My Life in France [Deckle Edge] [Hardcover]

Julia Child (Author), Alex Prud'Homme (Author)

Book Description

Release date: April 4, 2006

In her own words, here is the captivating story of Julia Child’s years in France, where she fell in love with French food and found ‘her true calling.’

From the moment the ship docked in Le Havre in the fall of 1948 and Julia watched the well-muscled stevedores unloading the cargo to the first perfectly soigné meal that she and her husband, Paul, savored in Rouen en route to Paris, where he was to work for the USIS, Julia had an awakening that changed her life. Soon this tall, outspoken gal from Pasadena, California, who didn’t speak a word of French and knew nothing about the country, was steeped in the language, chatting with purveyors in the local markets, and enrolled in the Cordon Bleu.

After managing to get her degree despite the machinations of the disagreeable directrice of the school, Julia started teaching cooking classes herself, then teamed up with two fellow gourmettes, Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle, to help them with a book they were trying to write on French cooking for Americans. Throwing herself heart and soul into making it a unique and thorough teaching book, only to suffer several rounds of painful rejection, is part of the behind-the-scenes drama that Julia reveals with her inimitable gusto and disarming honesty.

Filled with the beautiful black-and-white photographs that Paul loved to take when he was not battling bureaucrats, as well as family snapshots, this memoir is laced with wonderful stories about the French character, particularly in the world of food, and the way of life that Julia embraced so wholeheartedly. Above all, she reveals the kind of spirit and determination, the sheer love of cooking, and the drive to share that with her fellow Americans that made her the extraordinary success she became.

Le voici. Et bon appétit!

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Book Description

Julia Child single handedly awakened America to the pleasures of good cooking with her cookbook Mastering the Art of French Cooking and her television show The French Chef, but as she reveals in this bestselling memoir, she didn't know the first thing about cooking when she landed in France.

Indeed, when she first arrived in 1948 with her husband, Paul, she spoke no French and knew nothing about the country itself. But as she dove into French culture, buying food at local markets and taking classes at the Cordon Bleu, her life changed forever. Julia's unforgettable story unfolds with the spirit so key to her success as a cook and teacher and writer, brilliantly capturing one of the most endearing American personalities of the last fifty years.

Julie & Julia is now a major motion picture (releasing in August 2009) starring Meryl Streep as Julia Child. It is partially based on her memoir, My Life in France. Enjoy these images from the film, and click the thumbnails to see larger images.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. With Julia Child's death in 2004 at age 91, her grandnephew Prud'homme (The Cell Game) completed this playful memoir of the famous chef's first, formative sojourn in France with her new husband, Paul Child, in 1949. The couple met during WWII in Ceylon, working for the OSS, and soon after moved to Paris, where Paul worked for the U.S. Information Service. Child describes herself as a "rather loud and unserious Californian," 36, six-foot-two and without a word of French, while Paul was 10 years older, an urbane, well-traveled Bostonian. Startled to find the French amenable and the food delicious, Child enrolled at the Cordon Bleu and toiled with increasing zeal under the rigorous tutelage of éminence grise Chef Bugnard. "Jackdaw Julie," as Paul called her, collected every manner of culinary tool and perfected the recipes in her little kitchen on rue de l'Université ("Roo de Loo"). She went on to start an informal school with sister gourmandes Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle, who were already at work on a French cookbook for American readers, although it took Child's know-how to transform the tome—after nine years, many title changes and three publishers—into the bestselling Mastering the Art of French Cooking (1961). This is a valuable record of gorgeous meals in bygone Parisian restaurants, and the secret arts of a culinary genius. Photos. First serial in the New York Times Magazine and Bon Appétit. (Apr.)
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Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: Knopf; First Edition edition (April 4, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1400043468
• ISBN-13: 978-1400043460
• Product Dimensions: 5.7 x 1.1 x 9.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (403 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #122,164 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

461 of 475 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars It's not a book about food, but about a life --- a glorious life April 24, 2006

By Jesse Kornbluth TOP 500 REVIEWER

Format:Hardcover

Most Americans know of Julia Child via the parodies of her cooking show --- a frowsy, big-boned matron with a trill in her voice, hacking up a chicken with more zest than is called for, most likely because she's been chugging the cooking sherry. Well, that was, on occasion, a fair take on Julia Child, the jolly chef who taught her fellow citizens the joy of French cooking on public television.

