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The Best American Food Writing
The Best American Food Writing 2019: The National Bestseller―Inspiring Essays That Create Empathy and Critical Thought
A NATIONAL BESTSELLER
New York Times best-selling author and James Beard Award winner Samin Nosrat collects the year’s finest writing about food and drink.
“Good food writing evokes the senses,” writes Samin Nosrat, best-selling author of Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat and star of the Netflix adaptation of the book. “It makes us consider divergent viewpoints. It makes us hungry and motivates us to go out into the world in search of new experiences. It charms and angers us, breaks our hearts, and gives us hope. And perhaps most importantly, it creates empathy within us.” Whether it’s the dizzying array of Kit Kats in Japan, a reclamation of the queer history of tapas, or a spotlight on a day in the life of a restaurant inspector, the work in The Best American Food Writing 2019 will inspire you to pick up a knife and start chopping, but also to think critically about what you’re eating and how it came to your plate, while still leaving you clamoring for seconds.
New York Times best-selling author and James Beard Award winner Samin Nosrat collects the year’s finest writing about food and drink.
“Good food writing evokes the senses,” writes Samin Nosrat, best-selling author of Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat and star of the Netflix adaptation of the book. “It makes us consider divergent viewpoints. It makes us hungry and motivates us to go out into the world in search of new experiences. It charms and angers us, breaks our hearts, and gives us hope. And perhaps most importantly, it creates empathy within us.” Whether it’s the dizzying array of Kit Kats in Japan, a reclamation of the queer history of tapas, or a spotlight on a day in the life of a restaurant inspector, the work in The Best American Food Writing 2019 will inspire you to pick up a knife and start chopping, but also to think critically about what you’re eating and how it came to your plate, while still leaving you clamoring for seconds.
288 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 2019
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 148 reviews
January 14, 2020
There is not much joy in this year’s Best Food Writing anthology (and what little there is comes in obituaries.) I look forward to these books (first the Holly Hughes series, and now the “Best American” series) every year and save them to read on my January beach vacation. But this one was no fun. I want to experience other people’s love of food, cooking, shopping, eating, sharing, community, family, heritage, and to understand how their experiences and feelings are different from and similar to my own. I want them to make me hungry, and to make me look forward to cooking. Some history and politics and ethics and science, and even supply chain, are good too, and I very much appreciate the diversity reflected in this volume. I thought Samin Nosrat was the perfect editor to give me what I enjoy, since the attributes I look for are so often credited to her, but no such luck. Thank goodness the book ended with a tribute to Jonathan Gold that praised his bringing to the author the gifts of joy and love that can come from food, and what I have come to expect from the Best Food Writing books. If it were my job to read this book, I wouldn’t complain. But this volume contained so little joy, or love, or fun, or humor, or happiness that I fear I will need a new vacation read for next year.
October 18, 2019
"[O]ur mouths are liminal places where food and words mingle, where hot dogs, tagliatelle, and Nigerian puff puff meet my name is, memory, and I", writes Ruby Tandoh in her piece "Sugartime" which is included in this year's The Best American Food Writing edited by the formidable Samrin Nosrat. And as Tandoh asserts there is something about food and words: the best food writing, thus, is not just a description of a meal, it is much more as the anthology proves that.
There is only one restaurant review included and Nosrat admits in her introduction that she doesn't care much for the form. Instead, we get Yemisi Aribisala's essay about eggs which turns into a text about purity myths, gender, and sex. We follow Mark Binelli to Finland where he tastes all kinds of salty liquorice and Teja Rao to Japan investigating all the different KitKat flavours and their history. Melissa Chadburn remembers the food of her youth (as indicated in the title of her essay), food stamps, and poverty. Soleil Ho offers a complex answer to the often derogative and/or exoticizing question "Do You Eat Dog?". Pryia Krishna gives us a glimpse of the life of a restaurant inspector as Mayukh Sen provides a slice of (queer) food history in "The Gay Man Who Brought Tapas to America". These are not even all of the essays I really loved within this anthology. And while there were paragraphs I wish were different (no book on food where not at least one person offers some bad 'obesity' take somewhere) and some spoke more to me than others, each text brought something spicey, or sweet, or salty to the table.
