Category Archives: food

The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood

Sometimes when I read a book I wish the author wasn’t quite so good at what they do. I wish that their characters will seem less believable so that when the story is a bit gruesome I can think to myself – naah, nobody would ever do that for real… But Atwood is like Steven King, characters so well rounded and believable that it sometimes makes the books a bit too realistic – but in a good way- mostly.

This was the prequel to Oryx and Crake which, in my way, I remember about three non-relevant details from along with the sense that it was good/fascinating/icky which is just about exactly how this one was. Now I’ve got to go back and read Oryx and Crake again, quick before I forget!

Would I recommend it? She is a very good author but I’m not sure her post apocalyptic world is for everyone. I just have to much of a slimy feel to me after reading this to give it a broad recommendation – but for what it’s worth I am reserving Oryx and Crake from the library tonight to re-read.

Girl Hunter by Georgia Pellegrini (and Chukar Hunting)

This book was fine.

Woman chef becomes hunter in order to truly participate in her omnivorous life.

Pretty good stories, good looking recipes but one thing really bothered me.

The chukar.

Georgia shoots her chukar at a Texas game ranch where “…an olive brown figure rises from the left, only 10 yards in front and, crosses my path in a diagonal leap skyward.”

She who has never tasted a chukar gets her bird, and life is good. I bet she even remembers how it tastes.

I have also been chukar hunting.

It was a bit different than that.

My Dad, brother and cousin Johnny all went chukar hunting in Nevada a few years ago. After lots and lots of driving we arrived and it was beautiful.

We parked the truck down along the river.

Until I realized that I had to hike up all that beauty.

See here is the thing, the locals don’t call them “Dirty Rotten Bastards” without due cause. Chukars hang out on the side of the mountain until they see you coming, then they run – straight – up – the – mountain. When they reach the top they no doubt do a few chukar high fives before the Dirty Rotten Bastards laugh and fly down the other side of the mountain. 

I don’t run up mountains as fast as a chukar, my game vest stayed empty.

After a few days of hunting we got smarter and learned what the birds ( I mean Dirty Rotten Bastards) were flying to and we were able to set up hunts so that they flew down our side of the mountain. That sounds like it should be much better, and it was. All you had to do was stop upward movement on a 45 degree, rocky, snow covered slope, pivot outward to be facing the flying birds and then attempt to stop gasping for oxygen in the thin mountain air so as to steady your gun and get a shot off.

My game vest still stayed empty.

Then I’d watch and watch as the unscathed bastards would fly off, mark where they went down, hike back down my mountain and get ready to chase them up the next one. It was fantastic in a masochistic sort of way.

Fortunately not everyone was as bad a shot as I was and we were able to eat chukar for dinner at night.

Unlike Georgia I do not remember how it tastes.

I was so tired by the end of the day it’s possible I would have thought cardboard a delicious dinner.

Tyler (who can kill a chuckar) and dogs along ridge.

As the local mountain lion hunter told us, you go Dirty Rotten Bastard hunting the first time for fun, the next times are all revenge.

And now that I have my own bird dog and know that I have to pretend I’m training for a marathon before I leave, I can’t wait until I have an opportunity to get my revenge.

Hopefully I’ll even remember how it tastes.

Would I recommend the book? I go bird hunting because I like the hunting. Figuring out what the birds are eating, where they will be and when, watching the dogs work the field (or mountain) and maybe if I’m lucky being able to fill my game vest with something tasty for dinner. I’d rather hike up and down mountains while puzzling out how it all works with friends or family than be certain of finding game on a managed property with a guide.

The author is a hunter to find out where her food came from, participate in the harvest and cook great food. I think what she does is admirable, I think her stories are good and I’m glad she wrote a book about it, I just can’t broadly recommend it as a hunting book. It’s not my kind of hunting.

The Wideacre Trilogy by Phillipa Gregory

Wideacre

The most wonderfully written car crash of a book I’ve ever read. I couldn’t look away and I couldn’t stop reading even when I wanted to.

Would I recommend it? No. It’s well done, but I just can’t recommend a book full of incest, I can’t do it.

The Favored Child

One of those books where you know the end.  Right from the beginning you know the chances of a happily ever after are slim, very, very, slim. Then it gets worse, and you see the character falling into trap after trap and then end is coming and all of a sudden it’s back to the car crash that you just can’t look away from.

Would I recommend it? No.  See recommendation above and add in verbal and physical abuse and a barn owl that says “whoo, whoo”

Meridon

Wow.

Would I recommend it? Well, you can’t just go read the last book of a trilogy, it’d make no sense whatsoever.  This one almost made the rest worth it.

The end result:

While this won’t be a trio of books I’ll be highly recommending, my lack of recommendation is only due to the content. While they are clearly not for everyone I believe that they are remarkably well written, go read something else of Gregory’s I doubt you’ll be disappointed!

How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World by Marjorie Priceman

Making an apple pie is easy, unless the market is closed…

Then it’s off around the world to gather wheat from Italy, a chicken from France (“French chickens lay elegant eggs-and you want only the finest ingredients for your pie.”), kurundu bark from Sri Lanka, a cow from England, (“You’ll know she’s an English cow from her good manners and charming accent.”) seawater, on your way to Jamaica for sugar cane and then to Vermont for the apples.

After that all you have to do is:

This is a book that I suspect would appeal to slightly older kids but since my testers max out at the age of  three years and  ten months I can’t say for certain. What I can say is that Ivy does currently enjoy it, though I suspect it may be the parachuting cow and chicken more than the world travel that gets her attention.

Would I recommend it? Yes. In a world where a surprising number of kids (and adults I had no idea about the cinnamon) are a bit clueless as to how the food makes it onto the shelf at the market I think it’s a great book.

My only issue with it is that I’m certain my chickens lay just as good of eggs as any French chicken!

Mennonite in a Little Black Dress by Rhoda Janzen

Ever see a movie and then realize you saw all the good parts in the trailer? Well, I read a lot on this book at one point because I was thinking about choosing it for my book club to read, turns out I read about all the good parts in the reviews. Chalk that up to reason number 37 I don’t like to read about a book first!

In this book a woman goes back to her Mennonite roots after a bad accident and divorce, which is good because her mother is the best part of the whole book. She’s funny in a lets have a conversation on if marrying a pothead or your first cousin would be worse while standing in a checkout line sort of way.  I’m going to risk going into more detail than I’d like in my little reviews and tell you  my big problem with the book. It starts out humorous, author seems able to laugh at the fact that her husband left her for a guy she met on gay.com. Then you hit some serious chapters where you find out that he was bipolar, abusive, they had been on and off (divorced and remarried!) for fifteen years,  he had been in a previous relation ship with a man and gay.com “Bob” had been calling the house. That is not funny.  I was almost offended by the fact that the situation was originally put in such a humorous light. You could call it making lemonade from lemons, but I think sometimes lemons that have gone bad shouldn’t be made into lemonade.

Would I recommend it? No. Got to the library/bookstore. Read chapter one about first cousin Waldemar. Then resist the temptation to read the rest of the book, and put it back. That first chapter is really good, some of the rest of it is good, but it’s not cohesive and really once you debate between first cousin and pot head for potential husband material it’s all down hill from there.