What do we make of Michael Pollan’s seventh book, Cooked? Is it, as the subtitle suggests, a “natural history” which examines the science and paleoanthropology of cooking? Is it, as many of Pollan’s promotional interviews suggest, a polemic and a manual which tells us how and when to cook in order to repair the social fabric and national health of the United States? Is it a memoir of meals past, with ample nostalgia for a simpler time measured out with head-shaking over the bustle of the modern world? Is it the foodie equivalent of a travelogue, tracing the author’s encounters with cooking techniques in such exotic locales as Korea, Portugal, and North Carolina? Is it an intellectual history of cookery, attempting to establish the cerebral value of the culinary arts through the theories of French anthropologists and philosophers? Or do this book and its promotional tie-ins comprise an elaborately executed piece of multimedia performance art, a parody of the foodie intellectual on the level of Joaquin Phoenix growing a beard and releasing a rap album?
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Category Archives: Bookshelf
Every Grain of Rice
Simple Chinese cooking that's better, healthier, and (almost) easier than takeout
by Marisa McClellan
My grandma Bunny had a rule about dining out. She believed that if you were going to eat at a restaurant, you had to choose one that served food that you weren’t able to make at home. In Bunny’s case, that meant that she passed on the Italian and American joints in her neighborhood and opted instead for Mexican, Vietnamese, and Chinese.
This always seemed to be me to be sound advice and so, throughout my adulthood, I’ve always made a point to seek out restaurants serving food that was outside my own skills as a cook.
I’ve always found Chinese food to be a particularly mysterious cuisine to cook at home, with all the different sauces, spices, and fermented condiments. So in the past, when I’ve had a craving for flavorful beef with tender crisp broccoli, or cold, spicy noodles, I reached for the takeout menu. MORE
Higher Vegucation
Stuck in a veggie slump? Vegetable Literacy can help
by Marisa McClellan
I have been in something of a cooking slump since mid-February. When the Brussels sprouts first arrived in late fall, I bought them by the stalk and brandished them joyfully. Now, I recoil slightly at the bin of sprouts at Iovine’s. I’ve been similarly unmoved by potatoes, kale, and dense winter squashes for weeks.
I thought it was simply a general weariness with winter that was causing my resentment towards the available produce. However, now I realize that I was simply suffering from the effects of a rut – because since a copy of Deborah Madison’s new book, Vegetable Literacy, arrived last week, I have found myself picking up beets, carrots, and onions with fresh inspiration and no small amount of giddiness.
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Mac Attack
Creative twists on a crowd-pleasing classic
by Marisa McClellan
I was 12 years old when I learned that macaroni and cheese didn’t have to come from a box. Until that point, mac and cheese was something that my mom bought occasionally and tucked away for those evenings when my sister and I were home with a babysitter. It was cheaper than a pizza and even a 15 year old with basic cooking skills could make it. We never had mac and cheese made from scratch because my mom could not bear to sit down to a meal that starred a dish made solely of noodles and cheese.
Then one night, an old friend of my parents’ came to visit, with four of her six children in tow. After a quick glance at our pantry, Lusana began to make a colossal batch of homemade macaroni and cheese to feed the kids. I watched in fascination as she made a creamy sauce, poured it over broken spaghetti noodles (it was what we had) and baked it until it bubbled and browned. A single bite and I was forever sold. MORE
DIY Junk Food
A new book helps you recreate your childhood favorites
by Marisa McClellan
When I was eight years old, my family moved from Southern California to a cozy neighborhood in Portland, Oregon. To my young mind, there were a number of good things about our move, but none was more tantalizing than the fact that for the first time in my life, there was a small market a few blocks away that I could get to entirely on my own steam. Suddenly a world of candy and store-bought snacks opened to me.
My friends and I would meet after school and ride our bikes to the “Little Store” to buy boxes of Cheez-Its or packets of Lik-M-Aid. From there, we’d go back to the playground, where we could sit on the swings and gobble our spoils. For a girl who had previously been led to believe that homemade popcorn and baked tortilla chips were the highest form of snackage, it was revelatory.
Whole Grains for a New Generation
Kick off 2013 with delicious, healthy home cooking
by Marisa McClellan
The arrival of the New Year means that it’s time for clean slates and refreshed habits. I always look forward to January as a chance to reset and start being a little more intentional about how I spend my time and what I eat. For me, this means getting a little more sleep and reintroducing vegetables and whole grains into my kitchen. (I have a bad habit of losing all restraint during the holiday season.)
