Food Britannia
  • Published: 31 August 2012
  • ISBN: 9781409022220
  • Imprint: Cornerstone Digital
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 560
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Food Britannia

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Winner: Guild of Food Writers Food Book of the Year Award 2012

British food has not traditionally been regarded as one of the world's great cuisines, and yet Stilton cheese, Scottish raspberries, Goosnargh duck and Welsh lamb are internationally renowned and celebrated. And then there are all those dishes and recipes that inspire passionate loyalty among the initiated: Whitby lemon buns and banoffi pie, for example; pan haggerty and Henderson's relish. All are as integral a part of the country's landscape as green fields, rolling hills and rocky coastline.

In Food Britannia, Andrew Webb travels the country to bring together a treasury of regional dishes, traditional recipes, outstanding ingredients and heroic local producers. He investigates the history of saffron farming in the UK, tastes the first whisky to be produced in Wales for one hundred years, and tracks down the New Forest's foremost expert on wild mushrooms. And along the way, he uncovers some historical surprises about our national cuisine. Did you know, for example, that the method for making clotted cream, that stalwart of the cream tea, was probably introduced from the Middle East? Or that our very own fish and chips may have started life as a Jewish-Portuguese dish? Or that Alfred Bird invented his famous custard powder because his wife couldn't eat eggs?

The result is a rich and kaleidoscopic survey of a remarkably vibrant food scene, steeped in history but full of fresh ideas for the future: proof, if proof were needed, that British food has come of age.
  • Published: 31 August 2012
  • ISBN: 9781409022220
  • Imprint: Cornerstone Digital
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 560
Categories:
Share…

About the author

Andrew Webb

ANDREW WEBB is a food journalist and photographer who has worked for Channel 4 and the BBC. He has also written for Waitrose Kitchen and Delicious magazines. He lives in London.

Praise for Food Britannia

It's not all doom and gloom: there is much deliciousness in the British Isles. You just have to find it, which brilliantly Andrew Webb has done for us. A splendid book

Fergus Henderson, St John Bar & Restaurant

A near anthology-sized collection of the nation's most iconic regional dishes and traditional recipes, this book is a must for lovers of British food. Historical stories and producer profiles make it even more essential

Food and Travel

A fascinating gastronomic portrait of a nation

The Bookseller

Particularly good are the descriptions of tastes and textures. Webb is clearly a messy eater ... but on paper he's delicious. When he talks about figit pie or bara brith it's a stern reader that doesn't find herself overtaken by a bout of empathetic dribbling

Guardian

A handsome encyclopaedic survey of the best of British food

Best Christmas Cookery Books, Daily Mail

This beguiling book is hard to categorise - partly a guide book to the greatest culinary treasures in the British Isles; partly a travelogue; and partly a love song to our nation's food

Food Book of the Year, The Sunday Times

More than a good read, this may well turn out to be an important historical snapshot of the British food scene at the end of a significant decade

Tim Hayward, Financial Times