Laura Mason

A Global History

Sweets and Candy

Catherine Brown

For too long Britain has failed to celebrate its culinary heritage. But from the introduction of borage to the British Isles by the Romans to the nation's love-hate relationship with Marmite, Britain has always played host to an astonishing range of gustatory traditions.

The Taste of Britain

Students, Anglophiles, and literature hounds will want to delve into this delightful survey of foodways of a culture both ancient and cutting edge. Only in recent years have modern kitchen conveniences become taken for granted all over Britain. British cooking has also made tremendous strides lately, and the changes in shopping and food options, preparation, restaurant-going, and diet are detailed. The cooking traditions and classic dishes for which Britain is known are described as well, as they still help to define the people. Commercialization and globalization are shown to characterize British foodways today. For instance, Britain's regionalism is eroding. Health and environmental issues such as bovine spongiform encephalopathy have come to the fore. Television cook shows are all the rage. Women working outside the home and the increase in single-parent households fuel the demand for quick and pre-prepared meals. The trends are well supported by statistics. A timeline, glossary, and resource guide enhance the narrative.

Food Culture in Great Britain

Picnics and outdoor meals are a classic theme in British food. Afternoon tea in the garden on a golden afternoon in late summer, a packed lunch consumed on a hilltop while the eyes feast on a magnificent view, and the tantalising smell of grilling from a barbecue are all part of this. Being outside sharpens the senses and the appetite, refreshes the soul and gives different perspectives – and National Trust properties provide a wealth of different environments in which to enjoy food outdoors. The book will include over 100 recipes covering picnics, barbecues and campfire food. They range from bresola rolls and lemon gin to be enjoyed as a punting picnic, to a warming minestrone and spiced parkin for bonfire night, a baba ganoush made with aubergines chargrilled on the barbecue, and mussels wrapped in seaweed and cooked on the embers of a campfire. Author Laura Mason gives tips on transporting and cooking the food in the great outdoors, as well as giving historical context to the recipes and suggesting the best National Trust places to eat outdoors.

Outdoor feasts for every occasion

The Picnic Cookbook

Tracey Rizzo

"This new edition of Mason and Rizzo's anthology is a welcome addition to the study of the revolutionary and Napoleonic French Atlantic. It includes a wealth of documents related to life in metropolitan and colonial France from the middle of the eighteenth century through the Napoleonic Consulate as well as concise section overviews that detail experiences on the continent and in Saint-Domingue, France’s wealthiest Caribbean colony, during this tumultuous era. These features, along with images, maps, and a detailed timeline, provide an invaluable resource for scholars and students alike." —Rebecca Hartkopf Schloss, Texas A&M University

A Document Collection

The French Revolution

BAPTISM, MARRIAGE, CHILDBIRTH, DEATH: The book consists of six essays by recognised food-historians, each tackling one of these milestones.

Food and the Rites of Passage

A hearty collection of the nation's favourite pies, stews and one-pot meals, from Steak and Kidney pie and Bolton Hotpot to Chicken & Leek Pie and Sausage & Lentil stew. Includes recipes for beef and veal, lamb, pork, chicken, game, fish and vegetables, as well as dumplings, pastry and other must-have accompaniments. Ingredients can be swapped, altered or added to make quick and easy nourishing meals for friends and family.

National Trust Complete Pies, Stews and One-pot Meals

This wonderful collection of 200 traditional recipes brings you the best of British country cooking. There are mouth-watering recipes for every occasion, from soups, starters and light meals to hearty stews and pies, delicious puddings and teatime treats to fruity jams and spicy chutneys. The rhythms of rural life influenced country meals and dishes and led to tasty slow-cooked stews and hotpots and the rituals of baking bread, cakes and pies. There is a balance of classic ‘good plain cooking’ and rich, well-seasoned dishes often rooted in a particular region and focusing on local ingredients. Choose from time-honoured family favourites such as Slow Roast Belly Pork with Root Vegetables, Shepherd’s Pie, Apple Cake and Bakewell Pudding, or discover lesser-known regional country gems like Cornish Fish Pie, traditional Welsh Stew or Cumberland Girdle Cakes.

National Trust Complete Country Cookbook

With eye-popping colors and shapes, intense flavors, and curious textures, sweets and candy are beloved by people of all ages worldwide. They provide minor treats, lessons in economics for children, and colorful giveaways to mark festivities. They can be admired for beauty and novelty, make ideal gifts, and can even be used to woo. But these seemingly inconsequential indulgences are freighted with centuries of changing cultural attitudes, social and economic history, emotional attachments, and divergent views on the salubriousness of sugar. How did confectionary become so popular? Why do we value concentrated sweetness in such varied, gooey forms? And in the face of ongoing health debates, why persist in eating sweets? From marzipan pigs and nutty nougat to bubblegum and bonbons, Sweets and Candy looks beneath the glamour and sparkle to explore the sticky history of confectionary. Methods for making sweets can be traced back to the importance of sugar in Arabic medicine and the probable origin of this practice in ancient India—a place where sweetness is still important for both humans and gods. Gorging on gobstoppers from these early candy antecedents to modern-day delectables, Laura Mason describes the bewildering and fascinating ways in which different cultures have made, consumed, valued, and adored sweets throughout history. Featuring a selection of mouthwatering illustrations and scrumptious recipes to try at home, this global candy trail will delight sweet-toothed foodies and history buffs everywhere.

