Jane Grigson (born Heather Mabel Jane McIntire; 13 March 1928 – 12 March 1990) was an English cookery writer. In the latter part of the 20th century she was the author of the food column for ''

The Observer ''The Observer'' is a British newspaper published on Sundays. It is a sister paper to ''The Guardian'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', whose parent company Guardian Media Group Limited acquired it in 1993. First published in 1791, it is the ...

'' and wrote numerous books about

European cuisine European cuisine comprises the cuisines of Europe "European Cuisine."British dishes. Her work proved influential in promoting British food. Born in

Gloucestershire Gloucestershire ( abbreviated Glos) is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn and the entire Forest of Dean. The county town is the city of ...

, Grigson was raised in

Sunderland Sunderland () is a port city in Tyne and Wear, England. It is the City of Sunderland's administrative centre and in the Historic counties of England, historic county of County of Durham, Durham. The city is from Newcastle-upon-Tyne and is on t ...

North East England North East England is one of nine official regions of England at the first level of ITL for statistical purposes. The region has three current administrative levels below the region level in the region; combined authority, unitary author ...

, before studying at

Newnham College, Cambridge Newnham College is a women's constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college was founded in 1871 by a group organising Lectures for Ladies, members of which included philosopher Henry Sidgwick and suffragist campaigner Millic ...

. In 1953 she became an editorial assistant at the publishing company Rainbird, McLean, where she was the research assistant for the poet and writer

Geoffrey Grigson Geoffrey Edward Harvey Grigson (2 March 1905 – 25 November 1985) was a British poet, writer, editor, critic, exhibition curator, anthologist and naturalist. In the 1930s he was editor of the influential magazine ''New Verse'', and went on to p ...

. They soon began a relationship which lasted until his death in 1985; they had one daughter,

Sophie Sophie is a version of the female given name Sophia, meaning "wise". People with the name Born in the Middle Ages * Sophie, Countess of Bar (c. 1004 or 1018–1093), sovereign Countess of Bar and lady of Mousson * Sophie of Thuringia, Duchess o ...

. Jane worked as a translator of Italian works, and co-wrote books with her husband before writing ''Charcuterie and French Pork Cookery'' in 1967. The book was well received and, on its strength, Grigson gained her position at ''The Observer'' after a recommendation by the food writer

Elizabeth David Elizabeth David CBE (born Elizabeth Gwynne, 26 December 1913 – 22 May 1992) was a British cookery writer. In the mid-20th century she strongly influenced the revitalisation of home cookery in her native country and beyond with articles and bo ...

. Grigson continued to write for ''The Observer'' until 1990; she also wrote works that focused mainly on British food—such as ''Good Things'' (1971), ''English Food'' (1974), ''Food With the Famous'' (1979) and ''The Observer Guide to British Cookery'' (1984)—or on key ingredients—such as ''Fish Cookery'' (1973), ''The Mushroom Feast'' (1975), ''Jane Grigson's Vegetable Book'' (1978), ''Jane Grigson's Fruit Book'' (1982) and ''Exotic Fruits and Vegetables'' (1986). She was awarded the John Florio Prize for Italian translation in 1966, and her food books won three

Glenfiddich Food and Drink Awards The Glenfiddich Food and Drink Awards were intended to recognize achievements in writing, publishing and broadcasting on the subjects of food and drink. The awards had been sponsored since 1972 by William Grant & Sons, a family-owned Scottish disti ...

and two André Simon Memorial Prizes. Grigson was active in political lobbying, campaigning against battery farming and for animal welfare, food provenance and

smallholder A smallholding or smallholder is a small farm operating under a small-scale agriculture model. Definitions vary widely for what constitutes a smallholder or small-scale farm, including factors such as size, food production technique or technology ...

s; in 1988 she took

John MacGregor John MacGregor, John Macgregor or John McGregor may refer to: Sportsmen * John McGregor (footballer, born 1851), Scottish international football player * John McGregor (footballer, born 1900) (1900–1993), English football player * John McGrego ...

, then the

Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food was a United Kingdom cabinet position, responsible for the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. The post was originally named President of the Board of Agriculture and was created in 1889. ...

, to task after

salmonella ''Salmonella'' is a genus of rod-shaped (bacillus) Gram-negative bacteria of the family Enterobacteriaceae. The two species of ''Salmonella'' are '' Salmonella enterica'' and '' Salmonella bongori''. ''S. enterica'' is the type species and is ...

was found in British eggs. Her writing put food into its social and historical context with a range of sources that includes poetry, novels and the cookery writers of the

Industrial Revolution The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going f ...

era, including

Hannah Glasse Hannah Glasse (; March 1708 – 1 September 1770) was an English cookery writer of the 18th century. Her first cookery book, ''The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy'', published in 1747, became the best-selling recipe book that century. It w ...

, Elizabeth Raffald,

Maria Rundell Maria Eliza Rundell (née Ketelby; 1745 – 16 December 1828) was an English writer. Little is known about most of her life, but in 1805, when she was over 60, she sent an unedited collection of recipes and household advice to John Murray, of ...

and

Eliza Acton Eliza Acton (17 April 1799 – 13 February 1859) was an English food writer and poet who produced one of Britain's first cookery books aimed at the domestic reader, '' Modern Cookery for Private Families''. The book introduced the now-un ...

. Through her writing she changed the eating habits of the British, making many forgotten dishes popular once again.

Biography

Early life; 1928–1965

Grigson was born Heather Mabel Jane McIntire on 13 March 1928 in

Gloucester Gloucester ( ) is a cathedral city and the county town of Gloucestershire in the South West of England. Gloucester lies on the River Severn, between the Cotswolds to the east and the Forest of Dean to the west, east of Monmouth and east o ...

, Gloucestershire, the daughter of George and Doris McIntire. George was a solicitor and the deputy

town clerk A clerk is a senior official of many municipal governments in the English-speaking world. In some communities, including most in the United States, the position is elected, but in many others, the clerk is appointed to their post. In the UK, a Tow ...

of Gloucester; Doris was an artist. Grigson later said that home was where she "first learnt about good English food". After he had been involved in the closure of an

abattoir A slaughterhouse, also called abattoir (), is a facility where animals are slaughtered to provide food. Slaughterhouses supply meat, which then becomes the responsibility of a packaging facility. Slaughterhouses that produce meat that is no ...

, George gave up eating meat. When Grigson was four the family moved to

. She picked up a trace of a north-east accent that remained with her, and what the ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' calls a "quietly left-wing" political viewpoint. During the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

, Sunderland was a target of ''

Luftwaffe The ''Luftwaffe'' () was the aerial-warfare branch of the German '' Wehrmacht'' before and during World War II. Germany's military air arms during World War I, the '' Luftstreitkräfte'' of the Imperial Army and the '' Marine-Fliegerabt ...

'' bombs, so Grigson and her sister Mary were sent to

Casterton School Casterton School was an independent boarding and day school for girls aged 3 to 18 years in the village of Casterton in rural Cumbria. In its final years it also admitted boys, up to the age of 11. The school ceased to exist in 2013, though a pr ...

, a boarding school in

Westmorland Westmorland (, formerly also spelt ''Westmoreland'';R. Wilkinson The British Isles, Sheet The British IslesVision of Britain/ref> is a historic county in North West England spanning the southern Lake District and the northern Dales. It had an ...

. She then gained a place at

to read English literature. After university Grigson travelled around Italy, and lived for three months in

Florence Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilancio demografico ...

. On her return to the UK she became the assistant to

Bryan Robertson Bryan Robertson OBE (1 April 1925 – 18 November 2002) was an English curator and arts manager described by ''Studio International'' as "the greatest Director the Tate Gallery never had". Biography Robertson was born in London and educated at Ba ...

, the curator at the Heffer Gallery in Cambridge; an interest in painting, silver and textiles led her to apply for positions at the

Victoria and Albert Museum The Victoria and Albert Museum (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...

, but she was unsuccessful. She worked in a junior capacity in an art gallery on

Bond Street Bond Street in the West End of London links Piccadilly in the south to Oxford Street in the north. Since the 18th century the street has housed many prestigious and upmarket fashion retailers. The southern section is Old Bond Street and the ...

; she thought the watercolours were old-fashioned, and she later said that "I wished to rip everything off the walls and hang up orks by

Ben Nicholson Benjamin Lauder Nicholson, OM (10 April 1894 – 6 February 1982) was an English painter of abstract compositions (sometimes in low relief), landscape and still-life. Background and training Nicholson was born on 10 April 1894 in De ...

". She began writing art reviews for the ''

Sunderland Echo The ''Sunderland Echo'' is a daily newspaper serving the Sunderland, South Tyneside and East Durham areas of North East England. The newspaper was founded by Samuel Storey, Edward Backhouse, Edward Temperley Gourley, Charles Palmer, Richar ...

'', covering subjects such as fine pottery, the

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ide ...

and the work of

Clarkson Frederick Stanfield Clarkson Frederick Stanfield (3 December 179318 May 1867) was a prominent English painter (often inaccurately credited as William Clarkson Stanfield) who was best known for his large-scale paintings of dramatic marine subjects and landscapes. H ...

. In 1953 she became an editorial assistant at the publishing company Rainbird, McLean, a position she held for two years, during which time she was the research assistant for the poet and writer

. He was married, and twenty-three years older than she, but they began a relationship and shortly afterwards she moved to the Farmhouse at Broad Town, Wiltshire, which had been his family home since 1945. He and his wife did not divorce; his estranged wife refused to grant him one. Instead, in the mid-1950s, McIntire changed her name by

deed poll A deed poll (plural: deeds poll) is a legal document binding on a single person or several persons acting jointly to express an intention or create an obligation. It is a deed, and not a contract because it binds only one party. Etymology The ...

to Jane Grigson. In 1959 the Grigsons had a daughter,

, who later became a food writer and television presenter. Shortly after the birth, the couple purchased a cave-cottage in Trôo, France, and it was there, according to the ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', that Grigson developed a conviction that "because cooking is a central part of life it should be as carefully written about as any other art form". Grigson worked for ten years as a translator from Italian, and in 1959 she wrote a new translation of

Carlo Collodi Carlo Lorenzini (24 November 1826 – 26 October 1890), better known by the pen name Carlo Collodi (), was an Italian author, humourist, and journalist, widely known for his fairy tale novel ''The Adventures of Pinocchio''. Early life Co ...

's fairy tale ''

The Adventures of Pinocchio ''The Adventures of Pinocchio'' ( ; it, Le avventure di Pinocchio ; commonly shortened to ''Pinocchio'') is a children's fantasy novel by Italian author Carlo Collodi. It is about the mischievous adventures of an animated marionette named Pi ...

'', which she thought was "the only version of Pinocchio to transmit the liveliness and toughness of the original". She translated Gian Antonio Cibotto's 1962 work ''Scano Boa'' in 1963 and, the same year, also translated

Cesare Beccaria Cesare Bonesana di Beccaria, Marquis of Gualdrasco and Villareggio (; 15 March 173828 November 1794) was an Italian criminologist, jurist, philosopher, economist and politician, who is widely considered one of the greatest thinkers of the Age ...

