Garlic, an Edible Biography: The History, Politics, and Mythology Behind the World’s Most Pungent Food, with over 100 Recipes

Garlic weaves a colorful, engaging story about one of the world's timeless ingredients--perfect for food lovers, devoted eaters, and readers of culinary narrative.

Garlic is the Lord Byron of produce, a lusty rogue that charms and seduces you but runs off before dawn, leaving a bad taste in your mouth. Called everything from rustic cure-all to Russian penicillin, Bronx vanilla and Italian perfume, garlic has been loved, worshipped, and despised throughout history. No writer has quite captured the epic, roving story of garlic--until now. While this book does not claim that garlic saved civilization (though it might cure whatever ails you), it does take us on a grand tour of its fascinating role in history, medicine, literature, and art; its controversial role in bigotry, mythology, and superstition; and its indispensable contribution to the great cuisines of the world. And just to make sure your appetite isn't slighted, Garlic offers over 100 recipes featuring the beloved ingredient.

Travel writer and historian ROBIN CHERRY is the author of Catalog: The Illustrated History of Mail-Order Shopping. She was the publisher of Organic Style books and the circulation director of Organic Gardening and Organic Style magazines at Rodale. She has written for The Atlantic, Travel + Leisure, Dwell, Salon, and many other publications and websites.