Let me briefly come back to Tandoh. "Sugartime" is as much food writing as it is art criticism; it is a history lesson, but also full of pop-cultural allusions and quotes from theorists like Barthes, Hall, and hooks without ever becoming unapproachable. In only a few pages, she delves into the violent history (and present) of sugar plantages, discourses around sweetness, gender and race, regionally different approaches to food, hedonism, and the lust for sweetness as a survival strategy.
Reading this anthology left me feel well-nourished and hungry for even more.
There is only one restaurant review included and Nosrat admits in her introduction that she doesn't care much for the form. Instead, we get Yemisi Aribisala's essay about eggs which turns into a text about purity myths, gender, and sex. We follow Mark Binelli to Finland where he tastes all kinds of salty liquorice and Teja Rao to Japan investigating all the different KitKat flavours and their history. Melissa Chadburn remembers the food of her youth (as indicated in the title of her essay), food stamps, and poverty. Soleil Ho offers a complex answer to the often derogative and/or exoticizing question "Do You Eat Dog?". Pryia Krishna gives us a glimpse of the life of a restaurant inspector as Mayukh Sen provides a slice of (queer) food history in "The Gay Man Who Brought Tapas to America". These are not even all of the essays I really loved within this anthology. And while there were paragraphs I wish were different (no book on food where not at least one person offers some bad 'obesity' take somewhere) and some spoke more to me than others, each text brought something spicey, or sweet, or salty to the table.
Let me briefly come back to Tandoh. "Sugartime" is as much food writing as it is art criticism; it is a history lesson, but also full of pop-cultural allusions and quotes from theorists like Barthes, Hall, and hooks without ever becoming unapproachable. In only a few pages, she delves into the violent history (and present) of sugar plantages, discourses around sweetness, gender and race, regionally different approaches to food, hedonism, and the lust for sweetness as a survival strategy.
Reading this anthology left me feel well-nourished and hungry for even more.
January 3, 2020
The Best American Food Writing 2019
Samin Nosrat
This collection celebrates more than good food. It celebrates the good that food brings to the world. Samin Nosrat and Silvia Killingsworth compiled examples to prove, as Killingsworth explains in the Forward: "Food writing is just another way of looking at the world, and there is no one true form of it, despite what the scolds may say." The forms in the book opened up my mind to the traditions, the tears, the appropriation, the journey, and yes, the joy that season the meals we sit down to.
Nosrat did a commendable of including a interesting cross-section of selections. I never felt as if I was reading the same type of essay over and over. Her selections illuminated complicated larger social justice issues by using a connection to food to open up my narrow peephole of knowledge. Sometimes I felt angry or helpless, but I came to the end understanding the importance of the ingredients in the pot.
There are so many bright stars in the industry that foodies know very little about; especially if these stars aren't white. Nosrat takes on the task of changing this, "I wanted to make sure that both up close and from a distance, this collection accurately represented our year in food, in America, and on our precious planet." The collection is a solid step toward expanding the parameters of the canon with good writing and humor.
Although the writing is thought provoking, it's never overwhelming. I learned about the popularity of Kit-Kat candy bars in Japan, a restaurant inspector's job, and lovely essays about the late Anthony Bourdain and Jonathan Gold. In fact, now that I've finished the book I'm ready to sit down to enjoy a good meal. Because I understand a little more about what I'm eating.
Samin Nosrat
This collection celebrates more than good food. It celebrates the good that food brings to the world. Samin Nosrat and Silvia Killingsworth compiled examples to prove, as Killingsworth explains in the Forward: "Food writing is just another way of looking at the world, and there is no one true form of it, despite what the scolds may say." The forms in the book opened up my mind to the traditions, the tears, the appropriation, the journey, and yes, the joy that season the meals we sit down to.
Nosrat did a commendable of including a interesting cross-section of selections. I never felt as if I was reading the same type of essay over and over. Her selections illuminated complicated larger social justice issues by using a connection to food to open up my narrow peephole of knowledge. Sometimes I felt angry or helpless, but I came to the end understanding the importance of the ingredients in the pot.
There are so many bright stars in the industry that foodies know very little about; especially if these stars aren't white. Nosrat takes on the task of changing this, "I wanted to make sure that both up close and from a distance, this collection accurately represented our year in food, in America, and on our precious planet." The collection is a solid step toward expanding the parameters of the canon with good writing and humor.
