About the History of Foods

The Oxford Companion to Food by Alan Davidson, edited
by Tom Jaine, 2006
It’s a weight-lifting exercise to pick up this book, but that’s because it contains everything you ever wanted to know about the origin, history, and cultural uses of everything edible. This alphabetical guide to a huge range of food knowledge is, without exaggeration, a classic.
 
Alan Davidson, former British diplomat, award-winning food historian, and author of numerous food books, took 20 years to thoroughly research and write 2,250 entries for the original 1999 edition, with more than fifty other food authorities from around the world contributing. The current expanded volume, published posthumously in 2006 and based upon the notes Davidson left, contains a whopping 2,7ll entries.