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The Comfort Food Diaries: My Quest for the Perfect Dish to Mend a Broken Heart
A former New Yorker editor chronicles her journey to heal old wounds and find comfort in the face of loss through travel, friends and family, and home-cooked meals in this memoir “full of warm, bracing honesty…humor and paradox…and sprinkled liberally with the type of recipes that will make book club members say, ‘I could make that!’” ( Booklist , starred review).
One life-changing night, reeling from her beloved brother’s sudden death, a devastating breakup with her handsome engineer fiancé, and eviction from the apartment they shared, Emily Nunn had lost all sense of family, home, and financial security.
After a few glasses of wine, heartbroken and unmoored, Emily—an avid cook and professional food writer—poured her heart out on Facebook. The next morning she woke up with an awful hangover and a feeling she’d made a terrible mistake—only to discover she had more friends than she knew, many of whom invited her to come visit and cook with them while she put her life back together. Thus began the Comfort Food Tour.
Searching for a way forward, Emily travels the country, cooking and staying with relatives and friends. Her wonderfully idiosyncratic family comes to life in these pages, all part of the rich Southern story in which past and present are indistinguishable, food is a source of connection and identity, and a good story is often preferred to a not-so-pleasant truth. But truth, pleasant or not, is what Emily Nunn craves, and with it comes an acceptance of the losses she has endured, and a sense of hope for the future.
In the salty snap of a single Virginia ham biscuit, in the sour tang of Great-Grandmother’s Mean Lemon Cake, Nunn experiences the healing power of comfort food—and offers up dozens of recipes for the wonderful meals that saved her life. “ The Comfort Food Diaries is nothing less than a tour de force by Emily Nunn, our most hilarious and touching food writer. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry...and you’ll get hungry” (Mark Bittman, author of How to Cook Everything ).
One life-changing night, reeling from her beloved brother’s sudden death, a devastating breakup with her handsome engineer fiancé, and eviction from the apartment they shared, Emily Nunn had lost all sense of family, home, and financial security.
After a few glasses of wine, heartbroken and unmoored, Emily—an avid cook and professional food writer—poured her heart out on Facebook. The next morning she woke up with an awful hangover and a feeling she’d made a terrible mistake—only to discover she had more friends than she knew, many of whom invited her to come visit and cook with them while she put her life back together. Thus began the Comfort Food Tour.
Searching for a way forward, Emily travels the country, cooking and staying with relatives and friends. Her wonderfully idiosyncratic family comes to life in these pages, all part of the rich Southern story in which past and present are indistinguishable, food is a source of connection and identity, and a good story is often preferred to a not-so-pleasant truth. But truth, pleasant or not, is what Emily Nunn craves, and with it comes an acceptance of the losses she has endured, and a sense of hope for the future.
In the salty snap of a single Virginia ham biscuit, in the sour tang of Great-Grandmother’s Mean Lemon Cake, Nunn experiences the healing power of comfort food—and offers up dozens of recipes for the wonderful meals that saved her life. “ The Comfort Food Diaries is nothing less than a tour de force by Emily Nunn, our most hilarious and touching food writer. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry...and you’ll get hungry” (Mark Bittman, author of How to Cook Everything ).
320 pages, Paperback
First published September 26, 2017
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 249 reviews
May 31, 2018
This was a memoir that I had expected to love, but something was off.
Emily Nunn was dealt a traumatic blow when first, her brother suddenly died, and then her live-in boyfriend broke up with her. Nunn was depressed and didn't know what to do. But friends from across the country came to her rescue, inviting her to stay with them, and Nunn got the idea to focus on cooking comfort foods wherever she stayed. (Recipes are included in the book.)
I like foodie memoirs, I like travelogues, I even like soul-searching stories and stories of heartbroken people trying to pull themselves back up from despair. So, why didn't I love this as much as I had expected? It had something to do with the author's tone. Several times Nunn's bitterness was so sharp and her comments so cruel, especially toward her ex and certain family members, that it was off-putting. In short, Nunn doesn't come across well. Considering she's the writer of this book and had control of the narrative, she should have done more self-editing.
There are some good recipes in here, and I did appreciate parts of this memoir. But it didn't give me the comfort I had hoped for.
Meaningful Quote
"[T]here's no real logic to where we start out and what we end up with. It's like cooking. Once you get your ingredients, how you put them together at any given time is up to you. Maybe you have a book of recipes that has been passed down to you, maybe you're winging it. Either way, it's your responsibility to create something good, which you must then attempt to parlay into something better, never knowing exactly how things will turn out. It helps to have a high tolerance for disasters, in the kitchen or otherwise."
Emily Nunn was dealt a traumatic blow when first, her brother suddenly died, and then her live-in boyfriend broke up with her. Nunn was depressed and didn't know what to do. But friends from across the country came to her rescue, inviting her to stay with them, and Nunn got the idea to focus on cooking comfort foods wherever she stayed. (Recipes are included in the book.)
I like foodie memoirs, I like travelogues, I even like soul-searching stories and stories of heartbroken people trying to pull themselves back up from despair. So, why didn't I love this as much as I had expected? It had something to do with the author's tone. Several times Nunn's bitterness was so sharp and her comments so cruel, especially toward her ex and certain family members, that it was off-putting. In short, Nunn doesn't come across well. Considering she's the writer of this book and had control of the narrative, she should have done more self-editing.
There are some good recipes in here, and I did appreciate parts of this memoir. But it didn't give me the comfort I had hoped for.
Meaningful Quote
"[T]here's no real logic to where we start out and what we end up with. It's like cooking. Once you get your ingredients, how you put them together at any given time is up to you. Maybe you have a book of recipes that has been passed down to you, maybe you're winging it. Either way, it's your responsibility to create something good, which you must then attempt to parlay into something better, never knowing exactly how things will turn out. It helps to have a high tolerance for disasters, in the kitchen or otherwise."
September 26, 2017
Prepare to be hungry. If you can get through this book without craving many of the recipes, I commend you. Unfortunately, they're mostly beyond my skills or lack thereof in the kitchen, so craving is as far as it will go for me. My only experience is with quick recipes with fewer ingredients purely because they're much less time consuming and expensive to make. The story is sad and poignant, written well but didn't speak to me as much as I thought it would. It's hard for most of us to imagine just being able to take off traveling without serious worry about a job after a stay at the famous Betty Ford center which was financed by a family member. I couldn't stop my eyes from widening at descriptions of the writer's childhood home and luxuries either. The disengagement I felt did detract from the book for me. My favorite parts were towards the end and involved her aging father.
Emily hasn't even begun to grieve over the unexpected death of her older brother when she experiences another loss... of her fiance. He's dumped her and tells her she must move out of the place she's made into a home for their little family, which includes his daughter from a previous relationship. She has doted on them both, treating his daughter as a princess. (That's actually all she's referred to as, which got a little irksome.) She had spent the majority of her time cooking elaborate meals for them lovingly. Taking care of them was her job, having left the work writing about food and theater she did before she met Oliver.
When Oliver breaks up with her, she doesn't know what to do or where to go. She tries to find the answers in the bottom of a bottle, which leads to a ranting Facebook post and a trip to a hospital rehab. These both actually end up being good things. The trip has her determined to stop drinking for good, and that Facebook post actually brought to light how much support she has. Old friends from all over the country invite her into their homes. They can cook, they can heal, they can reconnect. It is here that the idea for the Comfort Food Tour is born.
We follow Emily in her travels around the country as she begins to reconnect (or try to reconnect) with her friends and family. All of her friends seem to be well-adjusted and happy, and she struggles to figure out where she went wrong and how she can help herself feel better. There's a lot of great thoughts and quotes in this book, but ultimately it just didn't keep my attention quite as much as I wished it would. It's the first time I've read a food related memoir, and that may be why I struggled a bit. I also haven't read many memoirs of any sort. I would say if this is the kind of book you've enjoyed in the past, you're likely to enjoy this one too.
I received a copy of this book from Net Galley and Atria Books, thank you! My opinion is honest and unbiased.
Emily hasn't even begun to grieve over the unexpected death of her older brother when she experiences another loss... of her fiance. He's dumped her and tells her she must move out of the place she's made into a home for their little family, which includes his daughter from a previous relationship. She has doted on them both, treating his daughter as a princess. (That's actually all she's referred to as, which got a little irksome.) She had spent the majority of her time cooking elaborate meals for them lovingly. Taking care of them was her job, having left the work writing about food and theater she did before she met Oliver.
