What Is Queer Food? is a beautifully layered and deeply researched exploration of how queer identity is expressed through food, history, and chosen family. John Birdsall skillfully connects the dots between overlooked culinary figures, cultural memory, and resilience, making the invisible visible. With each chapter, he honors queer lives and lineages—threading chiffon cake, quiche, and community potlucks into a broader cultural narrative. It’s part food history, part cultural memoir, and all heart. Insightful, tender, and quietly revolutionary, this book redefines what food can mean to a marginalized community.

I really wanted to like this book but ultimately had to push myself to get through it. I was looking for more history focused piece of work. Instead, this book felt like persuasive essays that really reached to overstate WHY certain food instances/time periods/ settings were queer and showing just how queer it was. It felt more like we were being guided as readers to the point instead of just being shown the true narrative. While I can appreciate the author's flare and writing style, certain things immediately drew me out of hte reading (such as describing nipples as filberts, and using modern slang). I unfortunately really did not like this one bit.

This was a great read. So well researched and vast in the topics covered. Gives a great rich history of Queer food and queer people within the history of food, cooking, farming and eating. Endlessly fascinating. I've recommended it multiple times to people and am very much looking forward to being able to discuss it with them.

I'm not sure what I was expecting from this book, but I found it pretentious and underwhelming. I did not feel much joy in reading this book. I was very disappointed and feel horrible for giving it such a bad review, but I really feel like it was a waste of my time.