Medieval Tastes: Food, Cooking, and the Table

Massimo Montanari

Published by Columbia University Press 2015

Medieval Tastes

Food, Cooking, and the Table

Massimo Montanari
Translated by: Beth Archer Brombert

In the series Arts and Traditions of the Table: Perspectives on Culinary History

https://doi.org/10.7312/mont16786

Overview
Contents

About this book

Acclaimed historian Massimo Montanari traces the development of medieval tastes—both culinary and cultural—from raw materials to market and captures their reflections in today's food trends. Tying the ingredients of our diet to the growth of human civilization, he details how food transformed from a simple staple to a symbol of social and ideological standing. Montanari shows how people adopted new attitudes toward food, investing as much in its pleasure and possibilities as in its acquisition.

Italy’s best-known food historian travels back to the birth of “modern” cuisine and reveals the remarkable links between medieval tastes and our own. Massimo Montanari traces the development of medieval tastes—both culinary and cultural—and details how food transformed from a simple staple to a symbol of social and ideological standing.

Author / Editor information

Massimo Montanari is professor of medieval history and the history of food at the Institute of Paleography and Medieval Studies, University of Bologna. He has authored and coauthored more than a dozen books on the history of cuisine and the cultural values of food, including Let the Meatballs Rest: And Other Stories About Food and Culture; Cheese, Pears, and History in a Proverb; Food Is Culture; Italian Cuisine: A Cultural History; Food: A Culinary History; and Famine and Plenty: The History of Food in Europe.

Beth Archer Brombert is the author of two widely acclaimed biographies: Cristina: Portraits of a Princess and Edouard Manet: Rebel in a Frock Coat, which was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. Her most recent work is a memoir of her decades of living, traveling, and cooking in Italy, Journey to the World of the Black Rooster. Her many translations from French and Italian include Italo Svevo's Senilità (Emilio's Carnival) and Erri De Luca's Tu, Mio (You, Mine).

Reviews

A monograph that will be of enormous use to scholars working in food studies and related cultural studies fields, while also promising delight for the general interst reader as well.

Medieval Tastes is an elaborately researched, sophisticated treatment of the topic.... Highly recommended.

Pina Palma, author of Savoring Power, Consuming the Times: The Metaphors of Food in Medieval and Renaissance Italian Literature:
With incisiveness and thoroughness, Massimo Montanari's Medieval Tastes redraws the contours of the central role food played in Italian society from the early centuries of the Middle Ages to the Renaissance and beyond. More than just an enthralling journey through medieval culinary tastes, regimens, and norms, this excellent volume probes the more hidden folds of the social and cultural discourses that undergirded culinary systems.

David Gentilcore, University of Leicester:
Massimo Montanari is a master communicator of fascinating ideas. He proposes the intriguing concept of the Middle Ages as something at once close but also very distant. This work will prove appealing to more than just food historians, and I highly recommend it.

Massimo Ciavolella, University of California, Los Angeles:
Massimo Montanari, one of the most renowned historians of cuisine, has produced a well-written volume covering a wide range of topics, from medieval recipe books to staple foodstuff. There was not one page that did not hold my complete attention.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	v
Introduction Invitation to the Voyage Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
CHAPTER I. Medieval Near. Medieval Far Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	7
CHAPTER II. Medieval Cookbooks Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	17
CHAPTER III. The Grammar of Food Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	25
CHAPTER IV. The Times of Food Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	41
CHAPTER V. The Aroma of Civilization Bread Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	54
CHAPTER VI. Hunger for Meat Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	62
CHAPTER VII. The Ambiguous Position of Fish Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	72
CHAPTER VIII. From Milk to Cheeses Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	79
CHAPTER IX. Condiment/Fundament The Battle of Oil, Lard, and Butter Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	89
CHAPTER X. The Bread Tree Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	107
CHAPTER XI. The Flavor of Water Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	117
CHAPTER XII. The Civilization of Wine Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	130
CHAPTER XIII. Rich Food. Poor Food Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	149
CHAPTER XIV. Monastic Cooking Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	158
CHAPTER XV. The Pilgrim's Food Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	172
CHAPTER XVI. The Table as a Representation of the World Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	177
CHAPTER XVII. The Fork and the Hands Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	193
CHAPTER XVIII. The Taste of Knowledge Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	199
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	211
Bibliography Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	245
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	257
Backmatter Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	269

Language: English
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Pages
- Main content: 280

eBook

Published: March 24, 2015
ISBN: 9780231539081