A fun read from one of my top 10 favorite diabetic comedians! He's British, he loves food, he used to be a big boy, now he's a regular sized boy, and A fun read from one of my top 10 favorite diabetic comedians! He's British, he loves food, he used to be a big boy, now he's a regular sized boy, and he still loves food!
You may know Ed Gamble as a Taskmaster champ, the Off Menu podcast cohost, a House of Games champ, a Taskmaster Champion of Champions loser (I mean, he really ate a dick), and other stuff!
I'm a fan. This book is solid. If you like Ed, you'll like this book. If you like British comedy, you might like this book. If you like Nish Kumar, you're all right in my book. He's in it, too! In fact, his conversation with Ed at the end of the audiobook is worth the price alone!...more
* * * Read & reviewed by me and my niece Emma * * *
Emma tricked me! We got two books from the library. I'd read one, she'd read the other. She picked * * * Read & reviewed by me and my niece Emma * * *
Emma tricked me! We got two books from the library. I'd read one, she'd read the other. She picked who would read which. Turns out she handed me the harder one, the one designed for her reading level, and she gave herself the easy-peasy one. Then she had me read first, so it was too late by the time I figured out what was going on. Sneaky little sh*t!
Oh well. I'm not her mom or teacher, and anyways we're just reading for fun on days when I babysit her during the summer, so it's no big deal. I'd like her to improve her reading skillz, but I also need to keep her entertained for about 8 hours. If some of that time is spent doing some sedate reading, all the better. (Damn kid wears me out!)
Walter the Baker provided a good bit of sedate entertainment. That alone gets it at least 3 stars in my book. That it's a fun story about food gets it another star. Emma loves the show "Cake Boss" and is planning a future trip (in her mind) to Hoboken, NJ (who is this kid?) where the show is apparently shot...I don't know if that's fact. I'm going on the word of a sneaky six-year-old.
The girl is rail-thin, but she loves cooking. Since Walter the Baker is about a bread baker, Emma was all about this book. "That was fun!" she exclaimed afterwards. She doesn't usually exclaim anything after I finish reading her a book, so I'll take that to mean this was a winner. ...more
Most of this tells you what many intro-to-wine-for-noobs guides are saying these days: the taste of wine is subjective, so drink what you like. And I Most of this tells you what many intro-to-wine-for-noobs guides are saying these days: the taste of wine is subjective, so drink what you like. And I actually did learn a little bit about wine, more specifically corks, "corked wine" and what it all means: Bacteria grows on the cork and screws the flavor, so they store the bottles on their sides and thus the alcohol stays in contact with the cork and prevents bacteria! Once wine traditionalists give up use of the cork, my cork knowledge will become obsolete. But until then, bring on the pub quiz!...more
I found this coffee table book on top of a tv, so at first I didn't know what to do with it, it being out of its element and me being currently drunk I found this coffee table book on top of a tv, so at first I didn't know what to do with it, it being out of its element and me being currently drunk on tacos.
Once I got the reading underway, I found this a quite enjoyable, light and informative slip of a book on the bubbly, aka Champagne.
I'm no expert on the stuff. Wines in general are not my strong suit, but even I knew quite a bit of what's between the soft covers of The Little Book of Champagne Tips. Then again, many a page found me exclaiming, "Oh really?" and "The hell you say!".
Slim, yes, and even so, half the pages are just numbers, by which I mean the page number (ALL BIG LIKE THIS 42) is on the left and the text is on the right, thus doubling the book's page total. Cheap, yes, but this is just a coffee table book, after all....more
"This is a real cookbook?" was my reaction when I popped open The Portlandia Cookbook: Cook Like a Local.
I shouldn't have been surprised since it says"This is a real cookbook?" was my reaction when I popped open The Portlandia Cookbook: Cook Like a Local.
