Essays Books

Everyday Drinking: The Distilled Kingsley Amis

Kingsley Amis

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 5 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

One Drunk Englishman 5 out of 5 stars.
27 of 31 people found this review helpful.

If you're interested in reading about the drinking life, where better to start than with a collection of writings on drink by Kingsley Amis, introduced by Christopher Hitchens? Though it weighs in at a mere 3.2 ounces, "Everyday Drinking" offers up enough drinking experience to float an aircraft carrier.

The book comprises three Amis titles. "On Drink" (1972) is a kind of informal treatise on drinking. "Every Day Drinking" (1983) is a collection of columns. "How's Your Glass?" (1984) is a set of drinking quizzes.

Though Amis provides a good bit of technical information and asks readers to produce no end of less-than-necessary information in the quizzes (he asks us to name a liqueur made with naartjies, for example), the main pleasures of "Everyday Drinking" are to be found in Amis's description of the drinking *life* and in his sublimely crotchety sense of humor.

Some people will object that Amis's repeated grousing about music in pubs is quaint, reactionary, and ridiculous. Such people are entitled to their opinions, of course, just as the rest of us are entitled to point out that such people are either drug-addled hipsters or ill-bred morons.

For those of you out there who are neither drug-addled hipsters nor ill-bred morons, here are a few choice sips of Amis:

* On the necessity of having a refrigerator to oneself: "Wives and such are constantly filling up any refrigerator they have a claim on, even its ice compartment, with irrelevant rubbish like food."

* On being a cheapskate of a host: "In preparing a gin and tonic, for instance, put the tonic and the ice and a thick slice of lemon in first and pour on them a thimbleful of gin *over the back of a spoon*, so it will linger near the surface and give a strong-tasting first sip, which is the one that counts."

* On the claim that the Irish taught the Scots the process of distillation: "The idea of a medieval Irishman inventing a rather complicated technique like that of distilling, or anything at all for that matter, is hard to credit."

* On Galliano: "Another Italian liqueur, Galliano, has gained a good deal of ground over the last few years, not as a drink on its own but as a constituent of the famous or infamous cocktail the Harvey Wallbanger, named after some reeling idiot in California."

* On drinking with wine snobs: "If asked what you think [about the wine], say breezily, 'Jolly good,' as though you always say that whatever it's like. This may suggest that your mind's on higher things than wine, like gin or sex."

Amis might be accused of being a bit harsh at times, as when he claims that the Pina Colada is "[j]ust the thing for the 95-IQ female" and that drinking lager and lime is "an exit application from the human race," but you have to admire a man who defends his convictions with such vigor. As someone who has been known to toss back lots (and lots) of Pina Coladas *and* lagers with lime when the weather's hot, I am more than willing to endure Amis's ridicule in exchange for the pleasure of having him ridicule wine snobs and Canadians.

He ridicules Canadians in a loving way, of course, just as he ridicules the Irish, Americans, and Kingsley Amis. As for wine snobs, they deserve their ridicule neat.

My one complaint about the book is that the introduction is on the short side. Hitchens is as entertaining as Amis, and an even better crafter of sentences, and I would have enjoyed a few more pages. Must have been pushing a deadline. Or running up against cocktail hour.

Editorial Review:

A gift for anyone who loves good liquor and high-proof prose: a collection of hilarious and deeply informed writings about drink from one of the all-time authorities.
Kingsley Amis was one of the great masters of comic prose, and no subject was dearer to him than the art and practice of imbibing. This new volume brings together the best of his three out-of-print works on the subject. Along with a series of well-tested recipes (including a cocktail called the Lucky Jim) the book includes Amis’s musings on The Hangover, The Boozing Man’s Diet, What to Drink with What, and (presumably as a matter of speculation) How Not to Get Drunk—all leavened with fun quizzes on the making and drinking of alcohol all over the world. Mixing practical know-how and hilarious opinionation, this is a delightful cocktail of wry humor and distilled knowledge, served by one of our great gimlet wits.

On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen

Harold McGee

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 163 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Technical but fascinating 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

This is probably more than the home cook ever wants to know but what a great reference book! It dispels lots of myths that bedevil the kitchen and are still spouted by too many TV chefs. For factual information it can't be beaten and I keep it to hand for a quick check whenever I am unsure of what to do with a recipe.

A True Classic 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

Not available in bookshops here, it took me a while to track down this much praised book, now in a 2004 updated edition. It can be read at many levels: history, folk lore, chemistry and just marvellous explanations of the 'why' of cooking. It must hold great appeal for anyone with a curiosity about the food we eat and what we do to it, for better or worse.

I found it well written with an easy style, making it a genuine pleasure to read, to skim and to quote. And you will quote. It's that kind of book.

