“My Life in France” by Julia Child with Alex Prud’homme.   

To most of us, Julia Child sprang full blown onto the food scene with her first series of cooking shows produced by PBS in Boston. The long years of struggle and learning to master her art remained an untold story until now.   

Julia arrived in France in 1948 on a passenger steam ship. She spoke no French, knew next to nothing about cooking let alone, French Cuisine. Yet, her first meal on French soil, in the city or Rouen, in a restaurant called La Couronne, a sole meuniére, changed the course of her life.   

Thus began a fascinating story of Julia Child search for the culinary Holy Grail. She set about to learn every thing she could about French cooking and in the process learned to speak fluent French. Along the way, she fell in love with France and all things French. Julia often refers to France as her spiritual home. 

  The journey to stardom took many twists and turns. She spent hours and hours perfecting a dish so that American cooks could enjoy the same French flavours in their American kitchens. At one point she use 248 pounds of flour to discover the best way to make a French baguette in an American oven using American ingredients. 

  From 1948 to late in September 1961 when her landmark book,” Mastering the Art of French Cooking”, finally saw print, 13 years of struggle, frustration and happiness had transpired. 

  We seldom get to see such an honest and heart felt look into the years that lead to apparent over night success. 

  The story is told my Julia Child who is not afraid to let you into the whirl wind of her years in France. She writes with charm and wit. You get to walk her Paris as she recounts her discoveries, her struggles with language, her doubts, and her triumphs. You dine with now famous names in the word of food. You holiday with her and her husband Paul in their hide away home in Provence. 

  It is hard to realize, as we watch the plethora of cooking shows today, the genre was totally new in the early sixties. Julia set the tone and the standard for all the cook shows that have followed in her footsteps. 

  The book is an absolute joy to read. I urge all of you if you are interested in food at all to latch onto a copy of this fabulous book. Open the book and step over the threshold, back to another time, and into a very different country, and enjoy all the sights and sensations that made up the life of Julia Child. 

  “My Life In France”, truly qualifies as a beautiful summer morning kind of book. 

  Follow the link below to order you own copy. You’ll be happy you did. 

  Nick Grimshawe 

       

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