I shouldn't have been surprised since it says so in the title, but I guess I was hoping for a wall-to-wall laugh fest in the form of a silly self-parody of the television show's eccentric characters and their maniacal passion for sustainable, organic, locally-sourced food (don't get me wrong, these are all good things).
The first episode of Portlandlia contains a skit in which a couple go out for a meal and proceed to hound the waitress for impossible-to-know information about the chicken they're maybe about to eat. (Colin is the chicken's name, btw.) The skit starts in the mundane, enters the odd, and ends in the absurd. Kind of like the real life story arc of the sustainable, organic, locally-sourced food movement. God damn humans can't just do things right. They've always got to push it too far. Why can't we just stop at good, natural, chemical-free food like great grandma used to make? No, now we have to name the rutabaga and cater to the needs of its superego. Stop making everything so precious and artisanal!!!...god... My wife and I are in Portland right now and just down the street from us is this place: Artisan Dentist Lab. Seriously?
What I'm saying is, the people are making a mockery of a good thing. That's why I like Portlandia. It's making a mockery of the people.
When I saw Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein had made a cookbook based on the show, I leapt on it!...and got it for my wife for her birthday. I know, I know, it smacks a little of this:
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Hey, she loves the show and her b-day was on the day before we drove up to Portland. Come on! Okay, yeah I know, I'm a horrible husband. But our 10 year anniversary is coming and I'm going to make it up to her!
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Lol, oh mercy! She'll love it, because it's funny AND it's true!
Okay, okay, back to the book. I almost forgot I came here to review this thing...
The Portlandia Cookbook is very well laid out. You get a little of the funny mixed in between the legitimate recipes in a nice balance all the way through.
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Seriously, these are real recipes and there's no f-ing around with them. All the funny is kept outside the parameters of the ingredients and instructions, so you can confidently make yourself some Marion Berry Pancakes, Korean Short Rib Stew, Mr Mayor's Jamaican Jerk Chicken, Babysitter's Mac & Cheese, Cacao Bark, a real Blood Mary (those come with celery...celery, damn it!), and more.
For fans of the show, the recipes mentioned above will sound familiar. Having seen every episode, I was expecting more recognizable dishes. But Portlandia isn't a bloody cooking show, so they've fleshed out the book with food that is at least related to things seen in skits or what the characters would probably come up with.
Little asides through out the book are written up "in character" and they weren't that funny. It's really just a nod to something you've seen on the show. I don't think I so much as even sniff-laughed once. If you like the show, this might raise a nostalgic smile, but don't expect hilarity. Actually, I'm starting to regret buying this for my wife, because now she wants me to make some of this stuff (CACAO!). Oh, how delicious the irony......more
I'm an amateur cook with a degree in terrible taste, but that doesn't stop me from trying! I love to fry upTis the season for old timey home-cookin'!
I'm an amateur cook with a degree in terrible taste, but that doesn't stop me from trying! I love to fry up this, sauté that, and get down on some good old fashioned baking, especially this time of the year. So, what better time than now to read Things Mother Used to Make: A Collection of Old Time Recipes.
Originally published over a hundred years ago, the accumulated knowledge within probably dates back to tried-and-true practices of the "old country". The recipes are for simple fare, require few ingredients and are easy to follow.
The author was a New Englander and it's reflected in these traditional recipes for chowdah, coffee cake, gingersnaps, sponge cake, Boston baked beans, rhubarb pie, and hasty pudding.
I suppose some of those may be familiar to certain people and others not. It all comes down to what mom used to make. For instance, even though I was born and raised in Massachusetts, I'd never heard of huckleberry dumplings, bannocks, rolley polys or hermits.
Beyond recipes, Things... also includes a section of how-to suggestions with tips on boiling a lobster, canning peaches, ways to make pies brown and shiny, and how to corn beef. I picked up a tip for a lighter cake by beating yolks and whites separately. The bit on how to prevent children from losing their mittens is classic mom ingenuity.
