UCC course makes art of food writing digestible

FOOD writing did not begin in the 1990s, with the rise of the celebrity chef and their (often ghostwritten) glossy tomes of recipes and pretty pictures. Mesopotamian clay tablets dating to 1750BC had recipes inscribed in a complex writing form.

While the digital revolution has seen a great, populist levelling of the field (there are 484 members of the Irish Food Bloggers’ Association, with more joining each week), a new University College Cork food writing course will focus on a vast body of work spanning centuries, deeming the craft of writing as essential to the discipline as culinary expertise, or wisdom.

Part of the English department’s new creative writing MA, the course has been put together by food historian Regina Sexton with chef/author Denis Cotter, food writer John McKenna, and chef and food writer Darina Allen.