Cookery And Dining In Imperial Rome: A Bibliography, Critical Review and Translation of Apicius De Re Coquinaria

LOVE this book. I've found information in it that I've never seen or heard anywhere else. I've actually tried out recipes from it. (Including the absinthe recipe. Who knew that wormwood was so easily obtainable online?) The annotations by the editors make this actually possible. I've learned about herbs that don't even exist anymore. I've learned about the sumptuary laws of the times. I've learned much history, gastronomic and otherwise -- simple everyday things, like the fact that it was perfectly acceptable to disguise the smell of rotten meat, and the book gives butchers instructions on how to do this to sell such meats. There was no knowledge that rotten meat could cause disease. It was simply offensive. We also learn here about the common vegetables (no potatoes or tomatoes, yet). Cow parsnips seem to be the most common root vegetable. There are dozens and dozens of recipes on how to prepare them. I've learned what the most popular meats were, since the Romans either didn't use, or didn't have access to, beef. (Surprisingly enough, peacock was one of the most popular meats then.) I've learned that the best way to keep vanilla beans without wasting them is to store them in powdered sugar, using the sugar for the vanilla taste, thus saving the bean. I've learned that the best way to preserve the freshness of table grapes is to keep them in a bowl of rainwater.All in all, a thoroughly delightful trip into history, from an angle that you don't often find -- through food.This is purportedly the oldest known cookbook. The language is dense and would be unreadable but for the excellent annotations by the editors, who make it easy (or easier, in any event) to understand. Many recipes can actually be used. I find myself grabbing it at odd times and opening it up randomly to see what's there. Even entries I've read previously give up more on subsequent readings.Any cook will be fascinated with this book. And, since I'm not in any way a sophisticated cook, anyone with any level of interest at all in ancient history will be fascinated. There are snippets of information in it I've simply never read anywhere else.

This is a very interesting book concerning the origens of all the classical cooking. Before the French this was the high cuisine of the antiques. Thus it's the classical cooking and the base even for the French cooking. The italians developed this classical cooking and their techniques and the french improoved it making it somewaht more sophisticated and delicate. Reading this book is like travelling throught time and space at once. It's worthing my while, a review to read anytime and anywhere :)

I was excited to read this, but unfortunately the Kindle formatting is practically unreadable.