There's also a section on "Household Hints Old and New for Housekeepers Young and Old," where I learned a thing or two I may try out, like keeping the iron clean with newspaper and salt...wait a minute, I can just use a scouring pad. Okay, so maybe some of this stuff is a little dated.
Additions like a weights and measures page shows that practicality was the name of the game back in the day when a book like this was the kitchen bible.
I read a kindle version and it didn't come with any bells and whistles. No pics, minimal design. Quite spartan. However, something tells me the original wasn't overly decorative either.
All in all, it's a solid book filled with tried and true wisdom....though I'm not sure about that racist and insensitive recipe "Cracker Tea for Invalids"....more
If aliens studied Earth, they would come to the conclusion that the United States is somehow consuming food on behalf of other countries.
And so beginsIf aliens studied Earth, they would come to the conclusion that the United States is somehow consuming food on behalf of other countries.
And so begins Comedian Jim Gaiffigan's Food: A Love Story. Actually, that's not how it begins. I just thought the quote sounded almost philosophical, plus I wanted to use the grandiose "And so begins...." I could have just as well started with...
I’m convinced that anyone who doesn’t like Mexican food is a psychopath.
...because that, my friend, is fact!
Gaffigan loves food. If you've ever watched one of his comedy specials this will soon become apparent. Food usually makes its way into his routine sooner or later, and his skewering of Hot Pockets has become legendary. No doubt the big success of his previous book pushed him into doing a second book, and so why not do one solely about food?
Gaffigan's a casual eater, not a connoisseur. He's not even obese, he's merely overweight. So why should we care what he has to say about food? Because he's funny, that's why. Disagree with me? Then you can just get out! Go on, this review ain't big enough for the two of us!
Food: A Love Story is not knock-you-over-the-head funny from start to finish. It's got a conversational tone, especially if you listen to the audiobook, which I always suggest when reading a comedian's book. Yeah, you may know their voice, but inflection is of paramount importance and you're not as clever in that regard as you think you are. But anyway, my point was, if you came purely for the punchlines you will be disappointed. The book isn't joke after joke, it's more like this:
It would be embarrassing trying to explain what an appetizer is to someone from a starving country. “Yeah, the appetizer—that’s the food we eat before we have our food. No, no, you’re thinking of dessert—that’s food we have after we have our food. We eat tons of food. Sometimes there’s so much we just stick it in a bag and bring it home. Then we throw it out the next day. Maybe give it to the dog."
Of course this book isn't as funny as his stand-up. Comedians work really hard to come up with an hour's worth of material, which they tour with for often a year. Here we have six hours of material written for this book. I doubt he wrote it with the idea that he'd do a six year tour with it.
Gaffigan isn't a particularly healthy eater. Junk food fills these pages like it fills our guts and the deepest, darkest places of our empty souls...
You ever talk to an old person? I mean a really, really old person. They always have this exhausted look on their face that says, I can’t believe I’m still here! I would’ve eaten so much more ice cream. Why did I ever consume kale?
His road-touring life has forced him given him the golden opportunity to pretend he has no choice but to eat poorly, thus bringing him into close and constant contact with what passes for restaurant food here in America. Fast food joints come in for a good, solid de-pantsing as he does a virtual tour around the States listing his "favorite" chains, and then breaking it down to the regional chains like WaffleHouse and Whataburger. Regional foods (I almost said cuisine, ha!) are reminisced, such as Chicago's deep-dish pizza, Seattle's coffee, NY bagels and the South's maternal love for bbq.
After reading this, I had to clear my head of Gaffigan's intentional food nonsense by reading Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma. You're just not going to find deep, scientific insight in Food. This is for the laughs. Although, there are some borderline poignant passages:
Nobody believes in racial profiling until they get a red-haired sushi chef with a southern accent.
I think everyone is aware how disgusting snails are, and that’s why they are served in a bowl of wine and butter and called “escargots,” which is a French word loosely translated as “denial.”
