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As Always, Julia: The Letters of Julia Child and Avis DeVoto Paperback – April 10, 2011
by
Joan Reardon
(Author)
| Joan Reardon (Author) Find all the books, read about the author, and more. See search results for this author |
Enhance your purchase
A National Bestseller
Winner of an International Association of Culinary Professionals Award for Literary Food Writing
“An absorbing portrait of an unexpected friendship.” — Entertainment Weekly
“Julia’s inimitable voice shines through . . . These letters offer [a] glimpse of how the truly great can merge heart and soul in the pursuit of excellence.” — Wall Street Journal
Julia is known around the world by her first name alone. But how much do we really know of the inner Julia Child? Through this riveting correspondence between Julia and Avis DeVoto, her “pen pal” and literary mentor, we hear Julia’s deepest thoughts and feelings and witness the blossoming of a unique and lifelong friendship. We see, too, the turbulent creation of one of the most influential cookbooks ever written. Frank, bawdy, funny, exuberant, these astonishing letters show an America on the verge of political, social, and gastronomic transformation and two women deeply engaged in the making of that new world.
“[Child] comes booming back to life in these dishy missives . . . A delicious read.” — People (3½ of 4 stars)
“Blazingly alive and entirely irresistible.” — Boston Globe
- Print length432 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherMariner Books
- Publication dateApril 10, 2011
- Dimensions5.31 x 1 x 8 inches
- ISBN-100547577486
- ISBN-13978-0547577487
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Editorial Reviews
Review
"An absorbing portrait of an unexpected friendship."
-Entertainment Weekly
"The spirit of the indomitable Julia Child lives on in Joan Reardon’s AS ALWAYS, JULIA, a saucy soup-to-nuts compilation of the correspondence between Child and lifelong friend Avis DeVoto. As Julia said, ‘Life itself is the proper binge.’ Let’s live it up!"
– Elissa Schappell, Vanity Fair, Dec. issue "The women’s frank, tender letters are an absolute delight to read, as much for their mouthwatering discussion of cuisine as for the palpable fondness they portray for one another. In an early note, DeVoto calls Child’s evolving manuscript "as exciting as a novel to read," and, indeed, so are their conversations."
-Booklist, starred review
"This epistolary testament to a close friendship will surely appeal to Child fans."
- Kirkus Reviews "Witty, enlightening and entertaining, these letters serve as a compelling companion volume to Mastering the Art of French Cooking."
- Publishers Weekly —
From the Back Cover
A National Bestseller
Winner of an International Association of Culinary Professionals Award for Literary Food Writing
“An absorbing portrait of an unexpected friendship.” — Entertainment Weekly
“Julia’s inimitable voice shines through . . . These letters offer [a] glimpse of how the truly great can merge heart and soul in the pursuit of excellence.” — Wall Street Journal
Julia is known around the world by her first name alone. But how much do we really know of the inner Julia Child? Through this riveting correspondence between Julia and Avis DeVoto, her “pen pal” and literary mentor, we hear Julia’s deepest thoughts and feelings and witness the blossoming of a unique and lifelong friendship. We see, too, the turbulent creation of one of the most influential cookbooks ever written. Frank, bawdy, funny, exuberant, these astonishing letters show an America on the verge of political, social, and gastronomic transformation and two women deeply engaged in the making of that new world.
“[Child] comes booming back to life in these dishy missives . . . A delicious read.” — People (3½ of 4 stars)
“Blazingly alive and entirely irresistible.” — Boston Globe
JOAN REARDON is a culinary historian, cookbook author, and biographer. She publishes and edits a quarterly newsletter for Les Dames d’Escoffier Chicago and serves on the advisory board of Gastronomica.
Winner of an International Association of Culinary Professionals Award for Literary Food Writing
“An absorbing portrait of an unexpected friendship.” — Entertainment Weekly
“Julia’s inimitable voice shines through . . . These letters offer [a] glimpse of how the truly great can merge heart and soul in the pursuit of excellence.” — Wall Street Journal
Julia is known around the world by her first name alone. But how much do we really know of the inner Julia Child? Through this riveting correspondence between Julia and Avis DeVoto, her “pen pal” and literary mentor, we hear Julia’s deepest thoughts and feelings and witness the blossoming of a unique and lifelong friendship. We see, too, the turbulent creation of one of the most influential cookbooks ever written. Frank, bawdy, funny, exuberant, these astonishing letters show an America on the verge of political, social, and gastronomic transformation and two women deeply engaged in the making of that new world.
“[Child] comes booming back to life in these dishy missives . . . A delicious read.” — People (3½ of 4 stars)
“Blazingly alive and entirely irresistible.” — Boston Globe
JOAN REARDON is a culinary historian, cookbook author, and biographer. She publishes and edits a quarterly newsletter for Les Dames d’Escoffier Chicago and serves on the advisory board of Gastronomica.
About the Author
Culinary historian, cookbook author, and biographer Joan Reardon is the author of M.F.K. Fisher, Julia Child, and Alice Waters: Celebrating the Pleasures of the Table, M.F.K. Fisher Among the Pots and Pans, Poet of the Appetites: The Lives and Loves of M.F.K. Fisher, and Oysters: a Culinary Celebration. Reardon, who has a PhD in English literature, won an IACP Award for culinary writing, publishes and edits a quarterly newsletter for Les Dames d’Escoffier Chicago, and serves on the advisory board of Gastronomica magazine.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Almost three and a half years after arriving in Paris with her husband, Paul, Julia Child read an article in a 1951 issue of Harper's written by the historian and prolific journalist Bernard DeVoto. In "Crusade Resumed," he revisited what he considered "the only mission I have ever set myself, that of trying to get for the American housewife a kitchen knife she can cut something with." DeVoto criticized American-made stainless steel knives for their inability to hold an edge, and he detailed his continuing search for a carbon steel paring knife. As a cook who had already acquired a substantial batterie de cuisine, Julia sent him one, and Avis, who answered most of her husband's letters, acknowledged the gift. Soon "Dear Mrs. Child" and "Dear Mrs. DeVoto" became "Dear Julia" and "Dear Avis."
