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CHOICE CUTS

Name: CHOICE CUTS
Author: Mark Kurlansky
ISBN: 0-345-45710-2

A SAVORY SELECTION OF FOOD WRITING FROM AROUND THE WORLD AND THROUGHOUT HISTORY

edited by Mark Kurlansky ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 1, 2002

An exhaustive and lively assemblage, best for snacking rather than gorging.

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Bestselling food historian Kurlansky (Salt, 2002, etc.) collects writing from two millennia that describes with wit and zest cooks, cooking, and cuisines.

Dividing the book into such sections as “Memorable Meals,” and “Their Just Desserts,” Kurlansky relies on a range of authors from Martial to Orwell. In his introduction, he suggests that writing about food has always been as much about culture, philosophy, and natural history, a way for writers to approach “the fundamental subjects of the human condition.” Many of the selections in this comprehensive collection support his point. Celebrating the delights of mint sauce, new potatoes, brown bread, and marmalade, George Orwell characteristically adds that they are all splendid, if you can pay for them. Plutarch, profiling the great gourmand Lucullus, details how this once famous statesman and general in his declining years spent his days (and money) on ostentatiously extravagant feasts. Selections from familiar food writers like M.F.K. Fisher, Elizabeth David, and James Beard cover topics as varied as bachelor cooking, hot chocolate, and the garlic press, which David asserts is both ridiculous and pathetic. More unexpected are the extracts from Thoreau on cranberries and watermelon, Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings on okra and Hush Puppies, and Hemingway on fishing in the Seine. Early cookbook authors like Hannah Glass, Fanny Farmer, and Mrs. Beeton are frequently cited on apple pies, endives, and potatoes; commentators from the 14th, 15th, and 16th centuries add their observations on salt-making (Aobo Tu), olive oil (Platina), and spinach (Giacomo Castelvetro). There are essays on truffles, the preparing of a royal feast (at least 6,000 eggs for each day of the feast), and the best chocolate (found in France according to Brillat-Savarin). Extracts describing the ordinary (bread and scrambled eggs) as well as the exotic (bird nest soup and stuffed dormice) complement more generalized writing on national tastes or the politics and meaning of food.

An exhaustive and lively assemblage, best for snacking rather than gorging.

Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2002

ISBN: 0-345-45710-2

Page Count: 496

Publisher: Ballantine

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2002

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE CORE OF AN ONION
by Mark Kurlansky

- BOOK REVIEW
BIG LIES
by Mark Kurlansky ; illustrated by Eric Zelz

- BOOK REVIEW
THE UNREASONABLE VIRTUE OF FLY FISHING
by Mark Kurlansky

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NUTCRACKER

by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996

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This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)

Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996

ISBN: 0-15-100227-4

Page Count: 136

Publisher: Harcourt

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER AND THE MOUSE KING
by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER
by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis

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TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955

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An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.