Elizabeth David bibliography

Elizabeth David, the British cookery writer, published eight books in the 34 years between 1950 and 1984; the last was issued eight years before her death. After David's death, her literary executor, Jill Norman, supervised the publication of eight more books, drawing on David's unpublished manuscripts and research and on her published writings for books and magazines.

David's first five books, particularly the earlier works, contained recipes interspersed with literary quotation and descriptions of people and places that inspired her. By the time of her third book, ''Italian Food'', David had begun to add sections about the history of the cuisine and the particular dishes that she wrote about. Her interest in the history of cooking led her in her later years to research the history of spices, baking, and ice.

Many of the recipes in David's early books were revised versions of her articles previously published in magazines and newspapers, and in ''An Omelette and a Glass of Wine'' (1984) she collected her favourites among her articles and presented them unedited with her afterthoughts appended. A second volume of reprinted articles was published after her death. David's biographer, Artemis Cooper, wrote, "She was hailed not only as Britain's foremost writer on food and cookery, but as the woman who had transformed the eating habits of middle-class England."

Background

David's interest in cooking was sparked by a 21st birthday gift from her mother of ''The Gentle Art of Cookery'' by Hilda Leyel, her first cookery book. She later wrote, "I wonder if I would have ever learned to cook at all if I had been given a routine Mrs Beeton to learn from, instead of the romantic Mrs Leyel with her rather wild, imagination-catching recipes."

In 1938, David and a boyfriend travelled through France to Antibes, where she met and became greatly influenced by the ageing writer Norman Douglas, about whom she later wrote extensively. He inspired her love of the Mediterranean, encouraged her interest in good food, and taught her to "search out the best, insist on it, and reject all that was bogus and second-rate." She continued her exploration of Mediterranean food and the use of fresh, local ingredients in Greece in 1940. When the Germans invaded Greece in April 1941, she fled to Egypt. There, she and her employer engaged a Greek cook who, she wrote, produced magnificent food: "The flavour of that octopus stew, the rich wine dark sauce and the aroma of mountain herbs was something not easily forgotten." In 1942, she moved to Cairo, where she was asked to set up and run the Ministry of Information's reference library. The library was open to everyone and was much in demand by journalists and other writers. She employed a Sudanese ''suffragi'' (a cook-housekeeper) of whom she recalled:

Returning to England after the Second World War and her years of access to superior cooking and a profusion of fresh ingredients, David encountered terrible food: "There was flour and water soup seasoned solely with pepper; bread and gristle rissoles; dehydrated onions and carrots; corned beef toad in the hole. I need not go on."David (1986), p. 21 Partly to earn some money, and partly from an "agonized craving for the sun", David began writing articles on Mediterranean cookery. Her first efforts were published in 1949 in the British magazine ''Harper's Bazaar''. From the outset, David refused to sell the copyright of her articles, and so she was able to collect and edit them for publication in book form. Even before all the articles had been published, she had assembled them into a typescript volume called ''A Book of Mediterranean Food''.David (1999), p. vii

The success of David's books put her in great demand by magazine editors. Among the publications for whom she regularly wrote for some period were ''Vogue'' magazine, ''The Sunday Times'' and ''The Spectator''.Cooper, Artemis
"David, Elizabeth (1913–1992)"
''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, 2004, accessed 10 July 2013

''A Book of Mediterranean Food'' (1950)

David's first book, ''A Book of Mediterranean Food'', frequently referred to by the abbreviated title of ''Mediterranean Food'', was published by John Lehmann in 1950, only a year after David's first articles had started appearing in British periodicals. The original typescript of the book consisted almost entirely of reused versions of her recent articles. It was submitted to and turned down by a series of publishers, one of whom told her that it needed something more than just the bare recipes. David took note, and wrote some linking text, interspersing her own brief prose with relevant excerpts from a wide range of authors known for their writings about the Mediterranean. They included Norman Douglas, Lawrence Durrell, Gertrude Stein, D. H. Lawrence, Osbert Sitwell, Compton Mackenzie, Arnold Bennett, Henry James and Théophile Gautier.

Lehmann accepted the work for publication, and gave David an advance of £100.Cooper, p. 144 He commissioned a dust-jacket painting and black and white illustrations from the artist John Minton. Writers including Cyril Ray and John Arlott commented that Minton's drawings added to the attractions of the book. David thought good illustration important. Although she did not like Minton's black and white drawings, she described his jacket design (right) as "stunning". She was especially taken with "his beautiful Mediterranean bay, his tables spread with white cloths and bright fruit" and the way that "pitchers and jugs and bottles of wine could be seen far down the street."

The book appeared when food rationing imposed during the Second World War remained fully in force in Britain. As David later put it, "almost every essential ingredient of good cooking was either rationed or unobtainable."David (1999), p. ix She therefore adapted some of the recipes she had learned in the years when she lived in Mediterranean countries, "to make up for lack of flavour which should have been supplied by meat or stock or butter." ''The Times Literary Supplement'' observed, "while one might hesitate to attempt 'Lobster à la Enfant Prodigue' (with champagne, garlic, basil, lemon, chervil, mushrooms and truffles), the resourceful cook with time to explore London's more individual shops, and money, should not often be nonplussed." ''The Observer'' commented that the book deserved "to become the familiar companion of all who seek uninhibited excitement in the kitchen."

The chapters of ''Mediterranean Food'' dealt with: soups; eggs and luncheon dishes; fish; meat; substantial dishes; poultry and game; vegetables; cold food and salads; sweets; jams, chutneys and preserves; and sauces.
The book was reprinted in 1951; an American edition was published by Horizon Press in 1952; and a paperback edition was published by Penguin Books

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