's 1764 work ''

Dei delitti e delle pene ''On Crimes and Punishments'' ( it, Dei delitti e delle pene ) is a treatise written by Cesare Beccaria in 1764. The treatise condemned torture and the death penalty and was a founding work in the field of penology. History Beccaria and t ...

''; the work was published as ''Of Crimes and Punishments'', and it won the 1966 John Florio Prize for Italian translation. Jane and Geoffrey then worked on a joint project aimed at juveniles that looked at the meaning of 65 artworks in the context of their time and their enduring impact; ''Shapes and Stories'' was published in 1964. ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' ( ...

'' and ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers '' The Observer'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the ...

'' both thought it "original and beautiful". A follow-up work, ''Shapes and Adventures'', was published in 1967.

Mid-1960s to mid-1970s

Pork cuts - Acton, Modern Cookery, page 236

In the mid-1960s Grigson was persuaded by her friend, Adey Horton, to co-author a book on pork. Horton dropped out part-way through the project and, in 1967, Grigson published ''Charcuterie and French Pork Cookery''. The reviewer in ''The Times'' commented, "the research is detailed, the recounting lively, the information fascinating, the recipes complete from head to tail." In a ''tour d'horizon'' of cookery books in 1977,

called the book "A valuable work on the salting, curing and cooking of pork ... as practised by French households as well as by professional ''charcutiers''", and commented on its "authentic recipes, practical approach and good writing". On the strength of ''Charcuterie and French Pork Cookery''—and a subsequent lunch—David recommended Grigson to ''

'' as their food writer; Grigson began her weekly column with the paper the following year. For her first article she wrote about strawberries, but was unsure of how to approach the topic. Her husband suggested "we'll find out what the strawberry has meant to people, what they have done to it, how they have developed it and so on". She used the same approach for most of her future columns.

Jay Rayner Jason Matthew Rayner (born 14 September 1966) is an English journalist and food critic. Early life Jason Matthew Rayner was born on 14 September 1966. He is the younger son of Desmond Rayner and journalist Claire Rayner. His family is Jewish. ...

, one of her successors in the role, writes that Grigson "established ... henewspaper's reputation as a publication that was serious about food".

Nigel Slater Nigel Slater (born 9 April 1956) is an English food writer, journalist and broadcaster. He has written a column for ''The Observer Magazine'' for over a decade and is the principal writer for the ''Observer Food Monthly'' supplement. Prior to ...

, another successor, considers her writing "legendary". She held the position until 1990. Grigson and her husband would spend three months a year in Trôo—sometimes visiting twice a year—writing there and at their home in Broad Town, Wiltshire. While in France she "delighted in proving to ... erFrench friends that British cooking could be every bit as good as theirs", according to her daughter. Her articles in ''The Observer'' provided the basis of further books; in 1971 her columns provided material for ''Good Things'', which she introduced by saying it "is not a manual of cookery, but a book about enjoying food". Harold Wilshaw, the food writer for ''The Guardian'', thought it a "magnificent book ... worth the money for the chapter on prunes alone" ''The Times'' considers it "perhaps the most popular of her books". Nika Hazelton, reviewing it for ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' writes that it is "a delight to read and to cook from. The author is literate, her food interesting but unaffected". The chef and food writer

Samin Nosrat Samin Nosrat ( fa, ثمین نصرت, , born November 7, 1979) is an American chef, TV host, food writer and podcaster. She is the author of the James Beard Award–winning, ''New York Times'' Bestselling cookbook '' Salt Fat Acid Heat'' and hos ...

lists ''Good Things'' as one of "the classic cookbooks that shaped my career as a chef and writer", alongside ''Jane Grigson's Fruit Book'' and ''Jane Grigson's Vegetable Book''. In 1973 Grigson was invited by the Wine and Food Society to write ''Fish Cookery''. According to the food writer Geraldene Holt, it was not common in Britain at that time for fish to be the main course at a formal meal; by the time Grigson came around to writing the updated edition in 1993, attitudes and tastes had changed, and a wider variety of fish was available for purchase. Grigson opened her 1974 work, ''English Food'' with "English cooking—both historically and in the mouth—is a great deal more varied and delectable than our masochistic temper in this matter allows". On reading the book, Roger Baker, reviewing in ''The Times'', described Grigson as "probably the most engaging food writer to emerge during the last few years"; he thought the book had "a sense of fun, a feeling for history, a very readable style and a love of simple, unaffected cooking". ''The Times'' later described ''English Food'' as being "a work to set alongside Elizabeth David's books on French and Italian cuisine". Holt records that with the book, "Grigson had become a crusader for the oft-maligned cooking of the British Isles"; she became an early critic of battery farming and passionate about the provenance of food. The same year, Grigson was a contributor to ''The World Atlas of Food''. The book was described by the food writer Elizabeth Ray as "by its nature both expensive and superficial", and by Baker as containing "hectic catch-lines on every page ... a thinness in the writing". Over the next three years Grigson returned to producing books dealing with key categories of food: two booklets, ''Cooking Carrots '' and ''Cooking Spinach'' were published in 1975, as was ''The Mushroom Feast''. The last of these was described by ''

Kirkus Reviews ''Kirkus Reviews'' (or ''Kirkus Media'') is an American book review magazine founded in 1933 by Virginia Kirkus (1893–1980). The magazine is headquartered in New York City. ''Kirkus Reviews'' confers the annual Kirkus Prize to authors of fic ...

'' as "A beautiful collection of recipes and culinary lore"; the reviewer for ''The Observer'' noted that "Grigson gives you more than recipes. She takes you down the byways of folklore and literature". Grigson described it as "the record of one family's pursuit of mushrooms, both wild and cultivated, over the last twenty years". Unlike many of her other books it owed little to her previously published articles, but drew on her family's experiences as mushroom enthusiasts. The idea of writing a book on fungi came to her after a friend in Trôo introduced the Grigsons to mushroom gathering. For him, as for other locals, "mushroom-hunting was part of the waste-nothing philosophy he had inherited from his farming peasant ancestors. ... mushrooms have long been accepted by chefs of the high cooking tradition in France: there is no question of allowing them to go to waste as we do so unregardingly". She had gradually concluded that few available books did justice to mushrooms and other fungi: "Most cookery books—always excepting ''Plats du Jour'' by Patience Gray and Primrose Boyd—are useless". Reviewing the first edition, Skeffington Ardron wrote in ''The Guardian'' that choosing between the many recipes "will drive you wild, for there is here such a magnificent collection" ranging from simple economical dishes to "the extravagant, impossible, ridiculous ''Poulard Derbe'' with its champagne, foie gras and truffles".

1978 to 1985

Antoine Raspal (1738-1811), Intérieur de cuisine , vers 1776-80

In 1978 Grigson wrote ''Jane Grigson's Vegetable Book''. Reviewing the book in the first edition of '' Petits Propos Culinaires'', Jane Davidson wrote "Erudition and commonsense are not always bedfellows. In this book they snuggle happily together. ... it is light on the eye and invigorating to the imagination." Writing about the first edition, the food writer Robin McDouall said in ''The Times'' that the book was "worthy to stand on the shelf by her ''Fish Cookery'' and her ''Charcuterie and French Pork Cookery''—praise could go no higher". He commented that the cuisines of many countries were covered, but the main ones were French, Greek, Turkish and Arab. In ''The New York Times''

Mimi Sheraton Mimi Sheraton (born Miriam Solomon; February 10, 1926) is an American food critic and writer. Family and education Sheraton's mother, Beatrice, was described as an excellent cook and her father, Joseph Solomon, as a commission merchant in a wh ...

wrote that the book was a "large, handsome volume ithhelpful shopping, storing and cooking information on all the vegetables included in recipes, and the range of dishes is worldwide if strongest on European specialties". Sheraton remarked on the "especially good lentil recipes, wonderful fragrant and bracing soups, and intriguing preparations for lesserknown vegetables such as chayote squash, Jerusalem artichokes and hop shoots". Wilshaw, reviewing the paperback edition for ''The Guardian'', praised Grigson's "warm and erudite style ... an encyclopaedic account of vegetables, their history and their place in modern kitchens". In 1986 ''The Guardian'' polled its readers to discover their most indispensable cookery books; ''Jane Grigson's Vegetable Book'' took the second place, behind Elizabeth David's '' French Provincial Cooking'' but ahead of other books by David and by

Madhur Jaffrey Madhur Jaffrey CBE (née Bahadur; born 13 August 1933) is an Indian-British-American actress, food and travel writer, and television personality. She is recognized for bringing Indian cuisine to the western hemisphere with her debut cookbook ...

, Delia Smith,

Claudia Roden Claudia Roden (née Douek; born 1936) is an Egyptian-born British cookbook writer and cultural anthropologist of Sephardi/ Mizrahi descent. She is best known as the author of Middle Eastern cookbooks including ''A Book of Middle Eastern Food'' ...

and

Julia Child Julia Carolyn Child (née McWilliams; August 15, 1912 – August 13, 2004) was an American cooking teacher, author, and television personality. She is recognized for bringing French cuisine to the American public with her debut cookbook, '' ...

. In July 1978 Grigson was interviewed for ''

Desert Island Discs ''Desert Island Discs'' is a radio programme broadcast on BBC Radio 4. It was first broadcast on the BBC Forces Programme on 29 January 1942. Each week a guest, called a "castaway" during the programme, is asked to choose eight recordings (usua ...

'' by

Roy Plomley Francis Roy Plomley, ( ; 20 January 1914 – 28 May 1985) was an English radio broadcaster, producer, playwright and novelist. He is best remembered for devising the BBC Radio series ''Desert Island Discs'', which he hosted from its inception i ...

. Among her selections were poetry recordings by her husband, one of his books—''Notes from an Odd Country''—and, as her luxury item, a typewriter and paper. Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe - Monet (Pushkin Museum)

Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe - Monet (Pushkin Museum)

Following a series of articles Grigson wrote for her column in ''The Observer'', she published ''Food With the Famous'' in 1979, a look at the food eaten by various figures through history. The critic for ''Kirkus Reviews'' thought "Grigson's leisurely quotation-studded essays are almost too tantalizing; eventually one begins to miss the factual data (accounts of recipe-adaptations, etc.)" while the reviewer for the ''

Birmingham Daily Post The ''Birmingham Post'' is a weekly printed newspaper based in Birmingham, England, with a circulation of 2,545 and distribution throughout the West Midlands. First published under the name the ''Birmingham Daily Post'' in 1857, it has had a ...

'' described it as "a charming book about food, rather than a cookery book". From late 1979 to 1980 the chef

Anne Willan Anne Willan (born 26 January 1938 in Newcastle upon Tyne, England) is the founder of the École de Cuisine La Varenne, which operated in Paris and Burgundy France, from 1975 until 2007. La Varenne classes continued in Santa Monica, California, thr ...

wrote "French Cookery School", a sixteen-part series in ''The Observer''. The series was collated into a book, ''The Observer French Cookery School'', with Grigson adding information on

French cuisine French cuisine () is the cooking traditions and practices from France. It has been influenced over the centuries by the many surrounding cultures of Spain, Italy, Switzerland, Germany and Belgium, in addition to the food traditions of the re ...

