The couch potato is an idler, the cabbage-head a dunce, Swede-bashers are stupid and you may as well give up life if you become a vegetable. A vegetable existence may imply dull monotony, but the human vegetable has sparked protests, threatened to topple a British government and almost triggered a revolution. From the Scottish Presbyterian campaign against the sinful potato to the class act that turned the carrot into a propaganda tool, from garlic inscriptions on Egyptian pyramids to Neolithic broad beans and medieval cabbage, and from the Dig for Victory campaign to their use in perfumes, The Curious History of Vegetables shows vegetables in a fascinating new light.