A History of Cooks and Cooking

"Fueled by James Boswell's definition of humans as cooking animals (for "no beast can cook"), Symons sets out to explore the civilizing role of cooks in history. His wanderings take us to the clay ovens of the prehistoric eastern Mediterranean and the bronze cauldrons of ancient China, to fabulous banquets in the temples and courts of Mesopotamia, Egypt, and Persia, to medieval English cookships and southeast Asian street markets, to palace kitchens, diners, and modern fast-food eateries.".

"Symons samples conceptions and perceptions of cooks and cooking from Plato and Descartes to Marx and Virginia Woolf, asking why cooks, despite their vital and central role in sustaining life, have remained in the shadows, unheralded, unregarded, and underappreciated.".

"Considering such notions as the physical and political consequences of sauce, connections between food and love, and cooking as regulator of clock and calendar, Symons provides a spirited and diverting defense of a cook-centered view of the world."--BOOK JACKET.