In past years, redoubling my whole grain efforts has mostly meant that I eat a lot of sautes with brown rice, pots of vegetable soup with barley, and slabs of salmon over quinoa. While moderately healthy, tasty, and filling, these meals aren’t particularly inspired or exciting.
This year is different, thanks to Liana Krisoff’s new book, Whole Grains for a New Generation. As follow-up to her book Canning for a New Generation, this volume contains whole grain recipes for every meal of the day. It’s one of those books that made me want to leap up and start cooking. So far, I’ve made four recipes from it and I have at least another 20 earmarked for the very near future. MORE
Learning to Love Winter
A cookbook to banish the winter blues
by Marisa McClellan
Each year, as the days shorten and the nights get increasingly frigid, the hours I clock in the kitchen take a drastic tick upward. I crave braises, soups, and hearty baked goods to combat the chilly darkness.
This season, the cookbook I’m turning to again and again for these cozy, warming dishes is Yvette Van Boven’s Homemade Winter. A follow-up to her first book, which was simply called, Homemade, this second volume is bursting with beautifully imperfect photography, charming line drawings, and enticingly seasonal recipes.
One of the things that makes this book so darn special is its visual appeal. Van Boven is a Dutch food stylist, freelance writer, and designer. Instead of handing her recipes and content over to a team of folks (which is how it typically works in publishing), she created each and every page in the book (using photography by her husband Oof Verschuren). The end result is a volume that feels personal and intimate, more like a family scrapbook than a traditional cookbook. MORE
Party Like a Vegetarian
A new book puts produce at the center of the celebration
by Marisa McClellan
Like so many folks these days, my husband and I have been trying to reduce the amount of meat we eat. We were both raised in families for whom animal protein was nearly always at the center of the plate and so this shift has required some retraining. We’ve had to change our understanding of mains and sides, and learn how to transform basic vegetable preparations into dishes that are both satiating and satisfying.
Happily, there’ve have been a number of cookbooks published in recent years that focuses on helping meat-eaters learn these skills and tricks. One author of such cookbooks is Kim O’Donnel. In 2010, she published The Meat Lover’s Meatless Cookbook: Vegetarian Recipes Carnivores Will Devour and, last month, followed it up with The Meat Lover’s Meatless Celebrations: Year-Round Vegetarian Feasts (You Can Really Sink Your Teeth Into). MORE
Not Your Mama’s Cookies
Win a copy of Hedy Goldsmith's new cookbook, Baking Out Loud
by Marisa McClellan
When it comes to home baking, I tend to be utilitarian. I can turn out a serviceable loaf of banana bread, am fairly comfortable with basic yeast doughs and make a mean oatmeal chocolate chip cookie. However, once I stray beyond my familiar territory, things often go sideways.
It’s not that I’m not interested in more adventurous baking, I simply haven’t had much luck when I’ve tried things like homemade Oreo-style sandwich cookies (the filling separated and tasted like a grease slick) and many-layered cakes (never has a baked good so resembled the leaning tower of Pisa). And while even the ugliest disaster can still be delicious, it’s nice when you find that sweet spot of both visual and palatable success.
Knowing this, you’ll understand that I approached Hedy Goldsmith’s Baking Out Loud with both excitement and a little trepidation. Goldsmith is a pastry chef based in Miami, Florida, who is known for making over-the-top versions of familiar treats (like Twinkies and Cracker Jacks) and her glossy, beautifully photographed first book contains many of the items that have made her famous throughout the South. MORE
Eat the City
A new book takes a look into our shared food culture
by Mary Sydnor
Living across the street from three pizza places, a Mexican restaurant, and a 7-11, I know how easily accessible food is. And I love it. I love being able to crave a taco and satiate that craving in less than 10 minutes. I love waking up at 1 a.m. and walking across the street for some cheesecake. And, I don’t admit this often, but I love rolling out of bed on a Saturday and walking to 7-11 for a box of Entenmann’s doughnuts and then downing half of them.
I’m like most Americans. I’ll never have to know what it’s like to live off the land… but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to. And I’m certainly not the only who has dreamed of capturing that feeling by making artisan food products the old fashioned way. The real-life beekeepers, butchers, and brewers profiled in Robin Shulman‘s new book, Eat the City have turned that dream into a reality.
New York City might be as partial as any other city of young hip people to follow the local and organic trends and we know it’s home to some of the best chefs and restaurants in the world. But, at the end of the day, it’s still a city, right? There’s only so much elbowroom for “homegrown” available and one would think “local” still referred to food culled from beyond its borders. MORE