When Oliver breaks up with her, she doesn't know what to do or where to go. She tries to find the answers in the bottom of a bottle, which leads to a ranting Facebook post and a trip to a hospital rehab. These both actually end up being good things. The trip has her determined to stop drinking for good, and that Facebook post actually brought to light how much support she has. Old friends from all over the country invite her into their homes. They can cook, they can heal, they can reconnect. It is here that the idea for the Comfort Food Tour is born.
We follow Emily in her travels around the country as she begins to reconnect (or try to reconnect) with her friends and family. All of her friends seem to be well-adjusted and happy, and she struggles to figure out where she went wrong and how she can help herself feel better. There's a lot of great thoughts and quotes in this book, but ultimately it just didn't keep my attention quite as much as I wished it would. It's the first time I've read a food related memoir, and that may be why I struggled a bit. I also haven't read many memoirs of any sort. I would say if this is the kind of book you've enjoyed in the past, you're likely to enjoy this one too.
I received a copy of this book from Net Galley and Atria Books, thank you! My opinion is honest and unbiased.
December 29, 2017
****4 STARS****
This book made me hungry and not just for food as the recipes are to die for. I found myself longing to visit and travel more to the places and countries that mean the most to me. The storyline is very unique and intriguing. I have never read a story so attached to food/love/art/pain/forgiveness. It was magical. There is also a great deal of humor to the story which was just icing on the cake for me. I wanted to head out to the nearest grocery store (Publix) and buy all of the ingredients to every single recipe in this novel - it was just that wonderful and well written. We all know that cooking can bring everyone together and this story is a prime example of that.
This book made me hungry and not just for food as the recipes are to die for. I found myself longing to visit and travel more to the places and countries that mean the most to me. The storyline is very unique and intriguing. I have never read a story so attached to food/love/art/pain/forgiveness. It was magical. There is also a great deal of humor to the story which was just icing on the cake for me. I wanted to head out to the nearest grocery store (Publix) and buy all of the ingredients to every single recipe in this novel - it was just that wonderful and well written. We all know that cooking can bring everyone together and this story is a prime example of that.
August 19, 2017
I have a secret love of food memoirs. I devoured Ruth Reichl's memoirs, and read my way through the Carnegie Library's impressive collection. But "The Comfort Food Diaries" was often a hard and uncomfortable journey.
Emily Nunn was an editor for the New York Times. She wrote about theater and food, before finding herself as a stay-at-home stepmom in Chicago, orchestrating school events and making elaborate meals for her fiance and soon-to-be-stepdaughter. Slowly, Emily's life crumbled. Her brother's death and the disintegration of her newfound domesticity leads her on a road trip quest for comfort food and family, often made daunting when her own family proves again and again to be a cesspool of anger, resentment, and dysfunction.
There are some truly lovely moments in this book, such as Emily's stay with her cousin, Toni, and reconnecting with old college friends. I believe, as Emily does, that food comforts and heals, that it showcases love, and enables real human connections. But I'm not sure the book gets there. The hurt she feels about being abandoned by her family is real and palpable, almost with a harshness that makes you want to look away. Some of the writing is a bit rough (and raw) as well. It was definitely unexpected, for me as a reader. I was expecting something more comforting (as comfort food implies), but what I read instead was almost reminiscent of "The Glass Castle." This isn't a bad thing, just unexpected.
There are also shards of unexplored classicism and a whisper of racism as well. Nunn grew up in the South, with a privileged background, and most of her journey takes place there. Still, there was a tiny scene involving Wal-mart that made me step outside the book and recoil a bit, feeling very much like the colloquial "other." I am 100% sure this is not what the book intended, but I must be honest and say I was uncomfortable while reading the rest of Nunn's memoir.
More than anything, it felt what Nunn was searching for (redemption and perhaps apologies from her family) was always going to elude her, no matter the delicious food she collected. I wanted to give her a hug and a reference to a very good therapist.
Emily Nunn was an editor for the New York Times. She wrote about theater and food, before finding herself as a stay-at-home stepmom in Chicago, orchestrating school events and making elaborate meals for her fiance and soon-to-be-stepdaughter. Slowly, Emily's life crumbled. Her brother's death and the disintegration of her newfound domesticity leads her on a road trip quest for comfort food and family, often made daunting when her own family proves again and again to be a cesspool of anger, resentment, and dysfunction.
There are some truly lovely moments in this book, such as Emily's stay with her cousin, Toni, and reconnecting with old college friends. I believe, as Emily does, that food comforts and heals, that it showcases love, and enables real human connections. But I'm not sure the book gets there. The hurt she feels about being abandoned by her family is real and palpable, almost with a harshness that makes you want to look away. Some of the writing is a bit rough (and raw) as well. It was definitely unexpected, for me as a reader. I was expecting something more comforting (as comfort food implies), but what I read instead was almost reminiscent of "The Glass Castle." This isn't a bad thing, just unexpected.
There are also shards of unexplored classicism and a whisper of racism as well. Nunn grew up in the South, with a privileged background, and most of her journey takes place there. Still, there was a tiny scene involving Wal-mart that made me step outside the book and recoil a bit, feeling very much like the colloquial "other." I am 100% sure this is not what the book intended, but I must be honest and say I was uncomfortable while reading the rest of Nunn's memoir.
More than anything, it felt what Nunn was searching for (redemption and perhaps apologies from her family) was always going to elude her, no matter the delicious food she collected. I wanted to give her a hug and a reference to a very good therapist.
December 24, 2017
I spent most of this book wishing I had stopped reading it sooner - it is hard for me to read a book in 2017 that has such an uninterrogated, unquestioned nostalgia for a white south. I understand that this was Nunn's personal journey throughout her past and towards healing, but the barely-there asides about slavery and indigenous genocide really grated at me. Also, no one eats as much pimento cheese as the people in this book. Why were they always eating pimento cheese?!
In the end, I was glad I finished, because Nunn wraps up her story with some profound insights about dysfunctional families, finding your own way in the world, and piecing a broken life back together, but it was a challenge to get myself there.
In the end, I was glad I finished, because Nunn wraps up her story with some profound insights about dysfunctional families, finding your own way in the world, and piecing a broken life back together, but it was a challenge to get myself there.
November 13, 2017
Emily Nunn loses her brother to suicide and breaks up with her fiancé, and in one night she finds herself without a family or home or income. She sets out on a quest to put her world back together again by visiting friends and learning how to cook their favorite comfort meals.
I loved the stories, and I loved her quest, and I loved the recipes she discovered. It’s a comfort of a book, and I think you will find yourself happier just for reading it, and even happier if you try a few of the recipes, especially Great-grandmother’s Mean Lemon Cake or Aunt Mariah’s Rolls or a Pot of Pinto Beans.
I loved the stories, and I loved her quest, and I loved the recipes she discovered. It’s a comfort of a book, and I think you will find yourself happier just for reading it, and even happier if you try a few of the recipes, especially Great-grandmother’s Mean Lemon Cake or Aunt Mariah’s Rolls or a Pot of Pinto Beans.
August 7, 2018
I stuck it out until the end, but I didn't like it much. Nunn's voice was so shrill, so bitter, so angry. Even at the end, where she's trying to practice a little gratitude, she still sounds aggrieved. I love me some memoirs of fucked-up families, but this one didn't feel like there was enough growth over time to give me an understanding of how the author had mended. I marked a couple of recipes, though.
September 26, 2017
Given the premise of Emily Nunn's food memoir, I was pretty sure I was going to like it. Then I came upon this passage and I knew I was going to love it:
Emily Nunn is my kind of people.
In the course of her memoir, we see her do the good and hard work of becoming sober, of processing her complicated and often toxic family dynamics, of grieving, of figuring out just who she is. It is not always neat or pretty but it is an honest account of someone taking stock of their life and doing their best to become healthier and stronger. It's worth reading for that alone.
Emily grew up in Galax, VA with two brothers and two sisters. Her parents ultimately divorced and her dad was not very involved with the family afterward. She moved to New York where she covered theater and wrote the original Tables for Two column for the New Yorker before taking a restaurant column job at the Chicago Tribune. Once in Chicago, she met the Engineer, who would become her fiancé, and his 7 year old daughter.
In so many ways, it seemed like Emily had an ideal life. But there were cracks along the surface and they shatter after her brother Oliver committed suicide. Shortly after Oliver's death, the Engineer breaks off their engagement and as Emily had become a stay at home stepmother of sorts, she has to figure out employment and housing. All while recognizing she was an alcoholic, like Oliver was, and she needed help.
