Book Review: Feasting and Fasting with Lewis & Clark: A Food and Social History of the Early 1800s

This volume is an intriguing combination of narrative and reference material. A first section sets the historical context for the famous voyage of discovery by discussing such topics as contemporary food preservation, outdoor cooking, and knowledge about nutrition and food safety. Then a longer second section chronologically details the food events of the journey, beginning with shopping in Philadelphia. Here the author gives attention not only to obvious topics such as food and beverage provisioning, indigenous flora and fauna food sources, and the diplomatic aspects of eating together with Native Americans, but also much about illness, starvation, and shortage of wood. An encyclopedic- like reference section concludes the volume, repeating much of the material presented in previous pages, but in a different order