Hungry Monkey: A Food-Loving Father's Quest to Raise an Adventurous Eater [Hardcover]

Matthew Amster-Burton (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 19, 2009

Matthew Amster-Burton was a restaurant critic and food writer long before he and his wife, Laurie, had Iris. Now he's a full-time, stay-at-home Dad and his experience with food has changed …a little.

Hungry Monkey is the story of Amster-Burton's life as a food-lover--with a child. It's the story of how he came to realize that kids don't need puree in a jar or special menus at restaurants and that raising an adventurous eater is about exposure, invention, and patience. He writes of the highs and lows of teaching your child about food--the high of rediscovering how something tastes for the first time through a child's unflinching reaction, the low of thinking you have a precocious vegetable fiend on your hands only to discover that a child's preferences change from day to day (and may take years to include vegetables again). Sharing in his culinary capers is little Iris, a budding gourmand and a zippy critic herself--who makes hug sandwiches, gobbles up hot chilis, and even helps around the kitchen sometimes.

A memoir on the wild joys of food and parenting and the marvelous mélange of the two--Hungry Monkey takes food enthusiasts on a new adventure in eating (with dozens of delicious recipes!). In the end, our guide reminds us: "Food is fun, and you get to enjoy it three times a day, plus snacks!"

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Seattle dad and food critic Amster-Burton wants his daughter to grow up fearlessly savoring a wide range of appealing foods, something beyond untutored childhood’s bland fodder and ubiquitous processed foods persistently marketed to television-watching adolescents. He believes that developing a child’s taste for uncommon produce, meats, fish, herbs, and spices lies in early exposure to their flavors and being sure that baby sees Mom and Dad relishing a spectrum of victuals. One by one, Amster-Burton debunks widely held opinions about feeding toddlers, such as withholding salt, sushi, or spices. And he’s not averse to cooking with wine or allowing his daughter a tiny sip of beer. Recipes include a number of Mexican favorites, even highly seasoned Thai and Chinese dishes, all designed to be simply and quickly prepared. Any parent frustrated by an offspring’s dismissive “Yuck!” will find some usefully novel approaches here to patient cultivation of adventuresome palates. --Mark Knoblauch

Review

With its incisive wit and hilarious stories about Iris, Hungry Monkey made me want to have a child...just so I could start feeding her. --Shauna James Ahern, author of Gluten-Free Girl

Matthew Amster-Burton is equal parts Mario Batali, Ray Romano, Dr. Spock of toddler cuisine, and Mr. Spock of toddler logic. He's a national and intergalactic culinary and literary treasure --Steven Shaw, author of Turning the Tables and co-founder of eGullet

Matthew Amster-Burton cast some sort of enchantment over me as I read about his all-too-real-life culinary adventures with his daughter. The proof? I actually found myself thinking" if Matthew were my dad, I don't think I'd mind being a little girl...or even a sock monkey...if I got my share of every meal. --John Thorne, author of Outlaw Cook and Mouth Wide Open

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Co; 1 edition (May 19, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0151013241
• ISBN-13: 978-0151013241
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.9 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (30 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #180,765 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Matthew Amster-Burton is a restaurant critic, food writer, and former rock journalist with credits in The Best Food Writing, The Seattle Times, Gourmet, Seattle Magazine, San Francisco Chronicle, Parent Map, culinate.com, and egullet.com--as well as his food blog, Roots and Grubs. He lives in Seattle with his wife Laurie, a school librarian, and his daughter Iris.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars the quest is short, the brag is long. **sour grapes alert**, July 6, 2009

By 

Andrew D. Fraser "the_fraser" (Austin, TX USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Hungry Monkey: A Food-Loving Father's Quest to Raise an Adventurous Eater (Hardcover)

The subtitle of the book "A Food-Loving Father's Quest to Raise an Adventurous Eater" is somewhat misleading. The "Quest" is basically over by the time his daughter cuts teeth. I had expected to read about a struggle, some sort of resistance, even some failures as the author raises his daughter.

It does have it's humorous moments and is an easy, enjoyable read. But, for those of us trying to raise kids with similarly adventurous palates, he makes it sound too easy.

Not every anecdote results in his daughter licking her plate clean and asking for more, but his stated goal of raising an adventurous eater is accomplished very early in the book. The rest of it reads like a proud father showing off his daughter's trophy case... "and here's the time she stuffed herself with sushi... and here's the time she ate pad thai for three days straight..."

Yes, I read the entire book, but apart from debunking advice re: baby food. I did not come away with much usable advice for raising my own adventurous eaters. He acknowledges this fact, but it seems like a cop out.

The recipes at the end of each chapter were nicely annotated and looked like they'd be welcomed by my children once they get out of the "no mixed-up food" phase.

Amster-Burton should write a companion "Cooking with Iris" cookbook of his daughter-friendly recipes bolstered with excerpts of his anecdotes. I liked his idea of using an electric skillet for cooking with children.

25 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Feed Your Baby Food!, June 4, 2009

By 

K. Heine (Bellevue, WA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Hungry Monkey: A Food-Loving Father's Quest to Raise an Adventurous Eater (Hardcover)

I finished this book today and gave it to my husband so he could read it while on a business trip. I am already regretting that decision because I won't have Hungry Monkey in my hands again for 6 whole days. As soon as I read the last page I wanted to start over again with some little sticky flags in my hand to mark recipes I wanted to try and passages where Amster-Burton says specifically that kaiten sushi is ideal baby food. But no, I was all, "This book is hilarious. It's about cooking and kids and Seattle. You're going to love it. Why don't you take it to LA with you?" And now I can't make dumplings or cornmeal pizza crust until Friday. If you know me at all, and you might not, you'll understand why these four reasons alone merited my five-star rating of Hungry Monkey:

-Amster-Burton writes about Seattle and makes me feel like an insider, even though I live in Bellevue;
-he references Bread and Jam For Frances multiple times, which is possibly the best book ever written;
-he got a 5 on my humor rating scale, meaning I was laughing out loud to myself AND making my husband listen as I read funny parts aloud;
-the way he talks about food and feeding his family is equal parts Anthony Bourdain and M.F.K. Fisher, which is no easy feat.

What I was drawn to most in this book is the author's respect for both his daughter and the food they make together. Their relationship as depicted in the book is really quite lovely and illustrates that one does not have to dumb down conversations, expectations, ideas or flavors just because one lives with someone who happens to be a toddler.

And, on a personal note, as I sat in a nearly empty restaurant today and waited for our order that I could SEE on the warming tray for over 15 minutes (including one child's order of mini hamburgers and grapes...yawn) while my own toddler got increasingly flappy and bouncy in her high chair, I thought about our last visit to our favorite sushi place where she happily ate her fill of tamago sushi and edamame as soon as we sat down. Then I thought about Hungry Monkey and realized that I'm glad to have its message, its spirit and its recipes to guide me through these next several years of eating, cooking and throwing food on the floor.

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Hilarious, Insightful, and contains bitchin recipies, May 7, 2009

By 

B. Schielke (Seattle, Wa) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Hungry Monkey: A Food-Loving Father's Quest to Raise an Adventurous Eater (Hardcover)

Super funny book about the adventures of raising a kid under a foodie's watch. The writing style and pace of the book make it tough to put down. Plenty of bacon and pirate references as any good book should have.

The recipies seem to be pretty dang good. I have made the Phad Thai recipe so far and am going to try out the braised short ribs soon even though my kid can't eat real food yet.