The delicious past, present and future of ice cream (with tastings).

This event takes place at the British Library.

Part of the British Library Food Season Super Sunday. Day pass and single session tickets available.

Join us on an exploration of everything ice-cream. We will find out about its origins as a food for the super wealthy, how it hit the mainstream and the trends, technologies and innovations that are shaping its future. Chaired by food writer Felicity Cloake, with food historian Ivan Day and dessert chef and Happy Endings owner Terri Mercieca, the lively discussion will include tastings.

This event is part of the British Library Food Season 2023. 

Felicity Cloake is the award-winning author of the Guardian’s long-running How to Make the Perfect recipe column as well as five cookbooks, including the Andre Simon-shortlisted The A-Z of Eating, and two on food and travel. Her French culinary adventure on two wheels, One More Croissant for the Road, was a Sunday Times bestseller, a Radio Four Book of the Week and shortlisted for the Fortnum and Mason food book of the year award, and her latest, Red Sauce Brown Sauce: A British Breakfast Odyssey was published last summer. 

Terri Mercieca. Australian-born Terri is an accomplished dessert chef, artisan chocolatier, and founder of Happy Endings – a proudly values-led desserts business who are not afraid to shake things up. Terri’s surname is an anagram of ‘ice-cream’, so it seemed destined that she would end up with a passion for frozen desserts. Since 2014, Happy Endings has totally transformed the UK dessert scene and now supplies sweet treats and their signature ice-cream sandwiches at more than 100 restaurants, bars, delis, and events nationwide.

Ivan Day is an independent historian of the social history and culture of food. He is noted for his reconstructions of historical table settings, which combine museum objects with accurate recreations of period dishes. His work has been exhibited in many major museums in the UK, Europe and North America, including the Fitzwilliam, Getty Research Institute, Detroit Institute of Arts, Gardiner Museum and Minneapolis Institute of Arts. Among his books are Cooking in Europe 1650-1850 (Greenwood) and Ice Cream: A History (Bloomsbury). He is the chair of the celebrated Leeds Symposium on Food History and Traditions.

This event will not be live-streamed.

The British Library is a charity. Your support helps us open up a world of knowledge and inspiration for everyone. Donate today.

Details