AUTHOR: Cathy Erway
STARTED: June 21, 2015
FINISHED: July 5, 2015
PAGES: 322
GENRE: Memoir / Food
FIRST SENTENCE: A few years ago when my friend Ari was apartment hunting, she was shown a two-bedroom in Brooklyn with plenty of sunlight, a patio, a nicely sized bathroom, and a tall industrial sink in one corner of the living room.
SUMMARY: [From BN] In the city where dining out is a sport, one daring gourmand swears off restaurants and commits to cooking at home in a manifesto for a new generation of conscientious eaters. Named one of Publishers Weekly's most exciting cookbook deals, Cathy Erway's timely memoir of quitting restaurants cold turkey speaks to a new era of conscientious eating. An underpaid, twentysomething executive assistant in New York City, she was struggling to make ends meet when she decided to embark on a Walden-esque retreat from the high-priced eateries that drained her wallet. The Art of Eating In reports on the delectable results of her twenty-four-month experiment, with thirty original recipes included. What began as a way to save money left Erway with a new appreciation for the simple pleasure of sharing a meal with friends at home, a trove of original recipes, and a greater awareness of take-out food waste and whether her ingredients were ethically grown. She also explored the antirestaurant underground of supper clubs and cook-offs, and immersed herself in an array of alternative eating lifestyles from freeganism to picking tasty greens in the park. The Art of Eating In is a personal journey that transforms the reader as it transformed the writer, about the joy of getting back in the kitchen and turning something seemingly ordinary into something completely extraordinary.
THOUGHTS: I don't know what I was expecting to read when I started this book, but it was not what I ended up reading... and that was okay. In fact, I think this book ended up being better than what I was expecting.
I was a touch annoyed that this was clearly a contrived idea (as many current food memoirs seem to be), but Erway manages to pull it off. I enjoyed how she explored all manor of ways of not eating out that go beyond simply cooking at home. I also liked how she was honest about the impact her decision had on her personal life. She stuck to her idea and managed to pull it off. Erway comes across as a complete hipster, but her self-awareness and openness meant I wasn't annoyed by how forced the concept of this book was.
Erway also has an addictive writing style. It was simple, but still managed to capture all the sights, sounds, and smells of the scenes she recounts. I enjoyed her writing so much that I added her blog feed to my reader.
RATING: 7/10 [Very Good]
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