Food and Spectacle: Medieval to Modern

Sam Bompas is the Co-founder of Bompas & Parr. He spends his time developing ideas that are universally appealing, experientially compelling and highly press-worthy. Over the years Sam has cultivated an extensive network of historians, chemists, micro-biologists, artists, musicians, art directors, flavourists, chefs, professional noses, inventors, stage illusionists, and pyrotechnicians who collaborate with Bompas & Parr to create genuine world firsts such a fireworks show where you can taste the fireworks as they explode above your head, attended by a quarter of a million people.

Calum Cockburn is Curator of Medieval Manuscripts at the British Library, where he is responsible for the cataloguing and digitisation of pre-1600 manuscript material. His recent projects have focused on the application of multispectral imaging on burnt fragments from the Cotton library, and initiatives to digitise the Library’s collection of Chaucer manuscripts and material relating to the lives of Medieval and Renaissance women. In 2024, he was part of the curatorial team behind the Library’s recent exhibition Medieval Women: In Their Own Words.

Dubbed 'The Pie King' by Jamie Oliver, Calum Franklin is an award-winning chef and author. Following his appointment as Executive head chef of Holborn Dining Room in 2014, Calum combined deeply traditional cooking techniques with clever flavour combinations to create a contemporary British menu. In 2018, Calum designed and opened Holborn Dining Room’s Pie Room, a treasure trove of savoury delicacies full of intricate creations. In September 2019 he released The Pie Room cookbook with Bloomsbury publishing. An immediate bestseller and award winner, it has gone on to critical success and featured in The Times, Wall Street Journal, Financial Times and many more. In March 2024 Calum launched Public House, a grand British brasserie in the heart of Paris.

Dr Eleanor Janega is a medieval historian and broadcaster. She specialises in propaganda, apocalypticism, sexuality, empire, and the urban experience in the Middle Ages generally, and in late medieval central Europe in particular. Her work highlights the voices of common people, and to bring medieval society as a whole to light. Eleanor is the author of The Once and Future Sex: Going Medieval on Women’s Roles in Society and The Middle Ages: A Graphic History. Her work has appeared in Time, BBC History, Times Literary Supplement, Washington Post, Slate and Politico, among numerous other venues. She regularly appears on both television and radio.

Ian Kelly’s TV series, Carême, an adaptation of his historical biography Cooking for Kings, launches on AppleTV in May 2025. He has written and presented a series of tv documentaries on food history in the UK and USA, mainly focusing on Carême’s food-art. Other works include Mr Foote’s Other Leg (directed by Richard Eyre, starring Simon Russell Beale, West End) The Painted Hall, (starring Hugh Bonneville and Jane Asher) Cooking for Kings (New York, Off Broadway) and Playing for Stalin, which premiered in the autumn, prior to West End. All his historical biographies he wrote and researched in the British Library and all have been adapted for stage, screen or ballet. He also co-writes for television with Julian Fellowes. As an actor, Ian’s work spans Merchant Ivory to the Harry Potter films and on stage from the West End, Broadway to the National Theatre.

The British Library Food Season returns for its seventh year, bringing together some of the most influential names in food, drink, hospitality, literature and science, for a series of events that highlight the stories, the politics and the people behind how and why we eat. Discover more Food Season events. 

This is an in-person only event in the British Library Knowledge Centre. Please arrive no later than 15 minutes before the start time of this event.  If you have specific access requirements please email customer@bl.uk

There are a range of concessions available. These include discounts for British Library Members, half-price tickets for students and under 26s, free entry for carers as well as a number of other concessions.