Despite its sober title and apparent depth of research, this is no dreary treatise. The explanations are generally easy to understand and often amusing. While some distant memory of high school chemistry may be useful, the author assumes no knowledge of food sciences on the part of the reader. The last section of the book further brushes up on all the chemistry you have chosen to forget.

Food industry professionals may find the book's format perhaps a bit wandering, making it somewhat clunky for rapid retrieval of specific technical information. As a lay person I can't vouch for its academic rigour, but it does include a long list of references and an extensive index.

A book with over 800 pages about food but with no real recipes does sound daunting, but not so. It's full of those "Wow. So that's why... listen to this!" moments that can get just a little trying for everyone else in the room. I realise how much food instruction I have taken at face value in the past. I will never view the humble egg quite the same way again.

And of course, as an added bonus, the book makes a perfect weight to put on top of the Summer Pudding as it sets. It doesn't even show the stains. McGee really has thought of everything.

Editorial Review:

A classic tome of gastronomic science and lore, On Food and Cooking delivers an erudite discussion of table ingredients and their interactions with our bodies. Following the historical, literary, scientific and practical treatment of foodstuffs from dairy to meat to vegetables, McGee explains the nature of digestion and hunger before tackling basic ingredient components, cooking methods and utensils. He explains what happens when food spoils, why eggs are so nutritious and how alcohol makes us drunk. As fascinating as it is comprehensive, this is as practical, interesting and necessary for the cook as for the scholar.

Secret Ingredients: The New Yorker Book of Food and Drink

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 8 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Since its earliest days, The New Yorker has been a tastemaker–literally. As the home of A. J. Liebling, Joseph Wechsberg, and M.F.K. Fisher, who practically invented American food writing, the magazine established a tradition that is carried forward today by irrepressible literary gastronomes, including Calvin Trillin, Bill Buford, Adam Gopnik, Jane Kramer, and Anthony Bourdain. Now, in this indispensable collection, The New Yorker dishes up a feast of delicious writing on food and drink, seasoned with a generous dash of cartoons.

Whether you’re in the mood for snacking on humor pieces and cartoons or for savoring classic profiles of great chefs and great eaters, these offerings, from every age of The New Yorker’s fabled eighty-year history, are sure to satisfy every taste. There are memoirs, short stories, tell-alls, and poems–ranging in tone from sweet to sour and in subject from soup to nuts.

M.F.K. Fisher pays homage to “cookery witches,” those mysterious cooks who possess “an uncanny power over food,” while John McPhee valiantly trails an inveterate forager and is rewarded with stewed persimmons and white-pine-needle tea. There is Roald Dahl’s famous story “Taste,” in which a wine snob’s palate comes in for some unwelcome scrutiny, and Julian Barnes’s ingenious tale of a lifelong gourmand who goes on a very peculiar diet for still more peculiar reasons. Adam Gopnik asks if French cuisine is done for, and Calvin Trillin investigates whether people can actually taste the difference between red wine and white. We journey with Susan Orlean as she distills the essence of Cuba in the story of a single restaurant, and with Judith Thurman as she investigates the arcane practices of Japan’s tofu masters. Closer to home, Joseph Mitchell celebrates the old New York tradition of the beefsteak dinner, and Mark Singer shadows the city’s foremost fisherman-chef.

Selected from the magazine’s plentiful larder, Secret Ingredients celebrates all forms of gustatory delight.

The Nasty Bits: Collected Varietal Cuts, Usable Trim, Scraps, and Bones

Anthony Bourdain

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 67 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Entertaining as ever 3 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

Bourdain's perspective is always hysterical and fun to read. Yet interesting and insightful. Reminded me of a harsher version of kitchen confidential with a slightly sad feeling throughout. Or better yet a blend of kitchen confidential and a cook's tour. If you're a Bourdain fan, then you must read it. It's always great to hear his voice and stories.

Good read 4 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

As a book of short articles I can read this book at any time, finish the article and walk away either chuckling to myself or going "wow, that's true" Especially the article about obesity and eating habits.

Editorial Review:

In the multiweek New York Times bestseller The Nasty Bits, bestselling chef and No Reservations host Anthony Bourdain serves up a well-seasoned hellbroth of candid, often outrageous stories from his worldwide misadventures. Whether surviving a lethal hot pot in Chengdu, splurging on New York’s priciest sushi, or singing the praises of Ecuadorian line cooks and Hell’s Kitchen dives, Bourdain is as provocative, engaging, and opinionated as ever. The Nasty Bits is an irresistible tasting menu of food writing at its outrageous best—served up Bourdain style.

