Ant Egg Soup: The Adventures of a Food Tourist in Laos [Paperback]

Natacha Du Pont De Bie (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 1, 2005

Natacha Du Pont De Bie is no ordinary tourist. She'll trek for hours or even days in search of a good lunch. Ant Egg Soup is the result of her adventures in Laos, the stories of the people she met, the places she visited and, of course, the amazing food she tasted. Drinking raw turkey blood with herbs in a tribal village, cooking Paradise chicken in a little guest house by the Kung Si waterfalls, and sampling fried cricket during the Festival of the Golden Stupa are just a few examples. Funny and refreshing, with recipes and lines drawings, Ant Egg Soup will awaken the senses while redefining the art of travelling and eating abroad.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Luscious ... her descriptions are so vivid you will want to rush off to the nearest oriental market' -- Sunday Business Post 'A charming portrayal of the people, the places, and of course the food of Laos' -- Western Morning News --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Natacha Du Pont De Bie has worked as a production assistant for a film company, a waitress, an usherette, a cameraman's personal assistant, a seamstress in a costume hire firm and as a tea lady - all by the age of 23. After holding proper jobs at Elle Decoration and House & Garden, Natacha swapped the cramped office environment for freelance styling for films and commercials. She is now a committed Food Tourist.

Product Details

• Paperback: 342 pages
• Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton (February 1, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0340825685
• ISBN-13: 978-0340825686
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.9 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,354,769 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #49 in Books > Travel > Asia > Laos

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars a terrific read, August 4, 2004

By 

a reader (London, United Kingdom) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ant Egg Soup: The Adventures Of A Food Tourist In Laos (Hardcover)

From the moment she lands in Laos and asks a customs official for the most authentic place to eat in town I was hooked on the author's cultural odyssey into the country's gastronomic soul. It's beautifully written and I found it a brave, generous book, siffused with a passion for exotic cuisine and a genuine affection for the people she encounters. Her own illustrations and a glut of tasty recipes nestle with quixotic travellers' tales and stimulating insights into the history, politics and customs of a country that is little known to the West. There are also some apposite reflections on tourism and international development.Complex and, naturally, hunger inducing. I loved it.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars You'll be able to taste the laap..., November 2, 2005

By 

Sarina Luangkhot (Alexandria, VA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Ant Egg Soup: The Adventures of a Food Tourist in Laos (Paperback)

This is a beautiful book about Laos, its people, and their customs. The descriptions of the food are spot-on and the recipes are a great bonus. As a transplanted Lao-American trying to recreate flavors of my past, this was quite a gem of a find. If you have any interest in Southeast Asian culture or tourism, you definitely must read this. The parts about Luang Prabang and the Plain of Jars will have you googling airfare to Laos in no time.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is what it means to write about travel, August 16, 2011

By 

ChangYai "stickyricechowda" (boston) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ant Egg Soup: The Adventures Of A Food Tourist In Laos (Hardcover)

This is easily one of the most pleasurable so called travel books I have read. I am not even finished with it yet but am spurred to share its quality with everyone. Not too much history to be opaque and distant, not too much inward introspection to be self-indulgent, not too much about the people she meets to be foreign, not too much about the geography and the journey itself to be boring and not too much about food to be blind to the rest. Everything is related at just the right tempo and you feel as if you are right there with Natacha and her new friends enjoying the journey with little tidbits of insight into everything that is Laos not just food. To her immense credit, her style of writing here comes across as real down-to-earth which paradoxically comes across expertly, or perhaps I mean comprehensible to a non-professional chef like me (but a semi-professional traveler....trying to get to the pros.)

I now even have some recipes I can use...and they are good recipes put into the context of where she learned them. That is the best part. I love the way she sketches different things that she sees such as the vegetable gardens along the Mekong, the faces and garb of the hill tribe women she meets and the post slaughter image of a turkey that she later enjoyed. Her description of the children she meets in the countryside and their laughter is so spot on and haunting. The book is a contemporary masterpiece on Southeast Asian culture for foreign readers, like me. I have yet to read a book of the food/travel genre that tells part of the Southeast Asian experience any better than this.....especially for lovers of food and Southeast Asian culture like myself.