At Christmas We Feast: Festive Food Through the Ages by Annie Gray

Annie Gray’s book is dedicated to Christmas food from the fourth century to today, complete with recipes from every era. Not all will make your mouth water (the Tudors had a weird affinity for mixing sweet and savoury dishes, even adding actual meat to their mince pies), but it’s an enlightening study of how Christmas dinner has dramatically changed over the years. It’s as much a social study as it is a food book, with Gray conscious to note how different classes did Christmas over the years. While interesting, it’s perhaps too dense – there are too many details and Gray assumes a lot of knowledge of historical figures who aren’t necessarily household names.