The Taste of Empire: How Britain's Quest for Food Shaped the Modern World Kindle Edition

Excellent item arrived right on schedule!

While traveling in former colonial India and Sri Lanka we read this book to get a real perspective on the socio-political and culinary impacts of empire and global trade. Fascinating and informative read. Recommend it for history and food buffs.

Not only that, it was listed on the reading lists I respect (both of them) as the best nonfiction book of the year. I would concur.

I love history and food so naturally I found this a lovely read!

One of those books that is chocked-block full of information. I highly recommend it.

interesting view of the British empire's histry

I have read several books about food vis a vis history. This one being the weekest. If history is what you are looking for, there are many much better ones.

full of more history than earlier books I have read

This is a wonderful book -- very cleverly conceived, based on deep learning, but very accessible and enjoyable to read. Highly recommended!

Le livre est arrivé en bon état un peu avant la date prévue. Je suis donc entièrement satisfait.

Terrific!The first thing that comes to the fore is the meticulous research that seems to have gone into the book.The second big winner is the language.Even though the book is essentially a historical account there isn't a single dull moment.The facts the book present are so wonderful, sometimes hugely startling, that one is simply glued to the pages.A must read for all interested in colonial history.A special shout out to those interesting pictures and plates.

‘The Hungry Empire’ could be read as an important primer for Brexit. Brexit is largely founded on the British sense of ‘exceptionalism’ - the concept that we are different, more important, than other nations. These ideas developed alongside the growth of the British Empire - they are terribly apparent in the current Brexit negotiations.It’s a book about food, and how diet developed over the history of the British Empire. But food isn’t just the physical stuff we put into our mouths - food involves cultivation, often by displacing or eliminating native peoples in order to appropriate their land, and networks of transport and finance which enabled the British to extend our Empire worldwide.So it’s about colonisation too. In common with the French, the British colonised their imperial possessions with settlers - people escaping poverty and malnutrition by pioneering farms in America, Africa, Australasia and the West Indies. It’s about how these colonies often grew, not food for nutrition, but cash crops like sugar or tea, which could be traded at huge profit, further adding to the economic power of the Empire. There's a sharp focus on Ireland, which has been colonised since Tudor times, and on Free Trade and the effects of the repeal of the Corn Laws. (all stuff that feels like background briefing for today's newspapers)The book shows how Britain treated vast areas of the world as simply a source of food, to keep its population nourished (albeit at a basic level), and also as places to provide the raw materials to feed an expanding industrial base. Britain as the world manufacturing centre at the hub of a global web of ‘free’ trade - we hear echoes of this every day.Part of the Brexit debate centres on immigration, on ’economic migrants’ flooding into Europe. Lizzie Collingham reminds us that over the course of the nineteenth century around fifty million Europeans migrated to colonial possessions overseas, driven - as today’s migrants - by hunger and lack of freedoms. The author gives us a much-needed perspective on current events.The book’s most shocking passages, to this reader, are about the sheer self-centredness and cold-hearted brutality of the British settlers and officials in places like India and Africa. The dark side of Empire is finally getting recognition, and ‘The Hungry Empire’ is a powerful and much-needed contribution to this process. A very important book.Strat Mastoris

Well researched and fascinating. It is heavy going at times, but worth the effort .