Book of a Lifetime: The Oxford Companion to Food by Alan Davidson

From The Independent archive: Christopher Hirst on an addictive and idiosyncratic masterpiece

Davidson was a career diplomat before compiling his epic reference work (Getty)

Battered and dog-eared, my copy of this hefty tome has suffered more wear than any other reference work on my shelves. My near-daily exploration of its 892 pages is usually prompted by the need for information on a certain topic but I am always distracted by neighbouring temptations.

Look up the entry, for example, on Egypt (a culinary paradise if you like beans and pickled turnip). You may also find yourself musing on elevenses (“it is necessary to heed the warning given by the expiring Henry King that elevenses should not be allowed to attain the status of meals”) and emmenthal, whose makers insist, “Anyone can make the holes, but only the Swiss can make the cheese.”

Far more entertaining, addictive and idiosyncratic than any reference book has a right to be, The Oxford Companion to Food involved “7,250 days of gestation”, according to Alan Davidson. With the exception of entries by a few dozen specialists, he wrote the entire work. Davidson was a career diplomat whose food sideline began when he produced a guide to local fish during a posting in Tunis. Subsequently expanded, it became his classic, Mediterranean Seafood. While ambassador in Laos, he wrote Fish and Fish Dishes of Laos, an unlikely project in a landlocked country.