PASSIONATE RATIONS

I don’t read non-fiction.

Well, let me clarify.   I read loads of non-fiction for my job; hence, I don’t read a lot of it at home.   I prefer fiction escapism in my off-time.

There is an exception:  food-related non-fiction.  I stumbled upon this exception as a happy accident.  I don’t know where I was, but I was staying somewhere and Ruth Reichl’s book Comfort Me With Apples was there for the taking.  Really.  No, I didn’t steal it; it was a book-exchange-y thing.  Good thing, too, because I started it and couldn’t put it down.

Ruth Reichl is currently the editor-in-chief of Gourmet magazine.  She has had previous stints as both the Los Angeles and the New York Times restaurant critic.  Comfort Me With Apples is actually her second book and details how she got into the critique business from chefdom.

Her first book, Tender at the Bone, which I quickly turned to after finishing Comfort, includes hilarious tales of a mother with no ability to discern spoiled food, which is what set Ruth on her lifelong food path.  She literally had to become the cook to save her family.

And I recently finished Garlic and Sapphires, which tells of her stint at the New York Times, complete with a catalog of the disguises she had to use to go unrecognized (of particular interest since I’m fascinated with the transformation one can achieve with a simple wig–and the effects it can have on how people respond to you).

Anyway, if you like quick and entertaining reads and you like food (or even if you don’t), I recommend these books.