As an employee of the State Department's U.S. Information Service (USIS), which operated as a sort of propaganda agency, Paul set up photo and other art exhibits that would present the United States in a favorable light. Meanwhile, Julia explored the markets and dined in the small restaurants of Paris. Blessed with a hearty appetite, she had never been particularly interested in food until she began working with Paul in the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) during World War II in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) and China, where she enjoyed exotic meals. But in the City of Light, she experienced a culinary epiphany, and she had all the fervor of a religious convert regarding French food, wine, and cooking utensils. Above all, she valued the importance the French placed on mtier (skill). Propelled by her enthusiasm, she began a formal culinary education at Le Cordon Bleu in 1949 and sought out friends who thought about food the way she did. She met Simone "Simca" Beck, a Parisian who was well versed in the cuisines of Normandy, Alsace, and Provence, at a party for embassy personnel. The two clicked immediately and began to discuss food and "how to make a valid professional project out of it." When Simca and her friend Louisette Bertholle urged Julia to join Le Cercle des Gourmettes, an exclusive women's club started in the late 1920s, Julia was delighted. The three women often arrived hours before the scheduled Gourmettes' luncheon to assist the chef of the day in what they considered a private cooking lesson.Cooking in tandem became a heady experience. So in January 1952, when a handful of Julia's American friends who either lived in Paris or were on holiday asked her to teach them something about French cooking, she persuaded Simca and Louisette to join her in organizing classes in a venture that came to be known as L'cole des Trois Gourmandes. The three women taught twice a week. Julia organized the lesson plans and typed the recipes. The format included two hours of instruction and hands-on cooking, after which everyone sat down to a leisurely meal in the Childs' dining room, with Paul selecting the wines.Teaching cooking classes together soon led to writing a cookbook together. A few years earlier, after Louisette returned to France from a visit to the United States, she and Simca had submitted about six hundred recipes for a book to be published by the New York publishing house Ives Washburn. The head of the house, Sumner Putnam, had hired a translator/writer named Helmut Ripperger to prepare some of the recipes for a small spiral-bound book called What's Cooking in France, which was published early in 1952 but not widely promoted. Ripperger was not interested in working on a much larger cookbook, no contract was negotiated, and the project stalled.Simca and Louisette turned to Julia to help them realize their plan to publish their big book. Although reluctant at first, Julia soon recognized the benefits of the project, which presented an opportunity to test and refine recipes and "translate the genuine taste of French cooking into American." Julia also knew that simply being an American might give her an advantage in dealing with U.S. publishers, and she began to question the wisdom of publishing the book with Ives Washburn. In the fall of 1952, she requested that all of the material already sent to Putnam be returned for translation and editing. Then she, Simca, and Louisette began to outline the tentatively titled "French Cooking for All" and discuss its scope. They told Ives Washburn that they wanted the manuscript published in a sequence of five individual volumes.Meanwhile, Julia sent the first draft of the book to Avis, who immediately saw its potential and communicated her enthusiasm to Julia, along with the advice to extricate the project from Ives Washburn. Avis was an enterprising cook who knew how rare it was to find shallots even in the specialty shops of Cambridge and understood that there were limited places where an American cook could find a variety of herbs. She quickly became Julia's stateside adviser on ingredients, utensils, and the preferences of American cooks, as well as a valuable sounding board for Julia's staunch liberalism, ambition, and occasional insecurity.Because Houghton Mifflin was her husband's publisher, Avis knew the staff at the venerable Boston publishing house, and she contacted her friend Dorothy de Santillana, senior editor there. De Santillana instinctively knew that this technique-focused cookbook was unlike the Americanized French recipes that were being offered in women's magazines and upscale cookbooks. She was interested.In the following early letters between Julia and Avis, the latest victims of Senator Joseph McCarthy's Communist witch hunt get equal time with experiments on beurre blanc. Avis's accounts of forays into the West and excitement over Democrat Adlai Stevenson's 1952 presidential campaign cross paths with Julia's descriptions of the catch at the Old Port in Marseille, where Paul was posted in 1953. ("What luck for us," Julia says. "It could have been Abbis Ababababa.") Family members are introduced, and recipes are discussed at length.Based on de Santillana's assessment of the manuscript and Avis's enthusiasm, Houghton Mifflin began discussing a contract in late 1953. It was signed on June 1, 1954. One-third of the $750 advance was forwarded to Julia as the representative of the Trois Gourmandes, with instructions to submit the manuscript of "French Cooking in the American Kitchen" (as it was now called) as soon as possible. Avis signed on as Julia's unofficial line editor. It was the perfect arrangement all around.81 Rue de L'Universit, Paris, 7March 8, 1952Dear Mr. de Voto:Your able diatribe against the beautiful-beautiful-rust-proof-edge-proof American kitchen knife so went to my heart that I cannot refrain from sending you this nice little French model as a token of my appreciation.For the past three years here, I've had the good fortune to be able to spend my life studying French cooking and have amassed a most satisfyingly professional batterie de cuisine, including a gamut of excellent French knives. When we were in the USA last summer I picked up four beautiful-beautiful American stainless steel housewives knives, of different makes, to try them out. But I have been quite unable to sharpen them satisfactorily. I am therefore wondering if the average American housewife really wants a sharp knife in the kitchen, as many of my compatriots accuse me resentfully: "But your knives are so sharp! They're dangerous!"If you are in need of some good professional knives, I would be very pleased to get some for you, and the prices are modest:This one is about 70 (280 francs)8-inch blade, about $2.407-inch flexible fish filleter, about $1.00Mailed from here Fourth Class, one or two at a time, there seems to be no duty to pay at your end.We do enjoy you in Harper's!Most Sincerely,Julia Child(Mrs. Paul Child)8 Berkeley StreetCambridge 38, MassachusettsApril 3, 1952Dear Mrs. Child:I hope you won't mind hearing from me instead of from my husband. He is trying to clear the decks before leaving on a five weeks' trip to the Coast and is swamped with work, though I assure you most appreciative of your delightful letter and the fine little knife. Everything I say you may take as coming straight from him on the subject of cutlery we are in entire agreement.This is the first knife which has come from France we have had one from Spain and one from Germany and a great many from all over the States. I