Often on the menu, oysters will be listed as “oysters on the half shell.” As opposed to what? “In a Kleenex?” Even the way you are supposed to eat an oyster indicates something counterintuitive. “Squeeze some lemon on it, a dab of hot sauce, throw the oyster down the back of your throat, take a shot of vodka, and try to forget you just ate snot from a rock.” That is not how you eat something. That is how you overdose on sleeping pills.
Okay, so those weren't poignant at all, but they did give me a chuckle and that's all I truly expected from this book....more
Oh no... not another book by this guy. And as if he couldn't be more self-centered, it's an autobiographical travel journal?
Let me guess, it's "a quiOh no... not another book by this guy. And as if he couldn't be more self-centered, it's an autobiographical travel journal?
Let me guess, it's "a quirky, humor-based piece that transports travelers to an exotic locale". Ugh, so sick of those. It includes photos...yeah, probably because he can barely write! To be fair, it's got a few things going for it, such as it's free, it's short and you can download it straight from its Goodreads page.
Go Home, Oaxaca. You're Drunk. might be 5-stars-good, but I'm sure as shit not reading it...again....more
Are you prepared for the excitement of reading a review about a book about fish? Well, strap yourselves in for a wild ride, folks!*
Why write a book abAre you prepared for the excitement of reading a review about a book about fish? Well, strap yourselves in for a wild ride, folks!*
Why write a book about cod? Why read it? Simple. Without you probably knowing it, cod has been one of the most important parts of our diets over the last thousand years. Without it, long distance sea exploration in medieval times (the era, not the ren fair) would've been just about impossible.
And now, ladies and gentlemen....THE MAJESTIC COD! [image]
No?
Okay, it looks more like this...
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Not very majestic, but oh so important.
Cod is a particularly unique fish. It eats just about anything and spawns like crazy. It's the frickin' rabbit of the sea! A single cod (well, a single cod who has "coupled"...heehee...SEX!) can produce millions of eggs. Once full-grown, the cod has virtually no predators. And yet we still managed to nearly fish it into extinction.
Though he does spend some time on the history, a very interesting history indeed, much of Kurlansky's book is about how man recently almost wiped the cod off the face of the earth...or to be specific, netted it off the bottom of the ocean. Cod spends many of its pages devoted to the current crisis, looking at it from the variant points of view: fishermen, the governments controlling the waters and the catch, and the public's ravenous demand for this tasty dish.
Perhaps Cod won't appeal to everyone, but it is written with a sense of humor, gives tons of interesting facts (good pub quiz fodder!), includes recipes interspersed through out and, most importantly, it's short. My interest is probably stronger than most in that I was born and raised in Massachusetts, where Cape Cod has been vital to our way of life. Fish-n-chip shacks were in every little village, even out in the sticks where I lived (45 minutes away from the coast is considered "the sticks" in Massachusetts, and it feels like it, trust me). With the important fishing tradition of Gloucester and Maine, etc., so strongly engrained, most New Englanders grow up thinking of cod as a synonym for fish.
Cod is one of those books that most readers will pass up, but the few who do pick it up will be surprised at the high entertainment value and wealth of easily digestible knowledge to be obtained.
* Okay, so you didn't really need to strap yourselves in...this time! But you never know what's to come and hey, safety first kids, safety first!...more
After reading books like these, I'm not sure what to eat anymore.
Michael Pollan, a sort of food journalist, doesn't always give you the kind of clearAfter reading books like these, I'm not sure what to eat anymore.
Michael Pollan, a sort of food journalist, doesn't always give you the kind of clear-cut answers you'd like if you're reading books like this in order to learn what's healthy for your body and what's not. However, here are two important things I did learn:
#1 - Eating only one thing is not good for you in the long run.
#2 - Corn is in nearly everything we eat these days.