But Julia Child was much more than a 6'2", 158-pound precursor of Martha Stewart. She was a revolutionary. Not intentionally. She just had the great good fortune to find herself living in Paris with no job and nothing more compelling than a tentative interest in cooking. She signed up for classes at Cordon Bleu, got hooked, and soon found herself, with two friends, working on a book we now take for granted but was then unimagined --- an authoritative guide to French cooking for Americans. Published 40 years ago, 'Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume One' has never gone out of print. It never will. It is the gold standard.

Julia Child died in 2004. Of her 11 books, none was a memoir. But she kept scribbles and letters, and at the end of her life, she began to shape this book with her grandnephew. Like almost everything she touched, 'My Life in France' is a triumph --- insightful, poetic, deadly accurate about people, and, above all, tasty. To read it is to breathe French air.

Nothing in her early life would have predicted that Julia Child would become formidable in any way. Her father was a conservative Southern California businessman; her mother was "warm and social." After college came World War II and government work in Ceylon. There she met Paul Child, an artist who designed 'war rooms' for the generals.... The first meal she cooked for him --- brains simmered in red wine --- was not a success. Still, they married, and, in 1948, moved to France. She was 36. She didn't speak a word of French.

Her first meal, in Rouen, started with oysters, served with a pale rye bread and unsalted butter. They were followed by sole meuniere, "perfectly browned in a sputtering butter sauce with a sprinkling of chopped parsley." Mr. and Mrs. Child washed it down with a bottle of Pouilly-Fume. They moved on a green salad and a baguette, fromage blanc and cafe filtre. "Absolute perfection," Julia decided. "The most exciting meal of my life."

Fortunately, the Childs were not rich --- two-star restaurants were the best they could afford in Paris. But Julia was reading cookbooks, making friends in the food markets, falling in love with Paris. At Cordon Bleu, her classmates were 11 former American servicemen who were studying courtesy of the GI Bill of Rights. She went right to the head of the class.

To read this book is to peer over her shoulder and learn with her. Scrambled eggs, for example. They are not whipped, just gently blended. Smear the pan with butter, add the eggs, salt and pepper, cook over a low flame. After about three minutes, the eggs will start to form a custard. Only then do you stir rapidly with a fork, sliding the pan on and off the burner. Pull the egg curds together --- and, finally, add the butter, to "stop the cooking." Sprinkle with parsley (or not). Serve. Dazzle.

The real revelations in this book are not about food, however ---they're about work. There's a lot of it involved in the creation of a book, especially when you're creating something new. "WHY DID WE EVER DECIDE TO DO THIS ANYWAY?" Julia writes to one of her collaborators. But after eight years, the thing is done. And Knopf offers to buy it for $1,500. The galleys weigh 15 pounds. When printed, it is 732 pages long.

In 1961, when 'Mastering the Art of French Cooking' was published, Paul Child was 59 years old. Julia was 49. They had no expectations of a bestseller, much less a franchise. But the New York Times raved --- the recipes are "painstakingly edited and written as if each were a masterpiece, and most of them are" --- and the book sold and sold. In 1962, Julia taped three half-hour shows for WGBH, the public TV station in Boston. By the following year, she had taped 26 more.

But this is not a celebrity memoir. This book is called "My Life in France" for a reason --- it is there that Julia and Paul feel most fully alive. Paul's photographs deliver the country in delicious slivers. The passages at their home in the South of France lift off the page and surround you. You inhale lavender. You feel the breeze. In the distance is the smell of lamb cooking in herbs. There is laughter, and wit, and, most of all, blessed silence. If this is not a description of Heaven, what is?

Paul takes ill and dies. Julia soldiers on. She understands --- you have to keep grabbing life. Food and love and very shrewd French friends have taught her well: "Nothing is too much trouble if it turns out the way it should."

The book ends this way: "The pleasures of the table, and of life, are infinite --- toujours bon appetit!" As you read these words, you finally get it --- this is not a book about food, this is a book about life. A wise life, a life of beauty, art and invention. You can learn a lot from a life like that.

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179 of 189 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Delicious read April 12, 2006

By Joanne Jerrell

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

With every word I sensed I was there. I could smell the air, feel the cold and want a blanket. I lusted to be able to taste the foods she talked about. I laughed when she described her first attempts at food preparation. I loved that she was pragmatic and yet extravagant about cooking utinsels. Her husband was very encouraging of her endeavors. Together they shared a life and a love, but it was more, they shared a passion for travel and the tastes of other cultures. My mouth salivated as she toured the markets. Her French was horrible by her own admission but her genuine interest in the culture won out with shop owners. It is a delicious read.

