SKU: 12940650947

Holy Food (Christina Ward)

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Holy Food (Christina Ward)Does God have a recipe? "Holy Food is a titanic feat of research and a fascinating exploration of American faith and culinary rites. Christina Ward is the perfect guide generous, wise, and ecumenical." Adam Chandler, author of Drive Thru Dreams "Holy Food doesn't just trace the influence that preachers, gurus, and cult leaders have had on American cuisine. It offers a unique look at the ways spiritualitywhether in the form of fringe cults or major

Does God have a recipe?

"Holy Food is a titanic feat of research and a fascinating exploration of American faith and culinary rites. Christina Ward is the perfect guide – generous, wise, and ecumenical." — Adam Chandler, author of Drive-Thru Dreams

"Holy Food doesn't just trace the influence that preachers, gurus, and cult leaders have had on American cuisine. It offers a unique look at the ways spirituality—whether in the form of fringe cults or major religions—has shaped our culture. Christina Ward has gone spelunking into some very odd corners of American history to unearth this fascinating collection of stories and recipes." — Jonathan Kauffmann, author of Hippie Food: How Back-to-the-Landers, Longhairs, and Revolutionaries Changed the Way We Eat

"An engaging book that shares everything from little-known facts to illuminating profiles of historical figures. Best of all, Ward shares recipes from historic religious communities, updated to reflect modern cooking technology. A must-have for food historians, religious historians, or just the curious and hungry folks in your life. " — Dr. Julia Skinner, author of Our Fermented Lives

Independent food historian Christina Ward’s highly anticipated Holy Food explores the influence of mainstream to fringe religious beliefs on modern American food culture. Author Christina Ward unravels the numerous ways religious beliefs intersect with politics and economics and, of course, food to tell a different story of America. It's the story of true believers and charlatans, of idealists and visionaries, and of the everyday people who followed them—often at their peril. Holy Food explains how faith pioneers used societal woes and cultural trends to create new pathways of belief and reveals the interconnectivity between sects and their leaders.

Religious beliefs have been the source of food "rules" since Pythagoras told his followers not to eat beans (they contain souls), Kosher and Halal rules forbade the shrimp cocktail (shellfish are scavengers, or maybe G-d just said "no"). A long-ago Pope forbade Catholics from eating meat on Fridays (fasting to atone for committed sins). Rules about eating are present in nearly every American belief, from high-control groups that ban everything except air to the infamous strawberry shortcake that sated visitors to the Oneida Community in the late 1800s. Only in the United Stateswhere the freedom to worship the God of your choice and sometimes of your own makingcould people embrace new ideas about religion. It is in this over-stirred pot of liberation, revolution, and mysticism that we discover God cares about what you put in your mouth.

Holy Food looks at how the explosion of religious movements since the Great Awakenings (the nationwide religious revivals in the 1730s-40s and 1795-1835) birthed a cottage industry of food fads that gained mainstream acceptance. And at the obscure sects and communities of the 20th Century who dabbled in vague spirituality that used food to both entice and control followers. Ward skillfully navigates between academic studies, interviews, cookbooks, and religious texts to make sharp observations with new insights into American history in this highly readable journey through the American kitchen.

Holy Food features over 75 recipes from religious and communal groups tested and updated for modern cooks. Also includes over 100 historic black-and-white images.


"Ward uses deep-dive research on religious history, and an equally deep knowledge of food, to show us how the two are intimately connected. Not only do we eat and drink within our religious rituals, but religion informs what and how we eat as well (and what and how we eat informs religion, too).  An engaging book that shares everything from little-known facts to illuminating profiles of historical figures. Best of all, Ward shares recipes from historic religious communities, updated to reflect modern cooking technology. A must-have for food historians, religious historians, or just the curious and hungry folks in your life. " --Dr. Julia Skinner, author of Our Fermented Lives

