FOOD HISTORIAN
Researcher, writer, speaker

Research
My latest research includes the history of food waste, and the links between food, religion, and colonialism in the early modern era. I am a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow at Cardiff University.
Learn more about my research here
speaking
I regularly give lectures, and present my research in food history to camera, on podcasts, and on radio to national and global audiences.
See my speaking portfolio here

‘Eleanor Barnett [is] one of the UK’s leading food historians, as well as one of the most accomplished communicators of academic research to a wide popular audience.’
Dan Jones
ORDER NOW!
ORDER NOW!
lEFTOVERS: a hISTORY OF foOD WASTE & Preservation
My new book is out now and available at your usual bookshops!
I explore how food waste was understood by people in the past, and the many ingenious ways our ancestors sought to avoid it by preserving food and reusing any scraps. In doing so, LEFTOVERS reflects on pressing contemporary issues that shape our modern world, such as the development of the globalised and industrialised food system, wealth and gender divisions, and climate change.
It’s Delicious Magazine’s ‘Curl-Up Read of the Month’ and recommended reading in Waitrose Magazine, the Spectator, the Telegraph and more!
‘METICULOUSLY RESEARCHED AND FULL OF GOOD THINGS, ELEANOR BARNETT MAKES LEFTOVERS INTO A REAL FEAST’ ANNIE GRAY, FOOD HISTORIAN
‘BARNETT EXCELS AT CHOOSING SPECIFIC, OFTEN FUNNY EXAMPLES THAT DEMYSTIFY THE PAST’ thE teLEGRAPH
‘A thought-provoking and entertaining examination of our relationship with food’ THE Bristol Post
‘LEFTOVERS IS MORE THAN JUST A HISTORICAL RETROSPECTIVE; IT IS A BOOK FOR OUR TIME’ THE SPECTATOR
‘eLEANOR baRNETT IS A RARE BREED… AN ACADEMIC WHO CAN REALLY WRITE’ dAN joNES, AUTHOR OF poWER AND THRONES
‘AS TIMELY AS IT IS FACINATING… INFORMATIVE AND ENTERTAINING’ DELICIOUS MAGAZINE
‘a wonderful book. it definitely has the simon majumdar endorsement’ Simon Majumdar, food writer and tv personality
‘couldn’t be timelier than right now[…]a very readable deep dive’ OLIVE MAGAZINE
‘beautifully written with warmth, passion and humour, it’s full of fascinating historical information … and it’s also seriously important.
go buy a copy for yourself and your friends. you need this book! ’ vivian French, MBE, writer

Latest WORK
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Hot cross buns in the Guardian
Find my comments on the history of hot cross buns in this Guardian article
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My book Leftovers listed as one of the 8 Agricultural Books to Inspire and Reflect on the Turn of 2025 by Forbes Brazil 31/12/24
Forbes Brazil select Leftovers as one of ‘8 books released in 2024 that deserve special attention at the beginning of 2025,’
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My historical supper club recommended in the Financial Times 31/12/24
‘Take your seat in the hotel’s orangery for a meal hosted by food historian and author Eleanor Barnett with the hotel group’s executive chef Joe Fox. This is the last dinner event in a series of historically themed evenings: a groovy homage to the 1970s (on 20 March) where guests will find devilled eggs and a prawn cocktail, Orange en Surprise and a pink blancmange. ‘
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Interview on LBC national radio 22/12/24
I speak to Clare Foges on LBC about the history of turkey, goose, and Christmas leftovers!
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Featured in the Telegraph article 22/12/24
Find my interview on a Victorian Christmas and the change in our food choices over time in today’s Telegraph.
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Leftovers in Civil Eats' Holiday Gift Guide!
‘Barnett’s detailed storytelling makes food waste fascinating […] From medieval England to Brexit and the pandemic, Barnett expertly rolls out the dough of U.K. history to prove that “if ‘you are what you eat,’ our values and culture are equally defined by what we don’t eat.”