The Fortune Cookie Chronicles: Adventures in the World of Chinese Food

Jennifer 8 Lee

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 38 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

A Peek into the Hidden World Behind Chinese Restaurant Dining Rooms 4 out of 5 stars.
0 of 1 people found this review helpful.

Jennifer Lee answers many mysteries in this book that may have interested you. (Where do all those Chinese people come from who work in the restaurants? How did fortune cookies get started? Who writes the fortunes? What is the real origin of Chop Suey?) For those answers, it's worth reading the book.

Her lens is a most unusual one: She visits Chinese restaurants where lottery winners got fortunes that gave them the numbers they used to win an unprecedented number of second prizes.

What she learns is that Chinese food as prepared and eaten in the United States says more about Americans than it does about the Chinese. She also shows how self-organizing principles (from complexity theory) apply to explain why Chinese restaurants are so similar.

Ultimately, this book describes what it means to be human and to want a better life. In that sense, it's very life affirming.

I found that the book had two major drawbacks. First, Ms. Lee chooses to tell you the story of how she tracked down her answers rather than cutting through the preliminaries. I found much of her research reporting to be less interesting than the punch lines when finally reached.

Second, I wondered how competent she was in doing this research. She seemed to rely a lot on interviewing people face to face. Surely, a lot of answers could have been gotten in other ways. Where I became most skeptical was in her section on picking the best Chinese restaurant in the world. One of her criteria was that lots of Chinese people eat there. I have Chinese-American friends who take me to many superb, attractive (as opposed to "hole in the wall") Chinese restaurants where my wife and I are the only non-Chinese Americans in the place. None of these restaurants were mentioned by Ms. Lee. She didn't even visit the cities where our favorite Chinese restaurants are such as Honolulu.

Editorial Review:

If you think McDonald's is the most ubiquitous restaurant experience in America, consider that there are more Chinese restaurants in America than McDonalds, Burger Kings, and Wendys combined. New York Times reporter and Chinese-American (or American-born Chinese). In her search, Jennifer 8 Lee traces the history of Chinese-American experience through the lens of the food. In a compelling blend of sociology and history, Jenny Lee exposes the indentured servitude Chinese restaurants expect from illegal immigrant chefs, investigates the relationship between Jews and Chinese food, and weaves a personal narrative about her own relationship with Chinese food. The Fortune Cookie Chronicles speaks to the immigrant experience as a whole, and the way it has shaped our country.

Bottomfeeder: How to Eat Ethically in a World of Vanishing Seafood

Taras Grescoe

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 4 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

An eye-opening look at aquaculture that does for seafood what Fast Food Nation did for beef.

Dividing his sensibilities between Epicureanism and ethics, Taras Grescoe set out on a nine-month, worldwide search for a delicious—and humane—plate of seafood. What he discovered shocked him. From North American Red Lobsters to fish farms and research centers in China, Bottomfeeder takes readers on an illuminating tour through the $55-billion-dollar-a-year seafood industry. Grescoe examines how out-of-control pollution, unregulated fishing practices, and climate change affect what ends up on our plate. More than a screed against a multibillion-dollar industry, however, this is also a balanced and practical guide to eating, as Grescoe explains to readers which fish are best for our environment, our seas, and our bodies.

At once entertaining and illuminating, Bottomfeeder is a thoroughly enjoyable look at the world’s cuisines and an examination of the fishing and farming practices we too easily take for granted.

Hamburger America: One Man's Cross-Country Odyssey to Find the Best Burgers in the Nation [DVD]

George M. Motz

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 5 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Essential Americana reading and a fantastic guidebook for the perfect food 5 out of 5 stars.
8 of 8 people found this review helpful.

I first saw Motz's documentary Hamburger America (which is included with the book) and was amazed on how he captured more than just places that serve a mean hamburger. Every place he went in the film gave you a look at different types of Americans, their history, their future and all held together by the love of America's favorite food. The book builds upon that. Each entry is written with admiration for the burger, the restaurant and the people that cook them. By visiting different cities, cultures, races, and histories of the many burger joints in this book, Motz is able to bring them altogether on one theme: they all make a great burger. And isn't that what America is about? This hodgepodge of cultures in one place looking for the dream, can all be united by ground beef in a bun. Forget the mass produced fast food chains. It's the local mom and pops, diners, decades old places that Americans hold true to their heart. It was written that if you don't claim your hometown greasy spoon as serving the best burger, then you're a wimp. Well this book covers many of those hometown favorites. Even if you do not especially like hamburgers, this book is essential for reading on American folk-life and its wonderful people.

