Peter Brears has a long acquaintance with jellies in every guise. He was fed them in childhood, he turned to curating their moulds and associated artefacts while director of York and Leeds museums, and he has made them for innumerable historical food shows and events.

Jelly is a more complicated thing than some packet from the supermarket mixed with boiling water. Historically, it was not factory-made gelatine that did the setting, but any number of ingenious adaptations of kitchen materials and ingredients. Additionally, it was not just a simple clear, coloured solid, but an optical prism to show off and transform the foods contained within it. Jelly was the old cooks' greatest resource for introducing colour, variety and delight into the table display.

This book sketches in the history of jellies, particularly in England, and discusses their place within a meal; gives several recipes based on the various setting agents (carrageen, gelatine, isinglass) and also for cereal moulds (flummery, tapioca, semolina, rice, cornflour, etc.); describes how jellies may be assembled by layering, embedding, lining and the inclusion of fruit, nuts, gold, etc.; and gives an excellent illustrated account of the various forms of jelly moulds.

Peter Brears is one of Britain's foremost reconstructionist cooks and adviser on historical food and its presentation. He was formerly Director of Leeds City Museums, having before that been in charge of the York Museum. His Cooking and Dining in Medieval England (Prospect) won the André Simon Award for Food Book of the Year for 2009.