[.ca] Pass the Polenta: And Other Writings from the Kitchen (ISBN 0345435656)

From Amazon.com:
Pass the Polenta is a collection of essays about home cooking, which is to say it's a book about home and family and tradition and the unspoken connectedness that comes of people pushing their knees under a table and passing plates of food back and forth. Pass the Polenta is a book about taking forward from the past all that is relevant, and savoring as memory those elements that serve better as the fodder for stories. For Lust, unlike too many food writers, doesn't simply like the idea of food as something to carry on about, she likes to eat and to cook, to dine with friends and family, and she draws this passion into her writing. When she's cooking at her keyboard, you can taste her best work on the page. And then there is the handful of recipes at the back of the book: stew and polenta, roast chicken, her grandmother's pie, sauerkraut, and potato and leek soup, among others. Connections. Teresa Lust hails from central Washington State, where agriculture is king. She's Italian on her mother's side of the family--hence the polenta of the title. Somehow a biology degree pushed her into commercial cooking, and commercial cooking got her moving from Washington to California, then from California to New England, where she turned her attention to writing as well as cooking, and earned an M.F.A. It's a happy marriage for Lust, this sense that what's on the plate is more than food, this sense that words on a page can be more than information. It's all to the reader's benefit. --Schuyler Ingle

If Pass The Polenta was a Wine, it would be a Five.:
Lust has intoxicated me with her writing where words strung together become magnificent aromas, memories of familial kitchen ethnic cooking, raising chickens, Pop's garden, and life growing up in the kitchen where everything was prepared fresh, from scratch, and with favorite family recipes. She has brought to my mind a memorable collection of essays on culinary subjects that everyone who loves to eat would love to read about, and especially in the way that she writes. She alivens the soul to once again slow down and experience preparing hearty food with love and care. "...Polenta" is definately a 5. Thank you Teresa for writing such an inspirational and touching book... and so young you are! Please write more!

I read it straight through:
Teresa Lust is a talented writer and a charming person. Her stories warm you up and the food that she writes about is unpretentious but delicious. She gently proclaims her working class heritage throughout the book and I find that refreshing. She clearly loves what she does so her enthusiasm just runs all over you in a delightful way when you read this book. I read the book straight through! I really hope that Lust writes more books. Technically speaking, her essays were well researched and the bibliography that she compiled reflects that. The selection of essays is balanced and the editing is good. I counted three typos--not bad for a modern book.

Far more than just recipes!:
If you love food and cooking, you will adore this well-written and fascinting book. It has some wonderful recipes (try her way of "assembling" polenta and gorgonzola and you'll never eat it any other way!) but it's her essays that make this book so special. She writes lovingly about food, and shares great insights into the world of cooking and 'gourmet' restaurants (for example: "It is a long-standing sentiment among professional chefs that American recipes, while quaint and cozy, really do need to be sent off to finishing school abroad before they can appear in public. I suppose they aren't elegant enough for your average gourmand. Yet what is a French meringue but a mess of egg whites? Or creme brulee but a bowl of pudding?") Ain't it the truth! This is one "cookbook" that belongs on the literature shelf -- yet it also has some of the best recipes I've found. Buy it ... read it ... use it.

Don't read when hungry!:
If you've spent hours speaking about memorable meals.. then this book is for you. It was great to read a book written with a shared passion of food. You can almost smell and taste the meals as described!

Delicious:
Outstanding food essays. I want every food lover I know to read it, but I can't bear to part with my copy. It is not leaving my kitchen. The essays are informative, entertaining, and mouth-watering. If you love a good meal, this book with put a smile on your face.