Agnes Bertha Marshall was a celebrity London cook in the mid 1800s, and the author of four cookbooks. She was one of the first people to serve ice cream in edible cones.

Ainsley Harriott is an English TV celebrity chef and a best-selling cookbook author. He has also been known for his comedic and singing talents. He is the son of a famous jazz pianist.

Alessandro Filippini was a famous chef at Delmonico’s Restaurant in New York, and a cookbook author in the second half of the 1800s.

Alexis Benoit Soyer was a famous French chef and food author whose career actually mostly took place in England.

Anthimus wrote what is probably the last ‘cookbook’ to come out of the western Roman Empire, “De observatione ciborum.”

Bletting is the process of letting a fruit partially rot so that it not only becomes edible, but also acquires its most desirable taste and texture qualities. As with all these things, it’s unknown who decided to first try a piece of rotting fruit.

Champagne rhubarb is rhubarb that is less tart, less fibrous, lighter in colour (a very pale pink), and more delicate overall than regular rhubarb — hence the name “champagne.” These qualities comes from special growing techniques. An entire region in Yorkshire, England, specializes in production of Champagne rhubarb.

Drupes are fruit with a single, large seed in the middle. The term encompasses fruit seemingly quite different, from peaches to olives to raspberries.

Rhubarb is the stalk of a leafy perennial plant. In cooking, it is used as a fruit owing to its high acidity. As such, it is one of the first fruits to appear in the garden each year, and thus many desserts and preserves have evolved around it. When purchasing, avoid limp stalks that are on their way out. As with many things in life, firmness can be a better indication of quality than size.

AGAs are always-on stoves and ovens. An AGA cooks food by using the type of radiant-heat that was used throughout most of history for cooking, before modern direct heat burners came along. Some models of the stove can also provide hot water and heat for the house.

Alcohol produced in very large quantities is made in a “continuous” still (aka Coffey, patent or column still.) In this type of still, you can just keep your production flowing through the still constantly. This is ideal for products such as gin or vodka. Alambic stills are different. They make alcohol in one distinct batch

The expression, ‘batterie de cuisine’, means literally ‘your kitchen artillery.’ Its actual usage is a bit less dramatic, though: it is taken to mean the collection of essential tools that you need in your kitchen to be an efficient and good cook in the cuisine that you practise.

A biscuit brake is a machine to beat air into an unleavened dough in order to make raised biscuits. Before biscuit brakes, the work used to be done laboriously by hand.