The Gastronomical Page-Turner
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

When people refer to a book as a “page-turner,” they’re usually talking about a compelling storyline that’s impossible to put down. But for a minutiae enthusiast like me, a page-turner isn’t about a single story arc – it’s about lots of unrelated factoids that keep me flipping pages back and forth in no particular order, so I can soak up random informational nuggets. Almanacs and encyclopedias are good for this, but they’re not as much fun as Ben Schott’s eclectic new book, “Schott’s Food & Drink Miscellany” (Bloomsbury, $14.95), which is a page-turner of the highest order.
Mr. Schott, who lives in England, is essentially a trivialist. His 2003 debut book, “Schott’s Original Miscellany,” was a hit when it was released last year, thanks to endearingly useless information such as the origin of the Postal Service’s “Neither snow nor rain…” motto (it dates back to 500 B.C.) and a primer on the British hat tax. But the new book is even better, because the food and drink theme provides just enough coherence to keep things focused.
Well, somewhat focused – the text isn’t structured in any linear sequence, so just open to a random page and dive in. Did you know, for example, that five-spice powder is comprised of star anise, clove, fennel, cinnamon, and Sichuan peppercorns? Or that Goldie Hawn, Ed Koch, and Cher have all received life-saving Heimlich maneuvers?
Reading these morsels of data is like reaching into a bowl of salted nuts: Once you get started, it’s hard to stop. Look, here’s a listing of foods that have prompted Homer Simpson to intone, “Mmmmm…” (as in, “Mmmmm, unprocessed fish sticks”). Here’s a breakdown of halal dietary guidelines. Here’s a chart showing how to order your steak to a specified doneness in French, Italian, Spanish, and German. And here’s a lengthy poem extolling the virtues of haggis, with the famously nasty Scottish dish described as “Great chieftain o’ the puddin’-race.”
The book’s interior design, which owes an obvious debt to Dave Eggers’s McSweeney’s journal, is arranged so that most entries conclude at the bottom of a given page, with no text spilling onto the next page. This keeps things nicely self-contained, but it also appears to have forced Mr. Schott to resort to B-level filler material toward the end of some pages. And there are several entries relating to cigars, which seems like a mild bending of the food and drink theme.
Such small quibbles notwithstanding, it’s hard not to love a book that provides a list of hangover recipes, an illustrated guide to pasta shapes, and the original lyrics to the Chiquita Banana commercial jingle (which Mr. Schott straight-facedly describes as “without doubt the most memorable song ever written to promote bananas”).
There are other culinary page-turners out there, of course. Some people like to randomly thumb through cookbooks, although I prefer food encyclopedias. I’ll pull one of them off the shelf, thinking I’m just going to look up this or that, and then find myself flipping pages for the next two hours, pursuing endless tangents.
As much as I love these books, however, none of them can compete with “Schott’s Food & Drink Miscellany” for eccentric trivial amusement. Unlike the encyclopedias, it’s not a book you consult to look up something you want to know – it’s more of a guide to things you didn’t even realize you wanted to know. And that’s an ideal page-turner.