Spoon Fed
How Eight Cooks Saved My Life
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3.8 • 13 Ratings
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- $7.99
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
From the prominent New York Times food writer, a memoir recounting the tough life lessons she learned from a generation of female cooks-including Marion Cunningham, Alice Waters, Ruth Reichl, Rachael Ray, and Marcella Hazan.
Somewhere between the lessons her mother taught her as a child and the ones she is now trying to teach her own daughter, Kim Severson stumbled. She lost sight of what mattered, of who she was and who she wanted to be, and of how she wanted to live her life. It took a series of women cooks to reteach her the life lessons she forgot-and some she had never learned in the first place. Some as small as a spoonful, and others so big they saved her life, the best lessons she found were delivered in the kitchen.
Told in Severson's frank, often funny, always perceptive style, Spoon Fed weaves together the stories of eight important cooks with the lessons they taught her-lessons that seemed to come right when she needed them most. We follow Kim's journey from an awkward adolescent to an adult who channeled her passions into failing relationships, alcohol, and professional ambition, almost losing herself in the process. Finally as Severson finds sobriety and starts a family of her own, we see her mature into a strong, successful woman, as we learn alongside her.
An emotionally rich, multilayered memoir and an inspirational, illuminating series of profiles of the most influential women in the world of food, Spoon Fed is Severson's story and the story of the women who came before her-and ultimately, a testament to the wisdom that can be found in the kitchen.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this frank confessional memoir, Severson, food writer for the New York Times since 2004, attributes her culinary confidence to the tutelage of eight maternal figures, from the legendary to the not-so-famous. Moving from Alaska, where she wrote for the Anchorage Daily News, to San Francisco to be a food writer for the Chronicle, Severson quits her destructive habit of excessive drinking, and when she first interviews Marion Cunningham, the beloved California food writer, the two share their similar fears and vulnerabilities. Severson's refrain that I was a fraud and an alcoholic and I was scared to death I would fail runs through this narrative like a dirge, while her successive culinary acquaintances reflect her insecurities: Chez Panisse chef Alice Waters represents an admirable, however ridiculously uncompromising model of perseverance; Ruth Reichl, her intimidating predecessor at the New York Times, reminds her of the leader of the popular girls at school into whose realm she never fit; and Southern food writer Edna Lewis's unconventional living situation with the young gay cook Scott Peacock inspires Severson to recount her own difficult early years of coming out as a lesbian in the face of her family's disapproval and discomfort. Some of the portraits verge on the fawning (e.g., Rachael Ray has a charisma that is as God-given as a star pitcher's right arm ), but Severson's goal of finding a connection to her Italian mother dying of Parkinson's rings brave and sincere.
Customer Reviews
Insightful and fun
This was an easy read that was most enjoyable when the author was in her most natural setting: the kitchen with the chefs who changed her life.
Don't bother
I've liked Kim's pieces both in the SF Chronicle and NYT. However, this book did not live up to anything she has ever written. Whatever happened to the show/don't tell of writing? I didn't care about her alcoholic past, or other aspects of her personal life that were repeated endlessly. Ditto with the other women in the book with the exception of Marion C. There are a lot more insightful food-related memoirs out there.
Shocking
I studied with Marcella, and Victor, in their Venice home. SPOON FED misrepresents Marcella to say the least.
Marcella is kind, very smart, though admittedly sometimes a tough cookie when she needs to be, however always with a twinkle in her eye. Studying and learning Italian cooking from her has been a major highlight of my life.
Overall, Ms. Severson's chapter on Marcella contradicts her introduction to her book.
In that chapter, number nine, Ms. Severson is mean, vicious and vindictive about Marcella. Comparing her mother to Marcella does not make sense , or is Ms. Severson saying like her mother that Marcella is done, over with, no longer of value -- is that it? That is certainly not true of Marcella.
Ms. Severson enlightens no one during her mother-daughter discussions.
Regarding Victor, Victor never broadcasted anything negative about Ms. Severson, so why does she about him?
SPOON FED belongs in tabloids like the NATIONAL ENQUIRER - nothing is ever believable there either.