Although the writing is thought provoking, it's never overwhelming. I learned about the popularity of Kit-Kat candy bars in Japan, a restaurant inspector's job, and lovely essays about the late Anthony Bourdain and Jonathan Gold. In fact, now that I've finished the book I'm ready to sit down to enjoy a good meal. Because I understand a little more about what I'm eating.
December 20, 2020
4.5 stars
An exceptionally varied, thoughtful collection of food writing that runs the gamut from investigative reporting to prose poetry.
I liked the longer pieces best, particularly Mark Arax' gripping 'A Kingdom from Dust' (I'll never look at a clementine or pomegranate in the same way again), Stephanie M. Lee's thoroughly researched 'Sliced and Diced' on the outrageously shoddy science behind Cornell's Food and Brand lab, Shane Mitchell's 'Hot Wet Goobers' (poetry from peanuts), and Tejal Rao's 'Big in Japan (oh, to have a mochi-flavoured Kit Kat in my possession!) but even the straight-out brief restaurant reviews had something of greater social and cultural interest to bring to the table. A joy to read overall. I can't wait to see what J. Kenji López-Alt has in store for readers in the 2020 edition!
An exceptionally varied, thoughtful collection of food writing that runs the gamut from investigative reporting to prose poetry.
I liked the longer pieces best, particularly Mark Arax' gripping 'A Kingdom from Dust' (I'll never look at a clementine or pomegranate in the same way again), Stephanie M. Lee's thoroughly researched 'Sliced and Diced' on the outrageously shoddy science behind Cornell's Food and Brand lab, Shane Mitchell's 'Hot Wet Goobers' (poetry from peanuts), and Tejal Rao's 'Big in Japan (oh, to have a mochi-flavoured Kit Kat in my possession!) but even the straight-out brief restaurant reviews had something of greater social and cultural interest to bring to the table. A joy to read overall. I can't wait to see what J. Kenji López-Alt has in store for readers in the 2020 edition!
January 6, 2021
I received this book for Christmas from my husband last month. And although I don't normally pick up collections, and certainly not 'best of' lists, this seemed so fitting to read at the end of 2020. So much of the pandemic was spent listening to Nosrat's podcast Homecooking as well as watching Taste the Nation and Somebody Feed Phil (and a rewatch of Salt, Fat, Heat, Acid). This gift was even paired with a Homecooking magnet. Swoon.
Although not every essay hit with me, the majority of them did. And as Nosrat writes in her introduction regarding her objectives with the collection, so many of them brought "joy and challeng[ed] [my] preconceived notions." They made me "think, feel, and, inevitably, want to eat." The ones that have stuck with me the most because they made me "consider divergent viewpoints" were: "A Kingdom from Dust," "Why Do Poor Americans Eat So Unhealthy," "Bison Bars Were Supposed to Restore Native Communities and Grass-based Ranches. Then Came Epic Provisions, "Food Fight," "The Gay Man Who Brought Tapas to America" and "The Vegan Race Wars." These articles are about food, of course, but they stayed with me because I learned so much about how our food comes to us and how bigger systems are at play. Thus these pieces on food are intertwined with politics and identity because food is always political. The articles on the passing of Anthony Bourdain, someone who I have read and viewed before, and Jonathan Gold, someone who I am not as familiar with, were both beautiful pieces as well. I also really enjoyed "Big in Japan" and "Salty Tooth" to learn more about other places and cultures outside of America.
Overall, this book was a joy to dip in and out of these last two week. I expect to visit certain essays again, perhaps even include some in my writing courses. This collection will make you consider what's on your plate in new ways.
Although not every essay hit with me, the majority of them did. And as Nosrat writes in her introduction regarding her objectives with the collection, so many of them brought "joy and challeng[ed] [my] preconceived notions." They made me "think, feel, and, inevitably, want to eat." The ones that have stuck with me the most because they made me "consider divergent viewpoints" were: "A Kingdom from Dust," "Why Do Poor Americans Eat So Unhealthy," "Bison Bars Were Supposed to Restore Native Communities and Grass-based Ranches. Then Came Epic Provisions, "Food Fight," "The Gay Man Who Brought Tapas to America" and "The Vegan Race Wars." These articles are about food, of course, but they stayed with me because I learned so much about how our food comes to us and how bigger systems are at play. Thus these pieces on food are intertwined with politics and identity because food is always political. The articles on the passing of Anthony Bourdain, someone who I have read and viewed before, and Jonathan Gold, someone who I am not as familiar with, were both beautiful pieces as well. I also really enjoyed "Big in Japan" and "Salty Tooth" to learn more about other places and cultures outside of America.
