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LAST CHANCE TO EAT

Name: LAST CHANCE TO EAT
Author: Gina Mallet
ISBN: 0-393-05841-7

THE FATE OF TASTE IN A FAST FOOD WORLD

by Gina Mallet ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 9, 2004

Pessimistic, protracted lament for the death of food.

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In a wistful memoir of her British/American upbringing, a food writer for the Canadian National Post urges us to grab all the flavor we can while we still can.

It should come as no surprise to anyone who has a palate that the industrial processes of bringing three squares a day to the modern world, particularly in the US, tend increasingly to suppress flavor and freshness in foods in favor of such economic factors as overcoming the rigors of mass distribution and insuring longer shelf life. Add the repeated blows from this doctor’s or that university’s medical research confirming once again that what tastes best is bad for you, and there’s no more familiar phrase to the average American food shopper than, “You just can’t get that anymore.” Mallet, unfortunately, chooses to commiserate and document the trend in terms of long-suffering favorites (her first hundred pages are on eggs alone) rather than flesh out any kind of battle plan. Yet her nostalgia may well assist those with a few decades of what passes for gourmandise here in the colonies in realizing how far indeed we’ve strayed from pastoral European ideals like, say, cheeses made from the milk of a single farmer’s herd of cows bred to the task of producing butterfat sans interference from any national health ministry. The author has in fact beaten the bushes to find full-flavored alternatives from free-range egg producers to “illegal” raw-milk cheeses sold over the Internet and “beef boutiques” offering the same Scottish Highland cattle meat that the Queen of England prefers. She also scatters some nostalgic recipes with authentique ingredients along the way, including English clotted cream and sole Meunière. Most instructive: documentation of health research flip-flops that have indicted and hence crippled the markets for food favorites, then later exonerated said favorites.

Pessimistic, protracted lament for the death of food.

Pub Date: Aug. 9, 2004

ISBN: 0-393-05841-7

Page Count: 384

Publisher: Norton

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2004

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

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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.