Prospect Books, Primary Sources of Food History, Rusticall and Economical Works of John Evelyn


	The Rusticall and Economical Works of John Evelyn: Acetaria, a Discourse of Sallets
	John Evelyn Edited by Christopher Driver with an introduction by Tom Jaine 130pp; 205x145mm; paperback ISBN 1903018293 £12.00		First published in 1699, John Evelyn's Acetaria is an early book about food, rather than just a collection of recipes or a medical treatise - the usual forms. He discusses with immense bravura and polymathy the merits of salad, the demerits of meat-eating, the best way to mix, to grow, to gather and to season a salad, and the place of the salad in classical literature and the early history of man. What better introduction to eating more vegetables, or growing more salad plants? John Evelyn (1620-1706) was a virtuoso, scholar and man of letters of Restoration England. His diary is required reading, his architectural and environmental treatises were prophetic, and his gardening was legendary. Acetaria is one of its fruits. It has pleased generations of readers. This is a new setting of his text, with a useful introduction putting some contemporary perspectives on his opinions, together with a full index and glossary. The late Christopher Driver wrote much about food and its history, particularly his British at Table. He also edited John Evelyn's culinary manuscript notebook - published by Prospect Books as John Evelyn, Cook. The late Christopher Driver was one of Britain's first food historians and food journalists.

	CONTENTS Foreword Introduction John Evelyn's Table of Salad Plants The Dedication The Preface The Plan of a Royal Garden Errata ACETARIA Appendix of Recipes TheTable Index & Glossary		FOREWORD As I look at the nine volumes of the diary of Samuel Pepys, and the five of John Evelyn's, both superbly indexed in our own time, I question how we could see or hear the period better: King Charles's execution and the decade of the Commonwealth; the Restoration and his son's numerous whores, created duchesses; the Royal Society, architecture and the beginnings of the Enlightenment; and not least, the food and drink, and domestic manners, of a generation of Londoners. Neither diarist would have thought the small details of their lives so imperishable after three centuries. In beginning a short sequence of John Evelyn's own writings on matters of food and the garden, how better to give it impetus than by re-issuing Acetaria? It encapsulates Evelyn's ability to invest the everyday with an apparently insupportable burden of classical allusion and scholarship. Yet given a short moment of absorption and contemplation, his arguments are seductive and provoking, and his instructions clear - and well founded in practice and experience. Just how well founded will be the more obvious when the next volume in this series is published. John Evelyn, Cook is a transcript of his manuscript recipe book, which contains the originals of many of the recipes contained in the Appendix to Acetaria. Christopher Driver

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