Consider the Fork: A History of Invention in the Kitchen - Hardcover

Bee Wilson

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1846143403 ISBN 13: 9781846143403

Publisher: Particular Books, 2012

Synopsis

Since prehistory, humans have braved sharp knives, fire, and grindstones to transform raw ingredients into something delicious--or at least edible. Tools shape what we eat, but they have also transformed "how" we consume, and how we think about, our food. Technology in the kitchen does not just mean the Pacojets and sous-vide of the modernist kitchen. It can also mean the humbler tools of everyday cooking and eating: a wooden spoon and a skillet, chopsticks and forks.
In "Consider the Fork," award-winning food writer Bee Wilson provides a wonderful and witty tour of the evolution of cooking around the world, revealing the hidden history of everyday objects we often take for granted. Knives--perhaps our most important gastronomic tool--predate the discovery of fire, whereas the fork endured centuries of ridicule before gaining widespread acceptance; pots and pans have been around for millennia, while plates are a relatively recent invention. Many once-new technologies have become essential elements of any well-stocked kitchen--mortars and pestles, serrated knives, stainless steel pots, refrigerators. Others have proved only passing fancies, or were supplanted by better technologies; one would be hard pressed now to find a water-powered egg whisk, a magnet-operated spit roaster, a cider owl, or a turnspit dog. Although many tools have disappeared from the modern kitchen, they have left us with traditions, tastes, and even physical characteristics that we would never have possessed otherwise.
Blending history, science, and anthropology, Wilson reveals how our culinary tools and tricks came to be, and how their influence has shaped modern food culture. The story of how we have tamed fire and ice and wielded whisks, spoons, and graters, all for the sake of putting food in our mouths, "Consider the Fork" is truly a book to savor.

About this title

About the Author

Bee Wilson is a food writer, historian, and author of three books, including Swindled: The Dark History of Food Fraud, from Poisoned Candy to Counterfeit Coffee and The Hive: The Story of the Honeybee and Us.

From Booklist

*Starred Review* At every turn, Wilson’s history of the technology of cooking and eating upends another unexamined tradition, revealing that utensils and practices now taken for granted in kitchen and at table have long and remarkable histories. The knife evolved from primitive humans’ need to reduce food to manageable portions. Thermometers helped make home ovens practical. Some of the first pleas for animal rights arose from the use of caged dogs to turn spits in front of kitchen hearths. Most societies weigh recipe ingredients, but Americans continue to measure ingredients by volume. Wilson traces this deviation back to the difficulty of lugging scales westward across the frontier. Wilson’s book teems with other delightful insights, laying to rest such questions as what Chinese parents say to their children to persuade them to finish their food, since they can’t employ the typical American admonition about children starving in China. (Answer: Don’t disrespect the sweat of the hardworking rice farmer.) --Mark Knoblauch

Edition details

• Publisher: Particular Books
• Publication date: 2012
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1846143403
• ISBN 13: 9781846143403
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 405