Dinner with the president : food, politics, and a history of breaking bread at the White House / Alex Prud'homme.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Prud'homme, Alex, author.

Contributor:

Sylvia W. Kauders Fund.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Presidents--United States--Biography.

Presidents.

Food--Political aspects--United States.

Food.

Food habits--United States.

Food habits.

Dinners and dining--United States--History.

Dinners and dining.

White House (Washington, D.C.)--History.

White House (Washington, D.C.).

White House (Washington, D.C.)--Miscellanea.

United States.

Genre:

Biographies.

Trivia and miscellanea.

Physical Description:

xxviii, 478 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (some color) ; 25 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Other Title:

Food, politics, and a history of breaking bread at the White House

Place of Publication:

New York : Alfred A. Knopf, 2023.

Summary:

"Perhaps the most significant meals in the world have been consumed at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue by the presumptive leaders of the free world. Thomas Jefferson had an affinity for eggplant and FDR for terrapin stew. Nixon ate a lump of cottage cheese topped with barbecue sauce every day and Obama regularly had arugula. Now, Alex Prud'homme takes us to the dining tables of the White House to look at what the presidents chose to eat, how the food was prepared and by whom, and the context in which the meals were served, making clear that every one of these details speaks volumes about both the individual president and the country he presided over. We see how these gustatory messages touch on not only sometimes curious personal tastes, but also local politics, national priorities, and global diplomacy-not to mention all those dinner-table-conversation-taboos: race, gender, class, money, and religion. The individual stories are fascinating in themselves, but taken together-under the keen and knowledgeable eye of Prud'homme-they reveal that food is not just food when it is desired, ordered, and consumed by the President of the United States"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Machine generated contents note: pt. I The Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries: Setting the Table

1. The First Kitchen / George Washington

2. The First Host / John Adams

3. America's Founding Epicure / Thomas Jefferson

4. To Jemmy's Health, and Dolley's Remorseless Equanimity / James Madison

5. Corn, Gingerbread, and Thanksgiving / Abraham Lincoln

6. The Drunken Tanner, the Military Genius, and the First State Dinner / Ulysses S. Grant

pt. II The Twentieth Century: Feast and Famine

7. Two Bears / William Howard Taft

8. Heartburn, Hard Cheese, and a Hail of Rotten Tomatoes / Hoover

9. The Gourmet's Lament / Franklin D. Roosevelt

10. Bourbon, Berlin, and the Comforts of Fried Chicken / Harry S. Truman

11. The President Who Cooked / Dwight D. Eisenhower

12. Camelot and Clam Chowder / John F. Kennedy

13. How Barbecue Led to Diplomacy and Chili Led to Civil Rights / Lyndon B. Johnson

14. The Unlikeliest Gastro-diplomat and the Instant President / Gerald R. Ford

15. In Search of Grits and Peace / Jimmy Carter

16. Jelly Beans, Weight Loss, and Glasnost / Ronald Reagan

17. The Yin and Yang of Broccoli / George H. W. Bush

pt. III The Twenty-First Century: Which American Cooking Is Most American?

18. Torn Between Renunciation and Appetite / William J. Clinton

19. T-Ball, Freedom Fries, and a Changing of the Guard / George W. Bush

20. The President with the Global Palate / Barack Obama

21. The Food Fighter / Donald Trump

22. We Finish as a Family / Joseph R. Biden.

Notes:

"This is a Borzoi Book published by Alfred A. Knopf."

Includes bibliographical references (pages 451-454) and index.

Local Notes:

Acquired for the Penn Libraries with assistance from the Sylvia W. Kauders Fund.

ISBN:

9781524732219

1524732214

9780525433033

0525433031

OCLC:

1334726083

Publisher Number:

99993038320