am particularly happy to have it because I have known all along that no French cook would be caught dead with a stainless steel knife. I have an enormous collection of knives all sent since the Harpers' piece and an earlier one in Fortune last spring but the prizes of my collection remain two ten-inch chef's knives made by a firm called Pouzet which I have owned for twenty-five years and which I plan to hand down to my children. I was in Paris for a couple of weeks in 1950 but was rather too busy eating to think about hunting for knives, a temptation I am sure you will understand.An aside on eating I am green with envy at your chance to study French cooking. There are two dishes served at Bossu on the Quai Bourbon that I remember in my dreams, and if by any possible chance you know how to make them I would be forever in your debt if you would let me know. One is a mixture of eggs, cream and fresh tarragon, done in a saucepan. I probably can't get the right kind of cream for it but I live in hopes I have tried it a dozen times with little success. The other is their veal in cream with tarragon. I am fairly successful with this using sometimes a dry white wine or even vermouth but Bossu probably has access to younger veal than I can get here.You are quite right in thinking that stainless steel knives can't be sharpened properly. If they are cheap, the steel is too soft to take an edge. The very expensive ones will hold an edge for a long time but can only be re-sharpened at the factory I am thinking of the brand called Frozen-Heat, made by Robeson at Perry, New York. These people have sent us two five piece sets retailing at $19.95 and I must admit they are good. But who wants to send knives to the factory to be reconditioned?We have been immeasurably heartened, however, to find that there are a number of small manufacturers who are quietly turning out excellent carbon steel knifes at reasonable prices, though where they are sold I cannot tell, as the American housewife wants stainless steel and that's what the retailers give her. A butchers' supply house seems to be the answer, and one of these houses in Kansas City sent us a boning knife, which sounds like your flexible fish filleter a wonderful knife. The best value of all is a set made by the Goodell Company in Antrim, New Hampshire long slicer, short chef's knife, boning knife, paring knife, pot-roast fork, plus a magna-grip to hold them on the wall it retails for $7.95. This set restored our faith in American industry, and my hardware man at Harvard Square now stocks them and they sell like hot-cakes.Since you are on your way to becoming an expert in these matters, I wish you would tell me how you sharpen your knives. Steel, hone, or what? I haven't mastered the hone, though if I ever get time I mean to practice until I have learned to do it correctly. I do use a steel frequently, but I find that once a year or so my knives need a trip to a really good professional who grinds them very gently and then finishes with a hone. The New Yorker last week spoke highly of a sharpener called the Emmons Rifle which has been made in Connecticut for a hundred and fifty years and sells for all of ninety-five cents. It's a fourteen inch paddle covered with some special Turkish emery I have sent for one but it hasn't come yet. Most patent sharpeners are death on knifes, I find especially the kind that give a sharp edge but remove ribbons of steel in the process. Of course you are right in thinking that lots of women are terrified of sharp knives but once having used a good one I don't see how they can go back to hacking and mashing.We have learned a tremendous lot this last year on the cutlery question, and sometime DeVoto is going to write another piece on the subject. We want to visit some of the manufacturers first at Antrim, and at Southbridge and Ayer, Massachusetts, where Dexter and Murphy make fine knives. We are even working our way through a six-volume affair called La Coutellerie Depuis l'Origine Jusqu' Nos Jours, by a gent named Pag, but since it was written before the invention of stainless steel, it won't be much help except to show off our learning to the enemy, who probably won't be impressed.Thanks again for the knife, which is a little gem. My husband, I regret to say, has snitched it for his own use cutting the lemon peel the proper thinness for the six o'clock Martini but it will be mine while he is in California. We are both pleased that you like the Easy Chair(1) and we both enjoyed hearing from you.SincerelyAvis W. DeVoto81 Rue de L'Universit, Paris, 7May 5, 1952Dear Mrs. De Voto:I have been planning to write you a long and well-organized letter in response to yours. But, with the tourist season and the sudden inauguration of "Mrs. Child's Cooking School, Paris Branch," there has been too little time. As to the tourists, we have been to the Follies Bergres, the Lido, the Ritz Bar, the Meurice Bar, the American Express, the Coq Hardi, the Tour d'Argent, the Table du Roi, and are now taking quite a bit of bicarbonate of soda. I don't ever want to go to any of them again except the American Express. And what is worse, a great many of these people are for Taft(2) and think McCarthy is doing a fine thing, which makes digestion even more difficult. What is the country coming to, I sometimes wonder.The cooking school, "L'cole des Trois Gourmandes" is a joint enterprise with two French women. Tuesdays and Wednesdays from 10 until 2, including lunch, maximum of 5 pupils. Object, to teach the fundamentals of French cooking to Americans. So far we've given 22 lessons, and it is working out well, and a tremendous amount of work for us professors, as each of us has slightly different methods, and we want everything to be as perfect and complete as possible. I'm enjoying it immensely, as I've finally found a real and satisfying profession which will keep me busy well into the year 2,000. But I wish I had started in when I was 14 yrs. old.I was fascinated with your account of the KNIFE. You must have a kitchen full by now. And particularly pleased to hear that there are some good ones being manufactured in the USA. The "Frozen Heat" types sound interesting, but who, as you say, wants to send them back to be re-sharpened. You'd have to have two sets. But, having seen lately, how few women have any idea how to use a knife (including French women), and remembering our American ideal of "glittering beauty," it will take a great deal of awakening to make the average housewife knife-conscious.I suppose one method will be the slow but sure one of the home economics courses, such as Life wrote up several weeks ago.As to knife sharpening, I am no expert. My husband, who is a one-man art factory, goes over them once in a while with a soap stone (carborundum with oil); and I keep an edge on them with a big steel fusil. I have once this year taken them all to a professional, who did a beautiful job, but I did feel he took off quite a bit of steel. However, I don't expect them to last a life time, I just want them to cut well. I don't know anything about hones. The next time I have the "man" sharpen them, I will hover over him, and report what he does. I think he has a mechanical wheel, and also a hand stone. Would be interested to hear how you like the Emmons Rifle, and what it is.You mentioned French cream. I think the difference between theirs and ours is how the separator is set. In theirs, the separator is set so that what comes out of the "other" spout is practically water, which is given to the pigs or thrown away. So it, the cream, is a most