Irons in the fire - looking for book review

[Baron Conal]

Anyone own this book?

http://books.google.com/books/about/Iro ... 5HAAAAYAAJ

Irons in the fire : a history of cooking equipment

Author: Rachael Feild

Any thoughts on it from a re-enactor's point of view?

[Thomas Powers]

I own a copy. I might be able to snag a minute to review it as I frantically pack tonight for my 1500 mile trip to a blacksmithing convention.

Do you have Iron and Brass Implements of the English House, Lindsay, J. Seymour? Lots of line drawings which are usually a lot easier on a smith to reproduce than looking at photographs.

[Baron Conal]

Now I have another book to look for... lol

thanks!

[Thomas Powers]

I've been collecting books on medieval/renaissance cooking equipment as part of my sneaky plan to get more people cooking medieval/renaissance recipes *medievally/renaissancally*

Do you want some others?

[Baron Conal]

I've been collecting books on medieval/renaissance cooking equipment as part of my sneaky plan to get more people cooking medieval/renaissance recipes *medievally/renaissancally*

Do you want some others?

Fully aware of the potential damage this could do to my book buying budget......

Sure I'd love to see your list.

[Konstantin the Red]

Then you do not want the book of that same title from John McPhee -- it's about branding irons. Like anything McPhee it's mighty good -- what a writer that man is. Not what you're after.

[Thomas Powers]

There are 3 or 4 books with the same title, only one of which is about cooking...

OK last night I went through it along side of a couple of other books: "Iron and Brass Implements of the English House" and "Savouring the Past: French Kitchen and Table from 1300 to 1789 (ISBN: 9780812278651)
Barbara Ketcham Wheaton; University of Pennsylvania Press, 1983 ($11.38 w free shipping on ABEbooks.com).

Irons in the Fire
As with most overview books the early stuff gets slighted over the 18th and 19th century. Most of the pictures/illustrations can be found in other books on the topic and I was quite disappointed by some real problems with the authors discussion on cast iron and wrought iron as much of it was simply WRONG! (and not esoterically wrong; but even a general overview wrong!---makes me wonder about their other research...)

It had about 2 pages of bibliography.

Savouring the Past is a much more scholarly work but includes recipes as well as discussion on cooking techniques and implements. Not as many pictures/illustrations but well captioned as to date/source and *22* pages of bibliography as well as a large section of notes on the text. If this fits in your time period I would suggest one pick it up over IitF---but ILL them both and make your own decision.

Iron and Brass IotEH, is an old book my copy originally published in the 20's as I recall and has been reprinted several times ('60's 70's, etc). It has 477 drawings generally well done, however you often have to dig into the text for the context of pieces---I've even annotated some drawings with the centuries of the pieces displayed where the caption did not. This book covers medieval through 19th century; but has a lot more examples of the medieval and renaissance than IitF which uses photo's of individual items rahter than plates with a number of items in them.

As a smith; Iron and Brass is the easiest to work from. To do research I would highly recommend Savouring the Past and working through it's bibliography.

Got a shelf on this topic; but am leaving early tomorrow for Quad-State, about a 1500 mile trip each way.

If someone could remind me around the 1st of October I can post some more titles.

[Thomas Powers]

I'm back and now in overload until after the SWABA meeting at my place on Oct 1st.