Eating Words gathers food writing of literary distinction and historical sweep into one splendid volume. Beginning with the taboos of the Old Testament and the tastes of ancient Rome, and including travel essays, polemics, memoirs and poems, the book is divided into sections such as “Kitchen Practices”; “Food Memory: Identity, Family, Ethnicity”; “Eating: Delight, Disgust, Hunger, Horror” and “Food Politics”. Selections by Julia Child, Anthony Bourdain, Bill Buford, Michael Pollan, Molly O’Neill, Calvin Trillin and Adam Gopnik, along with authors not usually associated with gastronomy—Maxine Hong Kingston, Henry Louis Gates Jr, Hemingway, Chekhov and David Foster Wallace—enliven and enrich this comprehensive anthology.