concentrated thick mass. And what you get is "whole cream." Some of it they make butter out of, the rest is sold as "crme frache." And they don't put it under refrigeration, so it gets that slightly sour taste. I wonder if one took US cream and put it through a separator one wouldn't get the same result. You could always get a richer flavor to your sauces by "buttering them up," i.e., after the sauce is off the heat, beat in bits of butter, a bit at a time; but never reheat to even under the boil again or the sauce will thin out or the butter will release itself. And you could get a slight sour by a few drops of lemon juice.Have been only once to Le Bossu, and had neither of the two dishes you mentioned. Scrambled Eggs, French, they do not scramble them as long as we do; the eggs remain in a soft broken custard, rather than in flakes. Done over very low heat, almost like a Hollandaise, stirred constantly until they "custard." A bit of butter beaten in at the end will add richness. Tarragon could be chopped up with the butter, and so impregnate itself.Veau la Crme, l'Estragon (a method). Heat butter in pan until it has foamed and is just turning blonde. Saut the veal, about 2 minutes on each side. Salt and pepper it. Stir in minced shallots. Pour in some brandy, set it aflame, let burn 1/2 minute and cover pan. Pour in a bit of white wine (dry) and some good reduced meat stock. Sprinkle in 1/2 your tarragon (chopped). Cover pan and let stew about 5 minutes. Uncover pan, turn up heat, let sauce reduce. Add heavy cream, and let that reduce. Sprinkle in fresh herbs before serving. The veal shouldn't be overcooked, and all of this shouldn't take more than 15 minutes.Mr. DeVoto's article on the hopelessly antediluvian monsters that Eisenhower will face in Congress(3) is a most sobering thought piece. But I want the Republicans in anyway; they need to "grow up" to their responsibilities. I have faith that the nation is strong enough to withstand them and to teach them, though my faith is not without dreadful qualms.Mon mari se joint moi, chre madame, en vous priant d'accepter,vous et votre mari, l'expression de nos meilleurs voeux(4),Julia Child(Mrs. Paul Child)8 Berkeley StreetCambridge 38, MassachusettsMay 30, 1952Dear Mrs. Child:The knife has come and it is a dream I am somewhat overwhelmed by your kindness. I have not used it yet but I expect it will perform nobly I want to try it first on a fish. In about two weeks my twelve-year-old son and I move down to the shore for the summer, and if he can't catch what passes for sole in those waters (flounder), he can provide me with a mackerel. But I think the knife will also be very good for vegetables it really is a joy to use knives like the two you sent me. They are as easy as possible to sharpen with a steel. Some of my best American knives are hell to sharpen, especially the hollow-ground ones. Hollow-ground is a hollow fraud it may be fine for razors but in the kitchen it is perfectly useless.Of course I know the Flint knives whose pretty picture you sent me, and I have a fine specimen. As I think I told you, these stainless steel knives, the expensive ones, hold an edge for quite a long time compared with a carbon steel knife, but it is practically impossible to sharpen them at home as the steel is too hard and too brittle. I have been faithfully using the Frozen Heat knives sent me by Emerson Case(5), because I promised him I would, but they weren't as sharp as your two knives to begin with. Funny thing happened with one of those Robeson knives. I had an extra one, roast carving size, sent me by the then president of Macy's last summer, but when Mr. Case sent me two of his sets I gave this odd knife to my part-time cook. Mary never abuses a knife; she has been too well indoctrinated by the DeVotos. But she was slicing an onion on a board one night at home and the Robeson knife was suddenly in two neat pieces. I sent it back to Mr. Case in great glee, and he replaced it at once since those knives are guaranteed for a lifetime, no less, but he has still not explained why or how it could possibly have happened. In all my days I have never had a knife come apart in my hands, even when digging dandelions out of the lawn.Of course there is nothing I would like better than to come and look at French knife factories except possibly go to England which is the great love of my life. But, fat chance. Or rather, there is about one chance in a million, because there is a vague deal on foot which would bring both the DeVoto's to France for a month or more to take a long look at French industry and the plan Schuman(6). I really doubt if this will come off, and DeVoto takes a dim view of it anyway, since he has always been oriented West like a homing pigeon and indeed has just returned from a six week's trip to California, Oregon, Utah, Colorado, as you will duly read in Harpers. However, I can dream, and the powers that are talking about this trip can easily deal with such minor matters as transportation in a summer when all space is at a premium. I am very superstitious about this possibility however, so don't mention it to anyone at all.The Emmons Rifle is not anywhere as good as Sheila Hibben(7) says it is, or perhaps I have not mastered its use. I am mastering the hone or carborundum stone, but I use my steel every day. I have an absolute beauty, a French import sent to me by a butcher's supply house in Kansas City.Recipes noted, and many, many thanks. I shall try your method for Veau la Crme, minus shallots which I can never find in the market. It is very like my own method, except that I do not use brandy, hence no flaming, and that I use olive oil instead of butter. I like to do vegetables in olive oil too mixtures such as celery, green peppers, onions plus sometimes eggplant and tomatoes. I like to do young carrots and scallions that way too, very little oil and let them cook in their own steam.I still hope you can eat the eggs with tarragon at Le Bossu, because there is some element there that I have not hit on. There is one more never to be forgotten egg dish that I hope you can help me with. This is called piprade and is I think of Basque origin it is very soft scrambled eggs with tomatoes and various kinds of peppers, so that it is full of little hot pockets. The best place to eat it is a tiny little hole in the wall between the Rtisserie Prigourdine and a little nightclub named L'Ecluse I have forgotten the name of the restaurant which has two or three tables on the sidewalk and a few more inside and is very inconspicuous and cheap. At least it was in 1950. I really cannot think of any dish more suited to a quivering stomach after too much wine the night before! Not that I ate it as a hangover cure; I have not had a hangover in fifteen years, thankyou.I am anxious to get to the beach I'm tired, dispirited after a hard winter, and nothing smoothes me out like sea air and long afternoons on a hot beach. My son Mark is great fun to live with and we gourmandize a lot, since Mary remains in town to look after my husband and elder son. Address, incidentally, 21 Leonard Street, Annisquam (Gloucester), Mass. This is on Ipswich Bay and rather heavenly. Cape Ann also provides what I stubbornly maintain are the world's best lobsters. I also stubbornly maintain that the only real way to cook lobsters is in three or four inches of sea water, in a covered kettle, for about twelve minutes (pound and a quarter lobsters being the ideal size). You then drape these dazzling creatures over the rocks until they cool off a bit, tear them apart with the bare