Overall, this book was a joy to dip in and out of these last two week. I expect to visit certain essays again, perhaps even include some in my writing courses. This collection will make you consider what's on your plate in new ways.
March 2, 2023
I've been enjoying these collections of the 'Best American' food writing. Filled with a wide array of topics that relate to food but can cover politics, environment, and sociology, they offer brief insights to some of the most pertinent topics going on at the time. This one of course is a few years back, but still offered valuable insight on farming practices and other themes that are probably still prevalent.
Edited by Nosrat, these articles were carefully curated. While they weren't all particularly engaging for me, there were several that were standouts; particularly the entry from Twitty, whose book on genetics and food I read earlier this year. I also found the article on Epic, Tanka, and Bison Bars interesting as I remember the advertising (for at least one of those products) and was surprisingly unsurprised as to which company found more consumer success through no fault of their own.
This was a solid edition to the Best series.
Review by M. Reynard 2023
Edited by Nosrat, these articles were carefully curated. While they weren't all particularly engaging for me, there were several that were standouts; particularly the entry from Twitty, whose book on genetics and food I read earlier this year. I also found the article on Epic, Tanka, and Bison Bars interesting as I remember the advertising (for at least one of those products) and was surprisingly unsurprised as to which company found more consumer success through no fault of their own.
This was a solid edition to the Best series.
Review by M. Reynard 2023
April 13, 2020
A beautiful collection. Every piece is worth reading.
October 16, 2019
Delightful
December 24, 2020
Excellent collection of writing that promotes delicious descriptions of food and diversity in the culinary world.
May 10, 2020
A diverse mix of essays on food and culture.
Read
November 27, 2019Essay or story collections are usually hit and miss, but this was such an excellent selection of writing from start to end. In the intro Samin Nosrat says she would only edit this if she had lots of flexibility in what constitutes "best", "American", and "food writing". Food is such an integral part of culture, so this collection of "food writing" from an amazingly diverse set of writers is really an anthology of human stories.
April 22, 2024
I have always defaulted to 4 stars when reading a collection or anthology because it's usually a mixture of greats and hates. Finishing this one and looking back through the table of contents, I think the most succinct word to encompasses almost all of these pieces is "forgettable." They were mostly journalism pieces and a lot of them seemed like they had more to say if they didn't have a word limit from their editor, and several of them clearly just had nothing to say at all. This collection of "the best" had at least a couple of the blandest restaurant reviews I've ever seen.
I'll just highlight the two that I thought were excellent. "The Maraschino Mogul" was my favorite. It had so many twists and turns on the true story of a cherry canning plant in Brooklyn, and the writer succeeded in telling it in the most thrilling way possible.
The other one that fascinated me was the one about Kotzebue, Alaska. More than 70% of this small town in Northern Alaska are descendants of native Eskimos. The short piece chronicles the town's 20+ year battle over the food served in the local elder care home. Since Eskimo food doesn't match mainstream American food, it doesn't fit within all the rules that the federal government imposes on these types of facilities. Imagine reaching old age and not being allowed to eat the caribu meat, berries, and seal products you've always had, just because some people on the opposite side of the continet made your diet their business. At the time of the essay, they had made great progress but still couldn't have seal oil (a staple) because of some chance of disease they never caught before; which to me is like a ban on raw chicken because some people might not cook it enough and get salmonella. Anyway, I hope the Eskimos win that battle in the end.
I'll just highlight the two that I thought were excellent. "The Maraschino Mogul" was my favorite. It had so many twists and turns on the true story of a cherry canning plant in Brooklyn, and the writer succeeded in telling it in the most thrilling way possible.
