Napoleon’s Chicken Marengo

 
From the publishers:
This work tells the story of Chicken Marengo, and cuts through the tangle of myths that has sprung up around it. Supposedly created on the evening of Napoleon's victory at Marengo, the dish rapidly conquered Paris, and became a renowned symbol of French haute cuisine. 
 
The author sets the dish in its context explaining the drama of Napoleon's Marengo campaign and the frenzy of rejoicing unleashed in Paris by the news of his victory. The author argues that the dish is part of a wider myth that Napoleon spun around the battle itself. Uncomfortably aware of just how close he had come to disaster, he rewrote the official account of Marengo. Determined to exploit the political impact of the victory to the full, he portrayed it as a masterly manoeuvre, rather than a near-defeat salvaged largely by luck.
 
Napoleon's Chicken Marengo demonstrates the persistency of popular myth in shaping perceptions of pivotal events.