NEW YORK TIMES **BESTSELLER NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE
YEAR BY Los Angeles Times - NPR - Men's Journal - BookPage -
Booklist - Publishers Weekly
**
In the fall of 2009, the food world was rocked when Gourmet magazine
was abruptly shuttered by its parent company. No one was more stunned by
this unexpected turn of events than its beloved editor in chief, Ruth
Reichl, who suddenly faced an uncertain professional future. As she
struggled to process what had seemed unthinkable, Reichl turned to the
one place that had always provided sanctuary. "I did what I always do
when I'm confused, lonely, or frightened," she writes. "I disappeared
into the kitchen."
My Kitchen Year follows the change of seasons--and Reichl's
emotions--as she slowly heals through the simple pleasures of cooking.
While working 24/7, Reichl would "throw quick meals together" for her
family and friends. Now she has the time to rediscover what cooking
meant to her. Imagine kale, leaves dark and inviting, sautéed with
chiles and garlic; summer peaches baked into a simple cobbler; fresh
oysters chilling in a box of snow; plump chickens and earthy mushrooms,
fricasseed with cream. Over the course of this challenging year, each
dish Reichl prepares becomes a kind of stepping stone to finding joy
again in ordinary things.
The 136 recipes collected here represent a life's passion for food: a
blistering ma po tofu that shakes Reichl out of the blues; a decadent
grilled cheese sandwich that accompanies a rare sighting in the woods
around her home; a rhubarb sundae that signals the arrival of spring.
Here, too, is Reichl's enlivening dialogue with her Twitter followers,
who become her culinary supporters and lively confidants.
Part cookbook, part memoir, part paean to the household gods, My
Kitchen Year may be Ruth Reichl's most stirring book yet--one that
reveals a refreshingly vulnerable side of the world's most famous food
editor as she shares treasured recipes to be returned to again and again
and again.
Praise for My Kitchen Year
"Ruth is one of our greatest storytellers today, which you will feel
from the moment you open this book and begin to read: No one writes as
warmly and engagingly about the all-important intersection of food,
life, love, and loss. This book is a lyrical and deeply intimate journey
told through recipes, as only Ruth can do."--Alice Waters
**
"What will send this book to the top of bestseller lists is the lovely
way Reichl describes how dishes come together, like the Greek chicken
soup with lemon and egg known as avgolemono, and her talent for
assembling a collection of recipes her legions of former Gourmet fans
will want to make themselves."--The Washington Post**
"The recipes make for lovely reading, full of Reichl's elemental wisdom.
. . . In the best way possible, My Kitchen Year is cozy, the reading
equivalent of curling up next to a fire with a glass of red wine and
perhaps the scent of bread in the oven wafting over."--Vogue
"If anyone can convince us that a dessert, plus two more fabulous
dishes, can turn a crummy day around, it's culinary writer Ruth Reichl,
who knows firsthand just how powerful food can be."--O: The Oprah
Magazine
"The voice is pure Reichl in a way that makes the reader yearn for a
house in the country with a pantry full of staples. . . . And as she
finds solace through cooking, we find comfort too."--Eater (Fall
2015's Best Cookbooks)
