Edible: An Illustrated Guide to the World's Food Plants
by
National Geographic Society,
Deborah Madison
The first section, on fruits, was awesome. The foreword was good too, very good--all the info about agriculture, the Fertile Crescent, the Americas...darn. Just writing this makes me want to go re-read it. Nothing "big" that I didn't already know, but a beautiful fairy tale for a dedicated gardener.
Basically each major fruit received a one or two-page spread, with less common ones getting a half-page. For reasons unknown they didn't mention that there are a lot more varieties of bananas available that just the single grocery store variety we know. (And they taste better.) But, sadly, I'm still not sure what that really delicious fruit I ate on Oahu was. My best guess is a cultivated variety of Custard Apple. Next time I go to the Islands, I'm trying every fruit I see.
The book's treatment of vegetables was just a bit disappointing, and then it went on to to herbs and beverage plants and grains and sugars, and all of these were given short shrift, IMHO. Only two pages for corn? I wanted more!
Which is just plain silly of me. The subject matter would have filled an encyclopedia and this was just a single book. A nice, big book with pictures out the gazoodle. I liked, I very much liked. If I could afford a big library this would be in it.
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