The other one that fascinated me was the one about Kotzebue, Alaska. More than 70% of this small town in Northern Alaska are descendants of native Eskimos. The short piece chronicles the town's 20+ year battle over the food served in the local elder care home. Since Eskimo food doesn't match mainstream American food, it doesn't fit within all the rules that the federal government imposes on these types of facilities. Imagine reaching old age and not being allowed to eat the caribu meat, berries, and seal products you've always had, just because some people on the opposite side of the continet made your diet their business. At the time of the essay, they had made great progress but still couldn't have seal oil (a staple) because of some chance of disease they never caught before; which to me is like a ban on raw chicken because some people might not cook it enough and get salmonella. Anyway, I hope the Eskimos win that battle in the end.
January 19, 2021
This was a really solid collection, I liked it a lot more than the 2018 collection. By far, my favorite two essays were "The Maraschino Mogul" by Ian Frazier, which actually brought me to tears, and "Big in Japan" by Tejal Rao, a surprisingly moving essay about Kit Kat bars. But flipping through again, I'm really impressed by how many of the essays have stuck with me and taught me something. I read this one super slow, as I was getting it from the library and kept letting it expire before putting much of a dent in it. I'll be also keeping my eyes open for more work by Melissa Chadburn, Priya Krishna, Marilyn Noble, Kathryn Schulz, and Ruby Tandoh after reading their essays here.
January 16, 2021
2020 was for me the year of food -- with the lockdowns forcing me indoors for most of the year, cooking/baking was a lifesaver. I also ended up finishing Samin's bible of cooking - Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat. And that led me to this. Samin's editorial vision -- the selection of writers -- is so diverse that this volume of writings feels like a multi-cuisine buffet, but like nothing you'd ever have assembled in your wildest dreams. Must read for food lovers (or should I rather say those who love to read about food as much as they love food). Can't really find a fault.
July 26, 2021
4.5 Samin Nosrat (Salt Fat Acid Heat) really picked up this collection and ran with it. There's a fantastic variety of voices, topics, perspectives, and styles collected, all of which illustrate why contemporary food writing is doing some tremendously important work. Food is such a hidden but profound expression of pretty much every element of life — work, culture, sex, politics, land, family, pleasure, suffering — and Nosrat's collection consider gives these equal weight and thoughtfulness, while being a joy to read.
February 18, 2020
I was very excited to read this book and found the beginning very captivating. I really appreciated Nosrat’s introduction that outlined her process for choosing writings and her desire to highlight authors and stories focused on women, people of color, LGBTQ, etc. as voices often excluded from food writing. Some stories drew me in strongly, like A Kingdom from Dust, In the Twin Cities..., Anthony Bourdain and the Power of Telling the Truth, and The Life of a Restaurant Inspector, to name a few, but I found others so academic to the point of boring. Overall a good anthology, but expect some writings to be better than others.
April 4, 2020
I enjoyed this eclectic collection. All Californians should be required to read "A Kingdom from Dust" by Mark Arax. My other favorites were stories about kit kits in Japan, the legacies of Jonathan Gold and Anthony Bourdain, a maraschino mogul hiding a big secret in his factory in NY, and the gay man who brought tapas to America (Felipe Rojas-Lombardi, who I had never heard of).
May 8, 2020
This collection made me think: about food I love, about how culture is driven by food, and about the supply chain and industry of food. The articles are not filled with recipes ready to cook, but fill me with wonder and questions about how and why we eat the food we do.
Read
July 22, 2022A Kingdom From Dust was fascinating and sublime. I love Michael Twitty and will absorb anything he writes with relish, and Kathryn Schulz taught me more about Utah in twenty pages than I had ever previously known. As with any anthology, YMMV.
January 14, 2020
[4.5 stars] A compilation of short- and longform essays on food and culture edited with care by Samin Nosrat. I enjoyed this collection, even if I didn’t love every essay, and appreciated her curatorial attention to race, gender, sexuality, region, and subject. I would’ve liked to see a more creative order (instead of alphabetical), as essay collections have the same promise as a well-ordered mixtape. Unsurprisingly, pieces by two of my perennial favorites Michael Twitty and Soleil Ho, stood out in this volume. I was also hooked by Ruby Tandoh’s race, gender, and historical critique of the uses of sugar and sweetness in modern art and Mark Arax’s investigative deep dive into agribusiness, exploitation, labor, water, politics, and the Wonderful company in central and southern California. Essays on boiled peanuts in the American South, Kit-Kats in Japan, and vegans of color were also delightful, insightful, and informative. Recommended for those who are curious about food, where it comes from, who produces and picks it, and who may or may not get credit or profit.