hands, dip each piece in melted butter, and guzzle. There should be from two to six lobsters per person. While the lobsters cook and cool off, two dry Martinis la DeVoto should be served. Nothing whatever else should be served we are eating all the lobster we want, we are not fooling around with salad or strawberry shortcake or even coffee. All you need are the martinis, plenty of lobsters, millions of paper napkins, and a view. This is one of the culinary matters where the Americans have it all over on the French, as I hope a loyal American like you will agree. Ditto strawberry shortcake, season for same being upon us when the New Jersey berries come in next week. A strawberry which has traveled from Florida or California has no taste at all. I am not saying that the French lobster in all its sizes and varieties is not a fine thing, but when you have plenty of lobsters right out of the ocean I think it is a crime to obscure that heavenly flavor with any sauces.We will be in Annisquam until September 10th or so, DeVoto commuting week-ends as it is only 45 miles.I am fascinated by your account of your cooking school what a wonderful job to tackle. Do you plan to come back to America eventually and set up shop here? You will have no competition except Mrs. Lucas(8), who at present is sweeping all before her, on radio, television, and in person. She comes to Boston every spring under the auspices of the Smith College Club to make six or eight public appearances, which are mobbed. I must admit she is a very good showman, and I believe she is making a fortune. She also hits the road and has appeared as far west as Seattle. Plenty of room in the field for you, and a very good living. I would give anything to take such a course as I really do love to cook and there is so much I have to learn. But there just isn't time. I do a weekly newspaper column on detective stories very mere, badly paid, and I do all my husband's secretarial stuff, all the typing, take dictation from a tape recorder, and handle a lot of his routine mail on my own. The house is big and the children need me a lot. Plus all this I am now correcting proofs on the new book, which will appear late in the fall, and it's a hell of a job,the footnotes and bibliography especially which have some horrifying items in illiterate, 16th-17th century French, Spanish and so on. I am losing my mind.Well, it is very relaxing writing to you, but there are other fish to fry. I am keeping your letters in my fat file on kitchen knives we still have hopes of another article on the subject but we haven't got round to visiting these local foundries yet. Maybe next fall, if things calm down a bit. If you ever hear of a stainless steel knife made in France, I wish you would let me know I cannot believe that French manufacturers will ever fall for that fraud, but in the interest of expanding markets they may have to. Let us hope they find chrome too hard to come by.Now I must bully my eldest into washing the car, a proper job for Memorial Day when any cautious American stays off the roads. I love my new knife, and so do all the visitors who have seen it. Thank you a thousand times.Yours,Avis DeVoto8 Berkeley StreetCambridge 38, MassachusettsOctober 3, 1952Dear Mrs. Child:I have been terribly delayed in writing to thank you for the little cookbook. I have had a stubborn virus for three weeks now, my maid only comes three days a week, a compromise between what I need and what her husband wants, and of course everybody in the United States is perfectly hysterical about the campaign. Including me. I hope to God you two have absentee ballots in good working order. The spectacle of Eisenhower's complete capitulation to Taft is something to see, and l'affaire Nixon(9) is and has been quite terrifying. I was completely confident until Nixon's soap opera was so successful and can only pray that serious Republicans return to their senses.Anyhow, during all this turmoil I have managed to make eggs piprade three times with complete success except that I found there was a little too much fat in it going a little light on the oil and butter takes care of that and I am overjoyed to have the recipe. Thank you very, very much. My family thanks you too. It is all so simple but I never would have thought of three kinds of fat in one recipe it works like a charm.If we live through the election perhaps I can get back to some serious cooking, but now life is far too full of telephones ringing. What with the boss going out to Springfield and helping with other speeches here, Ihave to swing quite a lot of his affairs myself. After a blistering hot summer during which my weight fell to 112 pounds, I could do with some peace and the opportunity to putter around a stove. And I have told DeVoto that if he ever gets back to the knife question, if he tells the truth he will have to accept my verdict that French knives are better than American or any others. My hand automatically reaches for the two you sent me and I vastly prefer them to any others. They are far easier to sharpen, too.I hope all goes well with you and with your school, but I am sorry you have to miss the campaign doings. They are to be sure quite exhausting, but I have never seen the population so excited nobody talks of anything else. And you are not seeing Adlai [Stevenson] on Television. (I never looked at TV until the conventions but now I see why it was invented.) Please do not think me too immoderate when I say that this is a completely new kind of man in politics. I think he is going to be bigger than Roosevelt but then, I didn't always admire FDR though I voted for him four times. I hope the French press is covering all this adequately the English papers and weeklies have been very satisfactory. The Economist certainly isn't missing anything.Sorry to sound so frenetic I am in a state, what with my throat and everything. Now I must dress to go to the Ritz to have dinner with Alfred Knopf, that great gourmet [and publisher] I'm perfectly certain he has been harrying the chef all afternoon. I hope there are no Republicans present as I would like to relax with the vintages Alfred probably ordered weeks in advance.Blessings. And Vote.Avis DeVoto81 Rue de L'Universit, Paris, 7December 15, 1952Dear Mrs. De Voto:I have not yet answered your very nice letter of way back before the election, but I have thought of you both with affection and interest. Was delighted to see that Mr. De Voto was in on the Stevenson campaign. It must have been a bitter disappointment to all of you, after the work you put into the campaign. Stevenson appears to be a marvelous fellow, from all points of view, and the more he talked, the better I liked him. He made a tremendous hit here with the French, which probably did him no good at home. But I do think he would have had one awful time, with more and louder McCarthyism. I am, of course, "persona traitoria" to my family in California, who are Old Guard Republicans of the blackest and most violently Neanderthal stripe. My nice step-mother wrote me the other day saying please not to write anything more to my father about either politics or Charlie Chaplin (10) as it upsets him too much. And my brother, from Pittsfield, Mass., writes to inform me I have no right to foster my ideas on other people, and that furthermore the only real red-blooded Americans are the Republicans. YE GODS. Well, I hope tempers will subside and a bit of mature reason shall reign.I am sending you with this letter a part of the Sauce Chapter from our forthcoming book FRENCH HOME COOKING. We are so steeped in it, we cannot