James Bond Food website launched

A website that explores the food of Ian Fleming’s James Bond has been launched. James Bond Food accompanies the James Bond cookbook, Licence to Cook, which is packed full of recipes inspired by the food James Bond eats in the novels of Ian Fleming. 

The website contains Bondian recipes not in the book, as well as articles about Bond’s food from the books and films. The website is being updated constantly, so be sure to visit regularly to read the latest post, find out how to eat like James Bond, or to get inspired for your next recipe idea.

Click here to visit James Bond Food.

Review – James Bond's Cuisine: 007's Every Last Meal, by Matt Sherman

In recent years, the food of James Bond (perhaps rather belatedly, given that there is so much of it in Ian Fleming's novels) has been attracting more academic and popular interest. In June 2009, I published a paper in Food, Culture and Society (vol.12.2) called '“Bond was not a gourmet”: An archaeology of James Bond’s diet'. In October 2012, an article by Michelle Warwicker and published on the BBC News website asked, “Does 007 eat all the wrong things?” The same month, Dr James Strong led a seminar ('James Bond: International Man of Gastronomy') at Newman University Birmingham that explored the representation of food and the function of Bond's culinary choices in the novels. Dr Strong's research was subsequently published as a paper in the Journal of European Popular Culture (2013, vol. 4.2).

As worthy as all this research is, however, it is of limited use for anyone looking for a handy guide to food in the Bond books. My own James Bond cookbook, Licence to Cook, is a better place to start, but the recipes described are restricted to the meals that Bond consumes in Fleming's novels. Luckily, the gap has now been filled.

Matt Sherman's James Bond's Cuisine: 007's Every Last Meal (2014) is as comprehensive a guide to the food of James Bond as one could expect. The author has trawled through the novels, not only of Ian Fleming, but those of the continuation authors too, to describe every meal and food reference. Nor has he confined himself to the food consumed by Bond. References to food related to other characters are there as well. And if you thought the films had largely excised food from James Bond's adventures, then a flick through Matt Sherman's book reveals otherwise. While Bond is rarely shown sitting down to enjoy a meal, food is referenced one way or another in all the films, including the two not made by EON.

Throughout the guidebook, Matt Sherman adds 'Chef's notes' that provide more information about the origin or preparation of the food described, and occasionally include a recipe, for example key lime pie, a dessert which Bond admires in John Gardner's novelisation of Licence to Kill (1989). The author also highlights the restaurants referenced in the books and films which actually exist, allowing the book to be used as culinary travel guide and giving the chance for readers to sample the locations, as well as the food, of James Bond's world.

An index by food type or ingredient would have been helpful, but this is a minor concern. The book is a one-stop reference for all the food of James Bond, and deserves a place on the Bond fan's bookshelf alongside other Bond-related reference works, in particular David Leigh's The Drinks of James Bond (I suggest the two are read in tandem). And if readers are inspired to prepare a meal of Bondian food, may I humbly suggest they try a recipe from Licence to Cook?

James Bond cookbook now available on Kindle

I'm very excited to report that my cookbook, Licence to Cook: Recipes Inspired by Ian Fleming's James Bond, is now available as a Kindle edition, priced £3.99 ($6.49). Click here for more details. 

It can also be purchased as a digital eBook through iBookstore or Lulu Marketplace or Barnes and Noble NOOK.

In addition, a paperback print edition is available through Lulu Marketplace (where there is currently a 30% discount on the title), Amazon, and most other online retailers. Bon appetit, Mr Bond!

James Bond cookbook now available to download

You know what James Bond drinks, but do you know what he eats? What is his favourite food? What is his favourite meal of the day? How does he like his steak? How does he take his coffee? 

This cookbook, the eBook edition of Licence to Cook published in 2010, is full of exciting recipes inspired by the food described in Ian Fleming’s novels. The recipes I've devised are modern, but have a period twist. 

The cookbook is intended for anyone who wishes to recreate the flavour of James Bond’s gastronomy. If you’re preparing a romantic meal for two or planning a Bond-themed party, or if you’re simply curious about the sorts of food Bond eats, this cookbook is for you. Eat like Bond throughout the day, breakfast, lunch and dinner.

The eBook is available for £4.99 ($8.09) from Lulu Marketplace. 

For iPhone, iPad and other Apple device users, download the book direct from iBooks. Just go to iBooks and search for 'Licence to Cook'. 

Licence to Cook is also available on NOOK from Barnes & Noble. Click here to order. 

Note about downloading:

Apple users can download the book onto their devices through iBooks simply enough. For Lulu customers, the ePub-formatted book can be downloaded onto any ePub-reading device, including Apple devices. You don't need to download Adobe Digital Editions. I successfully imported the book myself into Aldiko (a free e-reader app) installed on my Android phone. The whole process was very quick and I can now read my book on the move. 

The James Bond diet

James Bond doesn’t eat in the films. Who knows where he’s getting his energy from, but it’s not from three square meals a day. That’s not strictly true. In Casino Royale (2008), Bond consumes skewered lamb (a kebab of some sort?) on a Montenegro-bound train. And he eats breakfast relatively frequently: café complet in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969) and green figs and yoghurt in From Russia With Love (1963).

The literary James Bond is a dish served from a different menu. Food is as much part of the novels as guns, champagne, women, villains and travel. Ian Fleming claimed that he wanted to stimulate his readers, right down to their taste buds. He certainly does that. We don’t have to read many pages before Fleming stops the action to describe a meal.

There are about seventy separate meals in the twelve novels and two books of short stories, but many more food descriptions, since some of the dishes appear more than once. On average, there are five food references in each full-length novel. Goldfinger virtually acts as a gastronomic tour, containing ten food references, the meals mainly being consumed by Bond on a drive through France in pursuit of the eponymous villain.

Fleming was a foodie, but there is evidence that he lost interest. Academic John Griswold calculated the duration of Bond’s adventures, and the information allows us to work out that food is mentioned more infrequently towards the final adventures – one reference per every nine mission-days in The Man with the Golden Gun (1965), compared with every four mission-days in Live and Let Die (1954) – probably reflecting Fleming’s increasingly ill-health.

But it’s not so much the quantity, as the quality. Bond’s food ranges from mundane, commonly-consumed fare to exotic once-in-a-lifetime concoctions. He eats eggs scrambled and poached, caviar, lobsters, ray wings, turbot, beef tournedos, hamburgers, duck, asparagus, artichokes, strawberries, and guavas, among many other items. Most of Bond’s food is relatively commonplace today, but back in the 1950s, with Britain emerging, blinking, from the darkness of rationing, it was a revelation. How many people had seen an avocado in 1953, when Casino Royale was published, let alone tasted one? Avocados were so new that even Fleming didn’t know what to do with them, having Bond eat it as a dessert with French dressing.

Not that Fleming was particularly inconvenienced by rationing. In London he ate in his club, and in Jamaica, where he quartered during the winter, he had a private beach that was crawling with fish and lobsters. Of course Fleming liked to offer his readers a view of food that was beyond their grasp, but he also simply described his own experiences, which he gave to James Bond. It is no surprise that Bond regularly eats scrambled egg, because it was Fleming’s favourite food. Fleming’s usual grilled sole consumed at his club was a lunch-time usual for Bond. A beef stew that Fleming has in Japan is also eaten by Bond when he visits the country.

Note: this entry is taken from the introduction to the cookbook, Licence to Cook (see link to the right).