Anne Bramley

Many food riots broke out during Shakespeare's era. Endless rain wiped out crops, and speculators profited (including the bard). The chaos and anxiety around food show up in some of his famous works.

There were no dress circle lounges nor mezzanine bars 400 years ago. Back then, audience snacked on cold nibbles and ready-made street food from vendors they passed on their way to the performance.

References to obscure foods abound in Shakespeare. Know your codlings from carbonadoes? Your umbles from jumbles? We crack open Renaissance cookbooks to figure out how to feast like the Bard.

The eggplant and peach emoji are standard code for racy thoughts these days, but food has been used for sexual innuendo for centuries. Shakespeare was a pro. (Happy Shakespeare Week!)

It's difficult to name a play in which Shakespeare doesn't cook up a bit of conflict around the table. The juiciest plot twists often happened when characters gathered for a meal.

The patron saint of Ireland was born to high status in Britain, then stolen away by pirates as a teen. It's a life story with plenty of fodder to cook up an unexpected, historically inspired menu.

Editor's note: A version of this post first appeared in January 2015.

Many people will see the snow currently blanketing much of the U.S. Eastern Seaboard as a nuisance coating sidewalks and roads. Others are celebrating it as an excuse to spend the day swooshing down a hill.

As ...

In Charles Dickens' famous tale A Christmas Carol, Ebenezer Scrooge's spectral-induced transformation leaves him with a longing for an old-fashioned Christmas drink.

"I'll raise your salary and endeavor to assist your struggling family," Scrooge promises his much-abused employee, Bob Cratchit, "and we will discuss your affairs this very afternoon, over ...

Panettone may have once sounded exotic, but these days, the dome-shaped Italian fruit bread is readily available on American grocery store shelves. And if you're ready to expand your repertoire of global holiday breads, there are many more yeasty, doughy traditions to nibble on. And they all remind us how ...

It's impossible to pinpoint the exact moment Americans embraced industrialized food. But the first Christmas after the Civil War is a key date to note. That's when Chicago's infamous Union Stock Yard opened to the public, in 1865.

"Its promoters clearly thought there could be no more appropriate way to ...

Long before the homemade vibes of food podcasts, there were folksy radio homemakers. These early 20th-century women offered recipes, life hacks and insights for the modern farmer's wife. And just like podcasts today, their shows were often personal, off-the-cuff and straight from the kitchen table.

"We were just women who ...

Chefs may now be celebrities, farmers our food heroes, and small-batch producers worthy of culinary canonization. Yet the workers who make up one of the largest groups in the American food system rarely get a mention: truckers.

"When you sit down to eat at the table, give a little thought ...

It takes about four cups of milk to make one cup of skyr, Iceland's super thick, high-protein version of yogurt.

Every drop of skyr made in Iceland comes from Icelandic cattle, the country's single breed.

But there's a problem: The average Icelandic cow can't supply much milk. And the hunger ...

In 1776, the American colonies declared independence from Britain.

But it wasn't until 1796 that someone dared to tackle a question that would plague every generation of Americans to come: "What is American food?"

American Cookery, the very first American cookbook, was written by Amelia Simmons (more on this mysterious ...

Rapeseed, an oilseed known in North America as canola, has a mild reputation as a cooking oil. Maybe that's because the version that most consumers know is a pale, neutral-flavored oil used for frying and baking.

But in the U.K., a more colorful and flavorful version has made its way ...

Many people will see the snow that's currently blanketing much of the Eastern seaboard of the U.S. as a nuisance coating sidewalks and roads. Others are celebrating it as an excuse to spend the day swooshing down a hill.

As for me, I like to think of snow as food.

...

Forget the all-night boozing, the spicy jambalaya and the gaudy-colored king cake. And definitely forget the scantily clad debauchery that is Mardi Gras.

Like the setup of a Garrison Keillor joke, I'm here to tell you about Lutherans and their sweet February buns. Welcome to Fat Tuesday, Nordic-style.

Known as ...