Food in Shakespeare: Sex, Sack and a Dish of Prunes
As the title of this podcast suggests much of the discussion around the following episode centres on SEX. So, if you are travelling in the car with young people or anyone who is easily offended you may want to wait until you have dropped them off!Sex is, and always has been, a part of our lives. Without it none of us would be here. The very mention of the word can elicit titters, blushes, disgust and arousal. Shakespeare’s plays are teeming with sexual inuendo often with reference to food. Helping me unpick exactly what the Bard meant by these saucy references is Dr Will Tosh, Director of Education at Shakespeare’s Globe and author of Straight Acting: The Many Queer Lives of William Shakespeare and several other books.This is the last chance for listeners to claim their 25% off tickets for the Serve It Forth Festival on 18 October 2025! Enter SERVE25 at the checkout.If you enjoyed the podcast you can become a paid subscriber to the Comfortably Hungry Substack (which means you’ll receive additional content) or show your appreciation by leaving a small, one off tip here. Don’t forget that you can find links to the books discussed in today’s and other episodes on the Comfortably Hungry Bookshelf on Substack. Much Ado About Cooking is available to pre-order ahead of its release on 23 October 2025.Don’t forget you can follow me on Instagram or Bluesky @mrssbilton or find out more about my work on sambilton.com.A huge thank you to Thomas Ntinas of The Delicious Legacy for doing the sound mixing on this season of the podcast.Comfortably Hungry is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Comfortably Hungry at comfortablyhungry.substack.com/subscribe
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Food in Shakespeare: Dinner and Punishment
In an essay entitled “Feasts are too Proud / Better to Starve”: Shakespearean Culinary Divides, Sheila T. Cavanagh, Professor of English at Emory University explains that in Shakespeare’s plays ‘Disputes involving food … often reveal close convergences between dietary options and challenging loci of interpersonal conflict, frequently connected with competing hierarchies associated with status as well as domestic, political, financial, or social power.’In today’s episode Sheila will help me explore how food is weaponised in Shakespeare’s plays, both in a literal and figurative sense, to coerce or punish characters.As a special treat for my listeners I’m extending a 25% discount off the full ticket price for the Serve It Forth Food History Festival on 18 October 2025. I’ll be there continuing my discussion on Food in Shakespeare. Just enter SERVE25 at the checkout to claim the discount.If you enjoyed the podcast you can become a paid subscriber to the Comfortably Hungry Substack (which means you’ll receive additional content) or show your appreciation by leaving a small, one off tip here. Don’t forget that you can find links to the books discussed in today’s and other episodes on the Comfortably Hungry Bookshelf on Substack. Much Ado About Cooking is available to pre-order ahead of its release on 23 October 2025.Don’t forget you can follow me on Instagram or Bluesky @mrssbilton or find out more about my work on sambilton.com.A huge thank you to Thomas Ntinas of The Delicious Legacy for doing the sound mixing on this season of the podcast.Comfortably Hungry is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Comfortably Hungry at comfortablyhungry.substack.com/subscribe
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Food in Shakespeare: I want to eat like common people
One of the challenges of writing a cookbook based on early modern recipes, like Much Ado About Cooking, is that the culinary manuscripts food historians have at our disposal tell us very little about what ordinary people consumed. They record the food largely eaten by the rich or the upwardly mobile merchants and yeomen. As fascinating and delicious as many of these recipes are, they don’t reveal what the everyday folk ate. And this is where the works of playwrights like William Shakespeare are insightful.Helping me to dissect the food references in Shakespeare’s plays to solve this mystery is Diane Purkiss, Professor of English Literature for Keble College at the University of Oxford and author of English Food: A People’s History.As a special treat for my listeners I’m extending a 25% discount off the full ticket price for the Serve It Forth Food History Festival on 18 October 2025. I’ll be there continuing my discussion on Food in Shakespeare. Just enter