Cornucopia

Food, once the shame of the British nation, is now the object of our shameless, salivatory interest. Cookery is never off our TV screens, nor out of our newspapers. A revolution is afoot, in short, and never in the field of human nutrition have so many people eaten so well. So, at least, we are led to believe. But in the course of a dyspeptic journey around the eating places, the fine food producers, the markets and supermarkets of Britain, expatriate gastronome Paul Richardson found that the truth is more complex, more intriguing and much more amusing. He chats to chefs and shoppers, foodie faddists and junk-food junkies. He visits cheesemakers, bakers, smokehouses, coffee houses, and artisan producers of everything from ham and jam to cakes and ale. Democratic to the last, he tastes his way through deep-fried Mars bars in Newcastle, udder in Accrington, pasties in Padstow, and foie gras three ways on a buckwheat pancake in Fulham, interpolating his narrative with "bites" of culinary lore.