Goodreads Challenge: 1/52
Reading Women Challenge: A book about food
Popsugar Reading Challenge: An anthology
Femibooks Nonfiction Challenge: A book about food
Goodreads Challenge: 1/52
Reading Women Challenge: A book about food
Popsugar Reading Challenge: An anthology
Femibooks Nonfiction Challenge: A book about food
January 24, 2020
Important essays and reporting I’ll return to over and over again
February 28, 2020
What a great book! The articles were very engaging and informative. I appreciated the variety of topics that all relate to food. Perfect collection.
July 22, 2020
A very thoughtfully curated collection, cutting across cultural and socioeconomic boundaries. Bravo Samin.
August 31, 2020
3.5. Mixed bag of choices for my personal taste. Some really great, some long and some that I had a hard time clicking in on. Collections are always hard to balance.
October 30, 2020
Such a good read, so many great perspectives. I did skip the story about eating dog meat though. I didn't think that would be something anyone would benefit from reading.
May 22, 2025
https://www.instagram.com/p/DJ6sWu2uYSO/
Samin Nosrat (editor) - The Best American Food Writing 2019: Strong recommend for this collection, especially the California citrus, Kit-Kat, and Bourdain essays. #cursorybookreviews #cursoryreviews
Samin Nosrat (editor) - The Best American Food Writing 2019: Strong recommend for this collection, especially the California citrus, Kit-Kat, and Bourdain essays. #cursorybookreviews #cursoryreviews
December 21, 2020
This book came as an unexpected gift. Food writing I thought, a whole book of it, how could that be good. I was so pleasantly surprised. I love food and the writing here looks at it from so many perspectives, cultural, political, historic, as part of your identity, and more. I found almost every essay a complete perfect dish, with rich flavors and exciting spices. Now I may read more food writing.
November 22, 2020
4.5 stars, rounded down. I enjoyed this collection a lot. As is true for any anthology, some essays were stronger than others, but all of them made me think and taught me something new.
Overall, Samin Nosrat was a great guest editor. She selected a fascinating variety of essays that focused on all different aspects of food. To be honest, I liked too many essays to list my favorites, but, among them they covered issues including: water, licorice, bison, peanuts, fraudulent research, poverty, Alaska, Kit-Kats, Ghana, and Utah.
While this was only the second in the series, I hope it continues for many years to come.
Overall, Samin Nosrat was a great guest editor. She selected a fascinating variety of essays that focused on all different aspects of food. To be honest, I liked too many essays to list my favorites, but, among them they covered issues including: water, licorice, bison, peanuts, fraudulent research, poverty, Alaska, Kit-Kats, Ghana, and Utah.
While this was only the second in the series, I hope it continues for many years to come.
February 5, 2020
3.5 stars - Some of the pieces were masterfully written, making you think about food in new ways. I learned about a day in the life of a NYC restaurant inspector, about the different types of peanuts, about the heirloom beans of Mexico. Many were thought-provoking, such as the article that explained a movement in a town in Alaska to have nursing homes provide traditional foods to their elderly Inuit patients. But the collection is uneven, and some pieces were the types of articles that if I came across them on the internet, I would skim the first few paragraphs and then click to another tab. Overall though, worth the read. My favorite selections include “A Kingdom from Dust” and “On Reading Jonathan Gold.”
