Conventional food histories tend to tell us more about the diet of the nobility and gentry than the everyday food of ordinary people. This book takes a different viewpoint. It describes how people living and working together for a common purpose often shared a common diet, and examines the food preparation for certain groups restricted in their choice of foodstuffs.

So, what did medieval monks eat? How did the catering arrangements for servants change between the Middle Ages and the nineteenth century? What were school dinners like at the French school of St Cyr? What delights did a typical Yorkshire workhouse diet contain? What was on the menu if you were a sailor between 1530 and 1830? And have soldiers in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries really marched on their stomachs?

These questions and many more are answered in this fascinating new examination of Food for the Community, shedding as much light on contemporary dietary theories and the social context of special diets as it does on the actual foods consumed.