Dining with Leaders, Rebels, Heroes, and Outlaws

Fiona Ross leads a double-existence: in her ‘normal’ life as the exhausted English Teacher at an all-girls school, Fiona keeps company with screaming debutants and a lot of short people under the age of twelve, while practicing the dark arts of crowd control. Meanwhile, her double works as a freelance food writer and a gastro-detective whose headquarters are the Bodleian Library; she spends her time there pondering which sandwich filling she would prefer for lunch when she is not hot on the trail of a famous gastronome.

• Introduction1: Dining with the Leaders: Apparatchiks and their appetites will appeal to all those readers with a transcontinental interest in behind-the-napkin politics. Candidates include: Golda Meir; Lyndon B Johnson; Boris Yeltsin; ‘Peanuts’ Carter; Margaret Thatcher; Richard Nixon; Churchill; Bill Clinton; Gorbachev; Ronnie Reagan; and JFK and Jackie. 2: Dining with the Rebels: From the shores of Cape Town to the menu at Charlestown Penitentiary, we follow the crumb trail of the world’s leading revolutionaries. Ordering a Molotov are: Mandela; Marx; Castro; Ché; Malcolm X; Lenin; Osama bin Laden and Yasser Arafat. 3: Dining with the Heroes: serving up supper with heroes, geniuses and explorers. On a pedestal are: Lawrence of Arabia; Freud; Scott of the Antarctic; Gandhi; Martin Luther King; Charles Darwin; Einstein; and Men on the Moon.4: Dining with the Outlaws: If you are what you eat, could we all be dictators too? This accessible volume investigates the unusual appetites of these men with something to hide. The roll-call: Hitler; Tito; Pinochet; Mao; Mussolini; Saddam; Osama bin Laden; Stalin; and Peròn.

British gastrodetective Ross pairs a wide range of politicians, dictators, revolutionaries, heroes, and geniuses with their cuisine preferences, providing both recipes and descriptions of the dishes. She names Israeli leader Golda Meir’s heartwarming gruel, President Lyndon B. Johnson’s beef ribs, Russian head Boris Yeltsin’s favorite fish soup, Margaret Thatcher’s conservative 'Iron Lady Ginger Cake,' and JFK’s beloved fish chowder, among others. Her 'Rebel' and 'Outlaws' sections are full of historic detail and tongue-in-cheek relish, and they possess a real comic edge. Ross samples Nelson Mandela’s biryani of spicy lamb, Lenin’s 'Comrade’s Cabbage and Dumpling Soup,' Malcolm X’s savory pecan pie, and Osama Bin Laden’s toxic Swedish delicacy of smoked sausage with potatoes and mustard. Her heroes include Martin Luther King Jr., Charles Darwin, and Albert Einstein, and she especially enjoys Sigmund Freud’s Viennese rindfleisch goulash and Gandhi’s 'Seaman’s Roti.' Most of the civilization’s famous and infamous appear in Ross’s slyly humorous food dossier, which is concocted to be taken seriously while producing a belly laugh or two.