A guide to the food and drink collections
Scope of the collection
The Library’s collection of books covering food and wine is extensive. The relevant shelfmarks are all part of the larger Science & Miscellaneous collection which covers all subject areas not part of the main humanities and arts collection that form the majority of the Library’s stock.
There are more than 1400 volumes across all the Food and Drink shelfmarks and coverage is from generally the 18th century to the present. The Library continues to collect across all the aspects of the collection but the smaller shelfmarks will have little added due to the nature of their specialism. There are works in many European languages, especially in the earlier parts of the holdings.
Founded in 1841, the Library’s collection has grown each year and we hold titles from the late 18th century onwards on the open shelves. As a result, our collection reflects the evolution and changes in thinking in a particular subject and does mean that you may come across titles which contain ideas and vocabulary that would be considered abhorrent today. The collection continues to grow with some 5,000 new titles being added each year. As we develop the collection, we seek to ensure that the controversial topics of today are represented from all sides of a debate.
Understanding shelfmarks
The collection is divided into broad subject areas (History, Literature, Topography, for example) and then into smaller areas, arranged alphabetically. Within each section, books are generally arranged by author name but edited titles are filed under the book title instead. Check the Catalogue record for the ‘shelved under’ information.
In order to make the most effective use of space, the collection is also shelved by size. Check the end of shelf marks for the notations 4to (quarto), folio and folio extra large that may indicate a different place to look for the books.
Above is an example of a book record from the Catalogue. Here you can see that the book is shelved under the author’s name and that it is available (i.e. on the shelf) in the Science & Miscellaneous section (S.), in the sub-section for Food &c. and then shelved under Riley.
Books may be requested and put aside for ready for collection, but we would always encourage members to browse the shelves for themselves and discover the books they did not know they needed. Items from the Library’s Special Collections that cannot be borrowed, can be consulted in the Library under supervised conditions with 72 hours’ notice.
Books and eBooks
The Library’s collection includes both academic eBooks and other fiction and non-fiction eBooks available through the Libby platform. All academic eBooks will appear in your search results in the Library Catalogue. Those available through Libby are also in our Catalogue but can also be searched separately through the Libby platform, which you also need in order to access these titles.
In addition to the main S. Food &c. shelfmark there are separate collections for a number of foodstuffs and drinks which take in social and economic aspects. These include Beer &c. Cheese, Cocoa, Coffee, Hops, Salt, Sugar, Tea, Vegetarianism, Vinegar, Vines, and Wine. Some are very small indeed but reflect the Victorian arrangement of the collection originally. Most of the shelfmarks will have a 4to (quarto) collection as well as the standard 8o (octavo) collection.
S. Food &c.
Includes diet, recipes, regional histories, general histories, customs, advice, works on some individual foodstuffs such as bread, potatoes, jams etc., conference papers, and all manner of general observations about food. Many of the earlier 18th and 19th century works offer advice on household management and include recipes as well as stain removal tips and how to control servants. There are also plenty on dietary concerns both from the health as well as meal-planning angles. The collection does not include large numbers of regional recipe books as might be found in a general bookshop. There are no popular celebrity chefs in the current mode but a few works by chefs of earlier periods are represented. There are also no modern housekeeping or household management works but a good number of earlier works dating up to the beginning of the 20th century.
S. Beer &c.
Covers the history of brewing and of brewers. There are a few small titles from a Whitbread series.
S. Cheese
This includes the history of cheesemaking, specific cheese histories, regional and world histories and a cheese companion.
S. Cocoa
This is one of a number of foodstuffs-as-commodities where the bulk of the titles concern commercial and industrial aspects, including company histories. There are histories of Rowntree and Cadbury as well as the history of chocolate in Mesoamerica.
S. Coffee
Another foodstuff-as-commodity with an emphasis on the cultivation and commerce but little on company histories. There are a few titles on the running of coffee plantations for aspiring planters.
