Moveable Feasts

How many frequent flyer points have the strawberries in your bowl collected? Did that salmon in the freezer enjoy its trip to China and back? Whether it is 'French' beans grown in Kenya or 'Cheddar' cheese produced in New Mexico, what we eat has notched up thousands of miles before landing on our plates. How on earth did this happen? In her quirky, fascinating and delightful book, Sarah Murray has toured the globe in search of the stories behind food miles. Along the way, she has collected a series of astonishing facts and vivid accounts of Shanghai cafés serving English tea from Harrogate, American grain falling from a United Nations plane in Sudan and Memphis barbequed ribs flying FedEx to Wall Street traders. And such journeys date back millennia, from Roman olive oil to the Eastern spice trade. Moveable Feasts brings historical perspective to a subject that has grabbed the headlines, illustrating food's crucial role in shaping global politics, taste and culture. Murray shows how the well-travelled dinner is an inevitable consequence of man's quest for sustenance and argues that globetrotting food was a reality long before the term 'food miles' was coined.