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Plenti and Grase - Food and Drink in a Sixteenth-century Household (Hardcover)
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Plenti and Grase - Food and Drink in a Sixteenth-century Household (Hardcover)
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This is an important study of the household affairs - especially as
they relate to the provisioning and consumption of food and drink -
of the Willoughby family of Wollaton Hall in Nottingham and
Middleton Hall in Warwickshire. Made wealthy by inheritance, coal
mining and iron smelting, they built a Tudor wonder-house at
Wollaton, designed by the architect Robert Smythson. The survival
of their archive allows close analysis of their domestic
arrangements. For too long, food history has consisted of rummages
among old cookbooks and juicy extracts from published diaries, with
little serious work done on private archives and financial records.
In consequence we have much anecdote and little hard evidence. This
book should redress the balance.Drawing upon the household
accounts, Mark Dawson describes the patterns of food purchasing and
supply, whether from markets and merchants or from the family's own
estates. He models the dietary intake both of the family and its
servants; reconstructs the kitchen administration and organisation;
and links the Willoughbys' experience to that of England as a
whole, especially in relation to dietary and culinary change. There
was a great deal going on in the Tudor kitchen: styles of cookery
were altering, new foodstuffs were being added to the national
shopping basket, both from our European neighbours and from new
territories and discoveries overseas.A series of chapters treats
the main categories of foods: grains, meats, fish, fruit and
vegetables. There is discussion of drinks, whether wine or beer
(particularly the shift from ale to beer as the standard beverage).
There is an account of the strategies of purchase, preservation and
storage of foods, of the kitchen equipment, and of the kitchen
staffing and operation. And there is an account of the family of
Willoughby itself, whose great house at Wollaton survives as the
museum of the City of Nottingham. "Plenti and Grase" will appeal to
historians and general readers interested in Tudor England; to
culinary historians interested in the development of the modern
kitchen; to local students wishing to discover more about Midland
history; and anyone curious about how these great houses were run,
and the life that went on inside their walls.
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