The many influences of the past on our diet today make the concept of
'British food' very hard to define. The Celts, Romans, Saxons, Vikings
and Normans all brought ingredients to the table, and the country was
introduced to all manner of spices after the Crusades. The Georgians
enjoyed a new level of excess and then, of course, the world wars forced
us into the challenge of making meals from very little. The history of
cooking in Britain is as tumultuous as the times its people have lived
through.Tasting the Past: Recipes from the Second World War to the 1980s
documents the rich history of our food, its fads and its fashions to be
combined with a practical cookbook of over 120 recipes from the Second
World War onwards.Jacqui Wood guides us through the nutritious and
pragmatic recipes of wartime Britain, which juggled rationing and
shortages to produce delicious food and keep morale high; through the
era of convenience food and television chefs in the 1960s; and finally
the yuppies and stacked food of the 1980s.