Dining with Leaders, Rebels, Heroes and Outlaws is a marvelously funny journey into the gastronomic peccadilloes of the great, the good, and the not-so-good. Based on the findings of the British gastro-detective Fiona Ross, the Dining with Destiny series establishes a new genre: the food biography, with scandals, recipes, and their stories, allowing you to taste the culinary secret lives of presidents and prime ministers; dictators and revolutionaries; heroes and geniuses - and serve them up at your own dinner table. From Winston Churchill to Malcolm X, Golda Meir to Albert Einstein, and more, each of these figures took part in landmark historical and cultural events that have shaped and defined our way of life - but they also had to eat. Now it is time to look at their plates to discover what makes them a revolutionary, a hero, a rogue! Dining with Leaders, Rebels, Heroes and Outlaws lets you taste what's on Darwin's fork.

Dining with the Rich and Royal

by Fiona Ross

Published 17 October 2016
Dining with the Rich and Royal is a marvelous journey into the gastronomic peccadilloes of the great, the good, and the not-so-good. When the world is at your feet, what is on your table? Dining with the Rich and Royal serves up the glamour of the jet set on a plate, from the silver spoon to the last Kleenex wipe. We follow the food adventures of Hilton, Hefner, and Howard Hughes; the great transatlantic dynasties: Onassis, the Vanderbilts, the Astors and the Rothschilds. Royals watchers and history twitchers will find out the effect of too many fairy feasts on Ludwig of Bavaria; how Hirohito and Ibn Saud tasted East-Meets-West diplomacy. Would you try the cake that killed Rasputin or suck on a suicide sweet with Antony and Cleo? Was it sex or raspberry soufflé that won Mrs. Simpson a king’s heart? It’s all here: a succession of abdications, executions, revolutions, coronations, tales of toothache and posh picnics spiced with the odd military coup or two. Mind your manners now.

Dining with the Famous and Infamous is an entertaining journey into the gastronomic peccadilloes of celebrities, stars, and notorious public figures. From outrageous artists to masterpiece authors, from rock stars to actors – everybody eats. Based on the findings of the British gastro-detective Fiona Ross, this volume explores the palates, the plates, and the preferences of the famous and infamous. Including recipes and their stories in the lives of those who cooked, ordered or ate them, Ross invites you to taste the culinary secret lives of people like Alfred Hitchcock, Frank Sinatra, and Woody Allen, among many others. Food voyeurism has arrived.

If you’ve ever wondered whether George Orwell really swigged Victory Gin or whether cherries played their part in the fall of Oscar Wilde, then Dining with the Famous and Infamous will satisfy your appetite. 'Marilyn Monroe becomes a different kind of sex goddess when you discover she tried to eat her way out of Some Like It Hot with aubergine parmigiana: every curve you see on film is a protest (plus early signs of pregnancy!). You can recreate a ‘Get Gassed’ afternoon cocktail with Andy Warhol and Truman Capote; shake up the chocolate martini Liz Taylor and Rock Hudson invented on the set of Giant; and even relive the Swinging Sixties with the foodie tales, hedonism and hashish cookies of Bob Dylan, the Beatles, and the Rolling Stones.

Who wouldn’t want to sit at the table of their favorite film star, writer, artist or warlock and taste a piece of their lives?