. In 1981 Grigson was a participant at the second

Oxford Symposium on Food and Cookery The Oxford Symposium on Food & Cookery is an annual weekend conference at which academics, food writers, cooks, and others with an interest in food and culture meet to discuss current issues in food studies and food history. Overview The Sympo ...

, along with Elizabeth David. The symposium was founded by the food historian Alan Davidson and the social historian

Theodore Zeldin Theodore Zeldin (born 22 August 1933) is an Oxford scholar and thinker whose books have searched for answers to three questions: Where can a person look to find more inspiring ways of spending each day and each year? What ambitions remain un ...

. Grigson published ''Jane Grigson's Fruit Book'' in 1982, a companion book to her ''Vegetable Book''.

Prue Leith Dame Prudence Margaret Leith, (born 18 February 1940) is a South African restaurateur, chef, caterer, television presenter/broadcaster, journalist, cookery writer and novelist. She is Chancellor of Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh. She wa ...

, the cookery editor for ''The Guardian'', said the book was "a great read and a vital leg-up for the cook temporarily bereft of ideas beyond apple pie. ... There are literary, historical, and travel anecdotes, interleaved with solid information". Reviewing the book in the ''New York Times'', Sheraton wrote that the book was "readable and spirited, with ... diverse combination of practical information, enticing recipes and romantic lore and food history, all tempered with humor and goodwill". In 1983 Grigson published ''The Observer Guide to European Cookery''. The paper sent her on what she called "a cook's tour" of European countries in early 1981 to explore and write about their cuisines. Political difficulties and a limited timetable obliged her to miss many countries; those she visited and wrote about were Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal, France, Britain, the Scandinavian countries, Germany, Austria and Hungary. Russia had seemed likely to be omitted, because of the inefficiency and obstructiveness of Soviet officials, but Pamela Davidson, a friend based in Moscow, stepped into the breach, producing "the most informative part of the book, which tells us exactly what Soviet citizens eat and give their friends". Grigson's experiences were published as a ten-week series in the paper before being published in book form. Leith, in ''The Guardian'', wrote that, despite reading the columns in the newspaper, she was able to "read them again with undiminished pleasure". A sixty-minute video was produced by ''The Observer'' showing Grigson preparing six of the book's recipes. Shona Crawford Poole, reviewing for ''The Times'', thought it showed "Grigson's agreeable manner ... allied to great good sense". Grigson's next book, ''The Observer Guide to British Cookery'', was published in 1984, for which Grigson and her husband travelled round the UK to sample local fare. In her introduction she said "I think it helps if we try to consider the origins of our food, and its appropriateness." Her aim for the book, was to "make us all think out the best way of eating good honest food, seemly food if you like, at levels and in a style that are recognisably and proudly our own". Alan Davidson, reviewing for ''Petits Propos Culinaires'', observed Grigson's long-held interest in British food, and thought "the quality of her writing shines as brightly as ever". The journalist

Digby Anderson Digby C. Anderson (born 25 May 1944) is the founder and former director (until 2004) of the Social Affairs Unit, a public policy organisation/economic think-tank created in 1980. In addition to this role, Anderson served as a long-time contributor ...

, reviewing in ''

The Spectator ''The Spectator'' is a weekly British magazine on politics, culture, and current affairs. It was first published in July 1828, making it the oldest surviving weekly magazine in the world. It is owned by Frederick Barclay, who also owns ''Th ...

'', stated "This is 'expanded from her articles for ''The Observer Magazine''. Thus it is not pure Grigson but has additives, preservatives and a good deal of artificial colouring", although he allowed "There are splendid recipes, good general advice and useful tips in ''British Cooking''".

1985 to 1990

Geoffrey Grigson died in November 1985. Jane said that when married, "each day was vivid", "he made every ordinary day exciting and worth living". The following year she was diagnosed with

cervical cancer Cervical cancer is a cancer arising from the cervix. It is due to the abnormal growth of cells that have the ability to invade or spread to other parts of the body. Early on, typically no symptoms are seen. Later symptoms may include abnormal ...

. In a letter to the writer

Colin Spencer Colin Spencer (born 1933) is an English writer and artist who has produced a prolific body of work in a wide variety of media since his first published short stories and drawings appeared in ''The London Magazine'' and '' Encounter'' when he wa ...

soon afterwards, she said "When I first got cancer ... I welcomed the thought of joining him in the churchyard." After medical treatment, the cancer went into remission. Not long after Geoffrey's death, Jane Grigson began to take an active role in food lobbying. She campaigned for animal welfare, she promoted food provenance and

s. It was a subject she had long thought important; in 1971, in the introduction to ''Good Food'', she wrote:

The encouragement of fine food is not greed or gourmandise; it can be seen as an aspect of the anti-pollution movement in that it indicates concern for the quality of the environment. This is not the limited concern of a few cranks. Small and medium-sized firms, feeling unable to compete with the cheap products of the giants, turn to producing better food. A courageous pig-breeder in Suffolk starts a cooked pork shop in the high charcuterie style; people in many parts of the country run restaurants specialising in local food; I notice in grocer's shops in our small town the increasing appearance of bags of strong flour and the prominence given to eggs direct from the farm.

Christ Church and its churchyard, Broad Town - geograph

In 1988 Grigson took

, then the

, to task after

was found in British eggs. She told McGregor "I advise action, not just another research committee. You may get away with allowing agribusiness to poison our drinking water; it cannot get away with eggs". She also became involved in the opposition to development around

Avebury Avebury () is a Neolithic henge monument containing three stone circles, around the village of Avebury in Wiltshire, in southwest England. One of the best known prehistoric sites in Britain, it contains the largest megalithic stone circle in ...

, the

UNESCO World Heritage Site A World Heritage Site is a landmark or area with legal protection by an international convention administered by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). World Heritage Sites are designated by UNESCO for ...

. Grigson's last major work was ''Exotic Fruits and Vegetables'', published in 1986. The impetus for the 128-page volume came from the artist Charlotte Knox, who offered the publisher,

Jonathan Cape Jonathan Cape is a London publishing firm founded in 1921 by Herbert Jonathan Cape, who was head of the firm until his death in 1960. Cape and his business partner Wren Howard set up the publishing house in 1921. They established a reputation ...

, a portfolio of coloured drawings of exotic fruits and vegetables. Grigson's "idea was to make an album in 19th-century style with plates vivid enough for people to be excited by them, to want to pick them off the page and try them for themselves." Grigson's cancer returned in the middle of 1989 and she underwent

chemotherapy Chemotherapy (often abbreviated to chemo and sometimes CTX or CTx) is a type of cancer treatment that uses one or more anti-cancer drugs (chemotherapeutic agents or alkylating agents) as part of a standardized chemotherapy regimen. Chemother ...

in September that year; she died on 12 March 1990 at Broad Town. She was buried in the cemetery of Christ Church, the local church, alongside Geoffrey. A memorial service for Grigson was held at

St Margaret's, Westminster The Church of St Margaret, Westminster Abbey, is in the grounds of Westminster Abbey on Parliament Square, London, England. It is dedicated to Margaret of Antioch, and forms part of a single World Heritage Site with the Palace of Westminster ...

in June 1990; the speakers providing the eulogies were the food writers

Derek Cooper Major George Derek Cooper OBE MC (28 May 1912 – 19 May 2007) was a British Army officer, campaigner for refugees, and supporter of the Palestinian people. Early life and career Cooper was born in Bromley in Kent. He was the third of four c ...

and Paul Levy.

Broadcasting

Unlike Elizabeth David, who avoided broadcasting, Grigson appeared from time to time on radio and television. In 1984 she joined Prue Leith, Anton Mosimann,

Albert Roux Albert Henri Roux (8 October 1935 – 4 January 2021) was a French-British restaurateur and chef. He and his brother Michel operated Le Gavroche in London's Mayfair, the first restaurant in the UK to gain three Michelin stars. He helped tra ...

and two others in the

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a fourth television service ...

television series ''Take Six Cooks'', in which well-known cooks dined together at the

Dorchester Hotel The Dorchester is a five-star luxury hotel on Park Lane and Deanery Street in London, to the east of Hyde Park. It is one of the world's most prestigious and expensive hotels. The Dorchester opened on 18 April 1931, and it still retains its ...

in London and each then presented their thoughts on and recipes for a particular course or dishes. Leith presented ''

hors d'oeuvre An hors d'oeuvre ( ; french: hors-d'œuvre ), appetiser or starter is a small dish served before a meal in European cuisine. Some hors d'oeuvres are served cold, others hot. Hors d'oeuvres may be served at the dinner table as a part of the ...

s'', Mosimann fish, Roux meat and Grigson vegetables. In a book associated with the series eight of her recipes were included. As was her usual practice, she interspersed classic recipes—''carrots à la Forestière'' and peas in the French style with spring onions and lettuce—with less well known dishes such as artichokes stuffed with a purée of broad beans. On BBC radio she took part in interviews and panel discussions giving her views on ingredients and advice on techniques, and in a 1989 programme she presented a portrait of Elizabeth Raffald and her 18th-century recipes. On BBC television she extolled her heroes—Elizabeth David,

Henry James Henry James ( – ) was an American-British author. He is regarded as a key transitional figure between literary realism and literary modernism, and is considered by many to be among the greatest novelists in the English language. He was the ...

and Geoffrey Grigson, demonstrated how to roast and stuff a goose, went in search of Britain's best fresh produce, gave advice for the health-conscious about cooking vegetables, and joined other cooks at the

Savoy Hotel The Savoy Hotel is a luxury hotel located in the Strand in the City of Westminster in central London, England. Built by the impresario Richard D'Oyly Carte with profits from his Gilbert and Sullivan opera productions, it opened on 6 August ...

to supervise show-business celebrities attempting to cook classic dishes.

