Choice Cuts: A Savory Selection of Food Writing from Around the World and Throughout History“Every once in awhile a writer of particular skills takes a fresh, seemingly improbable idea and turns out a book of pure delight.” That’s how David McCullough described Mark Kurlansky’s Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World, a work that revealed how a meal can be as important as it is edible. Salt: A World History, its successor, did the same for a seasoning, and confirmed Kurlansky as one of our most erudite and entertaining food authors. Now, the winner of the James Beard Award for Excellence in Food Writing shares a varied selection of “choice cuts” by others, as he leads us on a mouthwatering culinary tour around the world and through history and culture from the fifth century B.C. to the present day. Choice Cuts features more than two hundred pieces, from Cato to Cab Calloway. Here are essays by Plato on the art of cooking . . . Pablo Neruda on french fries . . . Alice B. Toklas on killing a carp . . . M. F. K. Fisher on the virility of Turkish desserts . . . Alexandre Dumas on coffee . . . W. H. Auden on Icelandic food . . . Elizabeth David on the downward march of English pizza . . . Claude Lévi-Strauss on “the idea of rotten” . . . James Beard on scrambled eggs . . . Balzac, Virginia Woolf, E. M. Forster, Chekhov, and many other famous gourmands and gourmets, accomplished cooks, or just plain ravenous writers on the passions of cuisine. |
Contents
CHAPTER TWOFood and Sex | |
CHAPTER THREEMemorable Meals | |
CHAPTER FOURFavorite Restaurants | |
CHAPTER FIVEMarkets | |
CHAPTER SIXNot Eating | |
CHAPTER SEVENRants | |
CHAPTER EIGHTEENThe Thing About Truffles | |
CHAPTER NINETEENLoving Fat | |
CHAPTER TWENTYBearing Fruit | |
CHAPTER TWENTYONEThe Dark Side of Chocolate | |
CHAPTER TWENTYTWOTheir Just Desserts | |
CHAPTER TWENTYTHREEA Good Drink | |
CHAPTER TWENTYFOURBugs | |
CHAPTER TWENTYFIVEThe French | |
CHAPTER EIGHTOn Bread Alone | |
CHAPTER NINEThe Mystery of Eggs | |
CHAPTER TENEating Your Vegetables | |
CHAPTER ELEVENA Hill of Beans | |
CHAPTER TWELVEThe Fish That Didnt Get Away | |
CHAPTER THIRTEENPoultry Fowl and Other IllFated Birds | |
CHAPTER FOURTEENThe Meat of the Matter | |
CHAPTER FIFTEENEasy on the Starch | |
CHAPTER SIXTEENA Pinch of Seasoning | |
CHAPTER SEVENTEENJust a Salad | |
CHAPTER TWENTYSIXThe English | |
CHAPTER TWENTYSEVENThe Americans | |
CHAPTER TWENTYEIGHTThe Germans | |
CHAPTER TWENTYNINEThe Politics of Food | |
CHAPTER THIRTYWhat Does It Mean? | |
Text Credits | |
Photo Credits | |
Acknowledgments | |
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Choice Cuts: A Savory Selection of Food Writing from Around the World and ... Mark Kurlansky No preview available - 2004 |
Common terms and phrases
A. J. LIEBLING American Apicius apples baking beans beef bialys boiled bread Brillat-Savarin butter cake called cassoulet century A.D. cheese chef chicken chocolate chopped coffee cold cookbook Cookery cooking Copyright crabs cream Crisco cuisine delicious dinner dish drink eaten eggs Elizabeth David English excerpts fish flavor flour France French fresh fried fruit garlic gastronomic Gourmandism gourmet grilled herbs Italian James Michie JANE GRIGSON Joseph Dommers Vehling juice kitchen lemon look Lucullus LUDWIG BEMELMANS M.F.K. Fisher man’s Mark Kurlansky meal meat mushrooms never nouvelle cuisine onions oven oysters Paris parsley PELLEGRINO ARTUSI pepper Périgord pizza plate pork potatoes prepared recipe Reprinted by permission restaurant roast salad salt sauce season served slices soup steak stomach sugar sweet tablespoons Tafelspitz taste things toast Toklas translated tripe truffles vegetables vinegar wine writing yolks