look at it objectively, and need some intelligent American opinion.We seem to be sewed up morally (not legally) with Ives Washburn Company. Do you know anything about them as a publishing house? I immodestly think that this could become a classic on French cooking, as it is a complete re-studying of classical methods and recipes, in view of making them easier to do, and of bringing them up-to-date, and of making them understandable to the novice, interesting for the practiced cook. I do not think, moreover, that we are at all in competition with the Gourmet publications, or any of the other French cook books we've seen, as we are not trying to be an encyclopedia, only a good book on the fundamentals . . . with the object of making cooking make sense.Whether or not it makes sense to you, also, interests me very much, so if you have the time, I shall be deeply appreciative of any comments you can make. And please be frank and brutal.WISHING YOU BOTH A VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS!Julia ChildPS: Please do not show this ms. to anyone. I think cooking recipes and methods are too easily stolen, and, as quite a bit of this is new stuff . . .1 Bernard DeVoto's column in Harper's.2 Robert A. Taft, a conservative Republican senator from Ohio, who was vying for the GOP nomination for president in 1952 but lost to Dwight D. Eisenhower.3 Eisenhower hoped to win over the isolationist Republicans in Congress to an internationalist approach.4 "My husband joins me, dear lady, in hoping that you and your husband will accept the expression of our best wishes."5 Case, president of Robeson Cutlery Company in Rochester, New York, developed a process for heat-treating stainless steel blades to make them harder that he called Frozen Heat.6 The 1950 Schuman Plan, a precursor of the European Coal and Steel Community (1952) and eventually the European Union, called for establishing a single organization to pool European coal and steel resources.7 A food writer who had consulted on the White House menus for Eleanor Roosevelt and was a columnist for The New Yorker.8 Dione Lucas, an English chef, cooking teacher, and cookbook author; an early champion of French cooking; and the first woman to have her own cooking show in the United States.9 During Eisenhower's campaign for president, the vice presidential candidate Richard Nixon of California was accused of having appropriated campaign donations for his own use. In a nationally televised speech, he defended himself and said the only political gift he intended to keep was the family cocker spaniel, Checkers.10 The comic film star was forced to leave the United States by the FBI in 1952 because of his leftist political views.
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Product details
- Publisher : Mariner Books; Reprint edition (April 10, 2011)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 432 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0547577486
- ISBN-13 : 978-0547577487
- Item Weight : 15.2 ounces
- Dimensions : 5.31 x 1 x 8 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #207,113 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #139 in Literary Letters
- #298 in Gastronomy History (Books)
- #347 in Journalist Biographies
- Customer Reviews:
About the authors
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Culinary historian, cookbook author, and biographer Joan Reardon is the author of M.F.K. Fisher, Julia Child, and Alice Waters; M.F.K. Fisher Among the Pots and Pans; Poet of the Appetites: The Lives and Loves of M.F.K. Fisher; and Oysters: a Culinary Celebration. Reardon, who has a Ph.D. in English literature, won an IACP Award for culinary writing, publishes and edits a quarterly newsletter for Les Dames d’Escoffier Chicago, and serves on the advisory board of Gastronomica magazine.
Julia Child was born in Pasadena, California. She was graduated from Smith College and worked for the OSS during World War II in Ceylon and China, where she met Paul Child. After they married they lived in Paris, where she studied at the Cordon Bleu and taught cooking with Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle, with whom she wrote the first volume of Mastering the Art of French Cooking (1961). In 1963, Boston's WGBH launched The French Chef television series, which made her a national celebrity, earning her the Peabody Award in 1965 and an Emmy in 1966. Several public television shows and numerous cookbooks followed. She died in 2004.
(Photo credit: (C) Michael P. McLaughlin)
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Reviewed in the United States on July 18, 2022
Love anything about Julia Child
Reviewed in the United States on July 26, 2014
It started out with a letter about a knife, of all things. Julia and Paul Child had been in Paris about three and a half years when Julia read an article published in a 1951 issue of Harper's, written by Bernard DeVoto. His rant on the quality of American kitchen knives apparently spoke to Julia, so she wrote him a short letter and sent a him a knife, "a nice little French model as a token of [her] appreciation." (p. 7). Bernard DeVoto's wife, Avis, answered most of her husband's letters, so she was the one to respond to Julia.
And so it began. Before long, a close friendship between Julia Child and Avis DeVoto had been forged and the making of a culinary icon had begun. I was looking forward to reading this book once I heard about it. I was interested to learn more about Julia Child and her iconic cookbook, of course, but I was more interested in learning about the friendship between Julia and Avis. These two women corresponded primarily by letter for years as Julia and Paul moved from one country to the next. While it started out by discussing kitchen knives, the letters soon became about so much more, no topic was off limits it seemed- current events, politics, family life, travel. Julia's writing is (to me) surprisingly poetic in some instances, like her description of life in Norway:
"Every two or three days we have about 3 inches of snow, and a mist and snow clings to the trees so that every prickle and knobble is outlined in white. We can put on our skis and start right out from the front door....Little babies of 4 dressed in blue and red on tiny skis plow down the hills with happy ruddy faces. Little boys of 7 or 8 are learning how to jump." (Julia to Avis, 2/22/1960).
Once they began exchanging letters with some frequency, it's easy to see the women grow more comfortable with one another, exchanging thoughts about a variety of things. It's fascinating to read the effect modern technology had on cooking and entertaining. Avis and Julia exchanged thoughts about dishwashers, blenders, the pros and cons of frozen poultry and canned soups, and the modern marvel of Avis's "pig"- the garbage disposal she had installed! Pretty sure I've never heard it called a "pig". Both women had strong opinions about some of these modern advances and weren't afraid to share them.
That there will be plenty of food talk is obviously a safe assumption to make. I often wished I had a copy of Mastering the Art of French Cooking sitting right next to me so I could follow along as they talked food and tweaked recipes together. I'd be lying if I said my mouth didn't water more than a few times! Julia describes food and the art and science of cooking in a way that I knew how passionately she felt about it. And the research she did! Oh, the research! The amount of testing, retesting, and refining Julia did is impressive! I can see why this project took years to complete.