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SKU: 12940650947

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4.8 ★★★★★
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Forrest H Armstrong Cate
Alexandria, US
★★★★★ 5
So immersive, easy to set up and affordable it beats our Phillips Hue set up!
If you want a stunning, immersive viewing experience this set it for you! It can sync with up to 5 Govee light strips or bulbs for and even more immersive experience too! We have 3 different Govee backlight set Ups and this is the best one. It levels up our gaming experience. I cannot imagine watching movies without one now. Theater experiences are lack luster in comparison. Definately watching their how to videos on proper set up and syncing using those funny orange foam pieces! It makes things so much easier! The difference in the color displays are amazing! We synced 3 Govee rbgic light strips and two govee bulbs to the system. We get so many compliments on how incredible the room looks. When combined with relaxation, music or oled videos it's like a sanctuary! It is better in some ways than the Phillips $500 Hue set up we have on another set. It's a good idea to leave some of the adhesive spots on the led strip unused and covered in case your TV dies or you get a new one. This adhesive strip is strong and not reusable. Our new TV died during a power outage. This strip came off fine but lost all it stickiness once removed. Hopefully you won't ever have to remove yours. This is definately a 100 out of ten for us!
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Reviewed in the United States on July 8, 2025
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Madi J
Carnegie, US
★★★★★ 5
Great lights
Gorgeous lighting, it syncs perfectly with the tv colors and when the tv goes dark the lights go off, very cool effect. Happy purchase.
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Reviewed in the United States on March 9, 2026
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Steve Thomas
Fort Morgan, US
★★★★★ 5
Don’t waste time and money with the off brands buy the real deal.
What a creative way to watch tv, play games or watch movies. The length covers the entire TV, colors are amazing. There is a simple app the makes it so easy to use, change colors add custom designs. The options are unlimited and if you need help create the best experience but not sure what colors they have a community that’s done it, search your favorite sports team and have the colors of your team its so awesome to see. The functionality is endless. app is very easy to navigate, I have had mine installed for over a year now and the adhesive quality is something I never seen before. They have been removed from one Tv to my current one and not a single issue they just stick and don’t come off unless you want them to. I know you can find off brands for a lot less money, but you are not getting these immersive colors and brightness. I have tried multiple others trying to save money, in the end i spent more rebuying and reinstalling. Then still ended up buying the real thing. Do yourself a favor and just buy these instead of the cheap ones, those wont last only half the side of the tv works after a few weeks. The adhesive is either not sticking from the start, or within a week or 2 they will fall off. And they are just not bright, unless you see in person you just can’t get a picture to show the quality and brightness of these lights.
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Reviewed in the United States on February 18, 2026
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kmimbs
Houston, US
★★★★★ 4
Awesome product!
Ok so I was skeptical at 1st with all the mixed reviews but I finally decided to give it a try. Let me start off by saying this you will have to do some set up in the settings as all tvs are different and to get the best experience it will take some time and patience. After about 30 minutes of moving the towers around and tweaking the settings I finally got it working right. I am very satisfied with it as it makes watching movie so awesome. Some colors don't match up perfectly but as in shades of colors. I definitely recommend this to anyone that wants to take movie nights to the next level.
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Reviewed in the United States on April 7, 2026
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Samantha Cone
West Palm Beach, US
★★★★★ 5
Love, love, love!
The kit is easy to install and set up. The only installation note I have is of your TV is not perfectly flat on the backside you may need to get creative when attaching the rope lights. Our TV is a 55in Amazon fire TV and because the back slants a little we had to be very intentional about where we placed the clips but in the end everything worked out. Functionally, these lights are great and the camera does a good job reading the screen, however, we do have a ceiling light directly above our TV and if it's on the camera reads the reflection of the light as a yellow color at the bottom of the screen. We tried recalibrating with the light on a few different times but it still gets picked up. Not a huge deal, if we're using the movie mode we just turn off the ceiling light and everything works great.
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Reviewed in the United States on January 9, 2026

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