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About Me

I am an independent culinary historian and Scholar-in-Residence at the Newberry Library (Chicago, IL). While earning my PhD in History at The Ohio State University, I discovered that I not only love eating a wide range of foods, but also thoroughly enjoy researching historical food topics. My research cumulated in a dissertation based on the physical examination of manuscript and early print cookeries held in archives throughout the United States and England. I am currently working on my first monograph based on my dissertation research, Creating Cookbooks: Networks of Recipe Readers and Writers in England, 1300–1700. Together with Helga Müllneritsch, I am editing Early Modern Manuscript Recipe Books Across Europe: Materiality and Use, now under contract with Amsterdam University Press. I am also developing a digital edition of Lady Anne Percy’s Recipe Book (NYPL Whitney Ms 2) based on my transcription and research of the manuscript while a 2014 Food Studies Fellow at the New York Public Library. My research on bread and baking in medieval England has been published in the Food and History, a journal for which I now serve as a Corresponding Member. I have also served as an editor of The Recipes Project since 2019. My research has been supported by several organizations, including the Medieval Academy of America and the Bibliographical Society of America.

Since moving to the Chicago area in 2014, I have become active as a public historian. I teach a variety of culinary history courses in continuing education and adult learning programs at the Newberry Library and the College of DuPage. Also through these programs, I present virtual cooking demonstrations of historic recipes. I collaborate frequently with the Newberry Library, assembling modules on food history topics for Digital Collections for the Classroom and teaching programs on culinary history for teachers. I have also worked with The Met Cloisters (New York), the Manuscript Cookbooks Survey, and the Culinary Historians of Chicago.

Recent Publications

Books

Edited with Helga Müllneritsch, Culinary Texts in Context, 1500-1800: Manuscript Recipe Books in Early Modern Europe, Amsterdam University Press, 2024.

Articles

“Recent Trends in Food History Research in the United States: 2017–2019,” Food & History 18, no. 1–2 (2020): 233–40.

“From the Bakehouse to the Courthouse: Bakers, Baking, and the Assize of Bread in Late Medieval England,” Food & History 12, no. 2 (2014): 139–78.

Public Writing

Over 25 Contributions to The Recipes Project, including the Around the Table Series. Other posts include:

• “Teaching Through Virtual Cooking Demonstrations,” (posted Autumn 2022)
• “Records and Reminiscences: Some Interesting Aspects of Chiquart’s Du fait de cuisine (1420)” (posted 18 January 2018)
• “Strawberries: Delicious and Devotional,” (posted 27 July 2017)
• “Wyl bucke his Testament, or, an Ode to Dining on Venison,”  (posted 16 March 2017)
• “Illustrated Recipes in Crophill’s Cookery,” (posted 12 January 2017)
• “To Make a Fine Apple Pye,” (posted 1 December 2016)
• “Medieval Cookery Rolls as Practical Kitchen Texts,” (posted 10 March 2015)
• “A November Feast in Medieval Europe,” (posted 18 November 2014)

Digital Projects

Around the Table: A Podcast from the Recipes Project (recipes.hypotheses.org/)

Host and producer of a podcast featuring interviews with experts in recipes-related studies to talk about the latest projects, programs, and scholarship of interest to the Recipes Project community.

Newberry Library Digital Collections for the Classroom

Curated collections of archival materials, contextual description, and guided questions for classroom use on “The Discovery of Chocolate,” “Distilling in Early Modern Europe,” “Food, Health, and the Humors in Early Modern Europe,” “Foods of the Columbian Exchange,” “The Medieval Spice Trade,” and “Sugar and Power in the Early Modern World.”

Newberry Library Center for Renaissance Studies on YouTube

Recorded a series of brief collection presentation videos of Newberry items related to premodern “food and the book” for social media and use in teaching.

Manuscript Cookbooks Survey

Contributed all the entries on the University of Chicago Library manuscripts.

Anna Kelton’s Scrapbook, Kelton House and Museum / Columbus Metropolitan Library

Coordinated the digitization of a mid-19^th century scrapbook from a Columbus, OH historical site by OSU and organized its digital maintenance by the Columbus Metropolitan Library.

Media Coverage

Social Media

@sarahpkernan

Country Focus

England

Expertise by Geography

British Isles, England

Expertise by Chronology

Medieval, Pre-17th century, 17th century, Early Modern

Expertise by Topic

Book History, Food History, Material Culture