With her connections and knowledge of the publishing world, Avis DeVoto played a huge role in eventually getting Mastering the Art of French Cooking published. But she also acted as an unofficial recipe tester, copy editor, sounding board, and shoulder to cry on:
"...most Americans don't know anything at all, NOTHING, about the techniques of good cooking and that every detail (EVERY ONE) must be thoroughly explained. So I am deeply depressed, gnawed by doubts, and feel that all our work may just lay a big rotten egg." (Julia to Avis, 1/12/58).
"We must somehow convince the reading and eating and cooking public that there is nothing psychologically horrifying about this presentation, quite the contrary. What you are doing is casting a great light over the mysteries of French cooking. Stand by your guns, my lamb." (Avis to Julia, 1/17/58).
What a roller coaster this process must have been! I already knew the ending- obviously Julia Child becomes an icon, her masterpiece is published- and there were times it was heart breaking to go through the process with these two women. The letters convey how invested they both were. The joy when they find out the book will be published is wonderful and I felt like I was part of their celebration.
Overall, the book was a great read. I think it had something for everyone- the foodie, the history buff, the travel lover. For me, it was heartwarming to see this deep friendship develop over time, during a much simpler time- a time without email, text messages, social media. It's a good example of how two very busy, very capable, intelligent, and interesting women can devote time and energy to build a strong meaningful relationship. I bet more than a few of us could learn from this example today.
I will say the book was lengthy and at times I was glad to set it aside for a while, but I always came back to it. I think if you're someone who doesn't know a lot about the political events happening at the time, or aren't at all interested in them, you may find those sections are the ones that lag for you, at least, those were sometimes the ones that did for me. But overall, the book was well worth the read!
http://heididiariesbookaddict.blogspot.com/
And so it began. Before long, a close friendship between Julia Child and Avis DeVoto had been forged and the making of a culinary icon had begun. I was looking forward to reading this book once I heard about it. I was interested to learn more about Julia Child and her iconic cookbook, of course, but I was more interested in learning about the friendship between Julia and Avis. These two women corresponded primarily by letter for years as Julia and Paul moved from one country to the next. While it started out by discussing kitchen knives, the letters soon became about so much more, no topic was off limits it seemed- current events, politics, family life, travel. Julia's writing is (to me) surprisingly poetic in some instances, like her description of life in Norway:
"Every two or three days we have about 3 inches of snow, and a mist and snow clings to the trees so that every prickle and knobble is outlined in white. We can put on our skis and start right out from the front door....Little babies of 4 dressed in blue and red on tiny skis plow down the hills with happy ruddy faces. Little boys of 7 or 8 are learning how to jump." (Julia to Avis, 2/22/1960).
Once they began exchanging letters with some frequency, it's easy to see the women grow more comfortable with one another, exchanging thoughts about a variety of things. It's fascinating to read the effect modern technology had on cooking and entertaining. Avis and Julia exchanged thoughts about dishwashers, blenders, the pros and cons of frozen poultry and canned soups, and the modern marvel of Avis's "pig"- the garbage disposal she had installed! Pretty sure I've never heard it called a "pig". Both women had strong opinions about some of these modern advances and weren't afraid to share them.
That there will be plenty of food talk is obviously a safe assumption to make. I often wished I had a copy of Mastering the Art of French Cooking sitting right next to me so I could follow along as they talked food and tweaked recipes together. I'd be lying if I said my mouth didn't water more than a few times! Julia describes food and the art and science of cooking in a way that I knew how passionately she felt about it. And the research she did! Oh, the research! The amount of testing, retesting, and refining Julia did is impressive! I can see why this project took years to complete.
With her connections and knowledge of the publishing world, Avis DeVoto played a huge role in eventually getting Mastering the Art of French Cooking published. But she also acted as an unofficial recipe tester, copy editor, sounding board, and shoulder to cry on:
"...most Americans don't know anything at all, NOTHING, about the techniques of good cooking and that every detail (EVERY ONE) must be thoroughly explained. So I am deeply depressed, gnawed by doubts, and feel that all our work may just lay a big rotten egg." (Julia to Avis, 1/12/58).
"We must somehow convince the reading and eating and cooking public that there is nothing psychologically horrifying about this presentation, quite the contrary. What you are doing is casting a great light over the mysteries of French cooking. Stand by your guns, my lamb." (Avis to Julia, 1/17/58).
What a roller coaster this process must have been! I already knew the ending- obviously Julia Child becomes an icon, her masterpiece is published- and there were times it was heart breaking to go through the process with these two women. The letters convey how invested they both were. The joy when they find out the book will be published is wonderful and I felt like I was part of their celebration.
Overall, the book was a great read. I think it had something for everyone- the foodie, the history buff, the travel lover. For me, it was heartwarming to see this deep friendship develop over time, during a much simpler time- a time without email, text messages, social media. It's a good example of how two very busy, very capable, intelligent, and interesting women can devote time and energy to build a strong meaningful relationship. I bet more than a few of us could learn from this example today.
I will say the book was lengthy and at times I was glad to set it aside for a while, but I always came back to it. I think if you're someone who doesn't know a lot about the political events happening at the time, or aren't at all interested in them, you may find those sections are the ones that lag for you, at least, those were sometimes the ones that did for me. But overall, the book was well worth the read!
http://heididiariesbookaddict.blogspot.com/
5 people found this helpful
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Reviewed in the United States on June 12, 2014
Earlier I reviewed this book based on having read 21% of the content; which remains embedded within this updated review. Now, with the entire book completed, I see more depth in the totality of letters exchanged between Julia Child and Avis DeVoto than was evident in the early letters.
This is a "book of many colors". It is historical. It is political. It is about relationships. It contains elements of hope; frustration; despair; persistence; and,ultimately, triumph over what at times must have seemed like overwhelming odds.
I am only 21% of the way through these fascinating letters be Julia Child and Avis DeVoto so this is but a very brief review of this work, however, it is also the only time I have been so engrossed in a book that I find it valuable to write a review as a "work in progress".