Editorial Review:

Whether you're an armchair traveler, a serious hamburger connoisseur, or a curious adventurer up for a road trip, Hamburger America will be your guide to reclaiming this precious slice of Americana. No other food says “America” like the hamburger, and documentary filmmaker George Motz has made it his personal mission to save our nation's unique burger identity. He has traveled across the country in search of the best burger joints - those that have survived outside the fast-food mainstream - and has documented their rich histories and one-of-a-kind taste experiences. This edition of the book includes George Motz's 1 hour documentary “Hamburger America” that profiles 8 burger joints across the USA.

American Pie: My Search for the Perfect Pizza

Peter Reinhart

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 39 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Baking bread is mysterious enough. But creating truly great pizza--the transformation of next to nothing into something extraordinary--is downright alchemical. It is for no small reason that there are distinct words in Italian for those disciples of these mystic arts who bake pizza and focaccia, pizzaiolo and focacciaiolo. Peter Reinhart, he who gave us Brother Juniper's Bread Book and the multi-award winning The Bread Baker's Apprentice, takes the reader of American Pie: My Search for the Perfect Pizza right into the heart of the matter.

Reinhart begins his inquiry into pizza with his baseline palate memory for what a great pizza should be. As a teenager he had worked in a pizzeria, Mama's, and instinctively knew this pie to be the best. Returning as an adult years later, he discovered otherwise. Had he changed, or had the pizza changed? Both, it happened, were true.

So what is the nature of perfection, and where do you go to find it? In the case of Peter Reinhart, this journey includes travels through Italy and across the US. This is Part One of the book, called The Hunt. It's not the most enlivening travel writing, which would have helped elevate the insights into the nature of great pizza and the people who make it happen. But it's only a third of the entire package. The best is yet to come. In Part Two: The Recipes, Reinhart comes entirely into his own. Here is the master at work. Chapters include "The Family of Doughs", "Sauces and Specialty Toppings," and "The Pizzas." Reinhart gives you the building blocks, no matter what your kitchen, tools, and oven might be like. And then he unfolds the roadmap--pizzas from the strictly classical to the strictly whimsical.

Work diligently with American Pie and in time you will be able to call yourself, without hesitation or rising color, pizzaiolo and focacciaiolo. --Schuyler Ingle

Shark's Fin and Sichuan Pepper: A Sweet-Sour Memoir of Eating in China

Fuchsia Dunlop

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 7 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

A new memoir by the most talented and respected British food writer of her generation.

Award-winning food writer Fuchsia Dunlop went to live in China as a student in 1994, and from the very beginning she vowed to eat everything she was offered, no matter how alien and bizarre it seemed. In this extraordinary memoir, Fuchsia recalls her evolving relationship with China and its food, from her first rapturous encounter with the delicious cuisine of Sichuan Province to brushes with corruption, environmental degradation, and greed. In the course of her fascinating journey, Fuchsia undergoes an apprenticeship at China's premier Sichuan cooking school, where she is the only foreign student in a class of nearly fifty young Chinese men; attempts, hilariously, to persuade Chinese people that "Western food" is neither "simple" nor "bland"; and samples a multitude of exotic ingredients, including sea cucumber, civet cat, scorpion, rabbit-heads, and the ovarian fat of the snow frog. But is it possible for a Westerner to become a true convert to the Chinese way of eating? In an encounter with a caterpillar in an Oxford kitchen, Fuchsia is forced to put this to the test.

From the vibrant markets of Sichuan to the bleached landscape of northern Gansu Province, from the desert oases of Xinjiang to the enchanting old city of Yangzhou, this unique and evocative account of Chinese culinary culture is set to become the most talked-about travel narrative of the year.

Kitchen Table Wisdom 10th Anniversary

Rachel Naomi Remen

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 10 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Must Reading 5 out of 5 stars.
4 of 4 people found this review helpful.

Kitchen Table Wisdom: Stories That Heal
I was given a copy of this book by a colleague many years ago. I only recently read it for the first time, and I now realize what a wonderful gift I received. I know I will reread this book and refer to it many times. The subtitle explains it: "Stories That Heal." I cannot imagine that anyone reading this book thoughtfully would not be deeply rewarded for the time spent. I very rarely have read something that I would recommend to EVERYBODY, but this is one book I WILL recommend to everybody. Epiphany, anyone? File under "Guide for Living Well."

Editorial Review:

Praised by everyone from Bernie Siegel to Daniel Goleman to Larry Dossey, Rachel Remen has a unique perspective on healing rooted in her background as a physician, a professor of medicine, a therapist, and a long-term survivor of chronic illness. In a deeply moving and down-to-earth collection of true stories, this prominent physician shows us life in all its power and mystery and reminds us that the things we cannot measure may be the things that ultimately sustain and enrich our lives.