This book is a classic ( )

This book is certainly epic. If you are reading it, as I was, for the history of English food you won't be disappointed. However, you may find the bits you need can be garnered without reading each recipe. That's a personal choice, naturally. Definitely do not skip this book due to it being a cook book because its worth is far broader. Hartley left out very little and saved all of this knowledge as a culinary heritage. ( )

A world that vanished as we glanced away.

This is a cookery book, a history, a romance, a guide to self-sufficiency,a handbook of wild food and elegy for rural life. All these things are blended together with poetry and wit, and enlivened by stunning drawings by the author. If you have an interest in the history of everyday life, or in proper food, you cannot be without this book.

"Food in England" was written in the middle of the 20th century. If you are middle-aged, it is the world of your childhood - yet it is now so vanished it is difficult to imagine. Fortunately Dorothy Hartley's prose is so vivid and intense she can bring that world to life for us. In fact, Hartley did for English food what Elizabeth David did for the Mediterranean; sadly, the British public wasn't listening, and we are the poorer for it.

Most of her experience is in the North, in rural areas, so she describes the last of a way of life which had lasted, with few changes, for a thousand years - yet which is still, of course, clearly remembered by thousands of elderly people. I can only add, if one of those elderly people is YOUR granny, talk to her now before it is too late. It is a way of life where electricity, gas, and even mains drainage are not to be taken for granted, where food is seasonal not because we are trendy but because we have no choice.

There are many recipes, but they assume a foundation knowledge of cookery and are given in anecdotal rather than instruction style. Here you will find how to make your own haggis, to cure a ham, bake an Epiphany tart, mix the contents of a wassail bowl and roast an "six-legged goose". But there is also a huge amount of social history; some explicit, such as a chapter on the Industrial Revolution subtitled "Starvation and Plenty" - some embedded in the writing about food and cooking. There are the secrets of preserving food for long sea voyages, how to tell when peas are ready to harvest, and directions for the correct construction of a privy, all beautifully illustrated. It is a book you'll return to time and again over the years, either to look up something obscure in the excellent index, or to browse through for sheer pleasure.

If you want more recipes and background, in an easy-to-use format, go to Elizabeth Ayrton’s Cookery of England. ( )

Returning this largely unread as there's a reserve on it, but what little I read is fascinating. Much of what she's writing about has vanished, commonplace stuffs that people forget to write about, this is a book I think better bought and savoured rather than rushed through. The section on drinks would be useful both to myself and my husband. Getting some of the supplies may be more complicated than in the time of the author.

Note to self: some amazon reviews are quite scathing about the quality of the modern reproduction, second hand copy of older edition would probably be a good idea. This edition has quite good paper.

recommended by Terry Pratchett.