After seeking treatment for her alcoholism, this ultimately launches a year or so of staying with different friends around the country, freelancing, and figuring out what she should do with her life and how things got this bad. One friend quips it'll be her comfort food tour. Everywhere Emily stays, she and her friends or family discuss the idea of comfort food. They make favorite recipes for each other. They consider what makes comfort food comforting and why we turn to it when we're in distress or need to celebrate. (One smart person raised the idea of why we associate comfort food with sad things when food is also an important part of many of our happiest moments.)
It made me think about the role of comfort food in such unexpected ways, going beyond my go-to choices. It was interesting to consider what we cook for people when they're in distress and how it's formed by our own ideas of comfort, as well as how "the things people truly need from us at the very worst times in their lives are often much smaller than what we try to give them" (p. 24.)
While Emily has a complicated relationship with her immediate family, her cousin, aunt, and uncle shower her with love and affection and open up their homes to her for extended periods of time. I loved these relatives for being stable presences and for the way they nurtured Emily. I loved how they showed her it's possible to be part of a stable, loving family.
As Emily visits her relatives and reconnects with old friends from college and tries to settle somewhere, her relationship with food evolves. Early on she notes how she cooked to show people how much she loved them or to make them love her. But as she's putting the pieces of her life back together and people give to her when she has little or nothing to give in return, she realizes she has to let people take care of her for a while. In the process of allowing people to love her unconditionally, she becomes more of who she truly is. The contrast between her past relationships and the ones she encounters after Oliver's death was truly striking and I ached over what she'd gone through and settled for.
The Comfort Food Diaries is beautifully written. I'm adding it to my list of favorite food memoirs. Nunn thoughtfully weaves in recipes from her travels and there are many I can't wait to try. The food and her history complement one another and I was truly impressed with her ability to unspool her story in such a seamless way. It may be her Southern heritage but Nunn knows how to tell a story, that's for sure.
Food can't fully mend a broken heart but when someone shows up with a dish or a beverage in our time of need, something does start to knit us back together. If only because that person's presence tells us they see us. We're not alone. We're enough. We'll get through this.
Disclosure: I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
"Despite my dive into the mysteries of comfort food, my plans were not suddenly tied up in a neat bow. And unlike what you might expect from a story like this, I didn't have a road map for the next year of my life, a rock-solid timeline, or an uncharacteristically smart but rustic man hovering in the wings to make my life happy and perfect again. The truth was that I had absolutely no idea what I was going to do with the rest of my life, expect in the short term. And even the short-term was sketchy." p. 62
Emily Nunn is my kind of people.
In the course of her memoir, we see her do the good and hard work of becoming sober, of processing her complicated and often toxic family dynamics, of grieving, of figuring out just who she is. It is not always neat or pretty but it is an honest account of someone taking stock of their life and doing their best to become healthier and stronger. It's worth reading for that alone.
Emily grew up in Galax, VA with two brothers and two sisters. Her parents ultimately divorced and her dad was not very involved with the family afterward. She moved to New York where she covered theater and wrote the original Tables for Two column for the New Yorker before taking a restaurant column job at the Chicago Tribune. Once in Chicago, she met the Engineer, who would become her fiancé, and his 7 year old daughter.
In so many ways, it seemed like Emily had an ideal life. But there were cracks along the surface and they shatter after her brother Oliver committed suicide. Shortly after Oliver's death, the Engineer breaks off their engagement and as Emily had become a stay at home stepmother of sorts, she has to figure out employment and housing. All while recognizing she was an alcoholic, like Oliver was, and she needed help.
After seeking treatment for her alcoholism, this ultimately launches a year or so of staying with different friends around the country, freelancing, and figuring out what she should do with her life and how things got this bad. One friend quips it'll be her comfort food tour. Everywhere Emily stays, she and her friends or family discuss the idea of comfort food. They make favorite recipes for each other. They consider what makes comfort food comforting and why we turn to it when we're in distress or need to celebrate. (One smart person raised the idea of why we associate comfort food with sad things when food is also an important part of many of our happiest moments.)
It made me think about the role of comfort food in such unexpected ways, going beyond my go-to choices. It was interesting to consider what we cook for people when they're in distress and how it's formed by our own ideas of comfort, as well as how "the things people truly need from us at the very worst times in their lives are often much smaller than what we try to give them" (p. 24.)
While Emily has a complicated relationship with her immediate family, her cousin, aunt, and uncle shower her with love and affection and open up their homes to her for extended periods of time. I loved these relatives for being stable presences and for the way they nurtured Emily. I loved how they showed her it's possible to be part of a stable, loving family.
As Emily visits her relatives and reconnects with old friends from college and tries to settle somewhere, her relationship with food evolves. Early on she notes how she cooked to show people how much she loved them or to make them love her. But as she's putting the pieces of her life back together and people give to her when she has little or nothing to give in return, she realizes she has to let people take care of her for a while. In the process of allowing people to love her unconditionally, she becomes more of who she truly is. The contrast between her past relationships and the ones she encounters after Oliver's death was truly striking and I ached over what she'd gone through and settled for.
The Comfort Food Diaries is beautifully written. I'm adding it to my list of favorite food memoirs. Nunn thoughtfully weaves in recipes from her travels and there are many I can't wait to try. The food and her history complement one another and I was truly impressed with her ability to unspool her story in such a seamless way. It may be her Southern heritage but Nunn knows how to tell a story, that's for sure.
Food can't fully mend a broken heart but when someone shows up with a dish or a beverage in our time of need, something does start to knit us back together. If only because that person's presence tells us they see us. We're not alone. We're enough. We'll get through this.
"Food has become my touchstone for understanding what real love is. The best thing? Food makes it easier to give love, untangled. Since it keeps us alive, the smallest, simplest gesture can seem miraculous: I brought you this soup." p. 303
Disclosure: I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
July 15, 2021
When professional food writer Emily Nunn’s life fell apart when her brother committed suicide, her relationship crumbled and she found herself suddenly homeless, and with her drinking increasing again she decided to check herself in to rehab. It was then Emily was able to begin to see how she became the person she was and how she could change and become a person she could love.
As Emily began to look back on her life, especially her childhood which was turbulent to say the least with two parents who could barely take care of themselves, and did not want to take care of the many children they had. Nothing was ever talked about, like her father moving out and another man moving in, or the narcissistic personality her mother had or her father’s drinking or her brother being gay. It was all left for them all just to speculate.
She also began to understand her rocky relationships with her siblings and how they too had been impacted by the lack of care their parents showed. Many had not spoken to each other for years, while others fled to another country just to get away. She too would learn that their treatment of her would trigger her low self-esteem issues and she would always blame herself for the arguments, most of the time not understanding what she had done to provoke the anger.
When asked what comforted her in times of stress, Emily realized it was food. It was the actual cooking, creating and the enjoyment of eating. It was especially satisfying to cook with others, be it friends or family.
So she goes on a quest to find not only herself, but to also reconnect with family she has not seen in years as well as friends, some of whom the relationship had not ended well, and spend time with them, learn from them and cook with them. Thus begins Emily’s journey of healing herself. With this comes a new understanding of what her life was like but what her life could be like when you let go all of the annoyance and hostility she had held in for so many years and she begins to find an inner peace as her travels continue. She also learns the word “family” means many things and you sometimes have to accept some relationships are just not meant to be.
Throughout her memoir while she gives us glimpses of her unusual past, she also tells stories of recipes and how they came about and the impact they had on her life and the memories they invoke. Some mouthwatering recipes, and yes they are in the book for the reader to enjoy if they choose were her Aunt Mariah’s Pot Roast, Father Tray’s Bran Muffins and Bea’s Magic Salad Dressing.
As this unexpected journey came it its conclusion, Emily learned many lessons about living. But her curiosity about food literally saved her life.
As Emily began to look back on her life, especially her childhood which was turbulent to say the least with two parents who could barely take care of themselves, and did not want to take care of the many children they had. Nothing was ever talked about, like her father moving out and another man moving in, or the narcissistic personality her mother had or her father’s drinking or her brother being gay. It was all left for them all just to speculate.
She also began to understand her rocky relationships with her siblings and how they too had been impacted by the lack of care their parents showed. Many had not spoken to each other for years, while others fled to another country just to get away. She too would learn that their treatment of her would trigger her low self-esteem issues and she would always blame herself for the arguments, most of the time not understanding what she had done to provoke the anger.
When asked what comforted her in times of stress, Emily realized it was food. It was the actual cooking, creating and the enjoyment of eating. It was especially satisfying to cook with others, be it friends or family.
