Customer Reviews

Nobody Knows the Truffles I've Seen

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Renaissance man and restauranteur George Lang has experienced life in extremis and sat at table with kings. As recounted in his anecdote spiced memoir Nobody Knows The Truffles I've Seen, the years, luck, and determination have taken him from the stark deprivation of a forced labor camp, to freedom through the perils of a mine field and, eventually, to occupy an office in the luxe Waldorf-Astoria.

The only child of Jewish parents Lang was born in a small Hungarian village in 1926. From his tailor father he learned attention to detail and pride in self; from a mother, who fashioned 42 pairs small pants for him from his father's leftover materials, he acquired ingenuity and an appreciation for life. He would need all of these traits plus some to survive the Holocaust.

After escaping from the labor camp to which he was consigned at the age of 19, enduring torture at the hands of sadistic captors, and learning that his parents had died at Auschwitz, Mr. Lang felt there was no future for him in Hungary and determined to reach America. With the aid of border smugglers he was hidden in a coffin only to be abandoned by them, left to navigate a live minefield alone. He remembers little of this "deadly walk," only that he avoided the visible path as entrapment and forged ahead.

In 1946, with little more than dreams of becoming a concert violinist and a string-tied papier-mache valise in 1946 he boarded a "rickety Liberty ship" - one of the very first to ferry refugees to the United States once the war was over. It was in New York City that his only-in-America success story began.

While a music student the young emigre made do with a series of odd jobs. Then, upon hearing Jascha Heifetz play, he realized that in all probability his career would not be on the concert stage. Fortunate enough to eventually find work in the kitchen of the legendary Hotel Plaza, he observed, waited and learned. Before too long he assayed "the switch from behind the range to management."

His entree to oversight was found at the Lower East Side's Chateau Gardens, which resembled "a muted version of Frankenstein's castle circa 1898." From such inauspicious beginnings he rose to arrange banquets at the Waldorf-Astoria for the rich and royal, and then he took over the famed Four Seasons. When torn between two intriguing professional offers, he discovered that he could have his cake and eat it too , work for both parties by forming his own company. Thus, he embarked on a then new occupation - restaurant consulting.

Accomplished both intellectually and professionally, Mr. Lang has penned a poignant, amusing if somewhat elliptical memoir. We know much of him professionally - little of him personally. He is a diarist who devotes pages to a meal, and a paragraph to a marriage.

However, we do see that he has survived the unthinkable with uncommon fortitude and grace to live a story that would make Horatio Alger pale. And, with his store of anecdotes regarding everyone from James Beard to Luciano Pavarotti, he's a boon companion. That may be all we need to know.

- Gail Cooke

Being a college student at the Rochester Institue of Technology as a Hotel/Food major I found this book very inspirational. Mr. Lang took advantage of his life. He dreamed big, and his dreams came true! Sometimes I couldn't belive the oppourtunites he created for himself. He proves that you can open doors for yourself if you know your stuff and the right people. Mr. Lang, you are a inspiration to me! I too dream big!

I thoroughly enjoyed the book; the saga of his undaunted struggle to survive - and succeed - was a real page-turner. As a born-and-bred New Yorker of a "certain age," Mr. Lang's tales of old, familiar landmarks were an unexpected dividend, as was his demi-cookbook at the end, which, as an American of Hungarian extraction, solved many mysteries of my Grandma's cooking.

This autobiography covers the Jewish author in his native land, Hungary, just before, during and after WWII, and then after the Russians took over his country. His rendition of how he stayed alive when all the other Jews were being killed is grand reading. How he eventually came to the U.S. not knowing any English, and the multitude of jobs he secured to again stay alive, is interesting. He finally becomes a supremely successful restaurateur and his story keeps your interest throughout.

George Lang reveres the late great New Yorker writer Joseph Wechsberg (Grey Trout and Black Truffles, etc.). It shows. This autobiography that's also an "apologia pro vita sua" celebrates not just food, but life. And what a life! Thank goodness he's only at mid-passage. Go, George!

A good puff pastry, but not very filling. The most riveting sections -- early in the book -- detail Lang's WWII experiences through his emigration to the U.S. in the late forties. All the books reminiscences concentrate on the pleasant or the interesting; apparently Lang's family life contained none of either after he reached the States. Nevertheless, the stories he does tell provide a fascinating glimpse into Hungarian culture and the development of post-WWII American attitudes towards public consumption (and the banquet and other food descriptions are marvelous). It is unfortunate that he chose to gloss over details on exactly how many of his fabulous projects were achieved with phrases like "by pushing the right buttons". Lang is probably the Walt Disney of the restaurant business and, despite the light and breezy style, there is still material here of interest to those who find the details behind extravagant showmanship of any kind interesting.

I found the most exciting and compelling portions of the book to be the early chapters on his survival tactics during WWII. At age 19, he was sent to a forced labor camp. He never saw his family again. They were consumed at Auschwitz. Luckily, he was saved from the worst work, because his father had the foresight to teach him the skill of tailoring. Lang recounts how he escaped from the camp and made his way to Budapest, where he impersonated a Hungarian Arrowcross fascist to wait out the remaining months of the war. This impersonation later caused him to be jailed and put of trial by the Communists after the War.

His escape from Hungary in a coffin, trip to New York City, and rise from waiter to party planner to restaurant planner is your general Horatio Alger story redone. It is in these chapters that the spirit of the raconteur comes blasting out of the memoir's pages. And like good food, it should be consumed in small portions, because even raconteurs can become irritating. So, if consumed like papikra - in small sprinkles - this book makes for an above average read, especially for anyone with a taste for the changes in post-War American cuisine, hob-nobbing with luminaries of food and music, and the creation and management of such restaurants as Restaurant Associate's The Four Seasons and The Tower Suite, the Café des Artistes, and the Indonesian Pavilion at The New York World's Fair.

Mr. Lang has been blessed with talent and a lot of luck. As with anyone that has been faced with adversity I admire them like all get out when they manage to succeed and so it is with Mr. Lang. I have no doubt that his great big ego (gosh it's gotta be heavy carrying all that around) is well deserved. I however had a hard time stomaching some of this stuff he was spewing. His having done this and that and taking all the credit for it kind of got on my nerves. While he claims he is a nice man I got the distinct impression that if you weren't somebody then George wouldn't have a lot of time for you.

Amazingly rich in historical facts and reality.
Specialy visit the Budapesht and George Lang restorant "Gundel" in Budapesht
This gentelment is my hero. THANK YOU