From cucumber sandwiches to jam and scones, this comprehensive cookery book from the National Trust is chock full of recipes that go perfectly with a cup of tea.Afternoon tea is the quintessential British ritual. And with over 100 tearooms across the country, the National Trust knows a thing or two about it. This gift-sized guide has delicious recipes for savory and sweet treats, whether you’re looking for a lively party, the last word in elegance or a hearty winter tea by the fire.From sandwiches and tarts to cakes, scones, macaroons and preserves – some are classic, some have a twist, such as cucumber sandwiches with minted cream cheese, toasted farmhouse bread with anchovy butter, the classic Victoria sponge, brandysnaps or scones. Plus there’s everything you need to know to brew the perfect pot of tea (not to mention the odd cocktail and bowl of punch). Food historian Laura Mason also includes some fascinating and amusing historical recipes that reveal how afternoon tea was taken in times gone by and the origins of some of our beloved dishes.

National Trust Book of Afternoon Tea

Laura Mason brings you over 50 crumble recipes from the National Trust.

The National Trust Book of Crumbles

A book looking beyond the brilliant colours of the sweet-shop shelf, to ingenuity in sugar boiling: the humbug, the gobstopper.

The Prehistory of Sweets

Sugar-plums and Sherbet

Presents instructions for roasting a variety of different meats and includes recipes for main courses, side dishes, sauces, and vegetables.

And Tasty Leftovers

Good Old-Fashioned Roasts

Michael Krondl

Darra Goldstein

Sidney Mintz

"Celebrating sugar while acknowledging its complex history, 'The Oxford Companion to Sugar and Sweets' is the definitive guide to one of humankind's greatest sources of pleasure"--

The Oxford Companion to Sugar and Sweets

Laura Mason examines the shifting fortunes of singing as a political gesture to highlight the importance of popular culture to revolutionary politics. Arguing that scholars have overstated the uniformity of revolutionary political culture, Mason uses songwriting and singing practices to reveal its diverse nature. Song performances in the streets, theaters, and clubs of Paris showed how popular culture was invested with new political meaning after 1789, becoming one of the most important means for engaging in revolutionary debate. Throughout the 1790s, French citizens came to recognize the importance of anthems for promoting their interpretations of revolutionary events, and for championing their aspirations for the Revolution. By opening new arenas of cultural activity and demolishing Old Regime aesthetic hierarchies, revolutionaries permitted a larger and infinitely more diverse population to participate in cultural production and exchange, Mason contends. The resulting activism helps explain the urgency with which successive governments sought to impose an official political culture on a heterogeneous and mobilized population. After 1793, song culture was gradually depoliticized as popular classes retreated from public arenas, middle brow culture turned to the strictly entertaining, and official culture became increasingly rigid. At the same time, however, singing practices were invented which formed the foundation for new, activist singing practices in the next century. The legacy of the Revolution, according to Mason, was to bestow new respectability on popular singing, reshaping it from an essentially conservative means of complaint to an instrument of social and political resistance.

Popular Culture and Politics, 1787–1799

Singing the French Revolution

Since the pine tree is able to sprout after forest fires, on mountainsides, and in semi-desert climes, it is no surprise that the ever-resilient tree signifies longevity, wisdom, and immortality. From the pine cone staffs carried by the worshippers of Bacchus in the classical world to their role in the movement to establish national parks in nineteenth-century North America, pine trees and their symbolism run deep in cultures around the globe. In Pine, Laura Mason explores the many ways pines have inspired and been used by people throughout history. Mason examines how the somber, brooding atmosphere of pine woods, the complex forms of pine cones, and the coniform shape of the trees themselves have aroused the creativity of artists, writers, filmmakers, and photographers. She also considers the many ways we use the tree—its resin once provided adhesives, waterproofing, and medicines, and its wood continues to be incorporated into buildings, furniture, and the pulp used to make paper, while its cones provide pine nuts and other food for animals and humans. Filled with one hundred illustrations, Pine provides a fascinating survey of these rugged, aromatic trees that are found the world over.

Pine

Laura Mason was raised on a farm in Upper Wharfedale, Yorkshire. A highly respected food historian, her books include Good Old-Fashioned Roasts,

Laura Mason

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