British Grocery Chain Appoints Three Poets as Food Laureates

Posted on August 28, 2009

British supermarket chain Morrisons has teamed up with The Poetry Society and has appointed three well-known British poets to be the world's first Food Laureates. The poets will set recipes to verse. The goal of the project is to get the British people to start cooking again, and not to rely so much on prepared, prepackaged foods.

McMillan, a former poet in residence at Barnsley Football Club, is one of the Food Laureates. He told The Guardian, "Poets have always accepted shillings from patrons. A lot of courtly poets were given financial backing by the king, and there's been a rise of poets in residence since the 80s. It's fine, as long as you don't write anything you're not happy with."

There are eight poems in all, including John Mole's "Curry in a hurry" and "Use your loaf", a bread recipe by Ian McMillan. The poems will be displayed in the 415 grocery stores all over the country. There are also video clips of the recipes with poetry voiceovers at the accompanying website, where you can send in your own family's recipe set to verse and win 500 pounds.

We think it's a marvelous idea. It brings poetry into the public arena in a new way and it's a fun way to get people cooking more. It's certainly easier to remember a recipe or some handy kitchen tips when they are set to verse.