S. Drink
There are numerous works on the temperance movement and the problems of alcohol and alcoholism. There are also works on the drinks’ trade, one or two non-brewing or wine-making company histories (e.g. Bulmers), tracts on abstinence, titles on legislation, Prohibition, and the Anti-Saloon League Yearbooks from 1918-1925. There is also a recipe book for making liqueurs. The 4to. collection has a number of works on specific spirits and drinks mostly published in the past 30 years.
S. Fruit
Works on specific fruit, cultivation and use as well as company histories.
S. Hops
The three titles here can be listed in full: J. F. Brown’s Guinness and hops, 1980; and the two delightfully entitled Hopping in Kent by Alan Bignell, 1977 and Hops and hopping by J.B. Marsh, 1892. There are also 2 or 3 pamphlet titles listed in the subject index for 1913 and a Parliamentary Paper.
S. Salt
Titles here cover the salt industry as well as histories of salt production and diet and health aspects. The earliest is James Rattan’s Handbook of common salt, published in Madras in 1877.
S. Sugar
Titles cover the slave-trade aspect and also the sugar industry including company histories, the botany of sugar as well as planters’ manuals. There is quite a number of pamphlet items listed in the older London Library subject index volumes in the Foyle Lightwell Reading Room, as well as Parliamentary Papers; some of the pamphlets are 18th century and are bound into a number of different volumes within the main locked Pamphlet collection; please ask at the Issue Desk.
S. Tea
Titles here as with other foodstuff-as-commodity cover the commerce and industry, company histories and manuals for potential planters as well as histories of specific teas and customs. There are also a small number of 18th century pamphlets listed in the LL subject index volumes, mostly on the taxation of tea. These may be located within the main locked Pamphlet collection and accessed via the Issue Desk.
S. Vegetarianism
A small but interesting collection of titles. Works on vegetables and fruit as a diet are found in S. Food &c. from which we would suggest the theory is found in S. Vegetarianism but the practice in S. Food &c.
S. Vinegar
An extremely small section comprising 3 titles: Louis Pasteur’s Etudes sur le vinaigre, sa fabrication, ses maladies, ses moyens de les prévenir; nouvelles observations sur la conservation des vins par la chaleur, 1868 ; The manufacture of vinegar, 1871 by the appropriately named M. Dussauce and The vinegar cupboard : recipes and history of an everyday ingredient by Angela Clutton, 2019.
S. Vines
Another smallish section concerned here with cultivation of vines for 19th and early 20th century readers and some later regional histories.
S. Wine
This is the other main area of the food and drink collection. This section covers wines in general, regional production, individual labels, anthologies of wine writing, drinking companions and to some degree some overlap with S. Vines. There is quite a number of works on individual wines or spirits from both the 19th and 20th century with a fair number of these in the 4to. section.
Bibliog. Food & Drink
A collection of works on food and drink with bibliographies on food and cookery, household management, and wine. There are also a couple of auction catalogues of notable collectors in the subject.
R.R. Dicts., Food & Drink
The titles here include the Larousse Gastronomique 1938, Food of the western world by Theodora Fitzgibbon, 1978 and the Oxford companion to food (2nd ed. 2006) and the Oxford companion to American food and drink, 2007, the Oxford companion to wine edited by Jancis Robinson (2006) and the Oxford companion to the wines of North America edited by Bruce Cass, 2000, a Hachette atlas of wine, 2000, Lichine’s encyclopedia of wine, 1982, and Andre Simon’s Dictionary of wine, spirits and liqueurs, 1958.
Journals, eJournals and online resources
The Library holds a few periodical titles that complement the food & drink collection. Some titles are either no longer subscribed or are defunct but the Library retains back issues in its collection. Some titles may be online only or kept off-site so please check the Library Catalogue for details of holdings. There are a great many websites generally available devoted to all aspects of food and drink and the Library offers online access to a number of resources that may be useful, including JSTOR for journal articles.