All Consuming - by Ruby Tandoh (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

Hype restaurants. Allrecipes. The Great British Bake Off. Food dominates our every waking minute. In this dazzling cultural history, acclaimed food writer Ruby Tandoh traces the story of how--and why--we've all became foodies.

"Ruby Tandoh is a genius and All Consuming is everything." --Bryan Washington, author of Family Meal

"A fascinating, sometimes shocking, eye-opener that is also brilliantly funny." --Claudia Roden

How, in the space of a few decades, has food gone from "fact of life" to "national past time"; something to be thought about--and talked about--24/7?

In this startlingly original, deeply irreverent cultural history, Ruby Tandoh traces how our culinary tastes have been transformed; how they've been pulled into supermarket aisles and seduced by Michelin stars, transfixed by Top Chefs and shaped by fads. All Consuming is a deep dive into the social, economic, cultural, legislative, and demographic forces that have reshaped our relationship with food.

From the rise of the food writer to the dream of the modern dinner party; from the unlikely adoption of bubble tea to the advent of the TikTok restaurant critic, in these essays, Tandoh questions how our tastes have been shaped--and how much they are, in fact, our own.

Review Quotes

"All Consuming is extraordinary. In masterful prose, Tandoh shows us who we are, where we've been, and where we're going through what we eat--and also what we say we're eating, and what we'd like to eat, and what we refuse to eat, alongside everything in between. But All Consuming is just that--all of it--in the expansiveness of Tandoh's vision, through the humor and knowingness of her craft. Ruby Tandoh is a genius and All Consuming is everything." --BRYAN WASHINGTON, author of Family Meal

"Ruby Tandoh's sharp, insightful investigation into our evolving mass food cultures--the influences and drivers, weird excesses and absurdities--is a fascinating, sometimes shocking, eye-opener that is also brilliantly funny." --CLAUDIA RODEN, author of Claudia Roden's Mediterranean

"I loved this book. Witty and profound, informative and original, no one could write with more insight than Ruby on the question of our appetites, and what it is that we are really searching for when we google what to make for dinner." --BEE WILSON, author of Consider the Fork

"Ruby Tandoh is a charming, knowledgeable tour guide through the culinary traditions so deeply embedded in our culture that most of us hardly bother to think about them. Her voice is lively and her research thorough, calling to mind that one extra cool history teacher we all wanted to impress." --RAX KING, author of Sloppy

"A brilliant and engrossing investigation of what really shapes our desires when it comes to food. By following the shifting currents of restaurant criticism, the explosive rise of bubble tea, and the 'delusion economy' of wellness drinks, Ruby Tandoh offers a sharp riposte to culinary romanticism." --FUCHSIA DUNLOP, author of Invitation to a Banquet

"Most of us live in a world of abundance, and there's a problem there, writes Tandoh, in the paradox of plenty: 'The more we have, the less we seem able to enjoy it." That gives rise to diet fads, and "weird culinary nationalism, ' and a certain unbending devotion to certain foods at the expense of others. That plenty comes in information as well as food, with recipes available everywhere and with food trends (one, she notes, being smashburgers) spread worldwide thanks to the internet. Even so, she adds, most home cooks will tend to 'cycle through the same couple of dozen recipes for the rest of our lives.' Part of Tandoh's evident purpose is to shake those cooks out of complacency and try something new, even playful--for which she praises fellow cookbook writer Yotam Ottolenghi--and fun. One possibility: sausage and gochujang pasta, the latter being a Korean chili paste that renders an orange sauce--and orange, says one chef, 'makes people hungry.' Tandoh is a great explainer with a gift for a memorable turn of phrase, as when she renders judgment on bubble tea as representing a story 'about displacement, ruin and growth, ' noting along the way that bubble tea is dominated by corporate chains because the machinery to produce it is expensive, lending a certain sameness to bubble tea shops. As to home entertaining, Tandoh says, smartly, 'delusional thinking transcends class, ' meaning that any such gathering is likely to blow any budget and produce entirely too much food, procured from the surfeit of massive supermarkets around the globe: 'So many temples, and just one god.' Tandoh's knowing classification of the three types of cookbooks is worth the price of admission alone. An entertaining, endlessly instructive look at why we like what we do in our 'anarchic web of desire'."--Kirkus, starred review

"Journalist and Great British Bake Off finalist Tandoh examines so much more than why we eat the way we eat now. Her fascinating cultural history traces the social, economic, political, and technological forces that determine how we discover new foods, who we listen to, how we shop, how (and if) we cook, and how our relationship with food has evolved since the 1940s. Gatekeepers like glossy print publications and prestigious food critics have faded into the background, replaced by an ever-changing cast of social media influencers, food bloggers, and crowd-sourced platforms like Allrecipes. Massive multinational corporations are busy trying to create foods we didn't even know we wanted but somehow crave constantly. Tandoh's method
of presenting meticulously researched examples of fads and trends, like the explosion in the popularity of bubble tea and the rise and fall of the automat, gives readers their bearings and provides an accessible framework as they navigate the massive changes in food culture that have happened mostly within their own lifetimes. An entertaining and informative read for foodies and non-foodies alike." --Booklist, starred review

About the Author

RUBY TANDOH is an author and journalist who has written for The New Yorker, The Guardian, Vittles, and Elle. A finalist on The Great British Bake Off in 2013, she has also written Eat Up!, a book about the pleasure of eating, as well as three cookery books, Crumb, Flavour, and Cook As You Are.