Schott's food & drink miscellany - Hardcover

Ben Schott

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0747566542 ISBN 13: 9780747566540

Publisher: Bloomsbury, 2003

Synopsis

From the mind that brought you Schott's Original Miscellany comes a collection of vital irrelevance and uncommon knowledge surrounding the worlds of food and drink. Schott's Food And Drink Miscellany is a snapper up of unconsidered trifles (in both senses of the word) - from food history to cooking terms; cocktail recipes to dining etiquette; grace before meals to after-dinner toasts. What other book can tell you the accepted procedure when drinking from a Loving Cup; which potatoes are best for mashing; how to fold your napkins into a variety of pleasing shapes; the correct technique for lighting a cigar, or a Christmas pudding; or how to make the legendary 'Monster Egg'? Schott's Food And Drink Miscellany offers all this - and more. It will inform you of the King who served foie gras to his dog; the feast where guests ate in fear of their lives; the socialite who spiked his punch with benzedrine; and the dining club whose members ate their meals in reverse. An 'olla podrida' of all that is pertinent to wining, dining and socialising, Schott's Food And Drink Miscellany offers everything for the food-lover, wine-drinker, gastronome and glutton.

About this title

About the Author:

Ben Schott is the author of SCHOTT'S ORIGINAL MISCELLANY. A photographer, designer and miscellanist he lives in London, and divides his time between Highgate and the British Library.

From Publishers Weekly:

By now, readers may have finally gotten around to reading every last drop of trivia in last year's oddball bestseller (here and in the U.K.), Schott's Original Miscellany. Just in time, the London "miscellanist" returns, bestowing upon hungry readers every random thing they've ever wondered about the culinary arts and then some. It's just as addictive and enlightening as the first book, as Schott uses his signature objectivity to relay such obscure facts as "The Romans developed a taste for the edible dormouse (Myoxus glis), which they fattened in special cages (gliraria) before stuffing and roasting." Servants' wages, rates of digestion, blessings for wine and bread, dining times for monks, cognac nomenclature, Laotian cooking measures, ways to ask for the bill in 22 languages, microbial count in raw meat, Latin names for herbs—Schott addresses all these subjects and more, hopping between completely useless (though always fascinating) information and eminently practical tidbits. The "Some slang for drunkenness" entry (which lists, among other terms, "got a crumb in his beard," "wankered" and "sniffed the barmaid's apron") makes the book a wise choice for placement on the coffee table, while the "Measuring spaghetti" diagram suggests it is an indispensable kitchen reference.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

About this edition

• Publisher: Bloomsbury
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0747566542
• ISBN 13: 9780747566540
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 160