“‘The world produces enough food to feed everyone, if distributed equally,’” Barnett writes, quoting the founders of Food Not Bombs. Pandemic-era distribution efforts showed us what’s possible in terms of food rescue, and AI is already in the kitchen tracking scraps. Pick up Leftovers for motivation on reducing the muckpile.
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Featured on Simon Majumdar's Eat My Globe Podcast! 2/12/24
We discuss the history of food waste from the sixteenth century all the way to the present day; the influence of women who developed food preservation, through the art of refrigeration; the role of pigs, wars, and pandemics in food waste; and so much more.
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Leftovers talk at Culinary Historians of Chicago 9/11/24
Watch this talk - all about how we came to waste so much food as a society and how our ancestors sought to prevent waste through preservation - now on Youtube!
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New York Times recipe! 2/10/24
So wonderful to see my recipe and exploration of WW2 food waste and thrift in the New York Times this week!
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BBC Bitesize Recipe! 2/10/24
I tell BBC Bitesize all about a 2,000-year old recipe and its fascinating history!
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Wigtown 1/10/24
It was so much fun to speak about my book Leftovers: A History of Food Waste and Preservation at Wigtown Book Festival this week in Scotland, chaired by the lovely Vivian French!
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Leftovers recommended reading in Food Tank atClimate Week in NYC!
Leftovers is on the recommended reading list for the global think-tank Food Tank as it deals with climate change issues this week in New York!
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Our historical supper club in the press!
Our forthcoming supper club, hosted at Number Sixteen Hotel in London, is receiving lots of press attention, including from the Evening Standard, the Telegraph, the Londonist, Country & Townhouse, Wildflower Magazine, Fabric Magazine, and Secret London!
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A delightful history of dips in the Guardian featuring my comments!
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Leftovers reviewed in TLS!
‘It is a story of vinegars and jams and e-numbers and freezers, and Eleanor Barnett tells it well in her engaging new book, Leftovers, [with a] knack for linking different eras with thematic threads’
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New podcast episode - Eat This Podcast! 13/5/24
‘Leftovers: a history of food waste and preservation takes a much broader look at food scarcity, food surpluses and the byproducts of food production that people don’t or won’t eat. Our conversation reflected on the complex relationships among food waste, human behaviour, and systemic factors throughout history, advocating for a renewed appreciation of the value of food.’
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New article 'An Introduction to the Global History of Food Waste'
Published in Bloomsbury Food Library online.
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New episode on the British Food History podcast! 22/4/24
‘We talked about many things including the history of food waste used in agriculture and industry, food preservation in wartime, and Hannah Glasse’s dubious method for preserving very rank potted birds’
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Interview on Times Radio! 21/4/24
Listen to my interview all about Leftovers: A History of Food Waste and Preservation from 2.22 onwards!
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May's BBC History Magazine now out!
Tudor Jumbles! These simple, delicious, and elegant biscuits are the feature of my History Cookbook column in this month’s BBC History Magazine. And, as always, the recipe video will be up soon for History Extra members too
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Leftovers extract published in the Independent 7/4/24
Leftovers ‘shows us what the past can teach us about the future of food waste’!
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Leftovers recommended reading in Waitrose Weekend! 30/3/24
‘After all those delicious meals, it’s only appropriate that we should consider the leftovers. A scholarly history of food waste and preservation, Eleanor Barnett’s Leftovers explores the inventive ways our ancestors sought to make the most of their food, how we do so today, and how we might go about it in the future’
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Read the history of hot cross buns!
I explore the history of hot cross buns in an English Heritage article ‘Holy or Heretical? A History of Hot Cross buns’.
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Lunchtime Lecture at Bristol Central Library 28/3/24
It was wonderful to talk in Bristol - my home-town and a leader in food waste issues - to a great crowd! Thanks to those for coming and for all your comments and questions!
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Interviewed on BBC History Extra Podcast
Listen to me talking all things Leftovers on the BBC History Extra podcast - from the Tudor almoner to the Victorian rag-and-bone-man!
