Recent Arrivals from Rabelais - Fine Books on Food & Drink

North Canaan, Conn: [Printed by the] Press of Connecticut Western News, 1888. Octavo in wrappers (18.5 x 13 cm.), 76 pages. Evident FIRST EDITION. A New England community cookbook, unusual for its omission of any statement of ownership, responsibility, or purpose. With approximately two hundred attributed recipes, including Scalloped Tomatoes, Creamed Oysters, Liver Paté, and a reliable complement of… Read more about this item

[Montauban, France, 1942. Eighteen black and white original photographs (each 12.5 x 17.5 cm.); with one photo postcard (13.5 x 8 cm.) with manuscript note on the verso. Nineteen original photographs depicting children and staff at an orphanage in Montauban, in Southwest France. Included are images of children eating, food being prepared and served, children in the classroom and… Read more about this item

New York: Alfred A. Knopf Inc, 1989. Thick quarto (28 x 24 cm.), 511, [1] pages. Illustrated. FIRST EDITION, first printing. The book is a well-illustrated guide to technique with recipes for delicious classics. More than eight hundred recipes in this magnificent cookbook. Of Child's works, arguably second in importance only to Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Fine… Read more about this item

London: Ward, Locke & Co., Limited, 1890. Thick, octavo (21.5 x 14.5 cm.), xlviii, [3], 1997, [18] pages. Illustrated with color and black and white plates and numerous woodcuts in the text. Advertisements printed in lavender and green. Later printing of the revised edition of 1869. Perhaps the most famous of all English cookery books. Originally published in a… Read more about this item

New York: The Health-Culture Company, 1904. Small octavo (19 x 13 cm.), 246 pages. Stated Second Edition (from author's preface) of this early raw food cookbook. The authors' argument tends to be twofold: that early man ate raw foods and it was good enough for him; and that cooking saps food of its nutrients. Includes an interesting collection of… Read more about this item

Cleveland, Ohio: Privately Printed, 1905. 16mo. (15.5 x 10.5 cm.), 24 pages. Illustrated. All edges gilt. FIRST & ONLY EDITION, limited, number 363 of 400 copies hand-numbered copies. A commemorative book for the Silver Anniversary Banquet of the Civil Engineers' Club of Cleveland, held at The Colonial on March 13, 1905. The fare included Canape a la Russe, Blue… Read more about this item

Philadelphia, Penn: I. L. Cragin & Co, 1890. Cord-bound booklet, stapled in wrappers (11.5 x 7.8 cm.), 31, [1] pages. Advertisements. FIRST EDITION. A promotional cookbook for Dobbins' electric soap, manufactured by I.L. Cragin & Co. The recipes alternate with testimonials for the laundry soap. The company used 'electric' in the title in order to capitalize on people's fascination… Read more about this item

Lowell, MA: C.I. Hood & Co, 1885. Small octavo-sized booklet in wrappers (17.5 x 11.3 cm.), 31 pages. index. This little product cookbook, one in the long line of product cookbooks promoting Hood's Sasparilla, originated as a church cookbook of the Ladies of the High Street Church of Lowell, Mass. "for the purpose of being sold at their Annual… Read more about this item

Cardiff, Wales: Wales Gas Board; [Printed by Western Mail & Echo Limited, Cardiff], 1957. Octavo-sized stapled booklet (21.5 x 14 cm), 79 pages. Printed in red & black throughout on yellow stock. Printed by Western Mail & Echo Limited, Cardiff. Cover design by John Petts. Decorations by Kusha Miller. Revised edition; originally published in 1953. An advertising cookbook, published… Read more about this item

New York: Harper & Row, 1972. Octavo (24 x 19 cm), [xi], 378 pages. Foreword by Craig Claiborne. Drawings by Sidonie Coryn. FIRST EDITION, later printing Diana Kennedy's (1923-2022) quintessential first cookbook. Often credited with introducing a more "authentic" Mexican cuisine to an English-speaking audience, Kennedy dedicated her career to preserving traditional cooking techniques and regional recipes. She interviewed… Read more about this item