So she goes on a quest to find not only herself, but to also reconnect with family she has not seen in years as well as friends, some of whom the relationship had not ended well, and spend time with them, learn from them and cook with them. Thus begins Emily’s journey of healing herself. With this comes a new understanding of what her life was like but what her life could be like when you let go all of the annoyance and hostility she had held in for so many years and she begins to find an inner peace as her travels continue. She also learns the word “family” means many things and you sometimes have to accept some relationships are just not meant to be.
Throughout her memoir while she gives us glimpses of her unusual past, she also tells stories of recipes and how they came about and the impact they had on her life and the memories they invoke. Some mouthwatering recipes, and yes they are in the book for the reader to enjoy if they choose were her Aunt Mariah’s Pot Roast, Father Tray’s Bran Muffins and Bea’s Magic Salad Dressing.
As this unexpected journey came it its conclusion, Emily learned many lessons about living. But her curiosity about food literally saved her life.
November 2, 2017
(2.5; DNF @ 25%) Like
Life from Scratch
by Sasha Martin, this is too heavy on the sad backstory and not quite enough about food – at least in the first quarter, which is all I managed to read. After a dear brother’s suicide, a breakup from her fiancé, and a couple of spells in rehab to kick the alcohol habit that runs in her family, Nunn set off on a quest for what people across the country consider to be comfort food. “I would use food to lead me back to love, to some kind of family.” She starts with a visit to a cousin in the South and some indulgence in ham biscuits and peanut brittle. If you read the rest of this book and found it worthwhile, let me know.
July 9, 2018
to be clear, I did enjoy this and finished it because the food writing was great and delicious. and i also think the author was just being herself, which i don't want to dismiss given all she's been through. however, the two stars are because there were a few too many tone deaf moments where she mentions race or money (the one where she worries about having to buy her clothes from walmart one day was particularly cringe-y..) that made it hard to get through. i think there was something about her mobility - going from place to place on her comfort food tour and on these amazing vacations with her friends while also saying she was in a tight financial situation - that made her kinda unrelatable, even if it's true that she was in a tight financial situation. but some good food writing and a pretty honest book.
October 29, 2017
I only got to page 156 and stopped because this woman is an idiot. On that page she tells of seeing a cat with a huge gash in his head then she sees him again a few days later. She says she felt bad for his suffering. I want to know why she chose not to help him. She could have taken him to the vet for stitches, antibiotics or if it was too bad, a humane euthanasia. After reading that, I had no compassion for her and didn't feel bad for her broken marriage, loss of her brother or her alcoholism.
Prior to that, I was bored and kept reading out of pity. The recipes were nothing of interest to me either.
Prior to that, I was bored and kept reading out of pity. The recipes were nothing of interest to me either.
February 17, 2021
I thought this book would be the typical food memoir, a description of lush, exotic dishes followed by recipes, with a smattering of what the food meant to the author at the time.
There was some of that, but for the most part, it was about the author's struggle to accept her dysfunctional, hurtful family, who continually pushes away those who love and need them most. The food, with rare exceptions, is mostly Southern, as she doesn't really stretch herself much when it comes to locales and cuisines. For the majority of the book, she stays in places she's familiar with, or where she grew up, relying on the kindness of family and friends. I'd thought the book would involve a cross-country tour where she'd consciously and intentionally seek out the comfort foods from different States, not casually ask her friends (who all grew up in the South) what they liked.
As I read, two questions kept coming up: "Where on earth was this woman getting the money to not work for what seemed like an endless amount of time, as she drifted from place to place, sampling grits and homemade pickles and roasted oysters?" There's talk of dwindling resources, but she must have had a good stockpile originally, especially to stay in a place that's nearly $800 a night.
And the second..."Why was this published?" While reading a laundry list of everything she'd ever achieved in high school, or an intensely personal discovery about how she should handle her sister's cruelty, I realized this came across like a journal that would be relevant to those who knew and loved the author, rather than a memoir the general public would delight in or learn from. Had she been a famous food author? Or some other kind of celebrity?
Foodies will undoubtedly enjoy the depictions of how rural Southerners make the traditional delights the region is known for--the backbreaking, painstaking hours or months of labour required. Those were probably the best sections. But all the ruminating and self-pity (Nunn did have her struggles, for sure, but there doesn't appear to be a lot of perspective)? Perhaps they will be helpful for some, but I just wondered why I was reading detailed descriptions and tribulations of someone else's family ad nauseam. It wasn't a boring family, but there was nothing memoir worthy about it, either. It was like letters you'd get from a particularly verbose friend about her visit to other friends.
There was some of that, but for the most part, it was about the author's struggle to accept her dysfunctional, hurtful family, who continually pushes away those who love and need them most. The food, with rare exceptions, is mostly Southern, as she doesn't really stretch herself much when it comes to locales and cuisines. For the majority of the book, she stays in places she's familiar with, or where she grew up, relying on the kindness of family and friends. I'd thought the book would involve a cross-country tour where she'd consciously and intentionally seek out the comfort foods from different States, not casually ask her friends (who all grew up in the South) what they liked.
As I read, two questions kept coming up: "Where on earth was this woman getting the money to not work for what seemed like an endless amount of time, as she drifted from place to place, sampling grits and homemade pickles and roasted oysters?" There's talk of dwindling resources, but she must have had a good stockpile originally, especially to stay in a place that's nearly $800 a night.
And the second..."Why was this published?" While reading a laundry list of everything she'd ever achieved in high school, or an intensely personal discovery about how she should handle her sister's cruelty, I realized this came across like a journal that would be relevant to those who knew and loved the author, rather than a memoir the general public would delight in or learn from. Had she been a famous food author? Or some other kind of celebrity?
Foodies will undoubtedly enjoy the depictions of how rural Southerners make the traditional delights the region is known for--the backbreaking, painstaking hours or months of labour required. Those were probably the best sections. But all the ruminating and self-pity (Nunn did have her struggles, for sure, but there doesn't appear to be a lot of perspective)? Perhaps they will be helpful for some, but I just wondered why I was reading detailed descriptions and tribulations of someone else's family ad nauseam. It wasn't a boring family, but there was nothing memoir worthy about it, either. It was like letters you'd get from a particularly verbose friend about her visit to other friends.
February 5, 2020
If you’re looking for a cozy memoir to read in winter, then *The Comfort Food Diaries* fits the bill (I give it 3-4 stars). Ultimately, this is a story about finding home (I’m convinced most stories, in some way, are). In looking over my Goodreads “Favorites” list, a distinct narrative thread I’m drawn to is the homesick or homegoing odyssey. Usually when I hear the word odyssey, I think of a journey or adventure, and while Nunn’s memoir includes those elements, essentially it’s a book about the reinvention of home. What’s fascinating about Nunn’s journey is that of discovery of home through a pilgrimage of comfort food where she seeks to answer: what is comfort food to one who grew up in a home without comfort, nostalgia, love . . . ?
So my question for YOU is: what is YOUR comfort food?
Mine is Chili (with sharp Vermont cheddar cheese and saltines) and warm rice pudding, homemade of course. ☺
So my question for YOU is: what is YOUR comfort food?
Mine is Chili (with sharp Vermont cheddar cheese and saltines) and warm rice pudding, homemade of course. ☺
October 29, 2017
I listened to this as an audiobook on a long drive from Northern Virginia to Dalton, GA, and back home again. I wanted my husband Tom to listen to this book with me because I didn't think it was a book he would read otherwise. We both loved it.
Tom was drawn into Emily Nunn's story without knowing any of the people in the book. I was drawn into the story because I knew many of the people in this book and I wanted Tom to know them too. I became aware of Emily's journey on her Comfort Food tour because of Facebook. After connecting with her Aunt Mariah on Facebook, I ended up connecting with her cousins Toni and Susan, and then with Emily. There's a point in the book when she talks about posting a question on Facebook asking people what they think of as their comfort food. I remember answering that question.
Galax is a small city in southwestern Virginia near the North Carolina border. The five Nunn siblings and the five Sublett siblings attended the same Methodist Kindergarten, we lived next door to John and Mariah Nunn (to whom she has dedicated this book) and their three daughters until we moved in 1968. The parts of her memoir that talk about her childhood in Galax have a familiarity to me that is uniquely personal, and yet it could be the story of many small rural towns in the 1960s and 70s.
As I listened her memoir unfold, it also brought to mind a famous quote from Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, "Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way."
I can't speak for other people's relationship to food, but in my family, when we think of our best childhood memories, food always has a central role. Is that just a Southern thing? I'm not sure. But the recipes in this book speak to both the dishes of my childhood and the life I live now married to a "foodie."
