In her talk, Rachel Rich wants you to question what these most innocuous and ubiquitous of household staples are trying to say about you. Rachel decodes cookbooks past and present to reveal their hidden messages and explains why she thinks you’re safe to ignore them. Dr Rachel Rich is a historian specializing in the cultural history of food in modern Europe, with a current focus on royal dining in Georgian England. She is the Co-Editor of Food and History, a member of the scientific council of the IEHCA and is a Fellow of both the Royal Historical Society and the Higher Education Academy.Rachel’s research explores the intersections of food, gender, class, and national identity, with particular attention to women’s roles as cookbook writers and readers. Her publications include the monograph Bourgeois Consumption: Food, Space and Identity in London and Paris, 1850–1914 and studies on women’s domestic timekeeping and cookbook authorship. Her current British Academy-funded project digitises and analyses menus from the household of King George III.This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx