Before we went on vacation last week, we stopped off at Barnes and Noble to pick up some books for the boys. At the checkout counter, I impulsively grabbed My Life in France
for myself and promptly devoured it like a fine chicken cooked for hours in garlic and thyme.

My Life in France is Julia Child's account of her adventures in food. In her late thirties, her husband took a job with the government in Paris where she had her first encounters with French food. As she described her orgasmic first bites of this cuisine, my mouth watered. She enrolled in a local cooking school and met up with two women who were struggling to write the definitive French cookbook. One drops out of the project, and Julia works with the other woman for years polishing the ultimate cookbook. Later, she becomes famous in America on the PBS cooking series. 

Alex Prud'homme writes the book from Julia's perspective. He interviewed her when she was in her late 80s and early 90s about her time in France fifty years earlier. He also used Julia's and her husband's old letters to piece together the tale.

I read this book on the shores of Lake George, occasionally reading aloud to Steve. It was a joy to have Julia on vacation with us. Steve declared her, my kind of person. I guess she was. Opinionated, theatrical, obsessed, bohemian. How much fun must it have been to sit at Julia's table, all six foot two of her, and listen to her adventures in the kitchen? I imagine there would be several excellent bottles of wine on the table.

Continue reading “My Life in France With Julia” →