She talks about making Morning Custard at the Bluebird Café in Athens, GA, when she was a student at the University of Georgia, and that reminded me I had made a video several years ago of my aunt showing my sister and I how to make our Granny's baked custard. Does this happen in all families? I have no way of knowing. Emily's memoir, centered around food, family dysfunction and failed relationships resonated with me.
My daughter Emily called tonight to ask me recipe questions - she can't make out her Grandma Sublett's handwriting on her signature meatloaf recipe. In a meandering conversation about her childhood, she observed that sometimes she wonders if she and her sister Allison actually lived in the same house because they remember things so differently. That was a real "aha" moment for me. As one of five children myself, I'm sure we each experienced our lives in the same family and household quite differently.
That is a significant point that I don't want to overlook. This is Emily Nunn's story of her life the way she experienced it. It's not up for a vote on "right or wrong" or "good or bad" nor is it anyone else's story but her own. Her relationships with her family, fiancee and friends are relayed to the reader as she lived them. It's not about them . . . it's about her relationship with them. This is her journey, she owns it and she's sharing it through this memoir. Writing a book about the most personal aspects of your life is likely quite cathartic and satisfying on a number of levels. The vulnerability required to then look at reviews written by friends, colleagues and total strangers about that book, is beyond anything I can imagine. That takes strength and fortitude I'm not sure I have.
After hearing the wonderful audiobook version of The Comfort Food Diaries my husband Tom ordered the hardcopy book so we would have the recipes. It was a glorious experience to hear Emily's descriptions of dishes, meals and so many aspects of food preparation while sitting in a traffic backup on I-81 in Virginia. We'll always remember where we were when heard her talk about Cathy's mother's Sour Cherry Pie, which I knew immediately was the book's cover photo.
Spending time with this book, experiencing it with someone I wanted to understand the people and places contained in its pages, was a beautiful thing. Life is about the journey. We need to embrace it all - it's what we have. My heart aches for the loss of Emily's brother, as my heart aches for the loss of my own brother - who, quite ironically, was born the same day in the same hospital as her cousin Toni Nunn. My dad was the hospital administrator. Because that's how life was in Galax in the 1960s.
I highly recommend this book. It's unique. It's thoughtful and hopeful and real. And the recipes are out of this world wonderful!
Tom was drawn into Emily Nunn's story without knowing any of the people in the book. I was drawn into the story because I knew many of the people in this book and I wanted Tom to know them too. I became aware of Emily's journey on her Comfort Food tour because of Facebook. After connecting with her Aunt Mariah on Facebook, I ended up connecting with her cousins Toni and Susan, and then with Emily. There's a point in the book when she talks about posting a question on Facebook asking people what they think of as their comfort food. I remember answering that question.
Galax is a small city in southwestern Virginia near the North Carolina border. The five Nunn siblings and the five Sublett siblings attended the same Methodist Kindergarten, we lived next door to John and Mariah Nunn (to whom she has dedicated this book) and their three daughters until we moved in 1968. The parts of her memoir that talk about her childhood in Galax have a familiarity to me that is uniquely personal, and yet it could be the story of many small rural towns in the 1960s and 70s.
As I listened her memoir unfold, it also brought to mind a famous quote from Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, "Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way."
I can't speak for other people's relationship to food, but in my family, when we think of our best childhood memories, food always has a central role. Is that just a Southern thing? I'm not sure. But the recipes in this book speak to both the dishes of my childhood and the life I live now married to a "foodie."
She talks about making Morning Custard at the Bluebird Café in Athens, GA, when she was a student at the University of Georgia, and that reminded me I had made a video several years ago of my aunt showing my sister and I how to make our Granny's baked custard. Does this happen in all families? I have no way of knowing. Emily's memoir, centered around food, family dysfunction and failed relationships resonated with me.
My daughter Emily called tonight to ask me recipe questions - she can't make out her Grandma Sublett's handwriting on her signature meatloaf recipe. In a meandering conversation about her childhood, she observed that sometimes she wonders if she and her sister Allison actually lived in the same house because they remember things so differently. That was a real "aha" moment for me. As one of five children myself, I'm sure we each experienced our lives in the same family and household quite differently.
That is a significant point that I don't want to overlook. This is Emily Nunn's story of her life the way she experienced it. It's not up for a vote on "right or wrong" or "good or bad" nor is it anyone else's story but her own. Her relationships with her family, fiancee and friends are relayed to the reader as she lived them. It's not about them . . . it's about her relationship with them. This is her journey, she owns it and she's sharing it through this memoir. Writing a book about the most personal aspects of your life is likely quite cathartic and satisfying on a number of levels. The vulnerability required to then look at reviews written by friends, colleagues and total strangers about that book, is beyond anything I can imagine. That takes strength and fortitude I'm not sure I have.
After hearing the wonderful audiobook version of The Comfort Food Diaries my husband Tom ordered the hardcopy book so we would have the recipes. It was a glorious experience to hear Emily's descriptions of dishes, meals and so many aspects of food preparation while sitting in a traffic backup on I-81 in Virginia. We'll always remember where we were when heard her talk about Cathy's mother's Sour Cherry Pie, which I knew immediately was the book's cover photo.
Spending time with this book, experiencing it with someone I wanted to understand the people and places contained in its pages, was a beautiful thing. Life is about the journey. We need to embrace it all - it's what we have. My heart aches for the loss of Emily's brother, as my heart aches for the loss of my own brother - who, quite ironically, was born the same day in the same hospital as her cousin Toni Nunn. My dad was the hospital administrator. Because that's how life was in Galax in the 1960s.
I highly recommend this book. It's unique. It's thoughtful and hopeful and real. And the recipes are out of this world wonderful!
December 2, 2018
Time to confess my bias right up front. This book was not what I wanted it to be. I was hoping for an in-depth discussion of what comfort food is and means, combined with some travel and recipes. What I got is therapy in book form.
This is the story of how the author cooked her way out of grief (over the death of her brother and the end of her marriage) and into recovery (from alcoholism), and it’s raw and personal and way more detailed than I wanted. It’s a tell-all where the author exposes not only her own secrets and flaws and pain, but those of the people around her, many of whom certainly did not consent to be discussed in this way. It’s the kind of book that makes you wince away from the page and hope that you don’t know any budding memoir writers planning to pin you to a page and strip your skin away.
And it’s just. It’s just really full of feelings and realizations and endless discussion of What Went Wrong and every single neurosis or thought the author has ever had. I tell you what: therapists get paid good money to listen to stuff like this, and I am not thrilled to have read through it for free. Also, if I’m going to have to listen to a straight woman discuss internalized homophobia (the probable cause of her brother’s suicide), or a white woman pay endless tribute to Southern cooking with barely a mention of black people (and certainly without apparently knowing even a single black person), I definitely want $150 an hour.
Some of the recipes were interesting, and a few of them I’ll probably make. But I’d rather have had them in cookbook form, without the navel-gazing.
This is the story of how the author cooked her way out of grief (over the death of her brother and the end of her marriage) and into recovery (from alcoholism), and it’s raw and personal and way more detailed than I wanted. It’s a tell-all where the author exposes not only her own secrets and flaws and pain, but those of the people around her, many of whom certainly did not consent to be discussed in this way. It’s the kind of book that makes you wince away from the page and hope that you don’t know any budding memoir writers planning to pin you to a page and strip your skin away.
And it’s just. It’s just really full of feelings and realizations and endless discussion of What Went Wrong and every single neurosis or thought the author has ever had. I tell you what: therapists get paid good money to listen to stuff like this, and I am not thrilled to have read through it for free. Also, if I’m going to have to listen to a straight woman discuss internalized homophobia (the probable cause of her brother’s suicide), or a white woman pay endless tribute to Southern cooking with barely a mention of black people (and certainly without apparently knowing even a single black person), I definitely want $150 an hour.
Some of the recipes were interesting, and a few of them I’ll probably make. But I’d rather have had them in cookbook form, without the navel-gazing.
August 11, 2024
Emily Nunn is an impressive cook and a very funny writer. I subscribe to her newsletter (the Department of Salad) and that is saying a lot because I am frugal as heck and keep my paid subscriptions to a minimum. In fact, I enjoy her food writing so much that I found this memoir by searching her name to see what else of hers I could read.
Unfortunately, despite loving this author’s sensibility, I did not whole-heartedly love this book. It did not seem to be able to decide what chord it was going for--lighthearted romp/ southern traditions/travel narrative/ dysfunctional family/ break up saga/ recovery/ the kindness of friends? Nunn tackles some tough life stuff, but there is a brittleness to her voice here, underlayers of (fully understandable given her experiences) anger and resentment that pop up and provide a jarring counterpoint to the breezy chatter of other sections. Ultimately, I couldn't quite find the beat.
