The Lost Supper

We live in a time when we are more worried than ever about the impact globalization, pollution, and biotechnology are having on the safety, healthfulness, and sustainability of our diets. From wheat-belly to hormone-fed beef, from genetically-modified crops, through obesogenic snack foods, to coronary-inducing trans fats and "grain-brain": many of us now fear that the food industrial agriculture is putting on our plates, and into our bodies, may be killing us. This trail-blazing book is the first to explore an idea that is quickly spreading among restaurateurs, producers, scientists, and food-lovers around the world. The key to healthy eating, they argue, lies not in looking forward, but back to the foods, many of them forgotten or on the verge of extinction, that have sustained us through our half-million-year existence as a species. Ancient sourdough bread last baked by Egyptian pharaohs; raw-milk farmhouse cheese from critically endangered British dairy cattle; ham from Spanish pata negra pigs that have been foraging on acorns on a secluded island since before the United States was a nation; Neolithic wines from long-lost grapes uniquely capable of resisting quickly-evolving pests and modern pathogens: in ten brisk and gripping chapters, THE LOST SUPPER introduces readers to the surprising and forgotten flavors, whose revival is captivating food-lovers around the world.