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    Unavailable
    The Food Explorer: The True Adventures of the Globe-Trotting Botanist Who Transformed What America Eats
    Unavailable
    The Food Explorer: The True Adventures of the Globe-Trotting Botanist Who Transformed What America Eats
    Unavailable
    The Food Explorer: The True Adventures of the Globe-Trotting Botanist Who Transformed What America Eats
    Audiobook9 hours

    The Food Explorer: The True Adventures of the Globe-Trotting Botanist Who Transformed What America Eats

    Written by Daniel Stone

    Narrated by Daniel Stone

    4/5

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    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    The true adventures of David Fairchild, a late-nineteenth-century food explorer who traveled the globe and introduced diverse crops like avocados, mangoes, seedless grapes—and thousands more—to the American plate.

    In the nineteenth century, American meals were about subsistence, not enjoyment. But as a new century approached, appetites broadened, and David Fairchild, a young botanist with an insatiable lust to explore and experience the world, set out in search of foods that would enrich the American farmer and enchant the American eater.

    Kale from Croatia, mangoes from India, and hops from Bavaria. Peaches from China, avocados from Chile, and pomegranates from Malta. Fairchild's finds weren't just limited to food: From Egypt he sent back a variety of cotton that revolutionized an industry, and via Japan he introduced the cherry blossom tree, forever brightening America's capital. Along the way, he was arrested, caught diseases, and bargained with island tribes. But his culinary ambition came during a formative era, and through him, America transformed into the most diverse food system ever created.

    Editor's Note

    Fascinating read for foodies, scientists, and the curious…

    If this 19th-century explorer hadn’t risked it all to travel the globe, Americans wouldn’t have tasted avocado, mango, peaches, Bavarian hops, and more. Find out how his dangerous adventures made your kale salad possible.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPenguin Random House Audio
    Release dateFeb 20, 2018
    ISBN9780525531142
    Unavailable
    The Food Explorer: The True Adventures of the Globe-Trotting Botanist Who Transformed What America Eats
    Author

    Daniel Stone

    I am Daniel Stone. Originally an Essex boy I left home at nineteen to study at the London College of Printing in Elephant and Castle. I moved around London until I met my wife and now live and work in Hertfordshire with our daughter and cat and fishes. I used to use my daily commute into the city as my time to write. I am a season ticket holder at West Ham United and the Uxbridge Rovers. When I’m not at work, football or fishing I enjoy travelling the world, running and spending time with my friends and family.

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    Reviews for The Food Explorer

    4/5

    26 ratings4 reviews

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    • 4/5
      If you were always interested in finding out why the Meyer Lemon is called just that or how the Haas avocado got its name... this book is for you!
    • 4/5
      Utterly fascinating if one is interested in where our crops originated and how what we eat changes. Not a standard biography, but you'll certainly know more when you finish.
    • 2/5
      A solid waste of time. Neither a biography, a travelogue, or a book about food, this book does an excellent job of accomplishing nothing. Two stars for the pics, a zero for the writing. Problems galore in this book....no real indication of the educational background of Fairchild. No idea what the stop in Germany early in his career might have been about as it is not mentioned until it is referenced several times later in the book...very little about the plants themselves....and the author seems to be fascinated with Fairchild to the point that he defends him to an extent far beyond objectivity. I do not care about a person's sexuality, most especially in a book about a botanist, a book that turned out either to be an exceptionally bad biography or was never meant to be a biography....what then was it? The two decades from 1920 to 1940 were covered in just a few paragraphs....biography? I think not. I can usually put up with a mediocre book if I get something, anything, out of it. Not the case here. Beyond mediocre in the wrong direction.
    • 4/5
      This is a worthwhile read, not only to learn the history of foods we take for granted in North America, but to observe the opposing politics that continue to prevail today. Do we open our doors wide to the world, believing that there will be rewards or do we bar the door out of fear that new things will harm us?