · Rating 5 out of 5]

Incredibly informative with a simple and clear flow. The amount of references and research is ridiculous, Notaker jumps from philosophy to poetry to a list of ingredients without hesitation. This is more than just a book about the history of cookbooks, it is a book about time, language, art, and gender in relation to cookbooks.

I also really enjoyed the times Notaker's voice came through, usually to add something funny in a very straight voice.

My only minor complaint, besides the eurocentricism, which likely would have been asking too much, is that Notaker gives so much information but not in a cohesive manner. It's hard for me to describe, but with most non-fiction books, they have a central idea and by the end of the book you understand that idea. Here, each chapter felt like a self-contained book. It's like reading 19 books in quick succession, and then you struggle to remember the exact points in the fifth book. It was information overload However, this is clearly an academic book and is perfect as is for any researcher. I am judging this as a recreational reader.

[Nostalgia Reader · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 stars.

This is certainly an academic text, so please don't go into it thinking it's a casual non-fiction. Even considering its academic focus, I still felt the first half of the book--the focus on the evolution of specific parts of cookbooks and recipes--was very muddled. It felt like I was reading the history of the book, using cookbooks as a lens, rather than a history of cookbooks, with some fun facts about book history in there.

I enjoyed and learned more from the later chapters which focused on cookbooks focused for different audiences or with different themes (e.g. vegetarian, religious, nationalist). Using these types of cookbooks as a frame to give the history of various parts and evolutions of cookbooks themselves would have made this IMMENSELY more readable both from an academic and casual standpoint.

[Jen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting scholarly book, mostly about the history of European cookbooks.

Note that this book is sometimes miscategorized as California history. This is likely because it was published by the University of California Press. But it does not mention California and only briefly touches on the US.

[Rogue Reader · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dense, dense. Incredibly detailed and a fine reference. Extensive notes and bibliography

[Gary Allen · Rating 5 out of 5]

A thoughtful--and thought-provoking--read.

[Mills College Library]

641.5 N899 2017