Food is never simple. Take what is known as a cookie in America and a biscuit in the United Kingdom—two small, usually sweet treat concepts that sometimes overlap and sometimes don’t. However humble, these foods are inextricably tied to gigantic ideas in the history of both countries: the expansion of empire, the Industrial Revolution, waves of immigration, slavery, labor, nationalism. It’s honestly not that insane to say that the cookie/biscuit, if you include its predecessors, is one of the most important foods in human history. The forebears of the cookie/biscuit…
