Cuisines of the Axis of Evil and Other Irritating States: A Dinner Party Approach to International Relations [Hardcover]

Chris Fair (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Foreign affairs analyst Fair combines current events, history and cookery in this unorthodox book. Provoked by Bush's 2002 State of the Union address and her brothers' call-up by the National Guard, she posits that one way to a more tolerant post-9/11 world might be through the stomach. The author takes on 10 countries: the axis of evil triad of North Korea, Iran and Iraq; global players like Israel and China; alleged thorns-in-freedom's-side like Pakistan, and finally the Great Satan, the U.S. She compiles dossiers of perfidy—a history of each nation's geopolitical sins—followed by culinary plans of attack. The research and experience backing the dossiers is considerable, if filtered through a shrill, leftist-corrective sensibility. The representative recipes, meanwhile, range from an Iraqi lamb and okra stew (Be warned: Okra is a finicky flora) to steamed Chinese eggplant and Kashmiri spiced tea. There's even Beer Butt Chicken to represent Uncle Sam. The genuine political and culinary passion don't organically connect; rather it's a crazy salad of dark leftist humor. Whether it's possible to laugh while despairing and cooking (the recent natural disasters particularly skew the tone of the chapters on Burma and China) remains to be seen. (Aug.)
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Review

"Self-described 'think-tanker chick' Chris Fair has whipped up a creative cookbook concept."--USA Today 

 

"I first met Chris Fair years ago in what could have been a staid, dull academic conference on one of the many troubled areas in the world. Ten minutes in the room with her, and I knew academe would never be the same--she can swear like a master sergeant, lifts weights for fun, and keeps pit bulls, to name just a few of her more endearing habits. In Cuisines of the Axis of Evil, Fair combines the culinary mastery of "Iron Chef" with the biting and acerbic wit of Jon Stewart's "Daily Show" in a snarky romp through some of the world's most picturesque and problematic hotspots. Imagine Julia Child, John Bolton, and Borat on a desert island, and you have the general tone of this creative, informative, and amusing look at the cuisines and policies of our enemies and our not-quite-friends. This could be the opening salvo by our next Secretary of State."--Timothy Hoyt, academic, musician, and occasional anarchist (US Naval War College)

 

"Chris Fair's treatise on America's enemies--real and imagined--is just the remedy and recipe for a host of foreign policy failures. Especially tasty is her menu to celebrate the ignonimous end of our fifty year showdown with the demon island of Cuba with its dangerous culinary arsenal of sugar, rum, and coffee."--Ann Louise Bardach, author of Cuba Confidential and Without Fidel

“Cuisines of the Axis of Evil is laugh-out-loud-funny; a shrewd primer on some of the more unsavory regimes the world has to offer, and a savory rendering of their cookery. Chris Fair by turns channels Richard Holbrooke, Steven Colbert, and Elizabeth David as she whisks up up a truly original contribution in the field of international relations and cook books.”—Peter Bergen, author of The Osama bin Laden I Know 

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: The Lyons Press; 1st edition (August 3, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1599212862
• ISBN-13: 978-1599212869
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.4 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #198,621 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #90 in Books > Cookbooks, Food & Wine > Regional & International > International

More About the Author

C. Christine Fair, in August, will become an assistant professor in the Center for Peace and Security Studies (CPASS), within Georgetown University's Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service. Previously, she has served as a senior political scientist with the RAND Corporation, a political officer to the United Nations Assistance Mission to Afghanistan in Kabul and as a senior research associate in USIP's Center for Conflict Analysis and Prevention. Her research focuses upon political and military affairs in South Asia. She has authored, co-authored and co-edited several books including Treading Softly on Sacred Ground: Counterinsurgency Operations on Sacred Space (OUP, 2008); The Madrassah Challenge: Militancy and Religious Education in Pakistan (USIP, 2008), Fortifying Pakistan: The Role of U.S. Internal Security Assistance (USIP, 2006); among others and has written numerous peer-reviewed articles covering a range of security issues in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. She is a member of the International Institute of Strategic Studies, the Council on Foreign Relations and is the Managing Editor of India Review.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Come for the shrill, leftist-corrective sensibility; stay for the fesanjan., August 10, 2008