Works

1960s

''Charcuterie and French Pork Cookery'' (1967)

Grigson's first book about food and cookery was ''Charcuterie and French Pork Cookery'', published by Michael Joseph in 1967. After a brief introduction outlining the history of the pig in European agriculture and cuisine, the main text begins with a "Picnic guide to the charcutier's shop", in which the author details the pork products available in a good French charcuterie. They include dishes ready to eat, such as rillettes; pâtés; cooked and cured ham (such as jambons de York and de Bayonne); and cooked sausages of the

salami Salami ( ) is a cured sausage consisting of fermented and air-dried meat, typically pork. Historically, salami was popular among Southern, Eastern, and Central European peasants because it can be stored at room temperature for up to 45 ...

and other types. Dishes that require cooking include pigs' trotters; sausages including

andouillette Andouillette () is a French coarse-grained sausage made from the intestine of pork, pepper, wine, onions, and seasonings. Andouillettes are generally made from the large intestine and are in diameter. True andouillettes are rarely seen outs ...

black pudding , type = , course = , place_of_origin = Great Britain and Ireland , region =England, Ireland, Scotland , associated_cuisine = United Kingdom and Ireland , creator = , year = , mintime = , maxtime = , served = Hot, occasionally ...

s; and, more expensive, boudins blancs. Also listed are cuts of fresh pork, from head to tail (''tête'' and ''queue de porc''). Later chapters deal with charcuterie equipment; herbs and seasonings; and sauces and relishes. They are followed by four substantial chapters of recipes for terrines, pâtés (cold and hot), and galantines; sausages and boudins blancs; salt pork and hams; and the main cuts of fresh pork. The final four chapters cover the "Extremities"; "Insides"; "Fat"; and "Blood" (black puddings). Throughout, there are illustrative line drawings by M.J. Mott. When the first American edition was published, in 1968, three of the US's leading cookery writers—Julia Child,

James Beard James Andrews Beard (May 5, 1903 – January 23, 1985) was an American chef, cookbook author, teacher and television personality. He pioneered television cooking shows, taught at The James Beard Cooking School in New York City and Seaside, ...

and Michael Field—called it "the best cook book of the year". In Britain,

Penguin Books Penguin Books is a British publishing, publishing house. It was co-founded in 1935 by Allen Lane with his brothers Richard and John, as a line of the publishers The Bodley Head, only becoming a separate company the following year.Chris Galvin called the book "a masterpiece": :so informative and well written ... it feels that you have someone on hand to help, steering you through the recipe, avoiding unnecessary technical terms and instead using universal words and phrases, e.g. "whirling ingredients together", "simmering and not galloping a stock". Most importantly Grigson encourages you to attempt dishes insisting, for example, that making a sausage is a simple affair then following this statement up with recipe after recipe for saucisse fumé, saucisse de campagne and saussicon sec. Translations of the book have been published in Dutch (''Worst, Paté: en andere Charcuterie uit de Franse Keuken'') and—unusually for a book on food by a British author—in French.

1970s

''Good Things'' (1971)

The sections of the book deal with fish, meat and game, vegetables and fruit, with a miscellany to conclude. In some of Grigson's later books she dealt exhaustively with specific ingredients: her ''Fish Cookery'' two years later covered more than fifty varieties of fish. Here she deals with five: kippers, lobster, mussels, scallops and trout, writing about her few chosen subjects more expansively than in the later book, and discussing the pros and cons of various recipes. She says of lobsters that there is nothing more delicious, so sweet, firm and succulent, discusses the most humane way of killing them, and although advancing the proposition that they are best eaten hot with only lemon juice and butter on them, she gives the recipes for homard à l'Americaine (quoting

Édouard de Pomiane Édouard Alexandre de Pomiane, sometimes Édouard Pozerski (20 April 1875 – 26 January 1964), was a French scientist, radio broadcaster and food writer. His parents emigrated from Congress Poland in 1863 after the January Uprising, changed the ...

's view that it is "a gastronomic cacophony") and

Thermidor Thermidor () was the eleventh month in the French Republican Calendar. The month was named after the French word ''thermal'', derived from the Greek word "thermos" (''heat''). Thermidor was the second month of the summer quarter (''mois d'ét� ...

, as well as bisque, which she calls "without qualification ... the best of all soups". Grigson adopts the same approach in the other sections, dealing at leisure with favoured ingredients and dishes. Not all her choices are the most frequently seen in other cookery books: in the meat section she devotes eight pages to snails, and ten to sweetbreads, and none to steaks or roasts. Among the six fruits she writes about, apples and strawberries are joined by quince and prunes. She agrees that stewed prunes endured at school or in prison—the "dreadful alliance between prunes and rice or prunes and custard powder"—are best forgotten, and makes her case for the prune as a traditional ingredient in meat and fish dishes, giving as examples beef or hare casseroled with prunes, turkey with prune stuffing, and tripe slowly simmered with prunes. In the final section she covers five French cakes, ice creams and sorbets, and fruit liqueurs.

WorldCat WorldCat is a union catalog that itemizes the collections of tens of thousands of institutions (mostly libraries), in many countries, that are current or past members of the OCLC global cooperative. It is operated by OCLC, Inc. Many of the O ...

records 21 editions of ''Good Things'' published between 1971 and 2009 in English and translation. The original edition, like the charcuterie book four years earlier, had line drawings by M.J. Mott. A reprint by the

Folio Society The Folio Society is a London-based publisher, founded by Charles Ede in 1947 and incorporated in 1971. Formerly privately owned, it operates as an employee ownership trust since 2021. It produces illustrated hardback editions of classic fic ...

in 2009 had illustrations, some in colour, by Alice Tait.

''Fish Cookery'' (1973)

The book was first published as ''The International Wine and Food Society's Guide to Fish Cookery'' in 1973, but became widely known in its paperback form with the shorter title, issued by Penguin in 1975. Grigson did not believe that anything is truly original in recipes, and happily included those of other writers in her books, being careful to acknowledge her sources—"There's nothing new about intellectual honesty". Her influences were not exclusively European: among those she credited in her ''Fish Cookery'' (1973) were Claudia Roden's ''A Book of Middle Eastern Food'', Mary Lamb's ''New Orleans Cuisine'' and James Beard's ''Delights and Prejudices''. Nevertheless, ''Fish Cookery'' is, of Grigson's books, the one most focused on the British cook, because, as she observes, the same edible birds and quadrupeds are found in many parts of the world, but species of fish are generally more confined to particular areas. Even given that limitation, Grigson urges her British readers to be more adventurous in their choice of fresh fish. She points out that there are more than fifty species native to British waters, not including shellfish or freshwater fish, and she urges cooks to venture beyond "cod and plaice, overcooked and coated with greasy batter". Solea solea 1

The chapters of ''Fish Cookery'' are "Choosing, Cleaning and Cooking Fish"; "

Court-bouillon Court-bouillon or court bouillon (in Louisiana, pronounced ''coo-bee-yon'') is a quickly-cooked broth used for poaching other foods, most commonly fish or seafood. It is also sometimes used for poaching vegetables, eggs, sweetbreads, cockscombs ...

s, Sauces and Butters"; "Fish Stews and Soups"; "Flat-fish"; "More Fish from the Sea"; "The Great Fish"; "Fish Caught in Fresh Water"; "Shellfish and Crustaceans"; "and "Cured and Preserved Fish". The book concludes with glossaries of fish names and cookery terms and measures. "Great" in the title of the sixth chapter refers to size, rather than particular pre-eminence: it includes

tuna A tuna is a saltwater fish that belongs to the tribe Thunnini, a subgrouping of the Scombridae (mackerel) family. The Thunnini comprise 15 species across five genera, the sizes of which vary greatly, ranging from the bullet tuna (max length: ...

swordfish Swordfish (''Xiphias gladius''), also known as broadbills in some countries, are large, highly migratory predatory fish characterized by a long, flat, pointed bill. They are a popular sport fish of the billfish category, though elusive. Swordf ...

, shark and sunfish. Grigson ascribes greatness in the qualitative sense only to sole and turbot among sea fish, trout and salmon among fresh-water species, and eel, lobster and crayfish. As well as classics such as sole Véronique, bouillabaisse, moules marinière, and lobster Thermidor, Grigson gives recipes for more unusual combinations of ingredients, including cod steaks with Gruyère cheese sauce, herring with gooseberries, scallop and artichoke soup, and prawns in tomato, cream and vermouth sauce. A statement in the section on mussels led to minor controversy some years after publication. Grigson writes that once the mussels are cooked any that do not open should be thrown away. She gives no reason, but many subsequent writers have taken it that eating a closed mussel would be injurious, rather than simply impracticable. The Australian Fisheries Research and Development Corporation published research in 2012 to rebut the assumption. Grigson had completed two-thirds of the text of a revised edition of the book when she died. Her editor, Jenny Dereham, completed the revision, using additional recipes and articles Grigson had published since 1973. It was published with the title ''Jane Grigson's Fish Book'' in 1993, in hardback by Michael Joseph and in paperback by Penguin. Reviewing the new edition in ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publish ...

'', Michael Leapman wrote that many of the recipes had been updated to reflect current tastes—"a little less cream and butter"—and remarked on Grigson's exploration of new areas of interest little known to readers of the first edition, such as

sashimi is a Japanese delicacy consisting of fresh raw fish or meat sliced into thin pieces and often eaten with soy sauce. Origin The word ''sashimi'' means "pierced body", i.e. " 刺身" = ''sashimi'', where 刺し = ''sashi'' (pierced, stu ...

and

ceviche Ceviche () is a Peruvian dish typically made from fresh raw fish cured in fresh citrus juices, most commonly lime or lemon. It is also spiced with '' ají'', chili peppers or other seasonings, and julienned red onions, salt, and cilantro are ...

''English Food'' (1974)

The book has the subtitle, "An anthology chosen by Jane Grigson". As in her earlier books, Grigson made no claim to originality in her recipes, and was scrupulous about crediting those with a known author. The chapters cover soups; cheese and egg dishes; vegetables; fish; meat, poultry and game; puddings; cakes, biscuits and pancakes; and stuffings, sauces and preserves. Line drawings by Gillian Zeiner illustrate details of kitchen techniques, materials and equipment. The introduction outlines Grigson's thoughts on good English cooking and its decline. Another point in the introduction is that whereas in France most of the great cookery writers have been men, in England it is the women writers, such as

and

, who stand out. Many of their recipes are included in subsequent chapters. The introduction to the revised 1979 edition enlarges on the state of English food, and calls for better cookery teaching in British schools. Grigson emphasises the advantages of good, locally produced food, which she says, is not only better but usually cheaper than that offered by the large commercial concerns: "Words such as 'fresh' and 'home-made' have been borrowed by commerce to tell lies." Cornish pasty

In a study of "The 50 best cookbooks" in 2010,

Rachel Cooke Rachel Cooke (born 1969) is a British journalist and writer. Early life Cooke was born in Sheffield, and is the daughter of a university lecturer. She went to school in Jaffa, Israel, until she was 11, before returning to Sheffield, and atten ...

wrote that it was debatable which of Grigson's "many wonderful books" was the best, "but the one for which she will always be most celebrated is ''English Food''". Cooke quotes the critic Fay Maschler's view that Grigson "restored pride to the subject of English food and gave evidence that there is a valid regional quality still extant in this somewhat beleaguered cuisine." The book contains mostly English recipes, but draws from time to time on the cuisines of Wales and Scotland. Cooke describes it as "undoubtedly a work of scholarship: carefully researched, wide-ranging and extremely particular" but adds that it also contains "hundreds of excellent recipes, the vast majority of them short, precise and foolproof. Who could resist poached turbot with shrimp sauce, or a properly made Cornish pasty?" Among the puddings in the book are Yorkshire curd tart, brown bread ice cream,

queen of puddings Queen of Puddings is a traditional British dessert, consisting of a baked, breadcrumb-thickened egg mixture, spread with jam and topped with meringue.

and Sussex pond pudding. ''English Food'' won the

Glenfiddich Award The Glenfiddich Food and Drink Awards were intended to recognize achievements in writing, publishing and broadcasting on the subjects of food and drink. The awards had been sponsored since 1972 by William Grant & Sons, a family-owned Scottish disti ...

for the cookery book of the year, 1974. A new edition, with an introduction by Sophie Grigson, was published by Ebury Press, London, in 2002. Reviewing it, Lindsey Bareham wrote, "If you don't already own a copy of this seminal book, now is the time to invest in our edible heritage made digestible by one of the finest writers we have ever produced".

