This is the eighteenth volume of the ongoing series of papers and submissions to the Oxford Symposium on Food & Cookery, the longest running food history conference in the world. The subject this year is more peculative than is often the case and contributors have ranged widely over a topic which allows them to explore the sychological bases of food consumption and the development of cookery, as well as more obvious excursions down memory lane in pursuit of food and drink. There are upwards of 30 papers from food historians based in Britain, United States, Japan and the Far East, Australia, and Northern Europe.