Also, may I say once again that publishers do authors no favors by comparing them to other writers—no, this is not the humor of David Sedaris, not even in the same ballpark, except that they are both from the south. Nunn IS very funny, but more wry than dry. And no, nothing at all like “the honesty of Cheryl Strayed.” A very different sensibility entirely. Strayed is brutally honest and turns the lens equally on herself, Nunn is confessional, but not revealing. Those are different things.
Unfortunately, despite loving this author’s sensibility, I did not whole-heartedly love this book. It did not seem to be able to decide what chord it was going for--lighthearted romp/ southern traditions/travel narrative/ dysfunctional family/ break up saga/ recovery/ the kindness of friends? Nunn tackles some tough life stuff, but there is a brittleness to her voice here, underlayers of (fully understandable given her experiences) anger and resentment that pop up and provide a jarring counterpoint to the breezy chatter of other sections. Ultimately, I couldn't quite find the beat.
Also, may I say once again that publishers do authors no favors by comparing them to other writers—no, this is not the humor of David Sedaris, not even in the same ballpark, except that they are both from the south. Nunn IS very funny, but more wry than dry. And no, nothing at all like “the honesty of Cheryl Strayed.” A very different sensibility entirely. Strayed is brutally honest and turns the lens equally on herself, Nunn is confessional, but not revealing. Those are different things.
October 21, 2017
I wanted to enjoy this book a lot more than I did. Having really enjoyed and flown through The Pleasure is all Mine by Suzanne Pirret, another loose biography/cookbook which shares a similar format of a character (the author) in crisis learning how to cope with her love of cooking and delicious food, I was game to devour this book. Something was missing. There wasn't much soul. The love of food seemed to be an after thought, a recipe sprinkled in here or there with a sentence or two thrown in at the end of another anecdotal story to somehow tie the recipe into the rest of the book. But if the recipes were not the focus of the story then neither was the author's story itself. There was a wall there, it felt like we were being shown what she wanted us to see under the guise of it being tell all.
In the end, I think what I was hoping for was a vulnerable, sometimes humorous chat with a close friend at her kitchen table. What I got instead was more like a quick business meeting at a Starbucks. Eventually I found myself skimming to get through it, which is sad as other books have shown us this format works and can be deliciously enjoyable. This one just missed the mark for me.
In the end, I think what I was hoping for was a vulnerable, sometimes humorous chat with a close friend at her kitchen table. What I got instead was more like a quick business meeting at a Starbucks. Eventually I found myself skimming to get through it, which is sad as other books have shown us this format works and can be deliciously enjoyable. This one just missed the mark for me.
December 26, 2021
Not a fictional novel as I expected. It's an autobjography from an alcoholic foodie after she had a nervous breakdown. I had to stop reading as it isn't very good. I flipped to the recipe index at the back as every chapter ends with a recipe, and I couldn't find any I was interested in. Did not finish.
Edited: I share my reviews on Twitter. The author said she was not happy with the review or me. Others replied snarkily to what I said in my review. I don't give a rat's @$$ what Twitter or the author thinks. And the author put down this site, Goodreads. Glad I borrowed this from the library, so the author didn't get any royalties off me. I will NEVER read anything by this ungrateful rude author ever again!!
Edited: I share my reviews on Twitter. The author said she was not happy with the review or me. Others replied snarkily to what I said in my review. I don't give a rat's @$$ what Twitter or the author thinks. And the author put down this site, Goodreads. Glad I borrowed this from the library, so the author didn't get any royalties off me. I will NEVER read anything by this ungrateful rude author ever again!!
April 5, 2018
When Emily Nunn's life falls apart after her brother's death and her divorce, she embarks on a self-healing journey. Reconnecting with family and friends, Emily uses her unique talent for cooking dinner to find her way back. Slipping between past and present, the author incorporates recipes that illustrate her life as a child, student, food writer, and friend. Her realization that her remaining family has "divorced" her forces Emily to redefine life on her own terms. This is a quiet, introspective memoir that gives you a lot to think about and many recipes to try if you like to cook.
May 17, 2021
This book got more annoying, meandering and sloppy as it went. I liked the first few chapters but by the end I was just frustrated and felt like the story wasn't really going anywhere. Not for me.
November 12, 2017
Emily Nunn, a former New Yorker magazine editor, was in love and living with her fiance`, "the Engineer" she called him, and his lovely young daughter in Chicago. While on vacation in Barcelona, she got word that her brother Gil had committed suicide.
Emily was devastated and the Engineer was upset that Emily couldn't just snap out of her depression and move on. The Engineer broke up with her and she lost her fiance, his daughter, her home and had no job. She began to drink heavily, and one night she poured out her heartache on Facebook.
The next morning, she discovered many of her Facebook friends had responded to her post, asking Emily to come visit them. Her sister Elaine got Emily into the Betty Ford Clinic to deal with her alcohol problem, and took charge of Emily when she got out of rehab.
But things soured quickly. In Emily's family, her mother and one of sisters didn't speak to anyone else in the family. Elaine would decide not to speak to Emily for long periods of time, and Emily never knew why. Emily grew up "in a family of seven- an exquisitely dysfunctional southern family, in various members stopped speaking for years in various convoluted and confusing configurations."
Emily decided to go on on comfort food tour. She would travel the country, visiting various extended family and friends, and that led to her memoir The Comfort Food Diaries: My Quest for the Perfect Dish to Mend a Broken Heart. She stayed with an aunt and uncle in Virginia, trying to learn why her family acted the way that they did. Childhood pals, high school friends, college chums, cousins- they all invited Emily to come visit and cook with them.
The Comfort Food Diaries is part food memoir, part travel guide, part family story, and part self-discovery story, filled with wonderful recipes for the food that nourishes the appetite and the soul. Emily found that she wasn't the only one who had been hurt, and she discovered the resilience to face her life head-on.
The most moving part of the story was when Emily and Elaine went to see their long-estranged father. He was suffering from dementia, lonely and living amid squalor . He had left the family when Emily was a young girl after her mother had taken up with another man and he moved out. It was heartbreaking to hear his story.
There are so many fabulous recipes in this book that I want to try- Toni's Tomato Sauce, Great-grandmother's Mean Lemon Cake, Bea's Magic Salad Dressing, Aunt Mariah's Pot Roast, Magnificient Sour Cream Corn Muffins- it is a nice mix of traditional family, and more modern restaurant fare.
If you like memoirs about families and food, The Comfort Food Diaries is a good read for you. I recommend it.
Emily was devastated and the Engineer was upset that Emily couldn't just snap out of her depression and move on. The Engineer broke up with her and she lost her fiance, his daughter, her home and had no job. She began to drink heavily, and one night she poured out her heartache on Facebook.
The next morning, she discovered many of her Facebook friends had responded to her post, asking Emily to come visit them. Her sister Elaine got Emily into the Betty Ford Clinic to deal with her alcohol problem, and took charge of Emily when she got out of rehab.
But things soured quickly. In Emily's family, her mother and one of sisters didn't speak to anyone else in the family. Elaine would decide not to speak to Emily for long periods of time, and Emily never knew why. Emily grew up "in a family of seven- an exquisitely dysfunctional southern family, in various members stopped speaking for years in various convoluted and confusing configurations."
Emily decided to go on on comfort food tour. She would travel the country, visiting various extended family and friends, and that led to her memoir The Comfort Food Diaries: My Quest for the Perfect Dish to Mend a Broken Heart. She stayed with an aunt and uncle in Virginia, trying to learn why her family acted the way that they did. Childhood pals, high school friends, college chums, cousins- they all invited Emily to come visit and cook with them.
The Comfort Food Diaries is part food memoir, part travel guide, part family story, and part self-discovery story, filled with wonderful recipes for the food that nourishes the appetite and the soul. Emily found that she wasn't the only one who had been hurt, and she discovered the resilience to face her life head-on.
The most moving part of the story was when Emily and Elaine went to see their long-estranged father. He was suffering from dementia, lonely and living amid squalor . He had left the family when Emily was a young girl after her mother had taken up with another man and he moved out. It was heartbreaking to hear his story.
There are so many fabulous recipes in this book that I want to try- Toni's Tomato Sauce, Great-grandmother's Mean Lemon Cake, Bea's Magic Salad Dressing, Aunt Mariah's Pot Roast, Magnificient Sour Cream Corn Muffins- it is a nice mix of traditional family, and more modern restaurant fare.
If you like memoirs about families and food, The Comfort Food Diaries is a good read for you. I recommend it.