214 of 229 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A Moveable Feast April 6, 2006

By H. Labalme

Format:Hardcover

This, hands down, is one of the best reads of the year. We took it with us on vacation last month & my wife and I competed over reading rights whenever the kids were otherwise occupied. It's beautifully told and as compelling as a great mystery that you know has a happy ending. It will remind you of your honeymoon in France (even if you went somewhere else) and inspire you to go again. And when you finish, you'll want to find a copy of Mastering the Art of French Cooking and keep going....

58 of 59 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars The Birth of the The French Chef April 7, 2006

By JL

Format:Hardcover

As a young person growing up in the Boston area, I watched Julia Child on WGBH. I will never forget her Salade Nicoise show where the lettuce ended up on the floor instead of the colander. This is why we loved Julia Child - she was real and fun and didn't take things too seriously. This comes through in My Life In France although sometimes it's a little too engrossed in the mundane details. It's an excellent read in her inimitable voice of her discovery and love of food and the trials and tribulations of writing Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Her curiousity, commitment to detail, perservence, and natural talent for communicating made Master the Art of French Cooking rock the food world when no one thought such a cookbook would sell. I loved reading about Julia's triumph.

44 of 45 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Dinner party conversations with Julia May 8, 2006

By Esther Schindler TOP 500 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover

One of Julia Child's most compelling attributes was her ability to share her knowledge without ever being intimidating. She gave you the sense that she was as accessible and friendly as your neighbor next door, although infinitely more interesting.

Of course, that "neighbor" only talked about food and recipes, and you didn't get to know her very well. This book shows how charming -- and human -- Julia Child really was (petty irritations and all). Mostly, it's like having Julia over to your house for a wonderful dinner party, in which she tells wonderful stories about her time in France. Obviously, food is a large part of that, but there are entertaining anecdotes about everything from being adopted by a cat to their worries about Paul's career to their move to Marseilles. Because the family kept all of Paul and Julia's letters home, the detail is as fresh and fun as when it first happened.

The book is entertaining and fun, with the added inspiration of watching a woman grow from "I could barely cook" to the legend we all admired. Recommended.

30 of 30 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A Charming Memoir of Vintage France March 16, 2007

By JW

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

This is a charming book, where Julia Child talks in detail about her years in Paris and France just after the Second World War. Julia

completely fell in love with France and with French food and the way of life there. The relationship between Julia and her husband Paul is also lovely to read about, as they completely adored each other. Julia's passion for life, her energy, her sense of humour, modesty and intelligence shine through every page. This is accompanied by a complete lack of self-pity eg where she mentions their inability to have children.

She describes in detail her first encounter with French food, her experiences studying at Le Cordon Bleu, learning to speak French, setting up her own cooking school and writing her first cookbook. There were many trials and tribulations in the years of research, testing of the recipes, collaborating with the other authors and getting the book accepted for publication. Julia was like the original Alton Brown or 'Cook's Illustrated'. Of the three authors, one of whom contributed very little, it was Julia who was constantly tinkering with the recipes in order to find the best result. Spend a month experimenting with the best way to boil an egg? No problem. She was fascinated by kitchen science, which was in its infancy in those days.

Julia also describes eating at restaurants all over France and she remembers many of the menus in detail, as well as the vintage of wines they drank and how the individual dishes were prepared. She talks about shopping for ingredients in the marketplace and some of the unusual kitchen gadgets she picked up in Paris, which later appeared on the set of her TV shows....

So many things were done differently in those days - you put your milk bottles on the window sill to keep cool because most Parisians didn't have a refrigerator, and just about everything in the professional kitchen was still done by hand in the old manner. It was a different culinary world and I am pleased that some of this history has been preserved in this book.

The book has a lot of general historical interest too - when they arrived there was rationing and there were hardly any cars in Paris. They walked all over the city, routes that you just could not do on foot these days. Her husband was a photographer/artist and there are some interesting B & W photos of Paris & the French countryside included in the book. They also had a house in Provence long before the influx of tourism changed and spoiled the area. She and her husband met many influential and eccentric people.

The book was a collaboration between Julia and her husband's twin brother's grandson, who is an author in his own right. I thought it was very enjoyable and interesting. Is this a great work of literature? No, and to be honest, few biographies are. But this book does what it set out to do very well. It is pleasant and easy to read and the story it tells is very interesting. I would recommend it for people with an interest in culinary history or community cookbooks, an interest in French cuisine, and of course for anyone who liked Julia Child. It makes a lovely accompaniament to the bible of classic French cuisine: "Mastering the Art of French Cooking". Read more ›