Thursday 21 April 2016

Charlotte Bronte and food

Today marks the bicentenary of the birth of Charlotte Bronte, the eldest of the three novelist sisters.  Having previously blogged about food in Jane Eyre (published 1847), I thought that today would be a good opportunity to revisit these posts and what we learn about food in Bronte's best-known novel.

Portrait of Charlotte Bronte at the Bronte Parsonage Museum
As I reread these posts I noticed the way Jane's relationship with food in the novel mirrors her journey to self-realization as a woman able to lead her life as she chooses.

Sunday 3 April 2016

Eating Out

I love eating out almost as much as I love cooking.  And living in London as I do, I'm lucky enough to have an amazing array of restaurants within easy reach offering me all types of food.  
And it's not just dining in fine establishments - which to be honest I hardly ever do - which I enjoy.  I love cafes, pub food, pizza chains and so on.  It's partly the social element - since my eating out in London is always with friends or family - but also the enjoyment of having someone cook (and perhaps more importantly wash up and tidy away!) for me.

Thinking back over the posts I have written I realise there have been very references to eating out.  Shakespeare's comic creation Falstaff, whom I wrote about here, eats and drinks regularly at the Boar's Head Tavern in Eastcheap and, although I did not blog about it, in Pride and Prejudice Jane and Elizabeth Bennet break a journey from London to Hertfordshire at an inn and dine at 'a table set out with such cold meat as an inn larder usually affords'.