February 22, 2023
DNF. There was so much I wanted to like here: good, memoir, recovery story, SALAD! But the setting of Emily Nunn’s life (the south) just doesn’t hook for me. And there were SO MANY characters I was just confused, no idea what was happening.
November 22, 2017
Certain memoirs grab me but if you add a foodie element to the mix, count me in. This was a well written accounting of Emily Nunn's journey and healing process after her brother's suicide, the lack of emotional support from her significant other and facing alcoholism.
Some of my random thoughts after reading this book:
*Every one us deals with loss and death differently. Some are stoic, some fall apart at every little thing and others keep it together only to collapse emotionally later.
*She deleted Oliver's messages without listening to them! Both of my siblings are now deceased but neither took their lives. Not that it would have played a factor as far as unheard/unread messages from them. When I read that part I actually exclaimed aloud, "She deleted the messages! Why would she do that?" Because I placed myself in that situation, and I would have reacted differently. No right or wrong about it, everyone deals differently.
*The breakup was so cold and one sided with emotion. I tried to consider the very small amount of empathy with a side of annoyance The Engineer displayed when he was confronted with Emily's grief? It was so black and white and zero gray areas for him.
*Checking into the hospital - that scene where Emily needed to go and had the strength to know it, to act on it, was pure raw emotion.
*The scenes where she and her sister Elaine visit their father was good yet sad. I miss my father, he's been gone over 10 years now but the proverbial heartstrings are pulled now and then, especially when I read those chapters. I had quite a bit of empathy for the father and how they left off with his portion of the story.
*Maggie, the rescue poodle, actually belonged to Emily's sister Elaine. This wasn't clear to me in the beginning of the book and I fretted about Maggie for a bit, worried she was abandoned again. But she wasn't, she is Elaine's dog and was cared for.
I swear, characters can die in books but nothing tears me up like an animal who gets abused, abandoned or killed. That makes me cry. Yeah, I'm like that.
All the talk about food had me inspired to cook and bake. I made French bread, always a favorite here, and slow roasted tomatoes. There were soooo many recipes in this book. That's all I have. Thoughts from anyone who read this one? Did you like it?
Some of my random thoughts after reading this book:
*Every one us deals with loss and death differently. Some are stoic, some fall apart at every little thing and others keep it together only to collapse emotionally later.
*She deleted Oliver's messages without listening to them! Both of my siblings are now deceased but neither took their lives. Not that it would have played a factor as far as unheard/unread messages from them. When I read that part I actually exclaimed aloud, "She deleted the messages! Why would she do that?" Because I placed myself in that situation, and I would have reacted differently. No right or wrong about it, everyone deals differently.
*The breakup was so cold and one sided with emotion. I tried to consider the very small amount of empathy with a side of annoyance The Engineer displayed when he was confronted with Emily's grief? It was so black and white and zero gray areas for him.
*Checking into the hospital - that scene where Emily needed to go and had the strength to know it, to act on it, was pure raw emotion.
*The scenes where she and her sister Elaine visit their father was good yet sad. I miss my father, he's been gone over 10 years now but the proverbial heartstrings are pulled now and then, especially when I read those chapters. I had quite a bit of empathy for the father and how they left off with his portion of the story.
*Maggie, the rescue poodle, actually belonged to Emily's sister Elaine. This wasn't clear to me in the beginning of the book and I fretted about Maggie for a bit, worried she was abandoned again. But she wasn't, she is Elaine's dog and was cared for.
I swear, characters can die in books but nothing tears me up like an animal who gets abused, abandoned or killed. That makes me cry. Yeah, I'm like that.
All the talk about food had me inspired to cook and bake. I made French bread, always a favorite here, and slow roasted tomatoes. There were soooo many recipes in this book. That's all I have. Thoughts from anyone who read this one? Did you like it?
August 3, 2018
Sigh. I love food memoirs, and this one ended up on a few end-of-year lists, so I was excited to get a hold of it. Unfortunately, this one was....disappointing. It's missing a sense of connection, and with a food memoir--especially one that is about the healing nature of food--that's something you need to be able to convey.
Much of the book read like the product of a therapist's assignment to keep a diary, with little editing. She is embarrassingly candid and deeply bitter about her dysfunctional living family members. And look: she actually might be the victim, of course--maybe her siblings really are as awful as she continually attests--but then, to my knowledge, none of her other family members have gone off on her in a nationally published book, so I'm just working with the information I have.
This isn't to say that the entire book is a diatribe against her family--it isn't, and there are plenty of cute stories about her friends and other family members who she visits--but it lacked an urgency, I guess, for lack of a better word. As I mentioned, there was no connection there. She spends so much time with her Aunt Mariah, and writes about her often, and yet...by the end of the book I couldn't really tell you much about her. The recipes are delightful, but I kept waiting for the book to have that moment of connection with the reader, and it never came.
Also, even with all of that, the thing that almost made me just stop reading all together came around 62% into the book, where she admits that she agrees with her naturopath friend that GMOs are "the worst!" because "we'll lose the recipe for nature!" Tell me: how can someone who's supposedly into food know absolutely nothing about it?
I don't know, is there no one at Simon and Schuster who can read a memoir of a deeply privileged white woman, look around at, like, the climate of the US, and be like "Uhh, just a thought, why don't we just tone it down a notch??" I'm not saying "Rich southern white lady does rich people stuff" can't be compelling, but can "Rich southern white lady flaunts her privilege at every turn and is ALSO completely unaware of said privilege" be over, now?
Much of the book read like the product of a therapist's assignment to keep a diary, with little editing. She is embarrassingly candid and deeply bitter about her dysfunctional living family members. And look: she actually might be the victim, of course--maybe her siblings really are as awful as she continually attests--but then, to my knowledge, none of her other family members have gone off on her in a nationally published book, so I'm just working with the information I have.
This isn't to say that the entire book is a diatribe against her family--it isn't, and there are plenty of cute stories about her friends and other family members who she visits--but it lacked an urgency, I guess, for lack of a better word. As I mentioned, there was no connection there. She spends so much time with her Aunt Mariah, and writes about her often, and yet...by the end of the book I couldn't really tell you much about her. The recipes are delightful, but I kept waiting for the book to have that moment of connection with the reader, and it never came.
Also, even with all of that, the thing that almost made me just stop reading all together came around 62% into the book, where she admits that she agrees with her naturopath friend that GMOs are "the worst!" because "we'll lose the recipe for nature!" Tell me: how can someone who's supposedly into food know absolutely nothing about it?
I don't know, is there no one at Simon and Schuster who can read a memoir of a deeply privileged white woman, look around at, like, the climate of the US, and be like "Uhh, just a thought, why don't we just tone it down a notch??" I'm not saying "Rich southern white lady does rich people stuff" can't be compelling, but can "Rich southern white lady flaunts her privilege at every turn and is ALSO completely unaware of said privilege" be over, now?
October 30, 2017
Didn’t finish. I got about half way through before asking myself why I was continuing to try to finish, as if it were assigned reading. It was rambling story with no direction, only loosely tied together with mentions of food. 3 stars only because the recipes sprinkled through the book are enticing and I’ll likely try some of them.
December 5, 2020
I usually enjoy food memoirs, but this one left me cold. The tone overpowered the food memories. I skimmed some of it because the details didn't seem pertinent to the memoir.
October 12, 2019
Insufferable author.
April 5, 2018
How does food fit into your memories and your emotions? This well-written memoir makes you reflect on that sometimes uncomfortable, sometimes soothing, always nostalgic question.
It was a lot heavier than I expected - anticipating a light, somewhat frothy "girl gets dumped, girl goes on comfort food tour with friends and probably falls in love with a cute chef along the way" type-read, it was a bit of a hard turn to realize this is actually a Southern gothic-type memoir that really dives deep into issues of family dysfunction, suicide, alcoholism and the generational patterns we're doomed to repeat. Oh, and there is no cute chef to swoop in and save the day. Ultimately, the author - with the help of true friends and family - saves herself.
There's a bit of an "Eat, Pray, Love" vibe here, if only because the narrator is a white, childless woman with a background in journalism and an evidently bottomless pocketbook (despite Nunn's weak protestations of having to drain her retirement fund amid worries of her sister funding her lifestyle). Clearly, Nunn had the resources and safety net to leave a relationship in which she had been a stay-at-home stepmom, and embark on a cross-country tour visiting family and friends while remaining unemployed. It's a luxury many people wouldn't have, and I know the kind of vague flippancy in which Nunn addresses the financial stuff bothers some readers of this book. I'm not quite sure if it's as much of an issue for me. Although the timeline is a bit murky, I don't think she remained unemployed for more than a year, and she mostly stayed with family and friends who were feeding her too.
