In the Restaurant: From Michelin stars to fast food; what eating out tells us about who we are - Hardcover

Ribbat, Christoph

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1782273085 ISBN 13: 9781782273080

Publisher: Pushkin Press, 2017

Synopsis

'A playful story, most entertaining, and wonderfully documented' Ferran Adria

'An entertaining smorgasbord of tasty stories that build into a deeper picture of the places where we eat, from fast food joints and cafés to the temples of gastronomy.' Hattie Ellis

What does eating out tell us about who we are?

The restaurant is where we go to celebrate, to experience pleasure, to show off - or, sometimes, just because we're hungry. But these temples of gastronomy hide countless stories.

This is the tale of the restaurant in all its guises, from the first formal establishments in eighteenth-century Paris serving 'restorative' bouillon, to today's new Nordic cuisine, via grand Viennese cafés and humble fast food joints. Here are tales of cooks who spend hours arranging rose petals for Michelin stars, of the university that teaches the consistency of the perfect shake, of the lunch counter that sparked a protest movement, of the writers - from Proust to George Orwell - who have been inspired or outraged by the restaurant's secrets.

As this dazzlingly entertaining, eye-opening book shows, the restaurant is where performance, fashion, commerce, ritual, class, work and desire all come together. Through its windows, we can glimpse the world.

About this title

Review

'Fascinating, multi-layered, audacious and unique. This book somehow manages to join the dots and connect all restaurants, past and present, in a tale that mixes fact and fancy so compellingly that I read it in a single sitting' -- Russell Norman, author of Polpo

'An entertaining smorgasbord of tasty stories that build into a deeper picture of the places where we eat, from fast food joints and cafés to the temples of gastronomy.' Hattie Ellis

'I imagined that this would be a book that opened new avenues into the study of 'restauración'. What I read surpassed that by far. Where I expected a wrought and dense text, I found a playful story, most entertaining, and wonderfully documented, about the history and the anecdotes around restaurants' --Ferran Adria

'Glorious stuff along the way... we are unquestionably gripped by the stories... Brilliant. Just bloody brilliant' -- Giles Coren, The Times

'All edible life is here - and tasty gossip, as the lid is lifted on the bubbling cauldron that is culinary society' --Tatler

'Compulsively readable... Christoph Ribbat's fascinating cultural history of restaurants transcends gastronomy to trace how this 250-year institution developed and its place in society' -- Shelf Awareness

'A fascinating buffet of fare and facts... Deliciously diverse, In the Restaurant is a uniquely intellectual and gastronoic experience' -- Foreword Reviews

'Knowing and nourishing in equal measure, the short, sharp chapters arrive like delectable hors d'oeuvres' -- Monocle

'A veritable smorgasbord of mouthwatering gastronomic tales... sure to delight everyone from the most knowledgeable foodie to those of us who struggle to boil an egg' -- The National

'A brilliant, provocative, wonderful, satisfying book. A proper gallimaufry of anecdotes that has been a real pleasure to lose myself in' --Desperate Reader (blog)

About the Author

Christoph Ribbat (b. 1968) has taught in Bochum, Boston and Basel, and is now Professor of American Studies at the University of Paderborn.

About this edition

• Publisher: Pushkin Press
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 1782273085
• ISBN 13: 9781782273080
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 224