America grows corn. The American government pays for its farmers to grow corn. Corn syrup goes into an alarmingly high percentage of our daily foods. Our farmed-fish and cows subsist on corn. Hell, some of our cars run on corn!
CORN!
Another issue is the nitrates used to grow all this corn. Because it's less physically demanding, farmers spread chemical nitrates over their fields. To ensure a good crop, they overcompensate. All this excess washes into our water system, contaminating our drinking water and destroying fish habitats. The Gulf of Mexico spreading outward from the Mississippi Delta is fucked.
The Omnivore's Dilemma is one of those books I've been hearing about for years. In the past, I've read other Pollan books and they were good, but for some reason I held off on this one. Maybe it was like that character in Lost holding on to a copy of Our Mutual Friend, the only Dickens book he hasn't read. I knew this book would be special. I wanted to wait and savor it. I also knew it would be slightly depressing. I wanted to be ready for it.
But it's not all doom and gloom. Pollan is hopeful and allows for the light at the end of the tunnel. He's also willing to try new things like hunting and vegetarianism. He gets his hands dirty and that's what I like to see in my journalists.
Books like this make me afraid to eat. Then they make me mad at the way I've been eating. Finally, they make me a better eater.
At the start, the ideaBooks like this make me afraid to eat. Then they make me mad at the way I've been eating. Finally, they make me a better eater.
At the start, the idea seems simple: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." When I read that I thought, okay I can stop reading. I know that already, so I've got this shit down.
But what is food today? It may not be what you think it is. Most of what you find at the grocer's is not food. That complicates things just a little bit, doesn't it?
Pollan complicates that simple "eat food" mantra a lot. Which is not to say In Defense of Food is a complicated read. Indeed no, quite the opposite. He actually does an excellent job at explaining it all in layman terms (He even helped me figured out the glucose-to-triglicerides issue I have that two doctors failed to make me fully understand). It's not Pollan's fault eating has become difficult. The problem is that the seemingly simple act of eating these days is more difficult than it used to be for our grandparents due to the food engineering/fiddling that's been happening the last few decades.
There's oh-so much more info I could lay down here for you, but you wouldn't want to bite into a rotten apple, so why would you want me too spoil this for you? No, no, read In Defense of Food. It's enjoyable, it's quick and it's full of information. Ingesting this book will do your body good!...more
After recently reading Jim Gaffigan's gastronomically good read Food: A Love Story, I decided to go on a mini Gaffigan binge.
As you might guess from After recently reading Jim Gaffigan's gastronomically good read Food: A Love Story, I decided to go on a mini Gaffigan binge.
As you might guess from the title, Dad Is Fat is about Gaffigan's home life and the travails of becoming a parent. It follows chronologically from him and his wife as a free-and-easy, no-kids couple to having five children all crammed into a tiny apartment.
I related to the no-kids couple, I laughed at some of the parenthood ridiculousness and I enjoyed every part of this book. I just didn't love it. I hoped for hilarity, but got more subtle ha-has instead.
Here's a sampling:
“Whenever one of my children says, 'Goodnight, Daddy,' I always think to myself, 'You don't mean that.”
“I used to wonder why I had hair on my legs, but now I know it's for my toddler sons and daughters to pull themselves up off the ground with as I scream in pain.”
“Look, you lost a tooth. Congratulations. Enjoy looking like a hillbilly. Here’s a dollar...”
“I don't know what's more exhausting about parenting: the getting up early, or acting like you know what you're doing.”
Yeah, there are a lot of one-liners. He is a stand-up comedian after all. However, Gaffigan does a nice job of setting up and exploring his topic, at least a little better than just tossing off zingers. No, this won't replace the What To Expect... series for folks looking to bone up on childrearing, but did you really think that's what you'd find between the pages of a book with this title?
You've seen them online! Now see them in book form!
Godawful cake disasters! [image]
Glorious confectionary monstrosities! [image]
Revel in gasps and giYou've seen them online! Now see them in book form!
