Weekend Read

I love to read. I love to cook. I love to eat. Naturally, I'm a sucker for reading about cooking and eating. I was first drawn to Eat, Memory because Ann Patchett (one of my favorite authors) contributed to this essay anthology. Secondly, I appreciated that the editor, NYT food editor Amanda Hesser, required that the subject matter have no sort of frou-frou sentimentality regarding the stories and recipes. Not that sentimentality is always frou-frou or a bad thing -- I could wax poetic for hours about my grandmother's chicken cutlets. I do enjoy, though, how each of the contributors take what could be a mundane memory and inject life into it. Plus, the wide variety of cuisines and locations allows the reader to hop from Paris to China to Queens, NY within an hour. The best part? Even you don't buy this for the recipes featured alongside each piece, you still get one of the most hysterical George Saunders essays ever written.