Summer make-ahead food
So I've discovered a new favorite summer breakfast! I found it in The Family Cooks, which is the latest adorably packaged, make-your-family-eat-better idea book. It's "Fresh, Fruity Summer Porridge" - basically a kind…
Susie
May cookbook roundup
Every month Susie Chang reviews new cookbook releases and notes trends in the United States. And she may also occasionally throw in a review of a "not-quite cookbook." And for our non-U.S. members, Jane and Fiona…
Impulse buys!
Just the other day I was reminiscing with friends about what it felt like to shop for The Perfect Thing - that feeling of exhilaration and delight! the thrill of the hunt! It was reminiscing because as I've gotten…
Wanderers
Eat. Travel. Write a cookbook. It's not a common formula in these tight-belted days, but every once in a while some intrepid spirit pulls it off. Some come by it through mixed heritage, like Tessa Kiros of Falling…
Fancy franks
"Eat your Coney Island," says Ryan O'Neal to then-10-year-old Tatum O'Neal in the bittersweet 1973 comedy Paper Moon, itself set during the Great Depression. Coney Island? I thought. What's he talking about? That's a…
One True Recipe . . . or a Rainbow Mosaic?
Sometimes people ask me, "What's your favorite food?" which is ridiculously hard to answer, of course, as any EYB member knows. If we didn't love all kinds of food, we wouldn't have all kinds of cookbooks, and if we…
Food writers and their books
This week, Ruth Reichl's Delicious! arrived in the mail - her first novel, though far from her first book. I've been getting press releases for at least six months, so it wasn't a surprise. But with the Beard book…
April 2014 cookbook roundup
Every month Susie Chang reviews new cookbook releases and notes trends in the United States. And she may also occasionally throw in a review of a "not-quite cookbook." And for our non-U.S. members, Jane and Fiona…
Cookbooks as teachers
Do you remember what it was like when you first learned to cook? And you had to learn everything for the first time, whether it was jointing a chicken or roasting a pepper? Now, you probably aren't even aware of just…
Spring resolutions...and the books to go with them
I finally got into the garden this weekend - anybody else? It wasn't much of a start, but I put in arugula and spinach, favas and peas. It's the start of the growing season, when there's nary a weed or a pest (except…
Let's Talk Lunch
As I write this, I'm thinking about lunch, one of the three highlights of my day. Dinner is recipe testing, breakfast is usually the same thing every day, but lunch is.....a mystery. Sometimes (often) it's leftovers…
What's up with France?!
I thought it was my imagination at first, but book after book seems to insist: France is back - in case you ever thought it went away. Maybe it's because we're all sick of winter and dreaming springtime-in-Paris dreams.…