Godawful cake disasters! [image]
Glorious confectionary monstrosities! [image]
Revel in gasps and giggles to mishaps like... [image]
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Some of my favorite are the ones that include inadvertently snarky quotes:
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Maybe this isn't a true 5 star book from cover to cover - some of the commentary and attempts to yuck it up fall flat - however, if you can make me laugh so hard that I cry, you deserve an extra star or two. This had me in tears two or three times before I finished. ...more
I've watched Monty Python's "Cheese Shop" sketch more times than I can recall, so ya know, I figured I knew my cheese. Then I found this book on the cI've watched Monty Python's "Cheese Shop" sketch more times than I can recall, so ya know, I figured I knew my cheese. Then I found this book on the cheap* and figured, what the hell, let's see how much I know about cheese...I know nothing about cheese.
Hell, I didn't even know how to pronounce many of them. Kefalograviera, Kefalotiri, Kopanisti, Ladotiri, Mizithra...and those are just a few from one page of the section on Greece, which besides Feta, isn't even known for their cheese! Yet they've got 15 examples. So, when you get to the heavyweight cheese producers of the world like France, the UK and Italy, you can imagine the mind-boggling amount of choice. Page after page of Pecorinos, Bleus out your backside, and every freaking Shire has their own pride and joy which they've probably been making since before the Roman's invaded a couple millennia ago.
There are over a thousand cheeses listed in the Simon and Schuster Pocket Guide to Cheese and this isn't even a comprehensive book. Since this is a "pocket book," with so many examples, you can be sure the type is necessarily small. We're talking size 8 type small! Not something your eyes will want to read straight through. I kept it on my nightstand and read a nation or two's worth of pages now and then. But even so, Carr was still forced to keep the descriptions short. Here's an example:
Atzmon Soft, buttery, cows' milk cheese similar to Italian Bel Paese.
(Thanks to Python, I'd heard of Bel Paese, so that made me all excited for a sec.)
Your Cheddars, Emmentals (Swiss), Parmesans, Goudas, all those super popular cheeses get a nice long entry. That's where much of the info comes from. That and the write-up on each country or region before their cheeses are listed. For instance, it was surprising in a good way to hear that Finland, my father's family's ancestral homeland, has a well-estiblished cheese making tradition. And all this time all I thought they did was drink themselves to death! However, the problem with this is that Carr inserts some important stuff within these descriptions that might better have been served within the introductory pages. A simple example like, if a cheese is sweaty or cracked don't buy it, is a general rule of thumb that applies to many cheeses, and so it perhaps should not have been buried in the vast forest of cheeses that makes up this otherwise handy guide.
* Yes, so I bought this on the cheap, as I mentioned at the top. If you live in the Los Angeles area you too can revel in the joys of excellent and incredibly affordable secondhand books by going to the Studio City branch Friends of the Library monthly book sale. Every time I've gone I've walked out of there with at least a few quality, good reads under my arms if not a whole grocery bag full of them, and for under $10! Last time I went it was a quarter for paperbacks and 50 cents for hardbound. It's a bookworm's paradise!
You get down on your knees right now and thank the heavens above for Craig Claiborne!
Go on, do it!
Why? Because if it weren't for him we'd all be eatiYou get down on your knees right now and thank the heavens above for Craig Claiborne!
Go on, do it!
Why? Because if it weren't for him we'd all be eating at the IHOP. Why is that such a bad thing? The Rooty Tooty Fresh'n'Fruity. But I digress...
In The Man Who Changed the Way We Eat Thomas McNamee lays out Mr. Claiborne's history, from small town, southern boy hanging around his mamma's kitchen to world-traveled food editor for the New York Times. As the first male editor of said newspaper, he turned what was considered a fluff "women's section" into a respected and much-read hub of information and critical analysis of the NY food scene.