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Leftovers reviewed in the Mail on Sunday 24/3/24
‘She’s an indefatigable researcher. And she keeps the reader’s spirits up with some splendid stories’
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Leftovers featured in Waitrose Weekend 21/3/24
‘Studying past habits is a reminder to keep up pressure on how we manage surplus food, but it also highlights successes, such as inventing products from waste streams - Golden Syrup and Marmite are industrial byproducts - and the impact of a state-run thriftiness campaign in the 40s’
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Leftovers excerpt published in Reader's Digest
‘Wasting food means wasting life, but also the huge amounts of energy and resources that go into making it.’
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Interview in Country and Townhouse!
‘What better way to connect to the lives of people in the past than through their food – Leftovers recreates the tastes, smells, and sights of Victorian London, for example, where poor rag-and-bone men scavenged for crumbs and flecks of meat on discarded bones; the striking bursts of sweetness provided as a reward for many sweaty hours spent preserving oranges in the Tudor still-room; and what it was like to taste banana for the first time, as the invention of artificial refrigeration made it possible to transport them to Britain in 1901 all the way from the Canary Islands.’
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Leftovers reviewed in the Spectator!
‘Leftovers is more than a historical retrospective; it is book for our time’!
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Article in the Conversation 14/03/24
How the Tudors dealt with food waste?
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Interview with Dan Jones!
‘Eleanor Barnett [is] one of the UK’s leading food historians, as well as one of the most accomplished communicators of academic research to a wide popular audience’!
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Article 'Leftovers: Bristol’s role in food waste history ' PUBLISHED ON BRISTOL GOOD FOOD 4/3/24
I explore how Bristol features in my new book Leftovers: A History of Food Waste and Preservation’, and ask ‘in our quest to create a more sustainable food system, can we learn from the wasteful mistakes and thrifty triumphs of the past?’
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Leftovers recommended for Mother’s Day by Women Talking 7/3/24
‘If mum’s a foodie, I’d recommend a fascinating newly published book: Leftovers. It’s an informative and entertaining history of food preservation and waste in Britain, from the 16th Century to today.’
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Leftovers reviewed in the Telegraph! 3/3/24
'Barnett excels at choosing specific, often funny examples that demystify the past, a skill she’s honed from running her popular Instagram account, @historyeats. Her nimble, confident writing makes Leftovers bingeable (as it were), without coming at the expense of rigour or depth. It’s clear that she loves her subject material, and her enthusiasm is contagious'. The Telegraph
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Membership of the Guild of Food Writers
Accepted as a member of the Guild of Food Writers March 24
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Delicious Legacy Podcast 13/3/24
Some of the best its of my new book Leftovers: A History of Food Waste and Preservation!
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Interview ABC Radio Australia 23/12/23
Hear about the history of our favourite Christmas food, from mince pies to turkey, plus a sneak insight into my book Leftovers: A History of Food Waste and Preservation!
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Article 'Five historical facts you didn't know about Christmas food' Evening Standard 15/12/23
Learn 5 fun facts about the history of Christmas food! Published in print and online.
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Articles in BBC History Magazine January '24
I’ve published two articles in January’s issue: ‘What is the world’s oldest surviving recipe?’ and ‘Sugar-free Tudor biscuits’ with recipe!
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RECIPE VIDEOS FOR BBC History Extra 12/'23
I explore the history behind three festive treats and share how to make them in this series of recipes videos commissioned for BBC History Extra members.
Upcoming events
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Dining Through the Decades - upcoming historical supper clubs!
The amazing Executive Head Chef Joe Fox and I will be hosting a series of historical supper clubs at the beautiful Number Sixteen hotel in London. Each event features a delicious four-course dinner inspired by three distinct time periods. Enjoy dishes such as Nesselrode Cream, a forgotten dessert from the Victorian era, and classic 1970s favourites like Devilled Eggs and Prawn Cocktail, all while learning about the wonderful world of food history!