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AMERICAN APPETITE

Name: AMERICAN APPETITE
Author: Leslie Brenner
ISBN: 0-380-97336-7

THE COMING OF AGE OF A CUISINE

by Leslie Brenner ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 6, 1999

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A witty and sumptuous pantry-level look at the struggle to create an American cuisine. Brenner (The Art of the Cocktail Party, not reviewed) is no mere foodie but a solid cultural historian who attacks, with hilarity, early American hunting and gathering—that is, the long period before celebrity chefs, restaurants too good to get into, and the Food Network. Puritan antipathy to pleasure and an antiseptic fear of disease made icons of Campbell’s soup, tasteless but convenient iceberg lettuce, and Crisco oil, Brenner writes. “The American housewife had been thoroughly persuaded, by this point [the 1950s] that cooking was a drag; new convenience foods offered a no-muss, no-fuss solution.” The Los Angeles of the author’s childhood was “a culinary wasteland” of shrink-wrapped meats in ketchup with perfect, flavorless fruits and vegetables, though the youthful Brenner found it “fun” to put chicken drumsticks in a lunchbag for Shake ‘n’ Bake or to indulge in the “vaguely chemical aftertaste” of Reddi-Whip. The first shot in the American culinary revolution, she asserts, was fired with the publication of Mastering the Art of French Cooking, co-authored by Julia Child (later our first TV cook). The uprising took half a century to do in Betty Crocker, but the new taste for things French eased the nation’s xenophobia regarding foreign foods. In the decades of border-crossing that followed, Americans tried Polynesian, Italian, Chinese, Greek, Indian, Mexican, Thai, Japanese, and, after a while, any cuisine indecipherable enough to be exotic. Today, notes Brenner, chic food art, celebrity chefs, and trendy patrons are so important that we must wonder if people go to hot restaurants “to enjoy the food or tell about it later.” Does such media-mixing add up to a true American cuisine?, Brenner ringingly says yes, citing regional successes like California wines, Maine lobster, and Pacific Rim cooking. Even dieters will be unable to resist this gourmet repast on American culture.

Pub Date: April 6, 1999

ISBN: 0-380-97336-7

Page Count: 304

Publisher: Avon/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1999

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE FOURTH STAR
by Leslie Brenner

- BOOK REVIEW
GREETINGS FROM THE GOLDEN STATE
by Leslie Brenner

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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.