Woodbury, CT: Ici La Press, 2002. Quarto (28 x 22.5 cm.), 269 pages. Illustrated throughout with color photographs. FIRST ENGLISH LANGUAGE EDITION. The undeniable masterwork from the three-star chef who has proven that purity and complexity can go hand in hand. He's been called "France's most venerated chef" and his book is essential for the shelf of all serious… Read more about this item

[Chicago: F. S. Burch & Co, ??. Stapled booklet, sextodecimo (16 x 9 cm), [16] pages. FIRST EDITION. A pretty little advertising booklet on a not-very-pretty subject. The cover features several delicate illustrations of happy hogs eating eagerly at a trough and being dressed after slaughter, surrounded by a dainty border made to look like ears of corn. As… Read more about this item

Providence, R.I.: [the hotel], 1883. Bi-fold menu on silk (16 x 10.7 cm.), [2] pages. Menu for a Christmas dinner at the Narragansett Hotel in Providence, R.I. Courses include Soup, Hors D'Oueuvres, Fish, Releves, Entrees, Roasts, Cold Meats, Vegetables, Mayonnaise, Game, and Dessert. The Narragansett Hotel, "conducted by Chapin & Robinson, is one of the largest, grandest, best furnished,… Read more about this item

London: William Heinemann Ltd, 1933. Octavo (20.3 x 13 cm.), [6], xiii, 85 pages. Illustrated color frontispiece by J.E. Laboureur. FIRST EDITION, trade issue. The companion volume to What Shall We Have To-Day? This small book is focused on wine, and includes a number of recipes to accompany the author's recommendations. The recipes include Crepes Flambees, Galantine of Salmon,… Read more about this item

Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1949. Octavo (21.5 x 15 cm.), [5], 263 pages. With illustrations by George Price. FIRST EDITION. The fifth book from the author of Miss Rasmussen's Book of One-Arm Cookery. The author's three Brooklyn heroines find themselves in Newark, standing in front of a dilapidated tavern with an owner with a war injury. In no time… Read more about this item

London: William Heinemann, 1931. Octavo (20.3 x 13 cm.), [8], 1-251 pages. FIRST EDITION, trade issue. One of the earliest efforts from Xavier Marcel Boulestin (1878-1943), one of England's most popular and prolific early 20th century cookbook authors. Boulestin was born and raised in France, then moved to England, where by the late 1920s he had become a successful… Read more about this item

England: Cunard Line, 1932. Tri-fold, card-stock menu (15 x 8 cm.), [6] pages. Illustrated, and signed "R." in the print. A shipboard cocktail menu, dated "Cruise 1932", but lacking the name of the specific ship. Attractively printed in black and red duo-tone, the menu offers lists of Liqueurs, Cocktails (twenty-three choices), Aperitifs, Mixed Drinks, Beer, Cigars, Tobaccos, Cigarettes, and… Read more about this item

Westfield, Mass: J. D. Cadle & Co., Printers, 1884. Octavo (19.5 x 12.5 cm.), 147, [10] pages. Advertisements appended (pages [103]-147). Blank pages at rear. Title page in red and black. Cover title: Culinary Gems. Central. Editor attribution from preface, page [5]. FIRST EDITION. A local affair, though not a charitable collection (despite an appearance in Cook): an effort,… Read more about this item

San Francisco: United Features Syndicate - Determined Productions, Inc, 1970. Square duodecimo (14.5 x 14.5 cm.), 91 pages. Illustrated. FIRST EDITION. "Lunchtime! Lunchtime! Charlie Brown and Linus would be first to agree there's more to brown-bagging-it than jelly-bread sandwiches." Thirty-nine recipes, one-to-a-page, each facing a multi-panel Peanuts comic. Contents presented alphabetically: "Bread: white and wheat; Brown Bagger Hints; Cheese… Read more about this item

San Francisco: Paul Elder and Company, 1914. Octavo (20.6 x 15 cm.), 138 pages. FIRST EDITION. A wonderful snapshot of San Francisco and its restaurants in the years not long after the Great Earthquake of 1906 had devastated so much of the city. "A remarkable portrait of the dining available at the time." [Strehl 100]. Publisher's medium brown cloth,… Read more about this item