''The World Atlas of Food'' (1974)

Subtitled "A Gourmet's Guide to the Great Regional Dishes of the World", this 319-page book was published by

Mitchell Beazley Mitchell Beazley Publishers Limited is a British book publisher which is particularly specialised in atlases, reference books, natural history books, cook books, garden books and wine books. History The London-based company Mitchell Beazley was ...

, a company specialising in atlases and other extensively illustrated works of reference. Grigson is credited as "contributing editor". James Beard wrote the introduction, titled "An epicurean journey". The book has pages illustrating and describing ingredients of the various areas of the world—fish, meat, vegetables, fungi and fruit. The cuisines of Europe, Africa, Asia, Australasia and the Americas are covered. The American edition was published by Simon & Schuster in 1974. The book was reissued in Australia and the US in 1984 and in Britain in 1988 and was reprinted in 1989.

''The Mushroom Feast'' (1975)

''The Mushroom Feast'' was published by Michael Joseph in 1975. The book is in six chapters. The first, "The best edible mushrooms", has descriptions of twenty varieties of mushroom, from the familiar cultivated ''

Agaricus bisporus ''Agaricus bisporus'' is an edible basidiomycete mushroom native to grasslands in Eurasia and North America. It has two color states while immature – white and brown – both of which have various names, with additional names for the matur ...

'',

morel ''Morchella'', the true morels, is a genus of edible sac fungi closely related to anatomically simpler cup fungi in the order Pezizales ( division Ascomycota). These distinctive fungi have a honeycomb appearance due to the network of ridges wi ...

s, cèpes, girolles and

oysters Oyster is the common name for a number of different families of salt-water bivalve molluscs that live in marine or brackish habitats. In some species, the valves are highly calcified, and many are somewhat irregular in shape. Many, but not all ...

, to the less well known matsutake,

parasol An umbrella or parasol is a folding canopy (building), canopy supported by wooden or metal ribs that is usually mounted on a wooden, metal, or plastic pole. It is designed to protect a person against rain or sunburn, sunlight. The term ''umbr ...

, shaggy cap, wood-blewit and others. Each is illustrated with a line drawing by

Yvonne Skargon Yvonne Skargon (1931-2010), was a British wood engraver, watercolorist, and typographer who was best known for her work related to botanical and culinary subjects. Career Yvonne Skargon was born in 1931. She attended the Colchester School of A ...

, and followed by descriptions of the flavour and basic cooking instructions. The next chapter, dealing with preserved mushrooms, sauces, stuffings, and soups, gives modern and old recipes, including some by Hannah Glasse, Eliza Acton,

Marie-Antoine Carême Marie Antoine (Antonin) Carême (; 8 June 178412 January 1833) was a French chef and an early practitioner and exponent of the elaborate style of cooking known as ''grande cuisine'', the "high art" of French cooking: a grandiose style of cookery ...

, Hilda Leyel and Grigson's mentor and friend Elizabeth David. In the chapter on mushroom main dishes—such as in an open tart or a covered pie, in a gateau with cream, or stuffed with almonds, or baked in the Genoese style—other ingredients play a subordinate part in the recipes, but are given more prominence in "Mushrooms with fish" and "Mushrooms with meat, poultry, and game". After a section on the principal mushrooms of Japanese and Chinese cooking, an appendix gives five basic recipes for sauces to accompany mushrooms.

records 18 editions of the book published between 1975 and 2008.

''Jane Grigson's Vegetable Book'' (1978)

For this book Grigson adopted a straightforward alphabetical layout. There are chapters on more than eighty vegetables, from

artichoke The globe artichoke (''Cynara cardunculus'' var. ''scolymus'' ),Rottenberg, A., and D. Zohary, 1996: "The wild ancestry of the cultivated artichoke." Genet. Res. Crop Evol. 43, 53–58. also known by the names French artichoke and green articho ...

s to yams. Most chapters are in three parts: brief historical information about the vegetables, guidance on preparing them, and recipes using them. The author does not play down her own likes and dislikes; she praises artichokes and

asparagus Asparagus, or garden asparagus, folk name sparrow grass, scientific name ''Asparagus officinalis'', is a perennial flowering plant species in the genus '' Asparagus''. Its young shoots are used as a spring vegetable. It was once classified in ...

as "the two finest vegetables we can grow", but calls winter turnips and

swedes Swedes ( sv, svenskar) are a North Germanic ethnic group native to the Nordic region, primarily their nation state of Sweden, who share a common ancestry, culture, history and language. They mostly inhabit Sweden and the other Nordic countr ...

"that grim pair", and admits to a lifelong detestation of

kale Kale (), or leaf cabbage, belongs to a group of cabbage (''Brassica oleracea'') cultivars grown for their edible leaves, although some are used as ornamentals. Kale plants have green or purple leaves, and the central leaves do not form a hea ...

. Seakale, on the other hand, she rates highly, not only for its delicate flavour, but as the only vegetable in the entire book native to England. Grigson considered omitting mushrooms from the book, on the grounds that they are not a vegetable and that she had already devoted a whole book to them in 1975, but decided that "leaving them out won't do", and gave them a two-page chapter, covering their choice and preparation, and giving recipes for mushroom soup and mushroom pie. Also included are savoury fruits such as

avocado The avocado (''Persea americana'') is a medium-sized, evergreen tree in the laurel family ( Lauraceae). It is native to the Americas and was first domesticated by Mesoamerican tribes more than 5,000 years ago. Then as now it was prized for ...

s and tomatoes. As well as ingredients familiar in European cuisine, Grigson includes sections on

bean sprouts Sprouting is the natural process by which seeds or spores germinate and put out shoots, and already established plants produce new leaves or buds, or other structures experience further growth. In the field of nutrition, the term signifies ...

, Chinese artichokes,

okra Okra or Okro (, ), ''Abelmoschus esculentus'', known in many English-speaking countries as ladies' fingers or ochro, is a flowering plant in the mallow family. It has edible green seed pods. The geographical origin of okra is disputed, with su ...

sweet potato The sweet potato or sweetpotato ('' Ipomoea batatas'') is a dicotyledonous plant that belongs to the bindweed or morning glory family, Convolvulaceae. Its large, starchy, sweet-tasting tuberous roots are used as a root vegetable. The young ...

, pignuts and other vegetables less well known among her readership in the 1970s. The longest chapters are those on lettuces (13 pages), spinach and tomatoes (both 18 pages) and potatoes (24 pages). In her preface to the first American edition in 1979, Grigson observed that although British and American cooks found each other's systems of measurement confusing (citing the US use of volume rather than weight for solid ingredients), the two countries were at one in suffering from supermarkets' obsession with the appearance rather than the flavour of vegetables. The book brought its author her first Glenfiddich Food and Drink Writer of the Year Award and the first of two André Simon Memorial Prizes.

''Food With the Famous'' (1979)

The book has its origins in a series of articles Grigson wrote for ''The Observer's'' colour magazine in 1978, and is described as part cookery book and part social history. Her publisher wrote that she "re-read favourite novels, re-examined pictures in the great galleries, explored houses, letters, journals, and the cookery books used (or written) by her choice of famous men and women". Starting with "the great diarist and salad fancier"

John Evelyn John Evelyn (31 October 162027 February 1706) was an English writer, landowner, gardener, courtier and minor government official, who is now best known as a diarist. He was a founding Fellow of the Royal Society. John Evelyn's diary, or m ...

in the 17th century, she traces a chronological development of western cooking. Her other examples are from the 18th century ( Parson James Woodforde), the cusp of the 18th and 19th (

Jane Austen Jane Austen (; 16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist known primarily for her six major novels, which interpret, critique, and comment upon the British landed gentry at the end of the 18th century. Austen's plots of ...

Thomas Jefferson Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 – July 4, 1826) was an American statesman, diplomat, lawyer, architect, philosopher, and Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 18 ...

, and the Rev Sydney Smith), the high-19th ( Lord and Lady Shaftesbury,

Alexandre Dumas Alexandre Dumas (, ; ; born Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie (), 24 July 1802 – 5 December 1870), also known as Alexandre Dumas père (where '' '' is French for 'father', to distinguish him from his son Alexandre Dumas fils), was a French writer ...

and

Émile Zola Émile Édouard Charles Antoine Zola (, also , ; 2 April 184029 September 1902) was a French novelist, journalist, playwright, the best-known practitioner of the literary school of naturalism, and an important contributor to the development of ...

); and on into the 20th "with

Marcel Proust Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust (; ; 10 July 1871 – 18 November 1922) was a French novelist, critic, and essayist who wrote the monumental novel '' In Search of Lost Time'' (''À la recherche du temps perdu''; with the previous ...

in the gourmet's Paris, and

Claude Monet Oscar-Claude Monet (, , ; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of impressionist painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. During ...

among the water-lilies at Giverny". In the introduction to Evelyn's chapter, Grigson describes his contribution to British food—translating the works of

Jean-Baptiste de La Quintinie Jean-Baptiste de La Quintinie (1 March 1626 – 11 November 1688) was a French lawyer, gardener and agronomist who served under Louis XIV. Named director of the royal fruit and vegetable gardens by the king in 1670, he created between 1678 and 1 ...

, promoting ice-houses and recording the earliest example of the

pressure cooker Pressure cooking is the process of cooking food under high pressure steam and water or a water-based cooking liquid, in a sealed vessel known as a ''pressure cooker''. High pressure limits boiling, and creates higher cooking temperatures whic ...

. She quotes him on vegetables, for instance on beetroot: "vulgar, but eaten with oil and vinegar, as usually, it is no despicable salad." Evelyn's garden was organised so that mixed green salad could be put on the table every day of the year; Grigson lists the 35 different species from balm to tripe-madam that Evelyn specified for his salads. For the chapters on the novelists, Grigson gives recipes for dishes mentioned in their books, including white soup and fricassée of

sweetbread Sweetbread is a culinary name for the thymus (also called throat, gullet, or neck sweetbread) or pancreas (also called stomach, belly or gut sweetbread), typically from calf (french: ris de veau, es, hígado) or lamb (). Sweetbreads have a ri ...

for Jane Austen, asparagus soup ''à la comtesse,'' and fillets of sole with ravigote sauce for Zola, brill Radziwill and boeuf à la mode for Proust, and for Dumas, who published a book about food, she prints his own recipes for cabbage soup, scrambled eggs with shrimps, and several others. Although Grigson's favourite of her works was the 1982 fruit book, she said she had a particular fondness for ''Food With the Famous''.

1980s

''The Observer French Cookery School'' (1980)

This book was a spin-off from an ''Observer'' series. Its two authors, Grigson and Anne Willan of La Varenne cookery school in Paris, augmented their ''Observer'' articles for the book. Willan's sections, occupying the majority of the 300 pages, give technical advice on various aspects of cooking, such as boning, making choux pastry, the use of gelatine, and cooking with bains-marie. A 1991 bibliography describes Grigson's section—a 47-page "Anthology of French cooking and kitchen terms"—as "an alphabetic listing of descriptions written in condensed but detailed prose, full of personal observation; almost a little book in itself".

