Gilbert & George never cook and always eat out. Back in 1969, however, the artist duo hosted The Meal, an elaborate dinner party that included thirteen guests, Princess Margaret’s butler, a chef who prepared a meal from a Victorian cookery manual, and the guest of honor, artist David Hockney. Birnbaum took a trip to London to visit the immaculately dressed pair to discuss The Meal and other curious projects from their fifty-year collaboration.
People have used honey, dates, and fruits to sweeten their dishes since time immemorial, but with the introduction of sugar—“white gold”—into cooking and baking, a whole array of delightful flavors and culinary possibilities was unearthed. In Bon! Bon!, Charlotte Birnbaum uncovers the wonderful world of all things sugary through surprising anecdotes and historical accounts, each accompanied by delectable recipes that are sure to satisfy any sweet tooth.
In 1932, F. T. Marinetti and his collaborator Fillìa published The Futurist Cookbook, a manifesto-as-culinary-innovation. Replete with experimental recipes (the founder of Futurism, Marinetti, is known to have ranted about the social dangers of pasta eating), the book is a multilayered exploration of cultural metabolisms, with the dining table as its centerpiece, of course!
Pies, pâtés, and pastries are the noblest of foods. Their inner life is always a secret; their outer form, a sculpture. No other dishes are so well suited to surprises and culinary amusements.
Joan Sallas, a virtuoso of the fold, has meticulously researched and mastered the history and techniques of the art of the fold. With the banquet table as setting, his expertise and philosophy pour forth in the form of splendid, folded linen.
In 1668, Queen Christina of Sweden was greeted in Rome with three spectacular banquets that surpass all historical precedents and successors in the register of extravagant gastronomy. As the first publication of her series On the Table, Charlotte Birnbaum presents Antonio degli Effetti’s newly translated seventeenth-century text, which elaborately describes the three feasts in all their sumptuous and performative glory.
