Product Description

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.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #16522 in Books
• Published on: 2003-11-03
• Format: Illustrated
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 158 pages

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.

Excerpted from Schott's Food and Drink Miscellany by Ben Schott. Copyright © 2003. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
FORMAL MEAL TIMES
C19th servants were expected to serve meals according to these rules:

Announced time Actual Time
6 o'clock...............................7 o'clock
6 o'clock precisely.....................6.30 o'clock
No later than 6 o'clock.................6 o'clock

DELIA SMITH ON MICROWAVES
I truly have tried ... and we had a microwave to heat things in [during] the filming - but actually, we mainly used it to keep the ashtrays in. I think it takes the soul out of food. - The Times, 1990

THE OSLO BREAKFAST
Norway's 'Oslo Breakfast' was an attempt in 1929 to improve the health of schoolchildren, who were given the following free meal each morning:
1/2 pint milk. wholemeal bread. cheese. 1/2 orange. 1/2 apple
a dose of cod-liver oil (September-March)

MR BURN'S LUNCH
Montgomery 'Monty' Burns, wizened plutocratic owner of Springfield's nuclear plant, gives Homer Simpson his antiquarian luncheon order:
'...a single pillow of Shredded Wheat, some steamed toast, and a dodo egg.'

THE TEMPERAMENT OF COOKS
It should also be remembered that an ill-tempered man can never succeed as a master in the culinary art, since the derangement of his gastric juices destroys the peculiar excellence which should govern his palate: it leaves it vitiated and tasteless.
- Charles Pierce, The Household Manager 1862

SOME QUOTATIONS ON SMOKING
RUDYARD KIPLING ... a woman is only a woman, but a good cigar is a Smoke

COLETTE When a wife can purchase her husband the right cigars, their relationship is blessed.

SHERLOCK HOLMES It is quite a three-pipe problem...

WINSTON CHURCHILL I always carry Cuba in my mouth.

Customer Reviews

Another Miscellaneous Triumph
If you liked Schott's Original Miscellany, and I loved it, then you are sure to like the sequel.

I was a little sceptical as to how Schott would write a Miscellany on a narrow subject like food and drink - but on opening the book I realised that it was not that narrow after all! He has everything from how to sharpen a carving knife to a list of slaves at a Roman feast (there was even a slave to fan the guests with peacock feathers....). In between are famous lasts meals, poisonous mushrooms, how to mix the perfect Martini (and a host of other cocktails) - and, of course, how to cure a hangover. He's got some useful stuff (cooking times, freezer temperatures) - but he doesn't get carried away with making the book to useful... there are wonderful pages on absinthe, gout, vitamins in beer, curry types, cigar measurement... and on and on!

Moreover, the whole book has the same lovely, elegant feel as the first - and it looks just wonderful on my shelf next to the Original. Don't think, however, it will transform you into a chef overnight... I spend far too much time flicking through the book to actually go and cook anything!

Have your cake and eat it.
Buy, borrow, or steal a copy. This little gem of a book is packed full of information relating to all things edible.From Absinthe to Zoo Eating, by way of Dining Times for Monks, it is all here.

Neatly packaged with a useful index, this book is designed for the itinerant reader and will appeal to anyone with an enquiring mind or love of the abstract.

A great deal of genuinely useful information is presented together with an entertaining mix of irreverent and sometimes bizarre material, which is guaranteed to provoke and comfort.

Much delightful detail is provided on the demon drink and the book is probably best enjoyed with a strengthening tincture.

I cannot recommend the book too highly {it would prove an excellent Christmas gift} nor find fault except that now hooked I will be compelled to buy the others in the series.

P.S. Should it all prove too much the Heimlich manoeuvre can be found on page 92.

Obscure trivia at it's best
This is one of the most facinating books on food I have read in a long while. It is full of interesting pieces of information from one end to the other. It's great for just dipping in and out of or reading from one end to the other, whatever you fancy. If you are a lover of food then this book really is compulsive reading.