Customer Reviews

What We Eat When We Eat Alone: Stories and 100 Recipes

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I had really high hopes for this book. I am in my mid-twenties, live alone (which I love), and am an avid cook, so this book piqued my interest. I was quite disappointed. First of all, a book about eating and dining alone should not be written in the first person plural ("we think" "we talked to" etc). Second of all, the book is nearly completely based on gender stereotypes of how men and women cook and eat (some of it is funny, but it quickly moves from funny to irritating). Finally, despite the fact that Madison has written a book about eating and cooking for one, she not only confesses that she doesn't like eating alone (which is fine), but goes so far as to say that she felt such pity for an "obviously single" woman buying a boneless chicken breast one Saturday evening that she wanted to invite the woman over for dinner. So much for the idea of enjoying cooking for yourself, taking care of yourself, and all the other things that she discusses in the book as the benefits of dining alone. (plus, what does an "obviously single" woman look like?)

I've used and loved many of Madison's cookbooks, particularly Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone and her farmer's market cookbook, but this one is, in my opinion, a throwaway. Save your money and get "Alone in the kitchen with an eggplant" instead.

I have read this book, and made a few of the dishes. They are easy to fix and most have 5-6 ingredients that are easily found in the local market. The book talks a lot about farmers markets and gardens and such. But, really the shopping center worked for me. Most of the meals were made quickly, and are written for 2 but can be easily doubled. I have noticed that I have increased, with little effort, the fruits and vegies I eat by just making and taking my lunch to work out of this book. I just prep the night before, sometimes fully cook, then heat in microwave if it needs to be warmed. The narrative in the book is entertaining, the art work is fun, and the food turns out well. So, overall this is my favorite cookbook. I have a couple others on Kindle, that I don't recall if I've reviewed, but this is the one I use the most.
**As far as formatting goes:
I own a kindle 2 and DX and have this on both. I prefer to read/cook off the DX because the format is set out on the "page" slighly more appealing. But I take the k2 to the store to shop for ingredients and have no trouble reading the recipes from it. So, if I didn't own the DX I could use it to cook from as well. The TOC are linked, BUT the index is not linked. The recipes are all listed in the index, not the TOC. At first this annoyed me, but I made a work around. I just go to the index, find the recipe I want -or am interested in-then do a search from there and it goes to page. Works great.

I highly recommend this cookbook. It is easy, fun, and has a lot of variety, Plus works great on the DX, and above average (for a cookbook) on K2.

Deborah Madison and Patrick McFarlin have written a great quirky book about favorite solo meals and how we indulge ourselves when no one is watching. It's a behind the scenes look at our lives and our values. I laughed out loud at some of the bizzare foods people craved from their childhoods like fried Spam and grape jelly and hungered to feast on foods like asparagus roasted for an entire week of solo snacking. Deborah's writing was great, but I confess that Patrick's surprisingly bold pictures compelled me to search through the book and smile at his creativity before reading the whole thing. This is the kind of fun book anyone could enjoy.

Deborah Madison is my all time favorite cookbook author and this book is a wonderful collaboration with her husband, Patrick McFarlin whose fantastic illustrations add so much to the book. I could not put the book down and laughed a lot of the way through it. It is a fun book to read and I have found my self totally addicted to avocado tacos since I read about them! I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in food on any level!

You may think men are from Mars. But I know better ... mine is from the butcher shop. I, on the other hand, am from the garden. From the moment I grew my first tomato plant, I was hooked.

Being married doesn't always mean you have companionship for dinner. Jim's nickname for me is the "Food Nazi", while I just shake my head at his meals of gargantuan steaks and slimy raw oysters. He thinks most things I eat are strange (meatless meals with many vegetables), and incredulously asks me how I can eat that stuff. He hopes I don't make him try it. Sound familiar to anyone out there?

So for those of you who actually are eating alone, you can take solace in the fact that no matter what you eat no one is there to say "What IS that you're eating?" or "Why did you buy that? You know I don't like broccoli." Or worse yet, to call you a Food Nazi.

As a new vegetarian who grew up in the heartland of America dining on a plate where meat was the centerpiece, I needed help when it came time to start eating a healthier diet. I began with some vegetarian cookbooks which called for hard-to-find ingredients with preparation and cooktimes nearly as long as my workday. Finally, I found the perfect vegetarian cookbook ... Deborah Madison's 720-some-page bible of vegetarian cooking, Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone, which is everything the title implies. So when I came across this book, I had to have it. Deborah and her husband, Patrick McFarlin, are a gifted couple with a complement of creativity many would envy. I would imagine dinner at their place would be quite the experience. If you invite me Deborah, I will come.

With a dose of humor, interesting facts, real-life stories, and 100 delicious recipes, this book is one you'll want to read from cover to cover. It's a delight!

Here's one interesting tidbit ... did you know that if we eat leftovers we will help to save the world? Discarded food accounts for a fifth of the United Kingdom's carbon emissions. The 6.7 million tons of discarded food represents a third of all food purchased. So let's all eat our leftovers for a greener planet!

If you're a vegetarian or flexitarian and you don't already own a Deborah Madison cookbook, first order Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone. Then order this book. It's a hoot!

This delightful book contains a wealth of gastronomical treats I never heard about or could have imagined. The narrative is relaxed, smooth, and congenial. The artwork expands the text providing moments for pleasant and humorous reflection. One also learns the authors have an interesting group of friends. My family has followed the genius of Deborah Madison through several previous volumes. Now, with the artistic genius of Patrick McFarlin, the book should attract many additional fans. This time next year, I hope to have tried many, if not most of the book's tempting recipes.

Have not finished this book, but have read enough to find it engaging and a satisfying read. Most of the "recipes" don't appeal to me (saltine crackers in coffee, for example), but it is fascinating to see what people do when they are alone. Also, you will probably find that what you do is not so weird after all!

The husband and wife team of author and illustrator make for a dyanmic duo in creating this entertaining, easy read for foodies interested in a peek at what other people eat when they are alone. The recipes are decently interesting but can be obtained in better cookbooks or online. The illustrations, however, are superb and definitely increasing the enjoyment I derived from the book. The drawings alone were probably worth the one star.

As a cookbook, it is severely lacking but I don't think the author ever advertised this book as such. As a casual read, I enjoyed it and found it very entertaining. I might even try out some of the recipes!

I got this book from the library first and I am glad I did since I would have not been happy had I bought this book. i did not find it particularly entertaining nor the recipes that appealing. Did not finish the book. I am glad I did not spend any money on it.

While the concept of the book was nice, the writing was very bad. The author wrote in the first tense, which can get irritating in this kind of book, characters and names jumped at you with no introduction or context and the ideas were fragmented and scattered. I couldnt finish it.