As an amatuer cook given to experienting will numerous styles of cuisine, I am not sure what I expected when I ordered this book in Kindle format but I assure those who read this that what I received is far more than what I believed the book would be. I guess I expected, well, a cookbook. To this point in my reading I have come to see this work as something far more important and, for those interested in history and travel, something totally unexpected.
If you are familiar with Julia Child through her cookbooks and PBS shows, then you, like I, don't know Julia as a person outside of her known field of expertise. Born in the mid-1940's, much of what is discussed in the letters relative to the political climate of the United States, post-World War II resonates with what I, and every other "Baby-Boomer" grew up with in the 50's and beyond. It provides an interesting perspective of what Julia and Avis (both obviously staunch Liberals) see as dangerous within the U.S.; Julia as an American living abroad with her husband working for the State Department, and Avis living in the U.S. married to a successful, if too liberal, author.
Highly recommended for cooks and those who aspire to be cooks; historians and those who think history is boring.
The preceding 4 paragraphs are from the original review.
Throughout these letters and Reardon's commentaries, we see a progression as the "pen-pal" friendship blossoms. The letters become more intimate. Attitudes and prejudices surface revealing much about both Julia and Avis. Julia loves France but seems, at times. to dislike the French. Avis mentions friends with a "certain condition", namely, that they are lesbians - revealing the deep-seated prejudice against gays and lesbians prevalent up until very recently (when viewed in the context of history). The use of the word "gay" in some of the letters is quickly explained to mean the true definition of the word as opposed to the sexual orientation it has come to represent.
Nothing in these letters serves to diminish the accomplishments of Julia, Simca, and Avis in the authorship and publication of Julia's and Simca's recognized masterpiece; nor, Julia's success as a star on PBS. These letters show what life was like from the late 40's through Avis' death and, in the Epilogue, beyond to further discuss (in commentary) Julia's continued success as an author and television personality.
Deserves more than 5-stars but that's all that are available.
This is a "book of many colors". It is historical. It is political. It is about relationships. It contains elements of hope; frustration; despair; persistence; and,ultimately, triumph over what at times must have seemed like overwhelming odds.
I am only 21% of the way through these fascinating letters be Julia Child and Avis DeVoto so this is but a very brief review of this work, however, it is also the only time I have been so engrossed in a book that I find it valuable to write a review as a "work in progress".
As an amatuer cook given to experienting will numerous styles of cuisine, I am not sure what I expected when I ordered this book in Kindle format but I assure those who read this that what I received is far more than what I believed the book would be. I guess I expected, well, a cookbook. To this point in my reading I have come to see this work as something far more important and, for those interested in history and travel, something totally unexpected.
If you are familiar with Julia Child through her cookbooks and PBS shows, then you, like I, don't know Julia as a person outside of her known field of expertise. Born in the mid-1940's, much of what is discussed in the letters relative to the political climate of the United States, post-World War II resonates with what I, and every other "Baby-Boomer" grew up with in the 50's and beyond. It provides an interesting perspective of what Julia and Avis (both obviously staunch Liberals) see as dangerous within the U.S.; Julia as an American living abroad with her husband working for the State Department, and Avis living in the U.S. married to a successful, if too liberal, author.
Highly recommended for cooks and those who aspire to be cooks; historians and those who think history is boring.
The preceding 4 paragraphs are from the original review.
Throughout these letters and Reardon's commentaries, we see a progression as the "pen-pal" friendship blossoms. The letters become more intimate. Attitudes and prejudices surface revealing much about both Julia and Avis. Julia loves France but seems, at times. to dislike the French. Avis mentions friends with a "certain condition", namely, that they are lesbians - revealing the deep-seated prejudice against gays and lesbians prevalent up until very recently (when viewed in the context of history). The use of the word "gay" in some of the letters is quickly explained to mean the true definition of the word as opposed to the sexual orientation it has come to represent.
Nothing in these letters serves to diminish the accomplishments of Julia, Simca, and Avis in the authorship and publication of Julia's and Simca's recognized masterpiece; nor, Julia's success as a star on PBS. These letters show what life was like from the late 40's through Avis' death and, in the Epilogue, beyond to further discuss (in commentary) Julia's continued success as an author and television personality.
Deserves more than 5-stars but that's all that are available.
16 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries
Sue Vickers-Thompson
5.0 out of 5 stars
Mastering the Art and so much more!
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 7, 2011
This is a wonderful book, dealing with the letters between Julia Child and Avis DeVoto, following a chance reference in Avis's husband's column to knives. They build up a real friendship through many long letters, which continued all their lives, although the book centres around the years of writing "Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Vol 1". Fortunately for us, the friendship deepened when they actually met! However, the letters contain much, much more than "just" queries about the book, publishers etc. It is a potted history of the politics of the US during the McCarthy era and also of the European scene, where Julia and her husband Paul, were based during this period. They are both widely read women, in touch with movers and shakers and linked in to journalists and politicians on both continents.
This is an important book to read if you love Julia Child's cooking and "Julie and Julia" and are interested in the social context in which "Mastering" was developed and first appeared, with its details about the relationship between the three authors of Vol 1 as well as the politics of publishing. Definitely a book for those who wish to set Julia's long cooking life in its social and political beginnings.
This is an important book to read if you love Julia Child's cooking and "Julie and Julia" and are interested in the social context in which "Mastering" was developed and first appeared, with its details about the relationship between the three authors of Vol 1 as well as the politics of publishing. Definitely a book for those who wish to set Julia's long cooking life in its social and political beginnings.
10 people found this helpful
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Amazon Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars
Book 📕
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 29, 2021
Very good 😊
D
5.0 out of 5 stars
MOST PLEASANT READING
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 26, 2020
GIVES INSIGHT INTO HER CREATIVE COOKING AND DRIVE TO SHARE.
mayanguy
5.0 out of 5 stars
A real pleasure to read
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 22, 2015
A wonderful insight into Julia and Avis. The letters are so varied and informative and a real joy to read. I would thoroughly recommend this to any fan of Julia Child
Gloslad
5.0 out of 5 stars
Best of friends
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 9, 2014
Still reading this book, but it is so good that I want to take it slowly and not miss anything. Would highly recommend.