So now that that's out of the way...getting into the meat of this memoir. And boy, it's meaty. After Nunn's brother kills himself, she is forced to deal with her own alcoholism and her pattern of searching for love from people who can't give it to her, for reasons of their own. It is painful to read about the alienation she suffers from her family, especially the inexplicable (to Nunn, at least) silent treatment and gaslighting from her sister Elaine. I related to this particular quote, as I've had this conversation with my mom before about the difficulty (to put it lightly) in mourning relationships with family members who are still very much alive, yet aren't interested in the same kind of relationship you want with them:
"Sometimes it was hard to accept the fact that rather than going down in a plane crash that I had no power to stop, they'd all, one by one, chosen to leave me out of their lives. How does a person say goodbye to her entire family?"
The part towards the end of the book where Nunn and her sister visit their elderly father - who left them as kids - to help him move out of his home was just heartbreaking. His simple joy at taking "his girls" out to Ruby Tuesday's filled me with an ache.
Throughout the book, Nunn peppers chapters with at least 2-3 recipes each, and they're all part of the narrative. So when she's visiting her Aunt Mariah (who is amazing!), we get Aunt Mariah's recipe for artichoke pickles. Most of the food is Southern, and the recipes, for the most part, seem straightforward if not always a 10-minute dish. Warning: you will get hungry reading this book!
One of the interesting thoughts this book provoked for me was the idea of what is comfort food? Early in the narrative, Nunn asks this question of her family and friends, and the answers led to further questions. Why do we associate comfort food with the food you eat when you're sad, when in reality our actual comfort food dishes invoke memories of happiness, cosiness and belonging? It made me think about the food I would describe as comfort food. Here are a few that sprang immediately to mind:
- My mom's "the thigh who loved me" chicken and rice from Janet and Greta Podleski's Crazy Plates
- beef barbecue sandwiches (this always reminds me of my first meal I ate after returning home from my first European trip, to Italy, as a teenager. After a week of delicious Italian food, I was equally happy to return home, tell my family all about the trip, and dive into some good ol' North American beef barbecue)
- My nanny's shortbread with chocolate, at Christmas
- My nanny Ivadell's chocolate chip cookies and Rice Krispies squares
- My mom's "cornmeal corns" = cornbread baked in a corncob-shaped cast-iron mold, spread with peanut butter, hot and fresh from the oven after school
- My mom's "cookies for rookies", also from the Podleski cookbook
- My mom's "Julie's chicken fajitas"
- that Lipton's chicken noodle soup that leaves a fluorescent yellow rim around the bowl, with buttered bread on the side
- barbecued mandarin chicken on a toasted everything bagel with lettuce and tomato
- my mom's porridge with a cup of brown sugar on the side to sprinkle on top
- hamburgers and corn on the cob served poolside at my grandparents in the summer
The thing that most stood out to me about this list is that this is all food I have not eaten in years. I won't deny I have a seriously messed-up relationship with food, and the fact that my immediate list of comfort food is all food I never eat anymore made me really sad. Does this mean I've gone the last 15 or so years of my life without any comfort? I genuinely do love the food I eat now, but I won't insist that they fit my definition of comfort food. The food I eat now gives me comfort in that it makes me feel comfortable, safe, clean, perfect. It keeps me in my comfort zone, but it is not comfort food.
I need to think about this more, but the fact that this book forced me to reflect on an uncomfortable topic for me makes it a good one, in my mind. My food choices might say otherwise, but I do really ultimately seek to be uncomfortable more often, because that's when growth happens.
It was a lot heavier than I expected - anticipating a light, somewhat frothy "girl gets dumped, girl goes on comfort food tour with friends and probably falls in love with a cute chef along the way" type-read, it was a bit of a hard turn to realize this is actually a Southern gothic-type memoir that really dives deep into issues of family dysfunction, suicide, alcoholism and the generational patterns we're doomed to repeat. Oh, and there is no cute chef to swoop in and save the day. Ultimately, the author - with the help of true friends and family - saves herself.
There's a bit of an "Eat, Pray, Love" vibe here, if only because the narrator is a white, childless woman with a background in journalism and an evidently bottomless pocketbook (despite Nunn's weak protestations of having to drain her retirement fund amid worries of her sister funding her lifestyle). Clearly, Nunn had the resources and safety net to leave a relationship in which she had been a stay-at-home stepmom, and embark on a cross-country tour visiting family and friends while remaining unemployed. It's a luxury many people wouldn't have, and I know the kind of vague flippancy in which Nunn addresses the financial stuff bothers some readers of this book. I'm not quite sure if it's as much of an issue for me. Although the timeline is a bit murky, I don't think she remained unemployed for more than a year, and she mostly stayed with family and friends who were feeding her too.
So now that that's out of the way...getting into the meat of this memoir. And boy, it's meaty. After Nunn's brother kills himself, she is forced to deal with her own alcoholism and her pattern of searching for love from people who can't give it to her, for reasons of their own. It is painful to read about the alienation she suffers from her family, especially the inexplicable (to Nunn, at least) silent treatment and gaslighting from her sister Elaine. I related to this particular quote, as I've had this conversation with my mom before about the difficulty (to put it lightly) in mourning relationships with family members who are still very much alive, yet aren't interested in the same kind of relationship you want with them:
"Sometimes it was hard to accept the fact that rather than going down in a plane crash that I had no power to stop, they'd all, one by one, chosen to leave me out of their lives. How does a person say goodbye to her entire family?"
The part towards the end of the book where Nunn and her sister visit their elderly father - who left them as kids - to help him move out of his home was just heartbreaking. His simple joy at taking "his girls" out to Ruby Tuesday's filled me with an ache.
Throughout the book, Nunn peppers chapters with at least 2-3 recipes each, and they're all part of the narrative. So when she's visiting her Aunt Mariah (who is amazing!), we get Aunt Mariah's recipe for artichoke pickles. Most of the food is Southern, and the recipes, for the most part, seem straightforward if not always a 10-minute dish. Warning: you will get hungry reading this book!
One of the interesting thoughts this book provoked for me was the idea of what is comfort food? Early in the narrative, Nunn asks this question of her family and friends, and the answers led to further questions. Why do we associate comfort food with the food you eat when you're sad, when in reality our actual comfort food dishes invoke memories of happiness, cosiness and belonging? It made me think about the food I would describe as comfort food. Here are a few that sprang immediately to mind:
- My mom's "the thigh who loved me" chicken and rice from Janet and Greta Podleski's Crazy Plates
- beef barbecue sandwiches (this always reminds me of my first meal I ate after returning home from my first European trip, to Italy, as a teenager. After a week of delicious Italian food, I was equally happy to return home, tell my family all about the trip, and dive into some good ol' North American beef barbecue)
- My nanny's shortbread with chocolate, at Christmas
- My nanny Ivadell's chocolate chip cookies and Rice Krispies squares
- My mom's "cornmeal corns" = cornbread baked in a corncob-shaped cast-iron mold, spread with peanut butter, hot and fresh from the oven after school
- My mom's "cookies for rookies", also from the Podleski cookbook
- My mom's "Julie's chicken fajitas"
- that Lipton's chicken noodle soup that leaves a fluorescent yellow rim around the bowl, with buttered bread on the side
- barbecued mandarin chicken on a toasted everything bagel with lettuce and tomato
- my mom's porridge with a cup of brown sugar on the side to sprinkle on top
- hamburgers and corn on the cob served poolside at my grandparents in the summer
The thing that most stood out to me about this list is that this is all food I have not eaten in years. I won't deny I have a seriously messed-up relationship with food, and the fact that my immediate list of comfort food is all food I never eat anymore made me really sad. Does this mean I've gone the last 15 or so years of my life without any comfort? I genuinely do love the food I eat now, but I won't insist that they fit my definition of comfort food. The food I eat now gives me comfort in that it makes me feel comfortable, safe, clean, perfect. It keeps me in my comfort zone, but it is not comfort food.
I need to think about this more, but the fact that this book forced me to reflect on an uncomfortable topic for me makes it a good one, in my mind. My food choices might say otherwise, but I do really ultimately seek to be uncomfortable more often, because that's when growth happens.
August 19, 2018
I bought this because I enjoyed a Twitter thread of Nunn’s. I’m not usually a reader of contemporary memoirs, yet I’ve read two recently and liked them both. (Everything Is Horrible and Wonderful was the other.) Nunn leans hard on her family and friends, all of whom evidently have the financial resources to support her. This normally would irritate the hell out of me, but I must’ve been soothed by the recipes.
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