''Jane Grigson's Fruit Book'' (1982)

For Grigson, this book was more fun to write than any of her others. Her particular fondness for fruits caused her to protest in her introduction about the quality offered by large suppliers:

The food trade makes the egalitarian mistake, which is also a convenience for itself, of thinking that every food has to be as cheap and inoffensive as every other similar food. This mistake has ruined chicken and potatoes and bread. No wine merchant sells only plonk, no flower shop sticks to daisies. In the matter of vegetables and fruit, we seem often to be reduced to a steady bottom of horticultural plonk.

The layout follows that of the vegetable book of three years earlier: chapters on each fruit, set out alphabetically from apples to water-melon. In between, familiar fruits such as bananas, cherries, pears and strawberries are interspersed with

cherimoya The cherimoya (''Annona cherimola''), also spelled chirimoya and called chirimuya by the Inca people, is a species of edible fruit-bearing plant in the genus ''Annona'', from the family Annonaceae, which includes the closely related sweetsop ...

medlars MEDLINE (Medical Literature Analysis and Retrieval System Online, or MEDLARS Online) is a bibliographic database of life sciences and biomedical information. It includes bibliographic information for articles from academic journals covering medi ...

persimmon The persimmon is the edible fruit of a number of species of trees in the genus '' Diospyros''. The most widely cultivated of these is the Oriental persimmon, ''Diospyros kaki'' ''Diospyros'' is in the family Ebenaceae, and a number of non-per ...

s and

sapodilla ''Manilkara zapota'', commonly known as sapodilla (), sapote, naseberry, nispero or chicle, is a long-lived, evergreen tree native to southern Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean. An example natural occurrence is in coastal Yucatán in the ...

s. There are 46 of these chapters, taking 432 pages. The book finishes with a miscellany of fruit-related topics, such as matching fruits and wines, fruit preserves, and recipes for biscuits suitable to eat with fruit. As well as recipes in which the fruit is the star ingredient, Grigson gives details of many dishes where fruit is combined with meat, poultry or fish, including pheasant with apples, lamb with apricots, sole with banana, quail with cherries, oxtail with grapes, and eel soup with pears. As in the vegetable book, Grigson is clear about her likes and dislikes. "Rhubarb: Nanny-food. Governess-food. School-meal-food." She finds some recipes for it worth including, but falls short of calling them delectable—"merely not too undelectable". Reviewing the book in ''Petits Propos Culinaires'', Jane Davidson called it "brilliant", adding, "Anecdotes, history, poetry and personal appreciation are all here as well as practical suggestions on how to use both the familiar and less so. ... In

Michelin Michelin (; ; full name: ) is a French multinational tyre manufacturing company based in Clermont-Ferrand in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes ''région'' of France. It is the second largest tyre manufacturer in the world behind Bridgestone and larg ...

language, ''four'' stars and ''six'' place settings". Like the Vegetable Book, this one won Grigson a Glenfiddich and an André Simon award.

''The Observer Guide to European Cookery'' (1983)

Grigson published ''The Observer Guide to European Cookery'' in 1983. She expanded her original articles from ''The Observer'' into this 256-page book, extensively illustrated by uncredited ''Observer'' photographers. A reviewer commented that one might expect the author, her life based partly in France, to begin with French cuisine, but Grigson explains: :Greece comes first, with classical and Hellenic chefs already theorising about food in terms that do not seem odd today. In terms that make perfect sense. Italy took on the skills of Greece, since well-off Romans employed chefs from Athens just as well-off Northerners have looked to Paris for their chefs. Through Spain, Arab dishes and Arab gardening, as well as new vegetables and foods from America, were handed on to the rest of Europe. Portugal comes in here, in its great phase of travel and discovery. France next, in the perfect, unique position between Mediterranean and Atlantic seas, exactly poised to take advantage of the Renaissance and the New World. In each chapter Grigson mixes the well known and the offbeat. In the opening Greek chapter, recipes for

taramasalata Taramasalata or taramosalata ( el, ταραμοσαλάτα; from 'fish roe' < tr, tarama +

Greek

: 'salad' < it, insa ...

moussaka Moussaka (, , ) is an eggplant- or potato-based dish, often including ground meat, which is common in the Balkans and the Middle East, with many local and regional variations. The best-known version in Europe and the Americas is the Greek vari ...

and

dolmades Dolma (Turkish for “stuffed”) is a family of stuffed dishes associated with Ottoman cuisine, and common in modern national cuisines of regions and countries that once were part of the Ottoman Empire. Some types of dolma are made with whol ...

sit alongside hare in walnut sauce and salad of calf brains. Italian recipes include classics such as osso buco with risotto milanese,

Parmigiana Parmigiana (, ), also called parmigiana di melanzane , melanzane alla parmigiana , or eggplant parmesan, is an Italian dish made with fried, sliced eggplant layered with cheese and tomato sauce, then baked. The origin of the dish is claimed by ...

di melanzane and

vitello tonnato Vitello tonnato is a Piedmontese dish of cold, sliced veal covered with a creamy, mayonnaise-like sauce that has been flavored with tuna. It is served chilled or at room temperature, generally in the summertime, as the main course of an Italian ...

, but also grilled eel, sole with Parmesan, tripe with pig's trotters, and lamb sautéed with olives. Similar juxtapositions are found in other chapters—Portuguese cuisine beyond sardines, British beyond steak and kidney pudding, and Scandinavian beyond

smörgåsbord Smörgåsbord () is a buffet-style meal of Swedish origin. It is served with various hot and cold dishes. Smörgåsbord became internationally known at the 1939 New York World's Fair when it was offered at the Swedish Pavilion "Three Crowns ...

. Among the less well-known dishes described by Grigson are beef fillet with gentleman's sauce, chicken in a dressing-gown, chilled grape soup, quaking pudding, red wine soup, and Siberian ravioli. In the US the book was published in 1983 by Atheneum, under the title ''Jane Grigson's Book of European Cookery''.

''The Observer Guide to British Cookery'' (1984)

This 231-page book is similar in layout and approach to the previous year's guide to European cooking, but unlike its predecessor it was published in book form before recipes from it were extracted and printed by the newspaper. The British regions are considered in nine sections, each with an introduction describing the character and ingredients, followed by recipes associated with places within the region. Shrewsbury biscuits (with fruit)

The South-West chapter includes Cornish bouillabaisse from

Gidleigh Park Gidleigh Park is a hotel and restaurant located in Gidleigh, near Chagford, Devon, England. Chris Eden joined as Executive Head Chef in September 2019, following 12 years as Head Chef at Driftwood in Portscatho, Cornwall, which has held a Michel ...

;

Sedgemoor Sedgemoor is a low-lying area of land in Somerset, England. It lies close to sea level south of the Polden Hills, historically largely marsh (or "moor" in its older sense). The eastern part is known as King's Sedgemoor, and the western part We ...

eel stew;

lardy cake Lardy cake, also known as lardy bread, lardy Johns, dough cake and fourses cake, is a traditional rich spiced form of bread found in several southern counties of England, each claiming to provide the original recipe. It remains a popular weeken ...

; and "Cornwall's most famous and most travestied dish", the

Cornish pasty A pasty () is a British baked pastry, a traditional variety of which is particularly associated with Cornwall, South West England, but has spread all over the British Isles. It is made by placing an uncooked filling, typically meat and vegeta ...

—"pronounced with a long 'ah' as in Amen". Among the dishes in the London and the South section are steak and kidney pudding, using beef rump steak and lambs' kidneys; salt beef; and bread and butter pudding. Dishes from the Midlands include rabbit and pig tail stew; Oldbury gooseberry pies;

Bakewell pudding Bakewell pudding is an English dessert consisting of a flaky pastry base with a layer of sieved jam and topped with a filling made of egg and almond paste. Etymology References to "Bakewell pudding" appear earlier than the term "Bakewell tart" ...

; and

Shrewsbury cake A Shrewsbury cake or Shrewsbury biscuit is a classic English dessert, named after Shrewsbury, the county town of Shropshire. They are made from dough that contains sugar, flour, egg, butter and lemon zest; dried fruit is also often added. S ...

s. The East Anglia section includes turnip pie; stuffed

guinea fowl Guineafowl (; sometimes called "pet speckled hens" or "original fowl") are birds of the family Numididae in the order Galliformes. They are endemic to Africa and rank among the oldest of the gallinaceous birds. Phylogenetically, they branched o ...

;

Lincolnshire Lincolnshire (abbreviated Lincs.) is a Counties of England, county in the East Midlands of England, with a long coastline on the North Sea to the east. It borders Norfolk to the south-east, Cambridgeshire to the south, Rutland to the south-we ...

plum bread; and, for its connection with

Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge or Oxford. ...

, crème brûlée. In the North East chapter Grigson includes recipes for mutton and leek broth, mussel or oyster pudding and

toad in the hole Toad in the hole or sausage toad is a traditional English dish consisting of sausages in Yorkshire pudding batter, usually served with onion gravy and vegetables. Historically, the dish has also been prepared using other meats, such as rump ste ...

. Dishes from the North West include

potted shrimps Potted shrimps are a traditional British dish made with brown shrimp flavored with nutmeg. The dish consists of brown shrimp in nutmeg-flavoured butter, which has set in a small pot, the butter acting as a preservative. Cayenne pepper may also be ...

, Lancashire hotpot, Liverpool's

scouse Scouse (; formally known as Liverpool English or Merseyside English) is an accent and dialect of English associated with Liverpool and the surrounding county of Merseyside. The Scouse accent is highly distinctive; having been influenced he ...

, Cumberland sausage and the chicken dish Hindle Wakes. Throughout the book Grigson includes lesser-known dishes alongside famous classics. The chapter on Scotland has recipes for Scotch broth,

Haggis Haggis ( gd, taigeis) is a savoury pudding containing sheep's pluck (heart, liver, and lungs), minced with onion, oatmeal, suet, spices, and salt, mixed with stock, and cooked while traditionally encased in the animal's stomach though n ...

, Atholl brose and

shortbread Shortbread or shortie is a traditional Scottish biscuit usually made from one part white sugar, two parts butter, and three to four parts plain wheat flour. Unlike many other biscuits and baked goods, shortbread does not contain any leavening, ...

alongside Scotch woodcock and the sheep's head broth

Powsowdie Powsowdie is a Scottish sheep's-head broth or soup. Traditional preparation of the soup includes sheep's trotters as an ingredient. Dried peas and barley can also be used as additional ingredients. Powsowdie has been described as a speciality dish i ...

. Among the Welsh dishes, cawl and Welsh rabbit are joined by caveach (pickled mackerel) and Lady Lanover's salt duck. In the final chapter, Ireland,

Irish stew Irish stew ( ga, stobhach/Stobhach Gaelach) is a stew native to Ireland that is traditionally made with root vegetables and lamb or mutton, but also commonly with beef. As in all traditional folk dishes, the exact recipe is not consistent from t ...

and

soda bread Soda bread is a variety of quick bread traditionally made in a variety of cuisines in which sodium bicarbonate (otherwise known as "baking soda", or in Ireland, "bread soda") is used as a leavening agent instead of the traditional yeast. The i ...

are included alongside nettle soup and

boxty Boxty ( ir, bacstaí) is a traditional Irish potato pancake. The dish is mostly associated with the north midlands, north Connacht and southern Ulster, in particular the counties of Leitrim, Mayo, Sligo, Donegal, Fermanagh, Longford, and Cavan ...