January 1, 2021
"And also, what does best even mean? For what is the best part of a landscape? Is it the most dramatic peak to which the eye is immediately drawn? Is it the way the sunlight reflects off the calm surface of the glassy sea? The parting of the clouds? Is it the tiny bird or the soft gray moss? I'd argue that what makes a landscape breathtaking, sublime, is all its parts..." p.xvii
"...I'm partial to Highway 99, the old road that brought the Okies and Mexicans to the fields and deposited a twang on my Armenian tongue." p.3
"Once he finished grabbing the flow of the five rivers that ran across the plain, he used his turbine pumps to seize the water beneath the ground. As he bled the aquifer dry, he called on the government to bring him an even mightier river from afar. Down the great aqueduct, by freight of politics and gravity, came the excess waters of the Sacramento River. The farmer moved the rain." p.4
"The wide-open middle of California did its lullaby on me again." p.6
"I love the congeniality of eggs, how quintessentially composed they are, the way they snuggle into the cupped hand." p.49
"I've seen the reaction often enough in my family; the eye roll and stifled cough, the muttered aside as I show yet another gues the wonders of my well-lit and cleverly organized bean closet. As my daughter Evangeline put it one night, a bit melodramatically, when I served beans for the third time in a week, "Lord, why couldn't it have been bacon or chocolate?"" p.56-7
"The best stapled make a virtue of blandess... They make your senses reach out to them." p.65
"...for licorice purists [it] is akin to stuffing a loaf of Wonder Bread into a poster tube and calling what comes out the other end a baguette." p.76
"It was a Tervapiru ("Tar Devil"), and it did indeed smell like a black-market cigarette with the filter torn off." p.80
"When I hear about millions of people losing access to food stamps and children no longer able to eat those free lunches I had the luxury of hating; when I see a young man, not unlike all the young men I knew, getting shot in the street, or when there's talk of a wall being built, or when my media stream fills with the sound of children crying out for their parents, that distinct wail that only a broken-hearted child can make... it's then that I reach for the food of my youth." p.95
"Overhead, the sky goes dense and dimensional with stars..." p.196
"What took two entrepeneurs twenty years to build could be gone in a fraction of that time, together with things that took nature 20,000 centuries." p.207
"One of the most beautiful things about being in Grand Staircase is that out in the deep middle of it, with all of prehistory underfoot and 12-billion-year-old starlight overhead, the world feels enduring and eternal." p.208
"In pre-Renaissance Italy, this was mano in fica, or fig hand, both sweet and explicit, standing for the ripeness - and rudeness - of a cunt." p.231
"She had taken a new job, the kind that seems promising enough to move a person from the cooler (and for us happier) climatic conditions of Northern California to what struck me not as beautiful but rather interrogating sunshine. Each ray of light seemed to shout "why aren't you satisfied by your choices?"" p.241
"...I'm partial to Highway 99, the old road that brought the Okies and Mexicans to the fields and deposited a twang on my Armenian tongue." p.3
"Once he finished grabbing the flow of the five rivers that ran across the plain, he used his turbine pumps to seize the water beneath the ground. As he bled the aquifer dry, he called on the government to bring him an even mightier river from afar. Down the great aqueduct, by freight of politics and gravity, came the excess waters of the Sacramento River. The farmer moved the rain." p.4
"The wide-open middle of California did its lullaby on me again." p.6
"I love the congeniality of eggs, how quintessentially composed they are, the way they snuggle into the cupped hand." p.49
"I've seen the reaction often enough in my family; the eye roll and stifled cough, the muttered aside as I show yet another gues the wonders of my well-lit and cleverly organized bean closet. As my daughter Evangeline put it one night, a bit melodramatically, when I served beans for the third time in a week, "Lord, why couldn't it have been bacon or chocolate?"" p.56-7
"The best stapled make a virtue of blandess... They make your senses reach out to them." p.65
"...for licorice purists [it] is akin to stuffing a loaf of Wonder Bread into a poster tube and calling what comes out the other end a baguette." p.76
"It was a Tervapiru ("Tar Devil"), and it did indeed smell like a black-market cigarette with the filter torn off." p.80
"When I hear about millions of people losing access to food stamps and children no longer able to eat those free lunches I had the luxury of hating; when I see a young man, not unlike all the young men I knew, getting shot in the street, or when there's talk of a wall being built, or when my media stream fills with the sound of children crying out for their parents, that distinct wail that only a broken-hearted child can make... it's then that I reach for the food of my youth." p.95
"Overhead, the sky goes dense and dimensional with stars..." p.196
"What took two entrepeneurs twenty years to build could be gone in a fraction of that time, together with things that took nature 20,000 centuries." p.207
"One of the most beautiful things about being in Grand Staircase is that out in the deep middle of it, with all of prehistory underfoot and 12-billion-year-old starlight overhead, the world feels enduring and eternal." p.208
"In pre-Renaissance Italy, this was mano in fica, or fig hand, both sweet and explicit, standing for the ripeness - and rudeness - of a cunt." p.231
"She had taken a new job, the kind that seems promising enough to move a person from the cooler (and for us happier) climatic conditions of Northern California to what struck me not as beautiful but rather interrogating sunshine. Each ray of light seemed to shout "why aren't you satisfied by your choices?"" p.241
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