AltaMira Press
Pages: 238
•
Trim: 6¼ x 9¼
978-0-7591-2163-8 • Hardback • July 2013 • $60.00 • (£46.00)
978-0-7591-2165-2 • eBook • July 2013 • $57.00 • (£44.00)
Heather Arndt Anderson is a Portland, Oregon–based food writer. Her recipes have been published in the cookbook One Big Table: 600 Recipes from the Nation's Best Home Cooks, Farmers, Fishermen, Pit-Masters, and Chefs, and she is a contributing writer to the magazines The Farmer General and Remedy Quarterly. In her food blog, Voodoo & Sauce, the most popular posts are about breakfast.
Series Foreword, by Ken Albala
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Chapter 1: History and Social Context
Chapter 2: Around the World in a Meal
Chapter 3: Breakfast at Home
Chapter 4: Breakfast Out
Chapter 5: Breakfast in the Arts and Media
Notes
Bibliography
Index
About the Author
“Heather Arndt Anderson gives us an entertaining and lucid account of the world’s most important meal! We’ve been waiting for an expert like her to shed light on the ways that people around the world break their fast.”—Andrea Broomfield, author of Food and Cooking in Victorian England: A History
— Andrea L. Broomfield, author of Food and Cooking in Victorian England: A History
"I started reading Heather Arndt Anderson's Breakfast: A History while sipping my morning coffee and chewing on a bagel schmeared with cream cheese. I couldn't put the book down. It is well researched and brims with surprising facts placed into a broader historical and global context. It's a must-read for culinary historians as well as for breakfast lovers.”—Andrew F. Smith, editor in chief, The Oxford Encyclopedia of American Food and Drink
— Andrew F. Smith, culinary historian
Though often hailed as the most important meal of the day, breakfast has not always been a universal custom. Food writer Arndt Anderson follows the evolution of the meal throughout history, comparing differences among cultures and explaining the origins of dishes commonly found on the breakfast table. Going all the way back to antiquity, the author begins with the societal transformations that led to the adoption of breakfast and explores the factors that resulted in changes to the meal, such as religion and the discovery of tea, coffee, and chocolate. The chapter “Around the World in a Meal,” for instance, covers familiar foods such as cereals, eggs, bacon, and pastries, as well as those eaten in other countries. Arndt Anderson also examines how the preparation of breakfast in the home has varied over time, influenced by advances in technology and women’s changing roles. VERDICT: The average reader will enjoy the insights into the roots of familiar foods, this book will mainly appeal to the dedicated reader with a specific interest in the subject
— Library Journal
Arndt Anderson shares the back story of our favorite morning meals in her book. The post picked some of the best anecdotes.
— New York Post
There’s more to breakfast than just bacon and eggs. This book dishes up the complete history of the morning meal, from its disgraced days as a sign of gluttony in medieval Europe to its current status as a daily essential. Anderson looks at American eats, like cold cereals, and dishes served in other countries, such as rice porridge and cheese platters. Plus, you’ll pick up pop culture tidbits and follow the rise of the breakfast sandwich to fast-food fame.
— Reminisce