Empires of Food : Feast, Famine and the Rise and Fall of Civilizations

Name: Empires of Food : Feast, Famine and the Rise and Fall of Civilizations
Brand: Cornerstone

Cornerstone

An evocative history that considers how food has shaped our world -- and what the future holds.\n\nFor thousands of years we have grown, cooked and traded food, and over that time much has changed. Where once we subsisted on gritty, bland grains, we now enjoy culinary creations and epicurean delights made with vegetables from the New World, fish trawled from the deep sea, and flavoured with spices from the Orient.\n\nBut how did we make that change from eating for survival to the innovations of modern cuisine? How has food helped to shape our culture? And what will happen when global warming and peak oil have their inevitable effect on agriculture?\n\nEmpires of Food is an authoritative exploration of the innumerable ways that food has changed the course of history. The earliest cities, after all, were founded on the creation and exchange of food surpluses, and since then trade routes of ever greater sophistication have developed. We've built complex societies by shunting corn and wh.