SERVE25 at the checkout to claim the discount.If you enjoyed the podcast you can become a paid subscriber to the Comfortably Hungry Substack (which means you’ll receive additional content) or show your appreciation by leaving a small, one off tip here. Don’t forget that you can find links to the books discussed in today’s and other episodes on the Comfortably Hungry Bookshelf on Substack. Much Ado About Cooking is available to pre-order ahead of its release on 23 October 2025.Don’t forget you can follow me on Instagram or Bluesky @mrssbilton or find out more about my work on sambilton.com.A huge thank you to Thomas Ntinas of The Delicious Legacy for doing the sound mixing on this season of the podcast.Comfortably Hungry is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Comfortably Hungry at comfortablyhungry.substack.com/subscribe
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Season 4 Preview: Thirst - In Search of Freshwater
Season 4 of the Comfortably Hungry podcast will start in earnest later this autumn. This season I’ll be chatting to historians, food writers, and artists to reveal the importance of water in all its guises and how it was used by our ancestors. To whet your appetite I had a chat with Janice Li, curator of a new exhibition at the Wellcome Collection in London called Thirst: In Search of Freshwater.You’ve no doubt heard the statistic that around 70 percent of the earth’s surface is covered with water. What may come as a surprise, as it did for me, is that only three percent of that water is fresh. And it is that limited resource and how it has been harnessed in the past to produce and preserve our food and drink that is the focus of Season 4.If you enjoyed the podcast you can become a paid subscriber to the Comfortably Hungry Substack (which means you’ll receive additional content) or show your appreciation by leaving a small, one off tip here. Useful Links* Thirst: In Search of Freshwater at the Wellcome Collection is open from 25 June 2025 to 1 February 2026.* Thirst: In Search of Freshwater book* Find out more about Janice Li’s work on her website or follow her on Instagram.Don’t forget you can follow me on Instagram or Bluesky @mrssbilton or find out more about my work on sambilton.com.A huge thank you to Thomas Ntinas of The Delicious Legacy for doing the sound mixing on this season of the podcast.Comfortably Hungry is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Comfortably Hungry at comfortablyhungry.substack.com/subscribe
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Bonus Episode: Serving Food History Forth
Ever wondered how someone gets into food history? What are the popular misconceptions about what we do? And do we ever have any recipe disasters?In this bonus episode I chat to my food history chums Neil Buttery, Alessandra Pino and Thomas Ntinas about how we got into food history and what inspires us. We also chat about our new food history festival, Serve It Forth, which will take place online on Saturday 18 October 2025 covering topics such as Falstaff’s love of food in Shakespeare’s plays; chefs from the Ancient Greek world; what the Thames can tell us about the feasting tables of the living and memento mori traditions; plus an interview with food writer Tom Parker Bowles about how we can keep food traditions alive. If you enjoyed the podcast you can become a paid subscriber to the Comfortably Hungry Substack (which means you’ll receive additional content) or show your appreciation by leaving a small, one off tip here. Useful LinksServe It Forth websiteServe It Forth ticketsServe It Forth on Social MediaDon’t forget you can follow me on Instagram or Bluesky @mrssbilton or find out more about my work on sambilton.com.A huge thank you to Thomas Ntinas of The Delicious Legacy for doing the sound mixing on this season of the podcast.Comfortably Hungry is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Comfortably Hungry at comfortablyhungry.substack.com/subscribe
Welcome to the comfortably hungry podcast where yesterday’s dinner is tomorrow’s history. If you’re a peckish person who is curious about the history of food and drink, then you’re in the right place. I’m Sam Bilton a food historian, writer and cook and each season I will be joined by some hungry guests to discuss a variety topics centred around a specific theme. As a former supper club host I’m always intrigued to know what people like to eat. So to whet everyone’s appetites I have invited my guests to contribute a virtual dish with them inspired by today’s topic. comfortablyhungry.substack.com
New Zealand