Over a red-hot stove

These essays were presented at the seventeenth Leeds Symposium on Food History, of which this is the fourteenth volume in the series 'Food and Society.' Their common theme is the way in which we cooked our food from the medieval to the modern eras, most especially, how we roasted meats. The authors are distinguished food historians, mostly from the north of England. They include David Eveleigh on the rise of the kitchen range, from the 19th-century coal-fired monsters to the electric and gas cookers of the early 20th century, Ivan Day, in two essays, on techniques of roasting, and Peter Brears on roasting, specifically the 'baron of beef.' The final two chapters discuss aspects of baking: Laura Mason on yeast as a raising agent and Susan McClellan Plaisted on the transmission of cooking techniques from the Old to the New World, and the problems encountered in baking a satisfactory loaf.  The book is heavily illustrated both with historical images and photographs of historical objects.