By 

John Fred - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Cuisines of the Axis of Evil and Other Irritating States: A Dinner Party Approach to International Relations (Hardcover)

Like some unholy hybrid of Rachel Ray and Fareed Zakaria, Ms. Fair uses her extensive knowledge of the world's hotspots and her love and talent for cooking to undertake the heretofore little-attempted mission of helping the reader actually learn something of use outside the kitchen whilst preparing to strap on the feedbag. The result subjects international relations, American foreign policy, and a sizable majority of the non-human animal kingdom to a healthy skewering.

Based on my own personal experiences with the author's cooking and rapier wit (she once helpfully explained to me the difference between "Northern Alliance" Afghan food and "Taliban" Afghan food), I believe you can safely assume that, in the end, you will be entertained, a little smarter for the effort, and in any event well fed.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A smart and evil grouse for dinner., August 23, 2008

By 

J. Kelley (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Cuisines of the Axis of Evil and Other Irritating States: A Dinner Party Approach to International Relations (Hardcover)

Unique is an understatement. What other book full of carefully selected, international recipes includes a no-holds-barred "dossier of perfidy" for the 10 countries from where they originate and a bibliography richer than many doctoral theses? A cookbook with "Beer Butt Chicken" AND Zhen Qie Zi? Powerful and insightful critiques of Pakistani AND Israeli policies?

In her analyst-world, the author is well known for being direct and honest; someone once called her unvarnished, but that's far too simplistic. Read the book and you'll see she's also incredibly passionate about important things, creative in her approach to understanding and explaining them, sometimes pornographic, amazingly well-informed, often skeptical, and always brings along her 800lb vocabulary.

Everyone who reads this will learn something. Perhaps it will be about food and politics or just some new words for the NYT crossword or your GRE. Maybe you'll be inspired to know more about some of these places. I certainly am. Regardless, you won't read another book like this, I promise. Yes, I'm an "insider", but that doesn't make me wrong.
Hate the policies, like the people, love the food.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A stark reminder of the connection between food and politics, February 9, 2010

By 

Brian Connors (Yarmouth, MA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Cuisines of the Axis of Evil and Other Irritating States: A Dinner Party Approach to International Relations (Hardcover)

This isn't a book for the average foodie -- the recipes are pretty cool, but that's only half the book. The rest of it is a whirlwind tour of the biggest annoyances on the world stage today, from Iraq to... the US. Give this to a Fox News fan, they will have a boilover on the Israel chapter and probably pop a blood vessel on the US section. The history and analysis behind the book are heavily and impeccably researched and provide a tremendous amount of background information on places the average American knows very little about. However, it's not pure propaganda -- every country has its upsides pointed out (Cuba's huge corps of home-trained international doctors, for example).

The book isn't quite what you'd expect -- rather than being collections of recipes, each chapter is set up with a dinner party menu after the historical sketch of each country. The recipes were picked by the author specifically for their authenticity (her extreme reluctance to include the rather ubiquitous flan in the Cuba section is noted rather humorously) and include appropriate drink selections; the author isn't averse to humor, and it even shows in some of the recipes, going so far to create a frozen dessert for the US chapter called "Vanilla Ice". (In any case, given the subject matter, one might argue that humor is rather necessary to keep from losing your faith in humanity as a whole.)

I don't know at what point "hard-nosed realism" turned into "leftist bias", but this book is most certainly more the former rather than the latter. Both fearless and impeccably appetizing, this book should be high on any foodie's reading list. After all, as Jared Diamond pointed out years ago, food and history are intimately connected, and that history doesn't stop just because it's being made now rather than a century ago.