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The United States of Arugula: The Sun Dried, Cold Pressed, Dark Roasted, Extra Virgin Story of the American Food Revolution Paperback – July 17, 2007

4.5 out of 5 stars 73

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The wickedly entertaining, hunger-inducing, behind-the-scenes story of the revolution in American food that has made exotic ingredients, celebrity chefs, rarefied cooking tools, and destination restaurants familiar aspects of our everyday lives.

Amazingly enough, just twenty years ago eating sushi was a daring novelty and many Americans had never even heard of salsa. Today, we don't bat an eye at a construction worker dipping a croissant into robust specialty coffee, city dwellers buying just-picked farmstand produce, or suburbanites stocking up on artisanal cheeses and extra virgin oils at supermarkets.
The United States of Arugula is a rollicking, revealing stew of culinary innovation, food politics, and kitchen confidences chronicling how gourmet eating in America went from obscure to pervasive—and became the cultural success story of our era.

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Editorial Reviews

Review

“With the sweep of an epic novel, David Kamp takes us behind the scenes and into the sweaty, wacky, weird trenches of the Great American Food Revolution. His reporting is solid, his storytelling magnificent, and his good humor is seemingly inexhaustible . . . . a terrific book.” —Molly O’Neill

“Culturally aware and cleverly written, this anatomy of the French-fried versus sun-dried tension at the heart of American gastronomy is refreshingly non-snooty.”
Atlantic Monthly

"A page-turner filled with fascinating footnotes, a delicious dish about bold-faced names, and an in-depth look at the ways in which a series of food pioneers touched off a revolution." —
USA Today

“Juicy, irreverent, and full of bite.” —Gael Greene

About the Author

David Kamp has been a writer and editor for Vanity Fair and GQ for more than a decade. He lives in New York.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Crown; Reprint edition (July 17, 2007)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 416 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0767915801
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0767915809
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 12.2 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.25 x 0.9 x 7.98 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.5 out of 5 stars 73

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David Kamp
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David Kamp is an author, journalist, lyricist, and humorist. Among his books are the national bestseller The United States of Arugula (Broadway Books, 2006), a chronicle of America’s foodways; the upcoming Sunny Days (Simon & Schuster, May 2020), a history of the Sesame Street-Mister Rogers era of children’s television; and, as co-author, Martin Short’s bestselling memoir, I Must Say (HarperCollins, 2014). A longtime contributor to Vanity Fair, he has profiled such figures as Johnny Cash, Sly Stone, Lucian Freud, Kerry Washington, Bruce Springsteen, John Hughes, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, and the Brill Building songwriters. His work also appears regularly in the New York Times. His first outing as a lyricist for the stage, for the John Leguizamo musical comedy Kiss My Aztec!, had its world premiere at Berkeley Rep in the spring of 2019; the show is now New York-bound. David began his career at Spy, the legendary satirical monthly. He lives in with his family in New York City and rural Connecticut.

Customer reviews

4.5 out of 5 stars
4.5 out of 5
73 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Reviewed in the United States on October 22, 2021
I loved this book. I picked it up and put it down a few times … it is very long. If you don’t know who at least three of the people are on the cover it’s probably not for you. If you do, it is an amazing journey into the history of foodie culture.
Reviewed in the United States on October 26, 2012
In the last 40 years, the predominant food culture in America has become "gourmet". Salsa and sushi have gone from unknown to ubiquitous, and local ingredients, specialty cooking tools and celebrity chefs have become routine. The United States of Arugula attempts to tell the story of how this happened.

This book is a fairly fun read, although it meanders quite a bit. We start with the Big Three that popularised inventive cooking and dining - James Beard, Julia Child and Craig Claiborne, and go all the way to Emeril Lagasse's restaurant empire. Kamp has certainly done his research, and the text is packed with all kinds of little asides and tidbits that make the events in the book come to life.

Any revolution always begins with a few people, and it is always interesting to read about those people's motivations and understand the movement itself in context. Kamp takes this a little too far, though and the book comes off as overly gossipy. Beard and Claiborne's (among others) sexual preferences are exhumed in detail, and there's a lot of focus on who did and didn't get along. For instance, Graham Kerr, a contemporary of Julia Child who also had a popular cooking show, is introduced as "Everyone in the food world agreed on one person they could hate", even though their hate of him had no bearing on any significant events. I wish that Kamp had instead devoted that space to the events he mentions omitting in his introduction.

Another problem with this book is that it was really hard to follow. I usually read epic fantasy and have no trouble keeping hundreds of characters straight in my head, but Kamp introduces so many names that it detracts from the flow of the book. Many of the people mentioned by name are only mentioned once, which adds to the confusion (is this a person I'm supposed to know?) Adding to this is Kamp's love of tangents, he does not stick to one person or one chronological period or even one story. Chapter 2 starts off with an introduction of Pierre Franey entering the US, but jumps quickly to Jacques Pépin's childhood, and then to French cooks' propensity for local foods, to an explanation of "classic French cooking", to a biography of Antonin Carême and so on... and when the book got back to Franey's story after he gets off the boat, I had a hard time remembering who he was.

Aside from those two issues, the book was a great primer on recent food history in the United States.
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Reviewed in the United States on September 17, 2013
i picked this up on a "you might also like" recommendation and was not disappointed. it made for great beach reading and was such a great history, pre-food network, of the industry and the big names involved. i think anyone will love hearing the stories of how all the names they have come to throw around on a daily basis came to be. growing up in california in the early 80's i just wish my folks were more into food and such as i have become as an adult because i could have experienced this burgeoning movement first hand.
One person found this helpful
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Reviewed in the United States on October 10, 2014
If you are a foodie like me you will love this book! I have followed chefs and collected cookbooks for over 42 years. This book describes in detail the food revolution in America. This book puts everything in order and makes everything make sense beginning with Julia Child to Celebrity chefs on the Food Network. I highly recommend this book if you love to cook!
2 people found this helpful
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Reviewed in the United States on February 10, 2014
A fun and witty story about food trends in America.
Purchased this as a gift for myself and enjoyed every page.
Reviewed in the United States on January 31, 2021
This is a very interesting book, full of little fascinomas. The only thing I didn’t like was a simple technicality— the type used in the book is quite small, so it was hard for me to read.
Reviewed in the United States on June 30, 2014
A foodie's delight of US culinary history, It was a great read
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Reviewed in the United States on December 16, 2014
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Top reviews from other countries

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Caro58
5.0 out of 5 stars intéressant et très complet
Reviewed in France on November 17, 2014
Un livre extrèmement bien recherché et bien écrit, un plaisir à lire. On suit l'ascension de la gastronomie Américaine à partir du début du vingtième siècle, en passant par la nourriture industrialisée et standardisée qui était l'idéal dans la période d'après-guerre, traversant ensuite la prise de conscience amorcée par Julia Child, Alice Waters et James Beard, jusqu'aux dernières modes et "quirks" des foodies de nos jours. Instructif et amusant!
Jonathan Haskell
3.0 out of 5 stars a bit too specialized, even for me, but well written and a book that deserves to be in print
Reviewed in France on June 5, 2013
HI; I am a foodie . An obsessed one at that, but I found this book simply too specialized in the American side of super chefs and their discoveries.
Nothing is wrong with this book, it is simply too specialized for me. read the first few pages on iBook and you'll see if it is for you.
It is certainly well-written and deserves to be in print