(potato pancakes). Each chapter concludes with a section contributed by Derek Cooper on "Regional drink". For the English regions and Wales the drinks are mostly beers and ciders, with some wines in the south. Sloe gin is included for

Cumbria Cumbria ( ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in North West England, bordering Scotland. The county and Cumbria County Council, its local government, came into existence in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972. ...

as are

whisky Whisky or whiskey is a type of distilled alcoholic beverage made from fermented grain mash. Various grains (which may be malted) are used for different varieties, including barley, corn, rye, and wheat. Whisky is typically aged in wooden ca ...

for Scotland and

whiskey Whisky or whiskey is a type of distilled alcoholic beverage made from fermented grain mash. Various grains (which may be malted) are used for different varieties, including barley, corn, rye, and wheat. Whisky is typically aged in wooden ...

and

stout Stout is a dark, top-fermented beer with a number of variations, including dry stout, oatmeal stout, milk stout, and imperial stout. The first known use of the word ''stout'' for beer, in a document dated 1677 found in the Egerton Manuscr ...

for Ireland.

''Exotic Fruits and Vegetables'' (1986)

The illustrations play a particularly large part in this book, and the artist, Charlotte Knox, is given equal billing on the covers of both the British and the American editions. The book is described by its publisher as "An illustrated guide to fruits and vegetables from the world's hotter climates." Grigson added notes on the choice, preparation, and culinary use of each fruit or vegetable, and recipes using them. These include

mango A mango is an edible stone fruit produced by the tropical tree '' Mangifera indica''. It is believed to have originated in the region between northwestern Myanmar, Bangladesh, and northeastern India. ''M. indica'' has been cultivated in Sout ...

and

carambola Carambola, also known as star fruit, is the fruit of '' Averrhoa carambola'', a species of tree native to tropical Southeast Asia. The mildly poisonous fruit is commonly consumed in parts of Brazil, Southeast Asia, South Asia, the South Pacif ...

salad, mango and paw paw tart, persimmon fudge, and grey mullet with

pomegranate The pomegranate (''Punica granatum'') is a fruit-bearing deciduous shrub in the family Lythraceae, subfamily Punicoideae, that grows between tall. The pomegranate was originally described throughout the Mediterranean Basin, Mediterranean re ...

sauce in the fruit chapters, and in the vegetable sections, plantain and chicken, snake gourd Malay style, drumstick curry with prawns, and yam and goat meat pottage. The book concludes with sections on 14 herbs and spices, from banana leaf to turmeric. A US edition (1987) was published by Henry Holt as ''Cooking With Exotic Fruits and Vegetables''.

Short books and booklets

''Cooking Carrots'' (1975) and ''Cooking Spinach'' (1976)

These two booklets, of 36 pages each, were written for Abson Books, Bristol. They follow the same pattern: brief guidance on choosing, buying and preparing the vegetable, followed by 37 recipes apiece. Both books conclude with advice on growing the vegetable. The spinach book was originally sold with a packet of seeds attached to the cover.

''The Year of the French'' (1982)

This booklet (16 pages) containing six recipes by Grigson, originally published in ''

The Radio Times ''Radio Times'' (currently styled as ''RadioTimes'') is a British weekly listings magazine devoted to television and radio programme schedules, with other features such as interviews, film reviews and lifestyle items. Founded in May 1923 by J ...

'', was issued to accompany the

BBC Television BBC Television is a service of the BBC. The corporation has operated a public broadcast television service in the United Kingdom, under the terms of a royal charter, since 1927. It produced television programmes from its own studios from 193 ...

series of the same name, "A calendar of French life in 12 film portraits". Each section of the booklet has a one or two-page introduction by Grigson relating the recipe to a representative French person shown in the series, from the driver of a

TGV The TGV (french: Train à Grande Vitesse, "high-speed train"; previously french: TurboTrain à Grande Vitesse, label=none) is France's intercity high-speed rail service, operated by SNCF. SNCF worked on a high-speed rail network from 1966 to 19 ...

to the octogenarian head of a

beaujolais Beaujolais ( , ) is a French ''Appellation d'Origine Contrôlée'' (AOC) wine generally made of the Gamay grape, which has a thin skin and is low in tannins. Like most AOC wines they are not labeled varietally. Whites from the region, which mak ...

wine-growers collective.

''Dishes from the Mediterranean'' (1984)

This publication is a slim (96-page) hardback, with numerous coloured photographs and line drawings of dishes. It was published by Woodhead-Faulkner for the supermarket chain J. Sainsbury. A new and enlarged edition was published in paperback the following year; it was reissued in 1991 with the title ''The Cooking of the Mediterranean''. The book contains chapters on Mediterranean ingredients; sauces and relishes; soups; first courses and

meze Meze or mezza (, ) is a selection of small dishes served as appetizers in the Levant, Turkey, Greece, the Balkans, the Caucasus and Iran. It is similar to Spanish tapas and Italian antipasti. A mezze may be served as a part of a multi-course ...

dishes; fish; meat, poultry and game; rice and bread; and sweet dishes. In addition to descriptions and some historical notes, Grigson includes practical advice such as, for preparing '' fegato alla veneziana'', "Half-freeze the liver so that it is solid enough to cut into thin, tissue-paper slivers". and for a chicken casserole with fifty cloves of garlic (''poulet aux cinquante gousses d'ail'') reassurance about the number of garlic cloves: "the purée they make is delicious and unidentifiable".

''The Cooking of Normandy'' (1987)

This book, published for Sainsbury's, follows the pattern of the earlier Mediterranean publication. It is a 96-page, extensively illustrated addition to the "Sainsbury Cookbook" series. Line drawings by Mandy Doyle show details of some of the techniques described in the text. The sections cover ingredients and specialities; soups and first courses; fish and shellfish; meat, poultry and game; and desserts and drinks, with a short epilogue. In her introduction Grigson writes, "For me, Normandy cooking is a return to good, basic home dishes, with the added pleasure of tracking down ingredients of the highest quality." Although the book was published for and sold by a supermarket chain, Grigson's recipes include dishes for which such stores would not be expected to stock key ingredients, such as saddle of rabbit (she suggests using chicken if rabbit is not available) for ''lapin à la moutarde'' and

sorrel Sorrel (''Rumex acetosa''), also called common sorrel or garden sorrel, is a perennial herbaceous plant in the family Polygonaceae. Other names for sorrel include spinach dock and narrow-leaved dock ('dock' being a common name for the genus '' ...

for ''fricandeau à la oseille'' (mentioning spinach as a substitute if necessary).

Contributions to books by others

Giovanna Garzoni - Chinese Porcelain Plate with Cherries - WGA8489

A bibliography published in ''Petis Propos Culinaires'' in 1991 lists substantial contributions by Grigson to books by other writers: the introduction to ''The Book of Ingredients'' by Aidan Bailey,

Elizabeth Lambert Ortiz Elisabeth Lambert Ortiz (17 June 1915 – 27 October 2003) was a British food writer who popularized Latin American cuisine in the United States and the United Kingdom. Initially a writer of poetry and fiction, she began working in the culina ...

and Helena Radecke; one of five introductory essays in ''The Shell Guide to France'', in which she offers guidance on food shops in France—poissonerie, pâtisserie, supermarché etc.—and how to shop in them; and a foreword, of about 1600 words, to ''The French Cheese Book'' by

Patrick Rance Patrick Lowry Cole Holwell Rance (18 March 1918 – 22 August 1999) was a cheesemonger who has been considered responsible for saving many British specialist cheeses from extinction. He is known for writing ''The Great British Cheese Book'' (1982) ...

. In her foreword to

Gillian Riley Gillian Riley is an English food writer. Biography She was born 1933 and brought up in Yorkshire, read History at Cambridge University. After obtaining a diploma in education, she went to live in London London is the capital and largest ...

's new translation of

Giacomo Castelvetro Giacomo Castelvetro (25 March 1546 – 21 March 1616) was an Italian expatriate in Europe and England, humanist, teacher and travel writer. Life Giacomo Castelvetro was born in Modena in 1546 to the banker Niccolò Castelvetro and his wife L ...

's 1614 book ''The Fruit, Herbs and Vegetables of Italy'' Grigson describes her acquaintance with Castelvetro's work and with the paintings of Giovanna Garzoni which figure largely in the illustrations to the new edition. WorldCat lists introductions by Grigson to five other books: ''The Elle Cookbook'' (later republished as ''The Art of French Cuisine''); the British edition of ''The Chez Panisse Menu Cookbook'' by

Alice Waters Alice Louise Waters (born April 28, 1944) is an American chef, restaurateur, and author. In 1971 she opened Chez Panisse, a Berkeley, California restaurant famous for its role in creating the farm-to-table movement and for pioneering Californi ...

; Francis Bissell's ''A Cook's Calendar''; ''A Definitive Catalogue of Toiletries and Comestibles'' by

Tessa Traeger Tessa Traeger (born 1938) is a British photographer. She is known for her still life and food photography, and has worked as an advertising photographer. Her work has been published in two books of her own; included in a number of books with othe ...

and Mimi Errington; and a new edition of Geoffrey Grigson's ''The Englishman's Flora''.

Posthumously-published anthologies

''The Enjoyment of Food: The Best of Jane Grigson'' (1992)

This 464-page anthology of recipes from Grigson's books was compiled by Roy Fullick and published by Michael Joseph. In a preface Fullick writes that it is intended "both as a tribute to Jane Grigson's culinary skills and scholarship and as a practical cookery book". The book has an introduction by Elizabeth David, recalling her friendship with Grigson and reminding readers that although it was now taken for granted that Grigson was a classic cookery writer, she had burst on the culinary scene in the late 1960s when "the clarity of the writing, and the confident knowledge ... displayed by this young author were new treats for all of us". David comments that "this varied yet balanced compilation" would remind readers what a loss the cookery world had sustained by Grigson's premature death and inspire them to acquire more of Grigson's works. "Hers are books which can be read in the comfort of one's sitting room as well as used in the kitchen". The main text is in eight sections, with the titles "At home in England"; "At home in France"; "Charcuterie", "The Mediterranean", "The Europeans", "The Americas", "India and the Far East" and "Treats and celebrations". There are recipes from writers of the past such as Eliza Acton, Hannah Glasse,

and

Auguste Escoffier Georges Auguste Escoffier (; 28 October 1846 – 12 February 1935) was a French chef, restaurateur and culinary writer who popularized and updated traditional French cooking methods. Much of Escoffier's technique was based on that of Marie-Antoi ...

, and contemporaries including Elizabeth David,

Richard Olney Richard Olney (September 15, 1835 – April 8, 1917) was an American statesman. He served as United States Attorney General in the cabinet of Grover Cleveland and Secretary of State under Cleveland. As attorney general, Olney used injunct ...

, Julia Child, Alice Waters,

Antonio Carluccio Antonio Carluccio, OBE OMRI (; 19 April 1937 – 8 November 2017) was an Italian chef, restaurateur and food expert, based in London. He was called "the godfather of Italian gastronomy", with a career of more than 50 years. He is perhaps best re ...

and Grigson's daughter Sophie. The recipes are interspersed with Grigson's customary historical background information: there are appearances by

Lord Byron George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron (22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824), known simply as Lord Byron, was an English romantic poet and peer. He was one of the leading figures of the Romantic movement, and has been regarded as among the ...

Chaucer Geoffrey Chaucer (; – 25 October 1400) was an English poet, author, and civil servant best known for '' The Canterbury Tales''. He has been called the "father of English literature", or, alternatively, the "father of English poetry". He w ...

Casanova Giacomo Girolamo Casanova (, ; 2 April 1725 – 4 June 1798) was an Italian adventurer and author from the Republic of Venice. His autobiography, (''Story of My Life''), is regarded as one of the most authentic sources of information about the c ...

Louis XIV Louis XIV (Louis Dieudonné; 5 September 16381 September 1715), also known as Louis the Great () or the Sun King (), was List of French monarchs, King of France from 14 May 1643 until his death in 1715. His reign of 72 years and 110 days is the Li ...

, and Evelyn, Sydney Smith and others from ''Food with the Famous''. The book was reissued in 2015 as ''The Best of Jane Grigson: The Enjoyment of Food'' by Grub Street publishers, to commemorate the 25th anniversary of Grigson's death.

''Jane Grigson's Desserts'' (1993)

This is one of two books of Grigson recipes published simultaneously by Michael Joseph. It is a 92-page hardback, in a small-page format of . It is illustrated throughout with line drawings and contains 50 dessert recipes, all taken from previously published Grigson books. Included are some old recipes such as

Robert Southey Robert Southey ( or ; 12 August 1774 – 21 March 1843) was an English poet of the Romantic school, and Poet Laureate from 1813 until his death. Like the other Lake Poets, William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Southey began as a ra ...

's gooseberry pie and Elizabeth Raffald's orange custards, and many from overseas (redcurrant tart from Austria, strawberry fritters from France, and sweet pumpkin from Turkey) as well as British favourites like

summer pudding Summer pudding or summer fruit pudding is a British dessert made of sliced white bread, layered in a deep bowl with fruit and fruit juice. It is left to soak overnight and turned out onto a plate. The dessert was most popular from the late 19th t ...

''Jane Grigson's Soups'' (1993)

Uniform with the preceding volume, the book contains 50 recipes from earlier books by Grigson. Well-known classic soups such as bouillabaisse, gazpacho and cock-a-leekie are interspersed with more unusual recipes including apricot and apple, red onion and wine, and cucumber and sorrel.

''Puddings'' (1996)

This is a 64-page paperback, in a small format (approximately A6) issued one of the "Penguin 60s series" of miniature books along with, among others, Elizabeth David's '' Peperonata and Other Italian Dishes'', and a collection of Sophie Grigson's recipes, ''From Sophie's Table''. Like the 1993 desserts collection, above, it reused material from previously published books by Grigson.

Style, reputation and legacy

De Nieuwe Vismarkt te Amsterdam, by Emanuel de Witte

Style

Along with Elizabeth David, Grigson is widely credited with transforming the British cookery book into something more than a collection of recipes. Like David's, Grigson's writing offered not only lists of ingredients and instructions for preparation and cooking, but also interesting historical and social background. The obituaries were warm and full of praise for Grigson's style and wide appeal. In ''The Independent'', Alan Davidson wrote:

She won to herself this wide audience because she was above all a friendly writer, equipped by both frame of mind and style of writing to communicate easily with them. However much more she knew about this or that than do the rest of us, she never seemed to be talking down to anyone. On the contrary, she is a most companionable presence in the kitchen; often catching the imagination with a deftly chosen fragment of history or poetry, but never failing to explain the ''why'' as well as the ''how'' of cookery. How often have I heard people declare that her recipes are not just a pleasure to read—they always ''work''!

Sophie Grigson writes that her mother "thought food was the key to unlocking life"; in the introduction to ''Good Things'', Jane stated:

Cooking something delicious is really more satisfactory than painting pictures or throwing pots. ... Food has the tact to disappear, leaving the room and opportunity for masterpieces to come. The mistakes don’t hang on the walls or stand on the shelves to reproach you for ever.

In Elizabeth David's view, Grigson's books have a "clarity of the writing, and the confident knowledge of its subject and its history". The sociologist

Stephen Mennell Stephen Mennell (born 1944 in Yorkshire, England) is Professor Emeritus of Sociology at University College Dublin. Mennell was educated at Huddersfield New College in West Yorkshire, and gained his BA in Economics in 1966 from St Catharine's ...

believes that Grigson's writing, like David's, should be considered "gastronomic literature", rather than cookery book writing, and therefore read as literature; the cultural sociologists Bob Ashley, Joanne Hollows, Steve Jones and Ben Taylor consider that because of the "considerable erudition" in her work, Grigson's books can be read as "culinary, historical literature", rather than cookery books. Geraldene Holt, who thinks Grigson's prose is both lyrical and robust, describes Grigson's writing style as:

forthright yet entertaining, in a similar vein to that of her eminent forebears who include Morton Shand,
Edward Bunyard Edward Ashdown Bunyard (1878–1939) was an English food writer and apple enthusiast known for his books ''The Anatomy Of Dessert'', ''A Handbook of Hardy Fruits'', and ''The Epicure's Companion''. His favourite apple was 'Orléans Reinette' which ...
, Lady Jekyll and Elizabeth David. Jane Grigson's essays are, however, memorably enlivened by relevant information and quotations from a remarkably wide range of sources—poets, novelists, gardeners, earlier food writers and cookery manuals.

According to the writers Hazel Castell and Kathleen Griffin, Grigson tried to show food within its historical, social and cultural context, which was "at the very heart of life, so it was natural that literature, history and poetry should be included alongside recipes". The journalist Deirdre McQuillan considers that the scholarly references are "always there to delight, and never to impress". Rayner sees in her writing a "lightness of touch" with her use of scholarly material. Christopher Driver writes:

Grigson's range was wider than Elizabeth David's, for it extended from fish and fungi to the exotic fruits and vegetables that arrived on the international market in the eighties. She would have been the first to acknowledge that Elizabeth's culinary scholarship was deeper and her precision superior: one of the little-noticed reasons for Mrs David's dominance of her audience in the 1950s was her miraculous sense of lucid detail while Mrs Grigson in the 1970s and 1980s could allow herself in print an element of careless rapture, depending on the commonsense of advanced cooks by then men as well as women.

The literary historian Nicola Humble observes that because of the way Grigson used the historical and literary sources in a more relaxed way, her writing was "less haughty" that David's could be.

Legacy and reputation

In 1991 the Jane Grigson Trust was set up in Grigson's memory. Its stated aim is "to advance the public understanding of food, its cultural and nutritional aspects, and the art of its preparation." The trust funds the annual Jane Grigson Lecture at the Oxford Symposium on Food and Cookery every July. In 2015, to commemorate the 25th anniversary of her death, the Jane Grigson Trust Award was inaugurated, for the writer of a commissioned first non-fiction book on the subject of food. It was proposed soon after Grigson's death that a library of books about food and cooking should be set up in her honour, under the Jane Grigson Trust. Sophie Grigson made the core of her mother's personal collection of food books available on permanent loan. The Jane Grigson Library, inaugurated in 1992, was originally housed at the

Guildhall Library The Guildhall Library is a public reference library specialising in subjects relevant to London. It is administered by the Corporation of London, the government of the City of London, which is the historical heart of London, England. The library ...

in the

City of London The City of London is a city, ceremonial county and local government district that contains the historic centre and constitutes, alongside Canary Wharf, the primary central business district (CBD) of London. It constituted most of London f ...

. By 2005, augmented by donations and bequests, the library had doubled its original size, to more than 4,000 volumes. It was rehoused at

Oxford Brookes University Oxford Brookes University (formerly known as Oxford Polytechnic) is a public university in Oxford, England. It is a new university, having received university status through the Further and Higher Education Act 1992. The university was named ...

in 2005. The library is available for use by scholars, researchers or members of the public. In March 2015 the university held a month-long exhibition, Jane Grigson: Good Things, to examine her life and work. Elizabeth Raffald (close crop)

In 1992 the

International Association of Culinary Professionals The International Association of Culinary Professionals (IACP) is a United States-based not-for-profit professional association whose members work in culinary education, communication, or the preparation of food and beverage. History The organizati ...

introduced the

Jane Grigson Award The Jane Grigson Award is an award issued by the International Association of Culinary Professionals (IACP). It honours distinguished scholarship and depth of research in cookbooks and is named in honour of the British cookery writer Jane Grigson ...

, to honour "a book that exemplifies Jane Grigson's extraordinary ability to put food in a wider cultural context, using diligent but not pedantic scholarship". The first winner was the Canadian writer Margaret Visser, for her work ''The Rituals of Dinner''. Other winners include, in 1995, Elizabeth David and Jill Norman, ''Harvest of the Cold Months: The Social History of Ice and Ices'' and, in 2014,

Jancis Robinson Jancis Mary Robinson OBE, ComMA, MW (born 22 April 1950) is a British wine critic, journalist and wine writer. She currently writes a weekly column for the ''Financial Times'', and writes for her website JancisRobinson.com, updated daily. She ...

, Julia Harding and Jose Vouillamoz, for ''

Wine Grapes This list of grape varieties includes cultivated grapes, whether used for wine, or eating as a table grape, fresh or dried (raisin, currant, sultana). For a complete list of all grape species including those unimportant to agriculture, see Vit ...

''. In 2015, on the 25th anniversary of her death, ''

The Food Programme ''The Food Programme'' is a BBC Radio 4 programme investigating and celebrating good food, founded by Derek Cooper and currently presented by Sheila Dillon, Dan Saladino, Leyla Kazim and Jaega Wise. The series is produced by BBC Audio in Br ...

'' broadcast a two-part special on Grigson and her impact on the culture of British food. Humble considers that Grigson's work turned the minds of the British public to

British food cooked by

, Elizabeth Raffald,

and

; this, Humble states, had "a transformative effect on ... ritisheating habits". She writes that the reason for the effect is that Grigson's writing is reader-friendly and ''English Food'' made many dishes fashionable again. The chef Shaun Hill believes Grigson's "legacy is ongoing—it's not finished yet"; he considers that even though much of her work was written 40 years ago, it is still relevant to modern readers. The food writer Diana Henry said of Grigson:

Jane Grigson exemplifies what a food writer should be. She is cerebral and practical—it's hard to find practitioners who are both—and she is inclusive. She didn't just want to tell you about cooking and impart knowledge, she wanted you to cook too. She was neither grand nor snobbish. You knew that if you ever got the chance to cook for her she wouldn't mind if you produced something less than perfect.

Notes, references and sources

Notes

References

Sources

Cited books by Jane Grigson

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Other cited books

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Internet

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Journals and magazines

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Newspapers

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Radio

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Grigson, Jane 1928 births 1990 deaths Alumni of Newnham College, Cambridge English food writers People educated at Sunderland High School Women food writers Women cookbook writers 20th-century British women writers 20th-century British non-fiction writers