What She Ate
Six Remarkable Women and the Food That Tells Their Stories
Published on 25. January 2018
Book
Hardback
320 pages
978-0-00-828107-6 (ISBN)
Description
`If you find the subject of food to be both vexing and transfixing, you'll love What She Ate' Elle
Dorothy Wordsworth believed that feeding her poet brother, William, gooseberry tarts was her part to play in a literary movement.
Cockney chef Rosa Lewis became a favourite of King Edward VII, who loved her signature dish of whole truffles boiled in Champagne.
Eleanor Roosevelt dished up Eggs Mexican - a concoction of rice, fried eggs, and bananas - in the White House.
Eva Braun treated herself to Champagne and cake in the bunker before killing herself, alongside Adolf Hitler.
Barbara Pym's novels overflow with enjoyment of everyday meals - of frozen fish fingers and Chablis - in midcentury England.
Cosmopolitan editor Helen Gurley Brown's idea of "having it all" meant having almost nothing on the plate except a supersized portion of diet gelatin.
In the irresistible What She Ate, Laura Shapiro examines the plates, recipe books and shopping trolleys of these six extraordinary women, casting a new light on each of their lives - revealing love and rage, desire and denial, need and pleasure.
Dorothy Wordsworth believed that feeding her poet brother, William, gooseberry tarts was her part to play in a literary movement.
Cockney chef Rosa Lewis became a favourite of King Edward VII, who loved her signature dish of whole truffles boiled in Champagne.
Eleanor Roosevelt dished up Eggs Mexican - a concoction of rice, fried eggs, and bananas - in the White House.
Eva Braun treated herself to Champagne and cake in the bunker before killing herself, alongside Adolf Hitler.
Barbara Pym's novels overflow with enjoyment of everyday meals - of frozen fish fingers and Chablis - in midcentury England.
Cosmopolitan editor Helen Gurley Brown's idea of "having it all" meant having almost nothing on the plate except a supersized portion of diet gelatin.
In the irresistible What She Ate, Laura Shapiro examines the plates, recipe books and shopping trolleys of these six extraordinary women, casting a new light on each of their lives - revealing love and rage, desire and denial, need and pleasure.
Reviews / Votes
`In this joyful examination of six women's lives in food, Shapiro sets out to excavate the minutiae of domestic routines for insights into the connection between mental state and menu ... Always entertaining and brimming with enticing small details, from an image of Roosevelt scrambling eggs at the table in a dinner-party performance piece, to Pym noticing that Philip Larkin refused Brie at lunch.' Francesca Wade, Financial Times`A bounteous and elegant feast for hungry minds' BookList, (starred review)
`If you find the subject of food to be both vexing and transfixing, you'll love What She Ate' Elle
`What She Ate is a culinary and historical delight. Feast on it slowly so as not to miss a crumb' BookPage
`I devoured the book in one sitting' Washington Post
`Fascinating' Wall Street Journal
`A deliciously satisfying read' Chicago Tribune
`Fascinating. Shapiro, like a consummate maitre d', sets down plate after plate and an amazing thing happens: Slowly the more familiar accounts of each of the women's lives recede and other, messier narratives emerge. How lucky for us readers that Shapiro has been listening so perceptively for decades to the language of food.' NPR
`A collection of deft portraits in which food supplies an added facet to the whole.What She Ate redeems the whole sentimental, self-indulgent genre of food writing' Slate
`A unique and delectable work' Kirkus
`What She Ate establishes Laura Shapiro as the founder of a delectable new literary genre: the culinary biography. A richly satisfying volume' Megan Marshall
`I wolfed down this wonderful account of the eating lives and habits of six notable and very diverse women ... Shapiro ... writes both engagingly and a trifle wryly' Bookseller
`Riveting. Shapiro reveals with wit and irony so much that is fascinating and unknown. What She Ate is both menu degustation and grand banquet' Claudia Roden
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
HarperCollins Publishers
Dimensions
Height: 222 mm
Width: 141 mm
Thickness: 32 mm
Weight
460 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-00-828107-6 (9780008281076)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
01/2018
1st Edition
Fourth Estate Ltd
€6.39
Available for download
Person
Laura Shapiro has written on every food topic from champagne to Jell-O for The New York Times, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Slate, Gourmet, and many other publications. She is the author of three classic books of culinary history. Her awards include a James Beard Journalism Award and one from the National Women's Political Caucus. She has been a fellow at the Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library, where she also co-curated the widely acclaimed exhibition Lunch Hour NYC.