His newspaper success sent him on travels to sample the nation's cuisine and what he found disgusted him. The post World War II U.S. landscape had become a vast desert of dining. Hell, we're not even talking fine dining, some of it was barely edible...think Spam and tv dinners. Even fresh, homemade meals were becoming a rarity. Thanks to Claiborne, chefs pulled up their bootstraps and Americans learned to love making, as well as eating, good food again.
But it's not all happy sunshine and sweet puppy dog kisses. Claiborne had his demons and more than just skeletons in the closet. Thomas McNamee takes a flamboyant delight in parading Claiborne's transgressions about for all to see. It gets to the point that one wonders if he even liked writing about his subject. But that doubt is wiped away when one considers the thick praise layered upon the man through out this well-baked cake, er rather, well-written book.
Note for those on a diet: If you're trying to lose weight, you may not want to read this. It's dangerous. Delicious descriptions of food abound!...more
Ruth Reichl's book about her time as the New York Times food critic is mainly focused on her need to don disguises inA bit more sapphire than garlic.
Ruth Reichl's book about her time as the New York Times food critic is mainly focused on her need to don disguises in order not to be recognized in the restaurants she was reviewing and how changing her appearance opened her eyes to how people are treated due to their physical appearance and projected personality. Therefore, foodies will find less about food in Garlic and Sapphires and more about fashion.
I was hoping for more about the food. I guess I neglected to read the book's subtitle, The Secret Life of a Critic in Disguise. I guess I've gone too far in my efforts not to judge a book by its cover. Reading and believing what the title says is kind of important.
Don't get me wrong, I did enjoy reading about Reichl's ridiculous hoop-jumping with wigs, make-up, clothing and personas in her successful efforts to fool the waitstaff of NY's finest eateries, even if her insights were nothing earth-shattering. I mean, most people know by now that bossy, demanding people get what they want while the meager among us get the scraps, if anything. But just the same, Reichl's stories and storytelling were quite entertaining, I also voyeuristically enjoyed her descriptions of fancy NY restaurants, and there was just enough meat on dining to whet my appetite (<--wow, that was cheesy)....more
I love books that open my eyes, teach me something, and even go so far as to re-educate me on the fallacies foisted upon me by ill-informed elementaryI love books that open my eyes, teach me something, and even go so far as to re-educate me on the fallacies foisted upon me by ill-informed elementary school teachers. To that last end, I found the chapter on Johnny Appleseed very enlightening as well as highly entertaining.
Michael Pollan is more humorous and, let's just say, more adventurous than one might expect from a journalist/botanist (see his passages on hallucinogenic plants.) I appreciate his willingness to "go first" in the same way I tip my hat to daring bastard who first tried, say, lobster. I assume it went down like this: "What's this? A giant, saltwater, armor-clad cockroach? Definitely looks poisonous....Fuck it, I'm hungry." Trying new, unknown food must have been done on a dare or at least with starvation lurking close at-hand.
Farmers on any scale will enjoy and find use in The Botany of Desire. As a pallid yellow-thumb aspiring to green, I know I learned a few things. For one, I've finally transitioned over to organic apples. I don't know who would eat another kind after reading this book. Why with the chemicals already?! Good lord!...more
Sarcastic, quirky and kooky, I Like You - this jokey book on being the hostess with the mostess - is perhaps the only kind of hospitality book I couldSarcastic, quirky and kooky, I Like You - this jokey book on being the hostess with the mostess - is perhaps the only kind of hospitality book I could take serious.
Half of this is domestic, home-maker, party-planner, cookbook material. In fact it surprised me how much of I Like You is straight up serious. Some of it's funny as hell, but then you suddenly get a recipe thrown into the mix. It's as scatterbrained as its author's onscreen performances. Hit and miss.
Amy Sedaris is generally a funny lady, but her brother David got the writer gene. She's more of a performer. That's fine if you listen to the audiobook, that way you at least get half of her talent. If this was a VIDEObook then you'd be in Amy Sedaris' wheelhouse!
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