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Search the World of Food

A Tool for Food History Research

Welcome to The Sifter!!

The Sifter is a free website for searching and comparing authors, their works and the details of their works regarding food and related topics around the world and throughout history.

Browse and search through thousands of historical cookbooks and manuscripts dating back to the Middle Ages!

We are now partnering with The Oxford Food Symposium which is hosting a monthly live, virtual session, as part of their Kitchen Table series, The Ask, about the Sifter and various aspects of using it. The host this year will be Gary Thompson, Data Architect and student of cookbooks, will lead the discussion and demonstration walking the user through techniques for searching, editing and getting the most from this resource. Our next session will be December, 4th, the first Wednesday of every other month at 12noon EST, 5:00 pm BST. We hope to see you there.

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CoReMA project - Brixen/Bressanone, Bibliothek des Priesterseminars, Cod. I 5 (Nr. 125), fol. 230v (Photo credit - Joe Wheaton)

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Search Thousands of Historical Cookbooks

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Discover Trends in Food History

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About Us

The Sifter
Mission Statement

The Sifter is a public database, free to all users. It is a tool for finding and comparing historical and contemporary writing on food and food-related topics. It is overseen by an advisory board composed of members from The Oxford Symposium on Food and Cookery as well as other friends of food history. As with Wikipedia, the Sifter will be populated by its users. All entries will have an English translation, enabling users to search languages they cannot read. Soon, we will have over 100 languages represented. Registered users will be able to make corrections and add new information. Future releases will include a data visualization component. We also plan to include more resources linking to digitized photographs, artworks, television and film. With the aid of this tool, it is our hope that what has been invisible will come into focus.

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Frequently Asked Questions

What is the Sifter?

The Sifter is a finding aid, a searchable database, to assist people with food related questions. At present it includes over 8,000 authors and almost 8,000 works with details about the authors and the contents of their works. The central documents are cookbooks and other writings related to getting, preparing, and consuming food, and the activities associated with them, as well as writings about cultural and moral attitudes.

It is based on the Wikipedia model, whereby users help to input the data, review it and make any needed corrections or edits. The more data is entered, the more comprehensive the search results will be. We hope that many people from different backgrounds, languages, cultures and professions will contribute. Information can be entered in many languages, including Chinese, Sanskrit, Scandinavian to name a few, since the Sifter supports Unicode. English is used as the language that ties all the other languages together so that when you search for “tamarind,” the English as well as the Urdu and Thai references will also be caught.

Who is it for?

Researchers of every age, cultural background and area of expertise who wish to explore the place of food and drink in human lives.

People interested in food whether it be the ingredients used in one author’s books or what cooking techniques appear across time or what authors were active in 1850 in England and India, for example.

Contributors, which includes anyone interested in adding to The Sifter, may register. For example, if you have an interest in Spanish cooks in Madrid from 1900, you can add the authors, their relevant details and related works and then the details in their works so that others can discover them. Then you can search the data for trends, popular spices, or links with other authors. Please register here.

What is in the Sifter?

Its source publications are printed and manuscript cookbooks, periodicals, and any other writings that shed light on how and why people have cooked and eaten as they have done since before the invention of writing. In addition to cookbooks, it includes works on architecture, medicine, etiquette, agriculture – anything, in fact, that will shed light on the universal human occupations of producing, preparing, and consuming food. It is hoped that future contributors will include a yet wider range of materials: novels, travel literature, poetry, music, etc.

How can I search or browse through the data?

Click on the Browse/Search tab located in the navigation menu. To browse through the data select any table on the left (Authors, Works, Sections, Details, and Items) then select Browse. You can filter the data by clicking on the column headers. You can also change which columns are displayed and resize, sort or move them around. The Search tab allows you two ways to search the data: the General Search Box up top, for quick searches through all the text data for any given keyword or phrase (put phrases in quotes), or a more targeted Search, where you can specify any number of criteria across all the tables.

What is not in the Sifter?

It does not contain the texts of books or recipes. Rather it has the details about these, such as dedications, table of contents, recipes titles and, in greater detail, the particular details of the recipes such as ingredients, actions and equipment. At present the entries are primarily cookbooks, though in time it will also include periodicals, poetry, fiction, etc.

How is it organized?

To clarify our terminology: an author is a person, organization or, often anonymous; a work is a book, manuscript or pamphlet; a section are each of the elements of the work such as a recipe, an illustration, a title page, an advertisement, etc. A detail is an individual ingredient, material, equipment or action, such as onion, enamel, whisk or knead. The Items table is the combined list ingredients, materials, actions, etc... that can be selected for a detail.

Each of the four elements (author, work, section and detail) is connected in descending order starting with the author. The author usually has a work(s) connected to it, then perhaps the sections and finally the details. As much detail is included at each of the four elements as is known.

How can I participate?

First register here (setup an account). Once registered you may add your own data. You do not need to be a professional or researcher, just be interested.

What can I find?

That will be up to you.

Where can I find additional information about food history?

Click here to see for more information and additional resources.

How do I register?

Click here and you will be sent to the registration page. Fill out the form, check the Accept Terms box and the Submit button. You will then be sent an email to verify your address. Check your spam folder if you don't find the email in your inbox. Click on the link inside the email, which will complete the registration process, and now you may login and contribute data.

Questions about how to use the site?

Please see our FAQ and Tutorials sections under the Help menu up top.

Abbreviations

Click here to see the list.

Additional Support

This project was in part funded through a sub-project of the AHRC US-UK Food Digital Scholarship Network, which was funded by the Arts & Humanities Research Council (Grant Reference: AH/S012591/1)

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  • Save your searches
  • Add new authors, books, recipes, etc.
  • Correct any mistakes you find
  • Receive emails regarding updates to the website
  • Be part of our community
  • (Note: we do not share your information)
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