In the 1993 film So I Married an Axe Murderer, Canadian
comic Mike Myers, contemplating the strange
thing that is haggis, observes that
Scottish cuisine is the only one in the world that is based on a dare. This is
not strictly so: The same can be said of nearly every cuisine in the world, at
least at some point in its history. What brave Roman was commissioned to
determine when the flamingo buried in the back yard was ready to eat? How many
Aymara Indians had to die before the potato was finally bred out of its
poisonous ways? How many countless humans have fallen before the mushroom? What
of the proto-Indo-European steppe dweller who decided that it would be a good
idea to raid a beehive for honey, competing with brown bears to do so? These
are our pioneers, explorers of the table, and one day a museum will have to be
built in their honor.

Knowing about where our food comes
from in history, I think, enhances our understanding of where it comes from
today. History, of course, is mutable, just as the future is unwritten.
American taste has shifted in the last half-century, toward greater consumption
of fresh, organically produced vegetables and other foodstuffs—at least for
those who can afford them in an increasingly class-structured, polarized
nation. This pattern will likely continue, so that at least one stratum of
society supports a healthy if boutique-like farming culture.

Yet, some economists warn, it is
likely that as farmland gives way to housing developments and shopping malls,
as the world’s population grows, and as the supply of fossil fuels declines,
the cost of food will rise substantially, perhaps as high as half of net
income. If this in fact happens, then grain production, so much of which is
given over to livestock feed and, lately, fuel production, will be diverted to
human consumption, so that Americans and other first-worlders will in time eat
what the rest of the world eats: grains and vegetables, with meat making up
only a small portion of our caloric intake. Stay tuned: given the food crises
roiling around the world, this may happen sooner than any of us think.

I have long been interested in food
and its ways, convinced that, just as our making good cities teaches us to
protect wilder climes, so learning about what we eat can make us better
guardians of the garden and table. That trust may be misplaced, but becoming
better consumers is certainly within the sphere of enlightened self-interest,
given how many opportunities the present market offers to ingest things that
are not good for us, that come from deep in the bowels of dubious labs, that do
not much seem like food at all. Think of margarine, dessert toppings, cheese
puffs, and most industrial hamburgers—or, for that matter, think of what
passes for tomatoes in so many groceries.

Moveable Feasts is primarily a book
of food history, science, and lore, and not of cookery strictly speaking. Be
forewarned as you read its recipes, then, that you put a bite of unfamiliar
food into your mouth at your own risk. But you knew that, as did the brave men
and women who preceded us, generation after generation, to taste and test the
foods of the world, bringing them at considerable risk but with great rewards
from every corner of the world to our tables. Blessings be upon them, and
forgiveness, too.