Columbus
To him the modern table owes more than to any other that can be named. The discovery of America has enriched our tables with the turkey, the canvas-backed duck, the potato, the tomato, cocoa, vanilla, the Jerusalem artichoke, the sugar-cane, red pepper, and a host of good things. Yet the master-cooks of Europe, who lavish their honours on nobodies and confuse their cookery books with a mob of ridiculous names, have not thought it worth their while to consecrate a single dish to his memory-not even the humble egg which he taught his friends to set on end.