Shrimp: A Global History

(Hardback)

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Description

In this lively and entertaining book, Yvette Florio Lane embarks on a culinary and historical tour of the small-but-mighty shrimp. Containing fascinating lore, unusual recipes, and compelling images, the book explores the shrimp in art, music, and popular culture, from Hiroshige to anime, and from Shakespeare to Seinfeld. The small but mighty shrimp, or prawn, has lured diners to the table for centuries. These primordial-looking creatures spend their short lives out of sight, deep on the ocean floor, yet they have inspired an immense passion among many cultures. They are also at the centre of some of our most pressing environmental and human rights concerns.

In this lively and entertaining book, Yvette Florio Lane embarks on a culinary and historical tour of the production and consumption of the beloved crustacean from earliest times to the present day. Essential reading for foodies and food historians, Shrimp demonstrates that the enormous desire for this favourite shellfish has always come with a high price tag.

Reviews

"Lane ends her book on a melancholy note. Shrimp-eating does more harm to the environment, both animal and human, than most other kinds of food production. Trawling scoops up whole ecosystems and discards half of them as by-catch. Farming is a polluting, fetid business. Shrimp shuckers and sorters are as low on the global labor chain in the twenty-first century as they were in the nineteenth, held in peonage and subjected to the corrosive effects of mountains of shrimp shells. Shrimp marketing in the United States is probably the most fraud-ridden section of the supermarket, where product is routinely mislabeled as to country and method of origin. They are delicious little guys, but there may be no way of enjoying them on the scale we're accustomed to without devastation and misery ensuing."--Tim Morris "lection"

Author Bio

Yvette Florio Lane is a writer and social and cultural historian based at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey.