books tagged “food writing”

books tagged “food writing”

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  • Toklas, Alice B.: The Alice B. Toklas Cookbook
    The Alice B. Toklas Cookbook
    by Alice B. Toklas, M. F. K. Fisher
    ISBN 1558217541 (1-55821-754-1)
    Softcover, Globe Pequot Press, The

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  • The Art of Eating
    by M. F. K. Fisher
    ISBN 0020322208 (0-02-032220-8)
    Softcover, Wiley & Sons, Incorporated, John

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    Book summary:

    The Art of Eating "...only wise men know the art of eating." ?Brillat-Savarin

    "There is a communion of more than bodies when bread is broken and wine is drunk. And that is my answer when people ask me, Why do you write about hunger, and not wars or love?" So M. F. K. Fisher begins The Gastronomical Me, one of the five memorable volumes collected together here in The Art of Eating. The five books cover an eclectic array of thoughts, memories, and recipes, from World War I vignettes of frugality at the table to a consideration of the social status of vegetables. Her recipes range from those for all manner of oysters, dressed and undressed, to Cold Buttermilk Soup, and are accompanied by the remarks and observations that provoked W. H. Auden to say, "I do not know of anyone in the United States today who writes better prose." "M. F. K. Fisher evokes the magic that shimmers just beneath the surface of the most commonplace, everyday experiences in prose you can wrap around your soul." ?Richard Sax, Chocolatier

    "M. F. K. Fisher is one of the best food writers. She makes you laugh, tells you stories, intrigues your mind, gives you an appetite, takes you on her travels. She is witty, wise, and unpretentious." ?Jane Grigson

    "One of the world's finest food writers and, in the eyes of many, the grand dame of gastronomy...M. F. K. Fisher has remained our guiding light, the source of infinite gastronomic and philosophic wisdom, the model of what a truly refined food writer should strive for." ?James Villas, Bon App?tit [via]

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  • The Art of Eating
    by James A. Beard, Joan Reardon, M. F. K. Fisher, Clifton Fadiman
    ISBN 0764542613 (0-7645-4261-3)
    Softcover, John Wiley & Sons Inc

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    Book summary:

    A collection of essays by one of America's best known food writers, that are often more autobiographical or historical than anecdotal musings on food preparation and consumption. The book includes culinary advice to World War II housewives plagued by food shortages, portraits of family members and friends (with all their idiosyncrasies) and notes on her studies at the University of Dijon, in France. Through each story she weaves her love of food and passion for cooking, and illustrates that our three basic needs as human beings--love, food and security--are so intermingled that it is difficult to think of one without the others. The book won the 1989 James Beard Cookbook Award. [via]

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  • The Art of Eating: Five Gastronomical Works
    by M. F. K. Fisher
    ISBN 0394713990 (0-394-71399-0)
    Hardcover, Vintage Books

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    Book summary:

    A collection of essays by one of America's best known food writers, that are often more autobiographical or historical than anecdotal musings on food preparation and consumption. The book includes culinary advice to World War II housewives plagued by food shortages, portraits of family members and friends (with all their idiosyncrasies) and notes on her studies at the University of Dijon, in France. Through each story she weaves her love of food and passion for cooking, and illustrates that our three basic needs as human beings--love, food and security--are so intermingled that it is difficult to think of one without the others. The book won the 1989 James Beard Cookbook Award. [via]

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  • Best Food Writing 2001
    by Holly Hughes
    ISBN 1569245770 (1-56924-577-0)
    Softcover, Marlowe & Co

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    Book summary:

    For food lovers, the next best thing to eating is reading about it. Best Food Writing 2001, compiled by Holly Hughes, offers these and other readers the year's most memorable food writing from books, magazines, newspapers, newsletters, and Web sites. Like its predecessor, Best Food Writing 2000, the book is a banquet--51 pieces on food in all its nutritional, gustatory, psychological, sociological, and, in short, personal glory. Dip into the book anywhere and enjoy, for example, Jeffrey Steingarten on bluefin tuna, Molly O'Neill discussing the glories of soup, William Grimes on comfort food, and Coleman Andrews on eating in Rome. Readers also journey to Paris (of course) in the form of Michael Lewis's wonderfully cranky paean to cassoulet (with recipe), and with John T. Edge in his search for the best Parisian Southern fried chicken (it exists); they also follow humorist Calvin Trillin as he seeks desperately for superior ceviche in Peru, Ecuador, and Queens, New York. Also included are excerpts from Ruth Reichl's bestselling Comfort Me with Apples and Patric Kuh's The Last Days of Haute Cuisine. There's more, of course, on topics as diverse as the agonies of dinner-party hosting, a chef's-eye view of dining out, and preparing perfect rice. Ideal for bedtime reading, the book also makes a great gift for fellow foodaholics who can't get enough of their favorite passion. --Arthur Boehm [via]

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  • Best Food Writing 2004
    by Holly Hughes
    ISBN 1569244162 (1-56924-416-2)
    Softcover, Marlowe & Co

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    Book summary:

    For food lovers, the next best thing to eating is reading about it. Best Food Writing 2001, compiled by Holly Hughes, offers these and other readers the year's most memorable food writing from books, magazines, newspapers, newsletters, and Web sites. Like its predecessor, Best Food Writing 2000, the book is a banquet--51 pieces on food in all its nutritional, gustatory, psychological, sociological, and, in short, personal glory. Dip into the book anywhere and enjoy, for example, Jeffrey Steingarten on bluefin tuna, Molly O'Neill discussing the glories of soup, William Grimes on comfort food, and Coleman Andrews on eating in Rome. Readers also journey to Paris (of course) in the form of Michael Lewis's wonderfully cranky paean to cassoulet (with recipe), and with John T. Edge in his search for the best Parisian Southern fried chicken (it exists); they also follow humorist Calvin Trillin as he seeks desperately for superior ceviche in Peru, Ecuador, and Queens, New York. Also included are excerpts from Ruth Reichl's bestselling Comfort Me with Apples and Patric Kuh's The Last Days of Haute Cuisine. There's more, of course, on topics as diverse as the agonies of dinner-party hosting, a chef's-eye view of dining out, and preparing perfect rice. Ideal for bedtime reading, the book also makes a great gift for fellow foodaholics who can't get enough of their favorite passion. --Arthur Boehm [via]

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  • Best Food Writing 2005
    by Holly Hughes
    ISBN 156924345X (1-56924-345-X)
    Softcover, Marlowe & Co

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    Book summary:

    Best Food Writing 2005 assembles, for its sixth year, the most exceptional writing from the past year's books, magazines, newspapers, newsletters, and Web sites. Included are the best writers on everything from celebrated chefs to the travails of the home cook, from food sourcing at the greenmarket to equipping one's kitchen, from erudite culinary history to food-inspired memoirs. Like past collections, the 2005 round-up will include pieces from food-writing stars such as Robb Walsh, John Thorne, Calvin Trillin, Amanda Hesser, Ruth Reichl, Colman Andrews, Jason Epstein, and Jeffrey Steingarten. Opinionated, evocative, nostalgic, brash, thought-provoking, and sometimes just plain funny, it's a tasty sampler to dip into time and again, whether you're in the mood for caviar or hot dogs.
    [via]

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  • Choice Cuts: A Savory Selection of Food Writing from Around the World and Throughout History
    by Mark Kurlansky
    ISBN 0142004936 (0-14-200493-6)
    Softcover, Penguin Group USA

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    Book summary:

    "Food is about agriculture, about ecology, about man's relationship with nature ... about nation-building, cultural struggles, friends and enemies ... and at times, even about sex." Thus Mark Kurlansky, author of the award-winning Cod and Salt, introduces Choice Cuts, his anthology of food writing throughout history. Kurlansky has cast his net very wide and presents a legion of food writers on every possible culinary subject.

    The usual suspects are here, sometimes in triplicate: Brilliat Savarin on gourmets, female food-love, and how to gain weight; M.F.K. Fisher on bachelor cooking, the dislike of cabbage, and dinner at France's famed Monsieur Paul's in the 1940s; Elizabeth David on the folly of the garlic press, the glories of toast, and English pizza. But Kurlansky's trail starts much earlier with Plato on cooking (food as a branch of medicine, a notion shared by many modern advertisers), Heroditus on Egyptian dining, and, resoundingly, Mencius, a student of Confucius who, in the third century B.C., implored Chinese leaders to observe saner food and environmental policies.

    There is a great deal to digest here, but readers can take small bites at their leisure. Enjoyed in this way, the book provides an endlessly fascinating glimpse of humankind's second--or is it the first?--greatest pleasure. --Arthur Boehm [via]

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  • Comfort Me with Apples
    by Ruth Reichl
    ISBN 0375758739 (0-375-75873-9)
    Softcover, Random House Inc

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    Book summary:

    Ruth Reichl's first book, the autobiographical Tender at the Bone, disarmed readers with its droll candor. The former restaurant critic of The New York Times and editor in chief of Gourmet magazine told great stories about growing up and loving food. Comfort Me with Apples begins where the first book ended, tracing Reichl's evolution from chef to food writer while detailing the dissolution of her first marriage, the start of a second, and motherhood at the age of 40. The book also limns a sensual journey, Reichl's awakening to the pleasures of sex as well as food, and also to love. Reichl interweaves her diverse coming-of-age narratives with passion (especially on the subject of food), wit, and a no-nonsense grace, all of which add up to a wonderful read--entertaining, but moving, too.

    The story begins when Reichl, living in a '70s Berkeley commune, gets her first real job as a restaurant reviewer. Despite the incredulity of her in-the-movement roommates ("You're going to spend your life telling spoiled, rich people where to eat?" asks one), Reichl persists, traveling widely to polish her palate. In the doing she meets food luminaries such as Wolfgang Puck (a mad encounter in a produce market), M.F.K. Fisher (lunch and sweet reminiscences), and Alice Waters (a garlic feast), among others. Her trip to China, which includes clandestine dealings with a former chef, is particularly well handled. The ungluing of her first marriage is depicted in adroit emotional counterpoint to her soaring career, as is her discovery of love with her second husband, unspooled against her father's death. Reichl also provides recipes, such as Fall Mushroom Soup (made to comfort herself and her mother) that, unexpectedly and delightfully, deepen the narrative. --Arthur Boehm [via]

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  • Reichl, Ruth: Comfort Me with Apples : More Adventures at the Table
    Comfort Me with Apples : More Adventures at the Table
    by Ruth Reichl
    ISBN 0375501959 (0-375-50195-9)
    Hardcover, Random House Publishing Group

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  • A Cook's Tour: Global Adventures in Extreme Cuisines
    by Anthony Bourdain
    ISBN 0060012781 (0-06-001278-1)
    Softcover, Harpercollins

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    Book summary:

    A Cook's Tour is the written record of Anthony Bourdain's travels around the world in his search for the perfect meal. All too conscious of the state of his 44-year-old knees after a working life standing at restaurant stoves, but with the unlooked-for jackpot of Kitchen Confidential as collateral, Mr. Bourdain evidently concluded he needed a bit more wind under his wings.

    The idea of "perfect meal" in this context is to be taken to mean not necessarily the most upscale, chi-chi, three-star dining experience, but the ideal combination of food, atmosphere, and company. This would take in fishing villages in Vietnam, bars in Cambodia, and Tuareg camps in Morocco (roasted sheep's testicle, as it happens); it would stretch to smoked fish and sauna in the frozen Russian countryside and the French Laundry in California's Napa Valley. It would mean exquisitely refined kaiseki rituals in Japan after yakitori with drunken salarymen. Deep-fried Mars Bars in Glasgow and Gordon Ramsay in London. The still-beating heart of a cobra in Saigon. Drink. Danger. Guns. All with a TV crew in tow for the accompanying series--22 episodes of video gold, we are assured, featuring many don't-try-this-at-home shots of the author in gastric distress or crawling into yet another storm drain at four in the morning.

    You are unlikely to lay your hands on a more hectically, strenuously entertaining book for some time. Our hero eats and swashbuckles round the globe with perfect-pitch attitude and liberal use of judiciously placed profanities. Bourdain can write. His timing is great. He is very funny and is under no illusions whatsoever about himself or anyone else. But most of all, he is a chef who got himself out of his kitchen and found, all over the world, people who understand that eating well is the foundation of harmonious living. --Robin Davidson, Amazon.co.uk [via]

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  • Cook's Tour: In Search of the Perfect Meal
    by Anthony Bourdain
    ISBN 1582341400 (1-58234-140-0)
    Hardcover, Bloomsbury Pub Plc USA

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    Book summary:

    A Cook's Tour is the written record of Anthony Bourdain's travels around the world in his search for the perfect meal. All too conscious of the state of his 44-year-old knees after a working life standing at restaurant stoves, but with the unlooked-for jackpot of Kitchen Confidential as collateral, Mr. Bourdain evidently concluded he needed a bit more wind under his wings.

    The idea of "perfect meal" in this context is to be taken to mean not necessarily the most upscale, chi-chi, three-star dining experience, but the ideal combination of food, atmosphere, and company. This would take in fishing villages in Vietnam, bars in Cambodia, and Tuareg camps in Morocco (roasted sheep's testicle, as it happens); it would stretch to smoked fish and sauna in the frozen Russian countryside and the French Laundry in California's Napa Valley. It would mean exquisitely refined kaiseki rituals in Japan after yakitori with drunken salarymen. Deep-fried Mars Bars in Glasgow and Gordon Ramsay in London. The still-beating heart of a cobra in Saigon. Drink. Danger. Guns. All with a TV crew in tow for the accompanying series--22 episodes of video gold, we are assured, featuring many don't-try-this-at-home shots of the author in gastric distress or crawling into yet another storm drain at four in the morning.

    You are unlikely to lay your hands on a more hectically, strenuously entertaining book for some time. Our hero eats and swashbuckles round the globe with perfect-pitch attitude and liberal use of judiciously placed profanities. Bourdain can write. His timing is great. He is very funny and is under no illusions whatsoever about himself or anyone else. But most of all, he is a chef who got himself out of his kitchen and found, all over the world, people who understand that eating well is the foundation of harmonious living. --Robin Davidson, Amazon.co.uk [via]

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  • Cooking for Mr. Latte: A Food Lover's Courtship, With Recipes
    by Amanda Hesser, Izak
    ISBN 0393325598 (0-393-32559-8)
    Softcover, W W Norton & Co Inc

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    Book summary:

    Cooking for Mr. Latte is a delightfully modern dating story, recipes included. It's the true story of the courtship between Amanda Hesser, a food writer for The New York Times and author of the award-winning cookbook The Cook and the Gardener, and writer Tad Friend, the titular Mr. Latte. Most of the book was written in installments for the New York Times Magazine, but fans of Hesser's writing will be happy to know that there are plenty of new stories and recipes to justify picking up the book version. Her tale ends happily ever after, but has enough ups and downs to keep it interesting. And it's not all about Mr. Latte. Ever wonder what it's like to eat out with foodie guru Jeffrey Steingarten? Chances are you guessed wrong.

    Food is an important aspect of Hesser's life (though it wasn't for Mr. Latte when they met, making for some of the downs in the ups and downs), but it's not until you notice how seamlessly Hesser weaves her meals into her story that you realize how much of our lives and our memories revolve around food. By the time you get to the recipes, you've already salivated over the dishes and become emotionally attached to them. From her mother's Chocolate Dump-It Cake to the Ginger Duck her future mother-in-law made the first time they met, you'll love that Hesser pays such close attention and generously shares the recipes. Filled with everything from old-fashioned treats from her grandmother's kitchen to dishes from some of New York's hottest dining spots, this is one entertaining read that is sure to end up in your kitchen. --Leora Y. Bloom [via]

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  • Endless Feasts: Sixty Years of Writing from Gourmet
    by Ruth Reichl, Gourmet Magazine
    ISBN 0375759921 (0-375-75992-1)
    Softcover, Random House Inc

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    Book summary:

    Endless Feasts: Sixty Years of Writing from Gourmet, part of the Modern Library Food series, is a fascinating compendium of Gourmet magazine food and travel pieces spanning six decades--a collection that mirrors our dining habits over the years but is timeless in its underlying theme: we are what we eat. The assembled cast is tops: James Beard on pasta; Elizabeth David lauding epicure Edouard de Pomaine; M.F.K. Fisher on her favorite Swiss inns; Paul Theroux writing about crossing the Rockies; Anita Loos evoking cocktail parties of the 1920s. Compiled by Gourmet editor-in-chief (and series editor) Ruth Reichl, and with recipes from the contributors' pieces--including hobotee, North Carolina's famed meat custard, and Katherine Hepburn's brownies--the book will delight armchair and meal-chasing foodies alike.

    Most readers will discover new voices among the more familiar. Present, as noted, is M.F.K. Fisher, offering one of her most splendid sun-and-shadow portraits, but there's also the underread (and magnificently dry) Ruth Harkness providing glimpses of a World War II winter spent in a crumbling Tibetan Lamasery, where she devoured $10,000 worth of rare pheasants; the drolly avuncular Joseph Wechsburg on Austria's legendary patisserie, Demel's ("the loudest sound you hear there is the breaking of crisp strudel dough"); crusty Maine poet Robert P. Coffin on Down East breakfasts and lobstering ("a night like a night of marriage"); and the reportorial, unblinking Jay Jacobs on Beard himself ("the man remembers in minute detail every one of the eighty-seven-thousand-odd meals he has eaten since his birth"). The quality of the essays varies, of course, but the book overwhelmingly gladdens in its rich breadth of time and place and evocative storytelling. --Arthur Boehm [via]

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  • Fast Food Nation
    by Eric Schlosser
    ISBN 0618130977 (0-618-13097-7)
    Hardcover, Houghton Mifflin College Div

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    On any given day, one out of four Americans opts for a quick and cheap meal at a fast-food restaurant, without giving either its speed or its thriftiness a second thought. Fast food is so ubiquitous that it now seems as American, and harmless, as apple pie. But the industry's drive for consolidation, homogenization, and speed has radically transformed America's diet, landscape, economy, and workforce, often in insidiously destructive ways. Eric Schlosser, an award-winning journalist, opens his ambitious and ultimately devastating exposé with an introduction to the iconoclasts and high school dropouts, such as Harlan Sanders and the McDonald brothers, who first applied the principles of a factory assembly line to a commercial kitchen. Quickly, however, he moves behind the counter with the overworked and underpaid teenage workers, onto the factory farms where the potatoes and beef are grown, and into the slaughterhouses run by giant meatpacking corporations. Schlosser wants you to know why those French fries taste so good (with a visit to the world's largest flavor company) and "what really lurks between those sesame-seed buns." Eater beware: forget your concerns about cholesterol, there is--literally--feces in your meat.

    Schlosser's investigation reaches its frightening peak in the meatpacking plants as he reveals the almost complete lack of federal oversight of a seemingly lawless industry. His searing portrayal of the industry is disturbingly similar to Upton Sinclair's The Jungle, written in 1906: nightmare working conditions, union busting, and unsanitary practices that introduce E. coli and other pathogens into restaurants, public schools, and homes. Almost as disturbing is his description of how the industry "both feeds and feeds off the young," insinuating itself into all aspects of children's lives, even the pages of their school books, while leaving them prone to obesity and disease. Fortunately, Schlosser offers some eminently practical remedies. "Eating in the United States should no longer be a form of high-risk behavior," he writes. Where to begin? Ask yourself, is the true cost of having it "your way" really worth it? --Lesley Reed [via]

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  • Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal
    by Eric Schlosser
    ISBN 0060838582 (0-06-083858-2)
    Softcover, Harpercollins

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    Book summary:

    On any given day, one out of four Americans opts for a quick and cheap meal at a fast-food restaurant, without giving either its speed or its thriftiness a second thought. Fast food is so ubiquitous that it now seems as American, and harmless, as apple pie. But the industry's drive for consolidation, homogenization, and speed has radically transformed America's diet, landscape, economy, and workforce, often in insidiously destructive ways. Eric Schlosser, an award-winning journalist, opens his ambitious and ultimately devastating exposé with an introduction to the iconoclasts and high school dropouts, such as Harlan Sanders and the McDonald brothers, who first applied the principles of a factory assembly line to a commercial kitchen. Quickly, however, he moves behind the counter with the overworked and underpaid teenage workers, onto the factory farms where the potatoes and beef are grown, and into the slaughterhouses run by giant meatpacking corporations. Schlosser wants you to know why those French fries taste so good (with a visit to the world's largest flavor company) and "what really lurks between those sesame-seed buns." Eater beware: forget your concerns about cholesterol, there is--literally--feces in your meat.

    Schlosser's investigation reaches its frightening peak in the meatpacking plants as he reveals the almost complete lack of federal oversight of a seemingly lawless industry. His searing portrayal of the industry is disturbingly similar to Upton Sinclair's The Jungle, written in 1906: nightmare working conditions, union busting, and unsanitary practices that introduce E. coli and other pathogens into restaurants, public schools, and homes. Almost as disturbing is his description of how the industry "both feeds and feeds off the young," insinuating itself into all aspects of children's lives, even the pages of their school books, while leaving them prone to obesity and disease. Fortunately, Schlosser offers some eminently practical remedies. "Eating in the United States should no longer be a form of high-risk behavior," he writes. Where to begin? Ask yourself, is the true cost of having it "your way" really worth it? --Lesley Reed [via]

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  • Feeding a Yen: Savoring Local Specialties, from Kansas City to Cuzco
    by Calvin Trillin
    ISBN 0375759964 (0-375-75996-4)
    Softcover, Random House Inc

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    Book summary:

    Calvin Trillin has never been a champion of the continental cuisine palaces he used to refer to as La Maison de la Casa Housenor of their successors, the trendy spots he calls sleepy-time restaurants, where everything is served on a bed of something else. What he treasures is the superb local specialty. And he will go anywhere to find one.

    As it happens, some of Trillins favorite dishespimientos de Padrón in northern Spain, for instance, or pan bagnat in Nice or posole in New Mexicocant be found anywhere but in their place of origin. Those dishes are on his Register of Frustration and Deprivation. On gray afternoons, I go over it, he writes, like a miser who is both tantalizing and tormenting himself by poring over a list of people who owe him money. On brighter afternoons, he calls his travel agent.

    Trillin shares charming and funny tales of managing to have another go at, say, fried marlin in Barbados or the barbecue of his boyhood in Kansas City. Sometimes he returns with yet another listing for his Registeras when he travels to Ecuador for ceviche, only to encounter fanesca, a soup so difficult to make that it should appear on an absolutely accurate menu as Potage Labor Intensive.

    We join the hunt for the authentic fish taco. We tag along on the boudin blitzkrieg in the part of Louisiana where people are accustomed to buying boudin and polishing it off in the parking lot or in their cars (Cajun boudin not only doesnt get outside the state, it usually doesnt even get home). In New York, we follow Trillin as he roams Queens with the sort of people who argue about where to find the finest Albanian burek and as he tries to use a glorious local specialty, the New York bagel, to lure his daughters back from California (I understand that in some places out there if you buy a dozen wheat-germ bagels you get your choice of a bee-pollen bagel or a ginseng bagel free).

    Feeding a Yen is a delightful reminder of why New York magazine called Calvin Trillin our funniest food writer. [via]

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  • From Hardtack to Home Fries: An Uncommon History of American Cooks and Meats
    by Barbara Haber
    ISBN 0142002976 (0-14-200297-6)
    Softcover, Penguin Group (Canada)

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    Barbara Haber's fascinating From Hardtack to Home Fries bills itself as "An Uncommon History of American Cooks and Meals." More exactly, it locates the recurrent intersection of American women's history and culinary practice and shows how one shaped the other. In lively chapters like "Pretty Much of a Muchness: Civil War Nurses and Diet Kitchens" and "The Harvey Girls: Good Women and Good Food Civilize the American West," Haber focuses on the untold female contribution to 19th- and 20th-century food culture, an engrossing story. Readers not only encounter great anecdotes--Civil War nurses guarding barrels of whiskey from thieves, for example, or pioneer chain-restaurateur Fred Harvey's female service corps in action--but discover a hidden American history.

    The vividness of the narratives results, largely, from Haber's excerpts of contemporary diaries and memoirs, like that of World War II POW Sarah Vaughan, who was held by the Japanese in Manila. ("There is a great rush for spinach juice," Vaughan reported, "on the days this is served.") In addition, Haber supplies pertinent recipes, like Ella Kellog's Savory Nut Loaf, a chilling example of 19th-century food-reformist fare, and Baked Fudge, the formula of Cleora Butler, whose unsung cookbooks first explored African American food in the Southwest. These documents tell truths as no others can. Haber's final and most personal chapter, "Growing Up with Cookbooks," explores the importance of cookbooks more explicitly, revealing their "intimate power to make connections between people"--to make culture itself. The authors of most of these recipes are women, a fact not lost on Haber, as the delightful Hardtack shows. --Arthur Boehm [via]

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  • Garlic And Sapphires
    by Ruth Reichl
    ISBN 0375435468 (0-375-43546-8)
    Hardcover, Random House Large Print

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    Book summary:

    Fans of Tender at the Bone and Comfort Me with Apples know that Ruth Reichl is a wonderful memoirist--a funny, poignant, and candid storyteller whose books contain a happy mix of memories, recipes, and personal revelations.

    Amazon.com Interview
    We chewed the fat with Ruth. Read our interview.
    What they might not fully appreciate is that Reichl is an absolute marvel when it comes to writing about food--she can describe a dish in such satisfying detail that it becomes unnecessary for readers to eat. In her third memoir, Garlic and Sapphires: The Secret Life of a Critic in Disguise, Reichl focuses on her life as a food critic, dishing up a feast of fabulous meals enjoyed during her tenure at The New York Times. As a critic, Reichl was determined to review the "true" nature of each restaurant she visited, so she often dined incognito--each chapter of her book highlights a new disguise, a different restaurant (including the original reviews from the Times), and a fresh culinary adventure. Garlic and Sapphires is another delicious and delightful book, sure to satisfy Reichl's foodie fans and leave admirerers looking forward to her next book, hopefully about her life with Gourmet. --Daphne Durham

    More from Ruth Reichl


    Tender at the Bone
    Comfort Me with Apples
    The Gourmet Cookbook

    Remembrance of Things Paris
    Endless Feasts
    Gourmet magazine


    Amazon.com's The Significant Seven
    Ruth Reichl answers the seven questions we ask every author.


    Q: What book has had the most significant impact on your life?
    A: Kate Simons New York Places and Pleasures. I read it as a little girl and then went out and wandered the city. She was a wonderful writer, and she taught me not only to see New York in a whole new way, but to look, and taste, beneath the surface.

    Q: You are stranded on a desert island with only one book, one CD, and one DVD--what are they?
    A: Ulysses by James Joyce. What better place to finally get through it?

    Keith Jarrett's The Köln Concert. If youre going to listen to one piece over and over, this is one that doesnt get tiresome.

    How to Build a Boat in Five Easy Steps. Since Im going to be watching one movie over and over, it might as well be useful.

    Q: What is the worst lie you've ever told?
    A: Im such a good liar, I wouldnt know where to begin.

    Q: Describe the perfect writing environment.
    A: I can write pretty much anywhere. But I prefer small, cozy spaces, with a good view over a lake or a forest, and room for the cats to curl up.

    Q: If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?
    A: "Shell be right back."

    Q: Who is the one person living or dead that you would like to have dinner with?
    A: Elizabeth I. She fascinates me. She had a great mind, enormous appetites--and she was a survivor. The most interesting woman of an interesting time, and I have a million questions Id like to ask her.

    Q: If you could have one superpower, what would it be?
    A: You mean after creating world peace? This is a hard one. But Ive always wanted to be able to fly.

    [via]

    More editions of Garlic And Sapphires:

  • Garlic and Sapphires: The Secret LIfe of a Critic in Disguise
    by Ruth Reichl
    ISBN 1594200319 (1-59420-031-9)
    Hardcover, Penguin Group USA

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    Book summary:

    Fans of Tender at the Bone and Comfort Me with Apples know that Ruth Reichl is a wonderful memoirist--a funny, poignant, and candid storyteller whose books contain a happy mix of memories, recipes, and personal revelations.

    Amazon.com Interview
    We chewed the fat with Ruth. Read our interview.
    What they might not fully appreciate is that Reichl is an absolute marvel when it comes to writing about food--she can describe a dish in such satisfying detail that it becomes unnecessary for readers to eat. In her third memoir, Garlic and Sapphires: The Secret Life of a Critic in Disguise, Reichl focuses on her life as a food critic, dishing up a feast of fabulous meals enjoyed during her tenure at The New York Times. As a critic, Reichl was determined to review the "true" nature of each restaurant she visited, so she often dined incognito--each chapter of her book highlights a new disguise, a different restaurant (including the original reviews from the Times), and a fresh culinary adventure. Garlic and Sapphires is another delicious and delightful book, sure to satisfy Reichl's foodie fans and leave admirerers looking forward to her next book, hopefully about her life with Gourmet. --Daphne Durham

    More from Ruth Reichl


    Tender at the Bone
    Comfort Me with Apples
    The Gourmet Cookbook

    Remembrance of Things Paris
    Endless Feasts
    Gourmet magazine


    Amazon.com's The Significant Seven
    Ruth Reichl answers the seven questions we ask every author.


    Q: What book has had the most significant impact on your life?
    A: Kate Simons New York Places and Pleasures. I read it as a little girl and then went out and wandered the city. She was a wonderful writer, and she taught me not only to see New York in a whole new way, but to look, and taste, beneath the surface.

    Q: You are stranded on a desert island with only one book, one CD, and one DVD--what are they?
    A: Ulysses by James Joyce. What better place to finally get through it?

    Keith Jarrett's The Köln Concert. If youre going to listen to one piece over and over, this is one that doesnt get tiresome.

    How to Build a Boat in Five Easy Steps. Since Im going to be watching one movie over and over, it might as well be useful.

    Q: What is the worst lie you've ever told?
    A: Im such a good liar, I wouldnt know where to begin.

    Q: Describe the perfect writing environment.
    A: I can write pretty much anywhere. But I prefer small, cozy spaces, with a good view over a lake or a forest, and room for the cats to curl up.

    Q: If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?
    A: "Shell be right back."

    Q: Who is the one person living or dead that you would like to have dinner with?
    A: Elizabeth I. She fascinates me. She had a great mind, enormous appetites--and she was a survivor. The most interesting woman of an interesting time, and I have a million questions Id like to ask her.

    Q: If you could have one superpower, what would it be?
    A: You mean after creating world peace? This is a hard one. But Ive always wanted to be able to fly.

    [via]

    More editions of Garlic and Sapphires: The Secret LIfe of a Critic in Disguise:

  • The Gastronomical Me
    by M. F. K. Fisher
    ISBN 0865473927 (0-86547-392-7)
    Softcover, North Point Pr

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    Book summary:

    M. F. K. Fisher sees life stomach first. The New York Times said "She spit Puritan restraint out like a dull wine and made a life of savoring the slow, sensual pleasures of the table." And between meals, she savored the pleasures of men and travel, too. She recalls California in 1912, life in France in the 1930s, and traveling solo to Mexico in 1941. Her first oyster is a beautiful story, about adolescence and the glory of the briny mollusk, and her humor is as forthright as her taste at table. [via]

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  • Home Cooking
    by Laurie Colwin, Anna Shapiro
    ISBN 0060955309 (0-06-095530-9)
    Softcover, Perennial

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    Book summary:

    The highly acclaimed and national bestselling author of Goodbye Without Leaving presents a delightfully delicious and witty exposition on what, how, and why we eat. With recipes, tips, and personal recollections, Home Cooking is part memoir, part cookbook, and part warm discourse on the joys of simple food. 26 line drawings. [via]

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  • Home Cooking : A Writer in the Kitchen
    by Laurie Colwin, Anna Shapiro
    ISBN 039455969X (0-394-55969-X)
    Hardcover, Knopf Publishing Group

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    Book summary:

    Share the unsurpassed pleasures of discovering, cooking, and eating good, simple food with this beloved book. Equal parts cookbook and memoir, Laurie Colwin's Home Cooking combines her insightful, good-humored writing style with her lifelong passion for wonderful cuisine in essays such as "Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant," "Repulsive Dinners: A Memoir," and "Stuffed Breast of Veal: A Bad Idea." Home Cooking is truly a feast for body and soul. [via]

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  • David, Elizabeth: Is There a Nutmeg in the House?: Essays on Practical Cooking With More Than 150 Recipes
    Is There a Nutmeg in the House?: Essays on Practical Cooking with More Than 150 Recipes
    by Elizabeth David
    ISBN 014200166X (0-14-200166-X)
    Softcover, Penguin Group USA

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    Book summary:

    If you care about food, you must read Elizabeth David. Author of nine definitive books, including Italian Food and French Provincial Cooking, her writings famously helped reawaken the postwar British palate while educating, through authentic recipes and compelling investigation, a generation of cooks about food and its joys. Is There a Nutmeg in the House?--a second posthumous anthology (David died in 1992)--contains previously uncollected essays, journalism, and correspondence, plus 150 recipes, all of which reveal the author at her wonderfully informative best. Readers will delight in her opinionated yet embracing sensibility, her unerring sense of what makes food not only good but genuine--true to itself and the people who make it.

    The book is divided into course-based chapters that net David's wide-ranging essays and recipes. The essays explore, among other topics, the story of bouillon cubes; the virtues of nutmeg; the uselessness of garlic presses; the nature of the ideal kitchen (keep refrigerators far away from stoves, she advises); and the best way to poach an egg (David quotes an historical source on the subject, with whom she agrees that if the eggs aren't fresh, "it is not in the power of the best cook in the Kingdom to poach [them] handsome"). The recipes run the gamut from a brilliant pizza quartet (Roman, Provençal, Armenian, and Genovese variations) to Beans in the Tuscan Bean Jar (a flasklike container that ensures even cooking) to ice creams and other tempting desserts like the Victorian Lemon and Brown Sugar Cake. With woodcuts and other illustration, the book is a treasure. --Arthur Boehm [via]

    More editions of Is There a Nutmeg in the House?: Essays on Practical Cooking with More Than 150 Recipes:

  • Is There a Nutmeg in the House?
    by Jill Norman, Elizabeth David
    ISBN 0718144449 (0-7181-4444-9)
    Hardcover, Michael Joseph

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    Book summary:

    This anthology of Elizabeth David's work is a direct sequel to "An Omelette and a Glass of Wine". It again contains a selection of her journalistic and occasional work from four decades. Much of it she had chosen herself for reprinting in this more accessible form. In addition there is a considerable amount of unpublished material found in her own files, or contributed by friends to whom she had given recipes, or to whom she had sent letters, either with notes in answer to queries or giving details of current research. None of the material here appears in any of her other nine books. The emphasis throughout is on the practical aspects of cooking and eating, and the book contains over 150 recipes. These stem from many different countries, but they all have Elizabeth David's unmistakable personal touch - a Mediterranean tomato consomme or a typically English raspberry ice-cream. Little-known articles on her many and varied likes and dislikes complete a unique picture of what for so long made her the most influential cookery writer in the English language. Her work is always immensely readable, elegant and witty, and she has a wonderful ability to share her sense of season and place, her passionate interest in food, its history, its myriad personalities, its role in civilized society. Those who have followed her progress from the astonishing "Mediterannean Food" to the equally unexpected "Spices, Salt and Aromatics in the English Kitchen" will find much that they have not seen before. For those who are new to Elizabeth David, a feast awaits you. [via]

    More editions of Is There a Nutmeg in the House?:

  • It Must'Ve Been Something I Ate: The Return of the Man Who Ate Everything
    by Jeffrey Steingarten
    ISBN 0375727124 (0-375-72712-4)
    Softcover, Random House Inc

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    Book summary:

    Thirty-eight outrageous, deliciously provocative pieces from Vogue's indomitable food critic-the man who eats everything, dreams perpetually of the ultimate food experience, and compulsively searches out the truth about how, why, and what we eat.

    Each section of his new book is a savory course of a splendid feast: For starters, in "Who Is Having All the Fun?," join Steingarten as he dons costly fishing gear and sets out on an epic hunt for bluefin tuna (whose raw belly meat is one of the most delicious things on earth), or read about how he was assaulted by toxic airline food (and be glad you didn't taste that little green leaf).

    Then, in "A Deep and Blinding Insight," partake of his investigative pursuits as he takes on salt chic (salt is salt, after all-isn't it?), assaults the FDA for banning succulent whole-milk cheeses in the name of hygienic sterility, and starts cooking dinners of braised short ribs for his dog when he can no longer withstand the baleful looks from his golden retriever confronted with desiccated dog-food pellets while his master sizzles sausages for himself. "There Is a God in Heaven," you'll find, be it in "Chocolate Dreams," "Caviar Emptor," or in the luscious taste of a superb boysenberry from the Chinos' farm.

    But for every reward, there is first "An Intense Hunt for the Facts": knowing the lobster includes understanding its sex life, the secret to supergoose is brining, and you have to aim a Raynger ST-8 at your baking stone in order to determine the heat for the perfect pizza.

    This is only a sampling of the gloriously entertaining menus that The Man Who Ate Everything dishes up this time around. You'll even find tucked under the plate some special recipes that he has climbed every mountain to obtain.

    Lucky for his audience that Jeffrey Steingarten is insatiable. [via]

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  • Julie And Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen How One Girl Risked Her Marriage, Her Job, And Her Sanity to Master the Art of Living
    by Julie Powell
    ISBN 031610969X (0-316-10969-X)
    Hardcover, Little Brown & Co

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    Book summary:

    Julie & Julia is the story of Julie Powell's attempt to revitalize her marriage, restore her ambition, and save her soul by cooking all 524 recipes in Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume I, in a period of 365 days. The result is a masterful medley of Bridget Jones' Diary meets Like Water for Chocolate, mixed with a healthy dose of original wit, warmth, and inspiration that sets this memoir apart from most tales of personal redemption.

    When we first meet Julie, she's a frustrated temp-to-perm secretary who slaves away at a thankless job, only to return to an equally demoralizing apartment in the outer boroughs of Manhattan each evening. At the urging of Eric, her devoted and slightly geeky husband, she decides to start a blog that will chronicle what she dubs the "Julie/Julia Project." What follows is a year of butter-drenched meals that will both necessitate the wearing of an unbearably uncomfortable girdle on the hottest night of the year, as well as the realization that life is what you make of it and joy is not as impossible a quest as it may seem, even when it's -10 degrees out and your pipes are frozen.

    Powell is a natural when it comes to connecting with her readers, which is probably why her blog generated so much buzz, both from readers and media alike. And while her self-deprecating sense of humor can sometimes dissolve into whininess, she never really loses her edge, or her sense of purpose. Even on day 365, she's working her way through Mayonnaise Collee and ending the evening "back exactly where we started--just Eric and me, three cats and Buffy...sitting on a couch in the outer boroughs, eating, with Julia chortling alongside us...."

    Inspired and encouraging, Julie and Julia is a unique opportunity to join one woman's attempt to change her life, and have a laugh, or ten, along the way. --Gisele Toueg [via]

    More editions of Julie And Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen How One Girl Risked Her Marriage, Her Job, And Her Sanity to Master the Art of Living:

  • Julie and Julia: My Year of Cooking Dangerously
    by Julie Powell
    ISBN 0316013269 (0-316-01326-9)
    Softcover, Little Brown & Co

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    Book summary:

    Julie & Julia is the story of Julie Powell's attempt to revitalize her marriage, restore her ambition, and save her soul by cooking all 524 recipes in Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume I, in a period of 365 days. The result is a masterful medley of Bridget Jones' Diary meets Like Water for Chocolate, mixed with a healthy dose of original wit, warmth, and inspiration that sets this memoir apart from most tales of personal redemption.

    When we first meet Julie, she's a frustrated temp-to-perm secretary who slaves away at a thankless job, only to return to an equally demoralizing apartment in the outer boroughs of Manhattan each evening. At the urging of Eric, her devoted and slightly geeky husband, she decides to start a blog that will chronicle what she dubs the "Julie/Julia Project." What follows is a year of butter-drenched meals that will both necessitate the wearing of an unbearably uncomfortable girdle on the hottest night of the year, as well as the realization that life is what you make of it and joy is not as impossible a quest as it may seem, even when it's -10 degrees out and your pipes are frozen.

    Powell is a natural when it comes to connecting with her readers, which is probably why her blog generated so much buzz, both from readers and media alike. And while her self-deprecating sense of humor can sometimes dissolve into whininess, she never really loses her edge, or her sense of purpose. Even on day 365, she's working her way through Mayonnaise Collee and ending the evening "back exactly where we started--just Eric and me, three cats and Buffy...sitting on a couch in the outer boroughs, eating, with Julia chortling alongside us...."

    Inspired and encouraging, Julie and Julia is a unique opportunity to join one woman's attempt to change her life, and have a laugh, or ten, along the way. --Gisele Toueg [via]

    More editions of Julie and Julia: My Year of Cooking Dangerously:

  • Kitchen Confidential
    by Anthony Bourdain
    ISBN 0747550727 (0-7475-5072-7)
    Hardcover, Bloomsbury Pub Ltd

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    Book summary:

    Most diners believe that their sublime sliver of seared foie gras, topped with an ethereal buckwheat blini and a drizzle of piquant huckleberry sauce, was created by a culinary artist of the highest order, a sensitive, highly refined executive chef. The truth is more brutal. More likely, writes Anthony Bourdain in Kitchen Confidential, that elegant three-star concoction is the collaborative effort of a team of "wacked-out moral degenerates, dope fiends, refugees, a thuggish assortment of drunks, sneak thieves, sluts, and psychopaths," in all likelihood pierced or tattooed and incapable of uttering a sentence without an expletive or a foreign phrase. Such is the muscular view of the culinary trenches from one who's been groveling in them, with obvious sadomasochistic pleasure, for more than 20 years. CIA-trained Bourdain, currently the executive chef of the celebrated Les Halles, wrote two culinary mysteries before his first (and infamous) New Yorker essay launched this frank confessional about the lusty and larcenous real lives of cooks and restaurateurs. He is obscenely eloquent, unapologetically opinionated, and a damn fine storyteller--a Jack Kerouac of the kitchen. Those without the stomach for this kind of joyride should note his opening caveat: "There will be horror stories. Heavy drinking, drugs, screwing in the dry-goods area, unappetizing industry-wide practices. Talking about why you probably shouldn't order fish on a Monday, why those who favor well-done get the scrapings from the bottom of the barrel, and why seafood frittata is not a wise brunch selection.... But I'm simply not going to deceive anybody about the life as I've seen it." --Sumi Hahn [via]

    More editions of Kitchen Confidential:

  • Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
    by Anthony Bourdain
    ISBN 158234082X (1-58234-082-X)
    Hardcover, Bloomsbury Pub Plc USA

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    Book summary:

    Most diners believe that their sublime sliver of seared foie gras, topped with an ethereal buckwheat blini and a drizzle of piquant huckleberry sauce, was created by a culinary artist of the highest order, a sensitive, highly refined executive chef. The truth is more brutal. More likely, writes Anthony Bourdain in Kitchen Confidential, that elegant three-star concoction is the collaborative effort of a team of "wacked-out moral degenerates, dope fiends, refugees, a thuggish assortment of drunks, sneak thieves, sluts, and psychopaths," in all likelihood pierced or tattooed and incapable of uttering a sentence without an expletive or a foreign phrase. Such is the muscular view of the culinary trenches from one who's been groveling in them, with obvious sadomasochistic pleasure, for more than 20 years. CIA-trained Bourdain, currently the executive chef of the celebrated Les Halles, wrote two culinary mysteries before his first (and infamous) New Yorker essay launched this frank confessional about the lusty and larcenous real lives of cooks and restaurateurs. He is obscenely eloquent, unapologetically opinionated, and a damn fine storyteller--a Jack Kerouac of the kitchen. Those without the stomach for this kind of joyride should note his opening caveat: "There will be horror stories. Heavy drinking, drugs, screwing in the dry-goods area, unappetizing industry-wide practices. Talking about why you probably shouldn't order fish on a Monday, why those who favor well-done get the scrapings from the bottom of the barrel, and why seafood frittata is not a wise brunch selection.... But I'm simply not going to deceive anybody about the life as I've seen it." --Sumi Hahn [via]

    More editions of Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly:

  • The Making of a Chef: Mastering Heat at the Culinary I
    by Michael Ruhlman
    ISBN 0805061738 (0-8050-6173-8)
    Softcover, Henry Holt & Co

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    Book summary:

    Journalist Michael Ruhlman talked his way into the CIA: the Culinary Institute of America, the Harvard of cooking schools. It had something to do with potatoes a grand-uncle had eaten deacades earlier, how the man could remember them so well for so long, buried as they had been in the middle of an elegant meal. Ruhlman wanted to learn how to cook potatoes like that--like an art--and the CIA seemed the place to go. The fun part of this book is that we all get to go along for the ride without having to endure the trauma of cooking school.

    Ever wonder what goes on in a busy kitchen, why your meal comes late or shows up poorly cooked? The temptation is to blame the waiter, but there are a world of cooks behind those swinging doors, and Ruhlman marches you right into it. It's a world where, when everything is going right, time halts and consciousness expands. And when a few things go wrong, the earth begins to wobble on its axis. Ruhlamn has the writerly skills to make the education of a chef a visceral experience. [via]

    More editions of The Making of a Chef: Mastering Heat at the Culinary I:

  • The Making of a Chef : Mastering Heat at the Culinary Institute of America
    by Michael Ruhlman
    ISBN 0805046747 (0-8050-4674-7)
    Hardcover, Holt & Company, Henry

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    Book summary:

    Journalist Michael Ruhlman talked his way into the CIA: the Culinary Institute of America, the Harvard of cooking schools. It had something to do with potatoes a grand-uncle had eaten deacades earlier, how the man could remember them so well for so long, buried as they had been in the middle of an elegant meal. Ruhlman wanted to learn how to cook potatoes like that--like an art--and the CIA seemed the place to go. The fun part of this book is that we all get to go along for the ride without having to endure the trauma of cooking school.

    Ever wonder what goes on in a busy kitchen, why your meal comes late or shows up poorly cooked? The temptation is to blame the waiter, but there are a world of cooks behind those swinging doors, and Ruhlman marches you right into it. It's a world where, when everything is going right, time halts and consciousness expands. And when a few things go wrong, the earth begins to wobble on its axis. Ruhlamn has the writerly skills to make the education of a chef a visceral experience. [via]

    More editions of The Making of a Chef : Mastering Heat at the Culinary Institute of America:

  • The Man Who Ate Everything: And Other Gastronomic Feats, Disputes, and Pleasurable Pursuits
    by Jeffrey Steingarten
    ISBN 0375702024 (0-375-70202-4)
    Softcover, Random House Inc

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    Book summary:

    When Jeffrey Steingarten was made food critic of Vogue in 1989, he began by systematically learning to like all the food he had previously avoided. From clams to Greek food to Indian desserts with the consistency of face cream, Steingarten undertook an extraordinary program of self-inflicted behavior modification to prepare himself for his new career. He describes the experience in this collection's first piece, before setting out on a series of culinary adventures that take him around the world.

    It's clear that Vogue gave Steingarten carte blanche to write on whatever subjects tickled his taste buds, and the result is a frequently hilarious collection of essays that emphasize good eating over an obsession with health. "Salad, the Silent Killer" is a catalog of the toxins lurking in every bowl of raw vegetables, while "Fries" follows a heroic attempt to create the perfect French fry--cooked in horse fat. Whether baking sourdough bread in his Manhattan loft or spraying miso soup across a Kyoto restaurant, Steingarten is an ideal guide to the wilder reaches of gastronomy, a cross between M.F.K. Fisher and H.L. Mencken. [via]

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  • More Home Cooking: A Writer Returns to the Kitchen
    by Laurie Colwin
    ISBN 0060925787 (0-06-092578-7)
    Softcover, Harpercollins

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    Book summary:

    Prior to her untimely death, Laurie Colwin's insightful novels developed something of a cult following, as did her good-humored food columns for Gourmet Magazine. This book, like its predecessor Home Cooking, is a result of her lifelong passion for wonderful food, often things one wouldn't immediately think of: beets, pears, black beans, chutney. More than a cookbook, it's like a conversation with a longtime neighbor--one who can reminisce all day about the great meals she's cooked and eaten; one who sees cooking as a wonderful adventure complete with a pot of Curried Broccoli Soup at the end of the rainbow. It's for reading in bed as well as in the kitchen. [via]

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  • My Life in France
    by Julia Child, Alex Prud'Homme
    ISBN 1400043468 (1-4000-4346-8)
    Hardcover, Alfred a Knopf Inc

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    Book summary:

    In her own words, here is the captivating story of Julia Childs years in France, where she fell in love with French food and found her true calling.

    From the moment the ship docked in Le Havre in the fall of 1948 and Julia watched the well-muscled stevedores unloading the cargo to the first perfectly soigné meal that she and her husband, Paul, savored in Rouen en route to Paris, where he was to work for the USIS, Julia had an awakening that changed her life. Soon this tall, outspoken gal from Pasadena, California, who didnt speak a word of French and knew nothing about the country, was steeped in the language, chatting with purveyors in the local markets, and enrolled in the Cordon Bleu.

    After managing to get her degree despite the machinations of the disagreeable directrice of the school, Julia started teaching cooking classes herself, then teamed up with two fellow gourmettes, Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle, to help them with a book they were trying to write on French cooking for Americans. Throwing herself heart and soul into making it a unique and thorough teaching book, only to suffer several rounds of painful rejection, is part of the behind-the-scenes drama that Julia reveals with her inimitable gusto and disarming honesty.

    Filled with the beautiful black-and-white photographs that Paul loved to take when he was not battling bureaucrats, as well as family snapshots, this memoir is laced with wonderful stories about the French character, particularly in the world of food, and the way of life that Julia embraced so wholeheartedly. Above all, she reveals the kind of spirit and determination, the sheer love of cooking, and the drive to share that with her fellow Americans that made her the extraordinary success she became.

    Le voici. Et bon appétit!
     [via]

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  • The Nasty Bits: Collected Varietal Cuts, Usable Trim, Scraps, and Bones
    by Anthony Bourdain
    ISBN 1596913606 (1-59691-360-6)
    Softcover, Bloomsbury Pub Plc USA

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    Book summary:

    The best-selling author of Kitchen Confidential and A Cook's Tour shares a candid and outrageous collection of his worldwide culinary misadventures, from scrounging for eel in backstreet Hanoi, to quarreling with raw-food activist Woody Ha
    Title: The Nasty Bits
    Author: Bourdain, Anthony
    Publisher: St Martins Pr
    Publication Date: 2007/05/01
    Number of Pages: 288
    Binding Type: PAPERBACK
    Library of Congress: oc2007085804 [via]

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  • Bourdain, Anthony: The Nasty Bits: Collected Varietal Cuts, sable Trim, Scraps, and Bones
    The Nasty Bits: Collected Varietal Cuts, sable Trim, Scraps, and Bones
    by Anthony Bourdain
    ISBN 1582344515 (1-58234-451-5)
    Hardcover, Bloomsbury Pub Plc USA

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  • David, Elizabeth: An Omelette and a Glass of Wine
    An Omelette and a Glass of Wine
    by Elizabeth David
    ISBN 1558215719 (1-55821-571-9)
    Softcover, Globe Pequot Pr

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    Book summary:

    An Omelette and a Glass of Wine, by Elizabeth David, is one of the first books that the Lyons Press (formerly Lyons and Burford) published as part of the Cook's Classic Library series. It offers 62 articles written by David between 1955 and 1984 for a variety of publications. Many of these pieces, such as "I'll Be with You in the Squeezing of a Lemon," from 1969--about cooking with lemons--barely show their age. But even if they did, you wouldn't care, because of the rich store of information that David shares and the literary grace with which she imparts it.

    "Foods of Legend" is a choice example. This essay is astonishingly timely in its discourse on a chef feeling compelled to elevate a humble country dish into haute cuisine. David bases her story on Master Chef August Escoffier's recomposition, over a century ago, of a Provençal favorite: potatoes baked with artichokes onto Carré d'Agneau Mistral, which involved adding truffles and rack of lamb.

    Some articles include recipes, but for the most part this is a volume nicely sized to curl up with or to take on a trip. [via]

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  • On Food And Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen
    by Harold McGee
    ISBN 0684843285 (0-684-84328-5)
    Softcover, Simon & Schuster

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    Book summary:

    Harold McGee's On Food and Cooking is a kitchen classic. Hailed by Time magazine as "a minor masterpiece" when it first appeared in 1984, On Food and Cooking is the bible to which food lovers and professional chefs worldwide turn for an understanding of where our foods come from, what exactly they're made of, and how cooking transforms them into something new and delicious.

    Now, for its twentieth anniversary, Harold McGee has prepared a new, fully revised and updated edition of On Food and Cooking. He has rewritten the text almost completely, expanded it by two-thirds, and commissioned more than 100 new illustrations. As compulsively readable and engaging as ever, the new On Food and Cooking provides countless eye-opening insights into food, its preparation, and its enjoyment.

    On Food and Cooking pioneered the translation of technical food science into cook-friendly kitchen science and helped give birth to the inventive culinary movement known as "molecular gastronomy." Though other books have now been written about kitchen science, On Food and Cooking remains unmatched in the accuracy, clarity, and thoroughness of its explanations, and the intriguing way in which it blends science with the historical evolution of foods and cooking techniques.

    Among the major themes addressed throughout this new edition are:

    • Traditional and modern methods of food production and their influences on food quality
    • The great diversity of methods by which people in different places and times have prepared the same ingredients
    • Tips for selecting the best ingredients and preparing them successfully
    • The particular substances that give foods their flavors and that give us pleasure
    • Our evolving knowledge of the health benefits and risks of foods

    On Food and Cooking is an invaluable and monumental compendium of basic information about ingredients, cooking methods, and the pleasures of eating. It will delight and fascinate anyone who has ever cooked, savored, or wondered about food. [via]

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  • Pot on the Fire: Further Exploits of a Renegade Cook
    by John Thorne, Matt Lewis Thorne
    ISBN 0865476209 (0-86547-620-9)
    Softcover, Farrar Straus & Giroux

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    Book summary:

    Pot on the Fire is the latest collection from "the most enticingly serendipitous voice on the culinary front since Elizabeth David and M.F.K. Fisher" (Connoisseur). As the title suggests, it celebrates -- and, in classic Thorne style, ponders, probes, and scrutinizes -- a lifelong engagement with the elements of cooking, and with elemental cooking from cioppino to kedgeree. John Thorne's curiosity ranges far and wide, from nineteenth-century famine-struck Ireland to the India of the British Raj, from the Tuscan bean pot to the venerable American griddle. Whether on the trail of a mysterious Vietnamese sandwich ("Banh Mi and Me") or "The Best Cookies in the World," whether "Desperately Resisting Risotto" or discovering a new breakfast, Thorne is an erudite and intrepid guide who, in unveiling the gastronomic wonders of the world, also reveals us to ourselves.  [via]

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  • The Raw and the Cooked: Adventures of a Roving Gourmand
    by Jim Harrison
    ISBN 080213937X (0-8021-3937-X)
    Softcover, Grove Pr

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    Book summary:

    Jim Harrison's The Raw and the Cooked extols our profound (and precarious) relationship to what we eat, and to the natural world. Compiled from the author's much-loved Esquire, Smart, and Men's Journal columns, the book offers charging personal panoramas in the guise of food essays. In pieces with titles like "Conscious Dining," "Hunger, Real and Unreal," and "Repulsion and Grace," Harrison--a kind of dharma bum cum foodie--takes his readers into realms of taste and feeling, spirit and body. "We are often like autistic children," he writes, "unable to connect experiences, especially if we want something interesting to eat." A Michigan "outlander," he nonetheless travels wide and can tell of the "tummy thrills" engendered by trips to restaurants like Manhattan's Babbo, meals planned and meals remembered. But the journeys he likes best involve hunting or foraging, his personal salves: "I arrived home in a palsied state," he writes. "To set the brakes, I wandered for hours in the woods looking for morels. At one point I wandered three hours to find four morels. I did however gather enough to cook our annual spring rite, a simple sauté of the mushrooms, wild leeks and sweetbreads."

    A warning: Harrison can lick his spiritual wounds publicly for long stretches, and not all readers will find his swaggering muscularity to their taste. Those who follow him are, however, rewarded by contact with his passion and sly, world-colliding depictions: "The dinner was a mystical experience," he writes, "and as such you must live through it to fully understand the mysticality ... less apparent when I got up next morning in a driving rainstorm with the usual flooded freeways." --Arthur Boehm [via]

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  • Remembrance of Things Paris: Sixty Years of Writing from Gourmet
    by Gourmet Magazine
    ISBN 0812971930 (0-8129-7193-0)
    Softcover, Random House Inc

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  • Stern, Jane: Roadfood
    Roadfood
    by Jane Stern
    ISBN 0394735080 (0-394-73508-0)
    Softcover, Random House Inc

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    Book summary:

    The authors of the incomparable Encyclopedia of Bad Taste present an updated edition of the classic guide to America's best diners, small-town cafes, BBQ joints, and other eateries serving great, inexpensive regional foods. [via]

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  • Roadfood
    by Michael Stern, Jane Stern
    ISBN 0060965991 (0-06-096599-1)
    Softcover, Harpercollins

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    Book summary:

    The authors of the incomparable Encyclopedia of Bad Taste present an updated edition of the classic guide to America's best diners, small-town cafes, BBQ joints, and other eateries serving great, inexpensive regional foods. [via]

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  • Stern, Michael: Roadfood and Goodfood: Jane and Michael Stern's Coast-To-Coast Restaurant Guides
    Roadfood and Goodfood: Jane and Michael Stern's Coast-To-Coast Restaurant Guides
    by Michael Stern, Jane Stern
    ISBN 0394743962 (0-394-74396-2)
    Softcover, Knopf

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  • Roadfood: The Coast-To-Coast Guide to 500 of the Best Barbecue Joints, Lobster Shacks, Ice Cream Parlors, Highway Diners, and Much, Much More
    by Michael Stern, Jane Stern
    ISBN 0767922646 (0-7679-2264-6)
    Softcover, Broadway Books

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    Book summary:

    First published in 1977, the original Roadfood became an instant classic. James Beard said, "This is a book that you should carry with you, no matter where you are going in these United States. It's a treasure house of information."

    Now this indispensable guide is back, in an even bigger and better edition, covering 500 of the country's best local eateries from Maine to California. With more than 250 completely new listings and thorough updates of old favorites, the new Roadfood offers an extended tour of the most affordable, most enjoyable dining options along America's highways and back roads.

    Filled with enticing alternatives for chain-weary-travelers, Roadfood provides descriptions of and directions to (complete with regional maps) the best lobster shacks on the East Coast; the ultimate barbecue joints down South; the most indulgent steak houses in the Midwest; and dozens of top-notch diners, hotdog stands, ice-cream parlors, and uniquely regional finds in between. Each entry delves into the folkways of a restaurant's locale as well as the dining experience itself, and each is written in the Sterns' entertaining and colorful style. A cornucopia for road warriors and armchair epicures alike, Roadfood is a road map to some of the tastiest treasures in the United States. [via]

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  • Salt: A World History
    by Mark Kurlansky
    ISBN 0142001619 (0-14-200161-9)
    Softcover, Penguin Group USA

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    Book summary:

    Homer called salt a divine substance. Plato described it as especially dear to the gods. Today we take salt for granted, a common, inexpensive substance that seasons food or clears ice from roads, a word used casually in expressions ("salt of the earth," take it with a grain of salt") without appreciating their deeper meaning. However, as Mark Kurlansky so brilliantly relates in his world- encompassing new book, saltthe only rock we eathas shaped civilization from the very beginning. Its story is a glittering, often surprising part of the history of mankind.

    Until about 100 years ago, when modern chemistry and geology revealed how prevalent it is, salt was one of the most sought-after commodities, and no wonder, for without it humans and animals could not live. Salt has often been considered so valuable that it served as currency, and it is still exchanged as such in places today. Demand for salt established the earliest trade routes, across unknown oceans and the remotest of deserts: the city of Jericho was founded almost 10,000 years ago as a salt trading center. Because of its worth, salt has provoked and financed some wars, and been a strategic element in others, such as the American Revolution and the Civil War. Salt taxes secured empires across Europe and Asia and have also inspired revolution (Gandhi's salt march in 1930 began the overthrow of British rule in India); indeed, salt has been central to the age-old debate about the rights of government to tax and control economies.

    The story of salt encompasses fields as disparate as engineering, religion, and food, all of which Kurlansky richly explores. Few endeavors have inspired more ingenuity than salt making, from the natural gas furnaces of ancient China to the drilling techniques that led to the age of petroleum, and salt revenues have funded some of the greatest public works in history, including the Erie Canal, and even cities (Syracuse, New York). Salt's ability to preserve and to sustain life has made it a metaphorical symbol in all religions. Just as significantly, salt has shaped the history of foods like cheese, sauerkraut, olives, and more, and Kurlansky, an award-winning food writer, conveys how they have in turn molded civilization and eating habits the world over.

    Salt is veined with colorful characters, from Li Bing, the Chinese bureaucrat who built the world's first dam in 250 BC, to Pattillo Higgins and Anthony Lucas who, ignoring the advice of geologists, drilled an east Texas salt dome in 1901 and discovered an oil reserve so large it gave birth to the age of petroleum. From the sinking salt towns of Cheshire in England to the celebrated salt mine on Avery Island in Louisiana; from the remotest islands in the Caribbean where roads are made of salt to rural Sichaun province, where the last home-made soya sauce is made, Mark Kurlansky has produced a kaleidoscope of history, a multi-layered masterpiece that blends economic, scientific, political, religious, and culinary records into a rich and memorable tale.
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  • Simple Cooking
    by John Thorne
    ISBN 0865475040 (0-86547-504-0)
    Softcover, North Point Pr

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    Book summary:

    John Thorne's classic first collection is filled with straightforward eating, home cooking, vigorous opinions, and the gracefully intelligent writing that makes him a cult favorite of people who like to think about food.
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  • The Soul of a Chef: The Journey Towards Perfection
    by Michael Ruhlman
    ISBN 067089155X (0-670-89155-X)
    Hardcover, Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated

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    Book summary:

    A fascinating behind-the-scenes look at the restaurant world and the men and women who live to create perfection.

    In 1997, journalist and cook Michael Ruhlman observed incognito the certified Master Chef examination at the Culinary Institute of America, one of the most grueling competitions in the gastronomic world. In his critically acclaimed The Making of a Chef, which Peter Kamisky of The New York Times hailed as "well-reported and heartfelt," Ruhlman offered a vivid and unique portrait of this extraordinary world.

    The Soul of a Chef combines Ruhlman's masterful storytelling with his immense love of food to reveal the men and women whose main goal is to serve food of perfection. Through working and talking with three of the most talented young chefs in the business, Ruhlman takes the reader on a journey past the dark heart of the profession toward the soul of a chef--a journey that takes him into the kitchens of the finest restaurants from the Napa Valley to the Hudson Valley. Here he reveals the collective experience of these men as they all strive to achieve their own level of perfection.

    The Soul of a Chef is a satisfying and fascinating immersion into the hearts and minds of those who undertake the grueling, but richly rewarding pledge to serve only the best. It is a must for gastronomes, prospective chefs, and all lovers of great food. [via]

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  • The Story of Salt
    by Mark Kurlansky, S.D. Schindler
    ISBN 0399239987 (0-399-23998-7)
    Hardcover, Putnam Pub Group

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    Book summary:

    From the team that created the ALA Notable Book The Cod's Tale comes the fascinating history of salt, which has been the object of wars and revolutions and is vital for life.

    Based on Mark Kurlansky's critically acclaimed bestseller Salt: A World History, this handsome picture book explores every aspect of salt: The many ways it's gathered from the earth and sea; how ancient emperors in China, Egypt, and Rome used it to keep their subjects happy; Why salt was key to the Age of Exploration; what salt meant to the American Revolution; And even how the search for salt eventually led to oil. Along the way, you'll meet a Celtic miner frozen in salt, learn how to make ketchup, and even experience salt's finest hour: Gandhi's famous Salt March.

    [via]

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  • Tender at the Bone: Growing Up at the Table
    by Ruth Reichl
    ISBN 0767903382 (0-7679-0338-2)
    Softcover, Bantam Dell Pub Group

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    Book summary:

    New York Times restaurant critic Ruth Reichl shares lessons learned at the hands (and kitchen counters) of family members and friends throughout her life, from growing up with her taste-blind mother to the comfort of cream puffs while away at boarding school on "Mars" (Montreal seemed just as far away) to her most memorable meal, taken on a mountainside in Greece.

    Her stories shine with the voices and recipes of those she has encountered on the way, such as her Aunt Birdie's maid and companion, Alice, who first taught Reichl both the power of cooking and how to make perfect apple dumplings; the family's mysterious patrician housekeeper, Mrs. Peavey, who always remembered to make extra pastry for the beef Wellington; Serafina, the college roommate with whom Reichl explored a time of protest and political and personal discovery; and, finally, cookbook author Marion Cunningham, who, after tales of her midlife struggles and transformation, gave Reichl the strength to overcome her own anxieties.

    Reichl's wry and gentle humor pervades the book, and makes readers feel as if they're right at the table, laughing at one great story after another (and delighting in a gourmet meal at the same time, of course). Reichl's narrative of a life lived and remembered through the palate will stay with the reader long after the last page is turned. [via]

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  • Toast: The Story of a Boy's Hunger
    by Nigel Slater
    ISBN 1592401619 (1-59240-161-9)
    Softcover, Gotham Books

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    Book summary:

    A deliciously evocative story of childhood in 1960s suburban England from one of the United Kingdoms best-loved writers, Nigel Slater

    Toast is the truly extraordinary story of a childhood remembered through food. In each chapter, as Nigel Slater takes us on a tour of the contents of his familys pantryrice pudding, tinned ham, cream soda, mince pies, lemon drops, bourbon biscuitswe are transported&

    His mother is a chops-and-peas sort of cook, exasperated by the highs and lows of a temperamental stove, a finicky little son, and the asthma that would prove fatal. His father is a honey-and-crumpets man with an unpredictable temper. When he is widowed, Nigels father takes on a housekeeper with social aspirations and a talent in the kitchen and the following years become a heartbreaking cooking contest for his affections. As he slowly loses, Nigel finds a new outlet for his culinary gifts and we witness the birth of a lifelong passion for food. Nigels likes and dislikes, aversions and sweet-toothed weaknesses, form a fascinating backdrop to this exceptionally moving memoir of childhood, adolescence, and sexual awakening.

    With a new preface and glossary for American readers, this British bestseller and national award winner is sure to delight foodies and memoir enthusiasts on this side of the pond. Possessed of the subtlety and wit of Ruth Reichls Tender at the Bone and the disarming frankness of Anthony Bourdains page-turning Kitchen Confidential, Toast is a treat to be savored. [via]

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  • The United States of Arugula: How We Became a Gourmet Nation
    by David Kamp
    ISBN 0767915798 (0-7679-1579-8)
    Hardcover, Broadway Books

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    Book summary:

    One day we woke up and realized that our macaroni had become pasta, that our Wonder Bread had been replaced by organic whole wheat, that sushi was fast food, and that our tomatoes were heirlooms. How did all this happen, and who made it happen? The United States of Arugula is the rollicking, revealing chronicle of how gourmet eating in America went from obscure to pervasive, thanks to the contributions of some outsized, opinionated iconoclasts who couldnt abide the status quo.

    Vanity Fair writer David Kamp chronicles this amazing transformation, from the overcooked vegetables and scary gelatin salads of yore to our current heyday of free-range chickens, extra-virgin olive oil, Iron Chef, Whole Foods, Starbucks, and that breed of human known as the foodie. In deft fashion, Kamp conjures up vivid images of the Big Three, the lodestars who led us out of this culinary wilderness: James Beard, the hulking, bald, flamboyant Oregonian who made the case for American cookery; Julia Child, the towering, warbling giantess who demystified French cuisine for Americans; and Craig Claiborne, the melancholy, sexually confused Mississippian who all but invented food journalism at the New York Times. The story continues onward with candid, provocative commentary from the food figures who prospered in the Big Threes wake: Alice Waters and Jeremiah Tower of Berkeleys Chez Panisse, Wolfgang Puck and his L.A. acolytes, the visionary chefs we know by one name (Emeril, Daniel, Mario, Jean-Georges), the Williams in Williams-Sonoma, the Niman in Niman Ranch, both Dean and DeLuca, and many others.

    A rich, frequently uproarious stew of culinary innovation, flavor revelations, balsamic pretensions, taste-making luminaries, food politics, and kitchen confidences, The United States of Arugula is the remarkable history of the cultural success story of our era. [via]

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  • The United States of Arugula: The Sun Dried, Cold Pressed, Dark Roasted, Extra Virgin Story of the American Food Revolution
    by David Kamp
    ISBN 0767915801 (0-7679-1580-1)
    Softcover, Broadway Books

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    Book summary:

    The wickedly entertaining, hunger-inducing, behind-the-scenes story of the revolution in American food that has made exotic ingredients, celebrity chefs, rarefied cooking tools, and destination restaurants familiar aspects of our everyday lives.

    Amazingly enough, just twenty years ago eating sushi was a daring novelty and many Americans had never even heard of salsa. Today, we don't bat an eye at a construction worker dipping a croissant into robust specialty coffee, city dwellers buying just-picked farmstand produce, or suburbanites stocking up on artisanal cheeses and extra virgin oils at supermarkets. The United States of Arugula is a rollicking, revealing stew of culinary innovation, food politics, and kitchen confidences chronicling how gourmet eating in America went from obscure to pervasiveand became the cultural success story of our era.

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  • Shields, John: Untangling My Chopsticks: A Culinary Sojourn in Kyoto
    Untangling My Chopsticks: A Culinary Sojourn in Kyoto
    by John Shields
    ISBN 0767908511 (0-7679-0851-1)
    Hardcover, Broadway Books

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  • Untangling My Chopsticks: A Culinary Sojourn in Kyoto
    by Victoria Abbott Riccardi
    ISBN 076790852X (0-7679-0852-X)
    Softcover, Broadway Books

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    Two years out of college and with a degree from Le Cordon Bleu in Paris, Victoria Riccardi left a boyfriend, a rent-controlled New York City apartment, and a plum job in advertising to move to Kyoto to study kaiseki, the exquisitely refined form of cooking that accompanies the formal Japanese tea ceremony. She arrived in Kyoto, a city she had dreamed about but never seen, with two bags, an open-ended plane ticket, and the ability to speak only sushi-bar Japanese. She left a year later, having learned the language, the art of kaiseki, and what was truly important to her.

    Through special introductions and personal favors, Victoria was able to attend one of Kyotos most prestigious tea schools, where this ago-old Japanese art has been preserved for generations and where she was taken under the wing of an American expatriate who became her mentor in the highly choreographed rituals of this extraordinary culinary discipline.

    During her year in Kyoto, Victoria explored the mysterious and rarefied world of tea kaiseki, living a life inaccessible to most foreigners. She also discovered the beguiling realm of modern-day Japanese foodthe restaurants, specialty shops, and supermarkets. She participated in many fast-disappearing culinary customs, including making mochi (chewy rice cakes) by hand, a beloved family ritual barely surviving in a mechanized age. She celebrated the annual cleansing rites of New Years, donning an elaborate kimono and obi for a thirty-four-course extravaganza. She includes twenty-five recipes for favorite dishes she encountered, such as Chicken and Egg Rice Bowl, Japanese Beef and Vegetable Hotpot, and Green-Tea Cooked Salmon Over Rice.

    Untangling My Chopsticks is a sumptuous journey into the tastes, traditions, and exotic undercurrents of Japan. It is also a coming-of-age tale steeped in history and ancient customs, a thoughtful meditation on life, love, and learning in another land.

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  • Fisher, Mary Frances Kennedy: With Bold Knife and Fork
    With Bold Knife and Fork
    by Mary Frances Kennedy Fisher
    ISBN 1582431876 (1-58243-187-6)
    Hardcover, Counterpoint

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