Book : Toast The Story Of A Boys Hunger - Slater, Nigel

-Titulo Original : Toast The Story Of A Boys Hunger

-Fabricante :

Avery

-Descripcion Original:

Toast is Nigel Slater’s truly extraordinary story of a childhood remembered through food. In each chapter, as he takes readers on a tour of the contents of his family’s pantry-rice pudding, tinned ham, cream soda, mince pies, lemon drops, bourbon biscuits-we are transported....His mother was a chops-and-peas sort of cook, exasperated by the highs and lows of a temperamental stove, a finicky little son, and the asthma that was to prove fatal. His father was a honey-and-crumpets man with an unpredictable temper. When Nigel’s widowed father takes on a housekeeper with social aspirations and a talent in the kitchen, the following years become a heartbreaking cooking contest for his father’s affections. But as he slowly loses the battle, Nigel finds a new outlet for his culinary talents, and we witness the birth of what was to become a lifelong passion for food. Nigel’s likes and dislikes, aversions and sweet-toothed weaknesses, form a fascinating backdrop to this exceptionally moving memoir of childhood, adolescence, and sexual awakening.A bestseller (more than 300,000 copies sold) and award-winner in the UK, Toast is sure to delight both foodies and memoir readers on this side of the pond-especially those who made such enormous successes of Ruth Reichl’s Tender at the Bone and Anthony Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential. About the Author Nigel Slater is the author of several classic cookbooks, including Real Fast Food and the award-winning Appetite. He has written a much-loved column for The Observer (London) for more than a decade and has been described by the media as a national treasure. He lives in London. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. Preface“Write a piece about the food of your childhood, will you?” asked the (then) editor of my weekly food column in London’s Observer newspaper. I liked the idea and went out and bought the candies and puddings that, some thirty years ago, had been such an important part of my diet. Some I still ate as an occasional treat; others I had not had my tongue around for twenty years or more. As I unwrapped each sticky chocolate bar or sucked each brightly colored candy, the memories-surprisingly clear and loud-flooded back. This would be easy, I thought. A painless column to write after several years of penning weekly recipe-led pieces.At first it was all straightforward enough. Oat cookies reminded me of coming home from school; green beans brought back the smell of the farm were I was sent to pick them; Turkish Delight reminded me of Christmas. In that respect it was not dissimilar from other foodie memoirs. But the more I ate the more I realized that not every mouthful produced a memory so sweet. A dish of canned raspberries revisited a violent thrashing from my father that brought me to a point of near collapse (I had spilt them and their scarlet juice on the new gray carpet, and he was distraught from being newly widowed); cream-filled Walnut Whips hit back with an embarrassingly vivid recall of early sexual voyeurism; and the soft pink marshmallows I had not eaten since I was nine I found to be inseparably linked with my late mom’s goodnight kisses. I decided to take a chance and made the piece uninhibitedly personal. I linked the food not just with events but with feelings, warts and all, and even chucked in a fair helping of sex. I handed the column in. A half hour later the phone rang. I knew it was my editor even before I picked it up. “It’s about the story,” she said. Immediately I gabbled at her, saying that I was sorry, I knew it was too intimate and was out of style. I offered to rewrite it, taking out all the memoir and sticking strictly to the food. “No,” she insisted, “I love it. I’m going to publish it exactly as it is.” The morning after the piece, now called “My Life on a Plate,” came out, Louise Haines, my literary editor who had worked on all of my cookbooks, called to say that she had read the story and tho