Books & Cookbooks

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As those of you who subscribe to the C&Z newsletter already know, my upcoming cookbook is now available for pre-order on Amazon (and on Amazon.fr, too).

It feels quite peculiar to see it there, as does each step that leads to the book’s release* and makes it more real: I have seen the production schedule, I have gone over the first-pass pages laid out as the final book will be, I will soon receive blads and galleys, and meanwhile I dream about the book one way or another almost every night. Sometimes I dream I am leafing through it and feeling pretty pleased, sometimes I dream I am leafing through it and finding horrifying goof-ups, and just last night I dreamt I was suddenly realizing that the book was 100% British recipes — don’t ask.

If you’d like to read more about the bookwriting process, check these past entries:
– Part I: The Book Deal
– Part II: The Recipes
– Part III: Recipe Testing
– Part IV: Food Photography
– Part V: Done!
– Part VI: What Happens Next?

* The book is scheduled for publication on May 15, 2007 both in North America and the UK.

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As a side note, yesterday’s New York Times T:Style Magazine included an article (free registration required) I wrote on Guy Savoy and two potato recipes — one for his purée de pommes de terre à la truffe and one for his pommes dauphines. It was great speaking with Mr. Savoy and having the recipes demonstrated to me in the rue Troyon kitchen as I took frantic notes in my faithful Moleskine, and I hope you’ll enjoy the piece.

However much I love the Paris métro — it might surprise you to learn that actually like its smell, a special mix of metal, dust, and rubber — walking remains my favorite means of transportation around the city. It gives me the opportunity to stretch my legs, traverse favorite or unfamiliar neighborhoods, indulge in a little people-watching, and get slightly lost from time to time, which often leads to interesting discoveries.

I usually like to be alone with my thoughts, but when I wish to be entertained as I walk, I take full advantage of the technological wonders of our times and listen to podcasts on my mp3 player. And since I figured I probably wasn’t the only one to do so, I thought I would share a few favorites. (If you would like to reciprocate and share yours, the comments section is wide open!)

~ Good Food

This weekly show airs on KCRW, an NPR radio station in the Los Angeles area. It is hosted by the gracious Evan Kleiman, restaurant owner and founder of the LA Slow Food convivium, who interviews authors, food experts, and critics. It is a lively and varied show that includes local tidbits (restaurant reviews and such) but has a broad enough scope otherwise to be of interest to listeners outside Southern California.

~ Eat Feed

This one is a “pure” podcast in the sense that it was created directly for the web, and isn’t aired on any other medium. Each show is organized around one of four formats (the seasonal, the new and noteworthy, the history of food, and the vocabulary of gastronomy) and the overall approach manages to be both scholarly and engaging — a difficult balance to strike. (Note: Amy, Aun, and I were guests on their most recent show, October Rumblings, and this is how the idea for this post came about.)

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Last time I mentioned my book was two months ago, when I wrote to say I had completed and delivered the manuscript. But what happens once the bird leaves the nest? The process is no doubt different from one publisher to the next and from one book to the next, but what I can offer is a glimpse into what the past few weeks have held for me.

First of all, a bit of waiting for the editor to share an overall impression. In my case, the wait was short, and the overall impression — deep sigh of relief — positive. A couple of weeks later, I received a printed version of the manuscript with my editor’s notes and corrections. I wasn’t too worried about grammar or spelling mistakes, having submitted it to three different and equally trusted readers, but there were a few things here and there. There were suggestions of cuts, too, since the manuscript was running quite long. Total word count isn’t very relevant for a cookbook — the lists of ingredients throw it off — and I knew what the target page count was, but this differs from the word processor page count, when you factor in the final layout of the book and the photography, boxed paragraphs, chapter headers, etc.

Cuts are painful, and I don’t mean just the paper cuts that you get on your fingers from handling the printed manuscript, although these are worth mentioning too. I was just reading Stephen King’s excellent memoir/essay On Writing, and he introduced me to the famous “Kill your darlings” advice. Whoever wrote it first (the quote is variously attributed to Faulkner, Hemingway, and Quiller-Couch) certainly hit the nail on the head, and it does make it a little easier to handle the word processor chainsaw if you can imagine yourself as a character in a horror flick. Or, for those really hard-to-kill darlings, if you think of it not so much as murdering them, but as wrapping them up in tissue paper and storing them in a wooden chest for future use.

But pruning and streamlining are very good things for any piece of writing, and although I don’t think I would have much enjoyed his company at a dinner party, William Strunk Jr. also comes to the rescue with his “Omit needless words” advice — as you can see, I’ve been reading my share of books on the writer’s craft.

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I am very pleased to announce that as of yesterday, 9:07 pm, the manuscript of my book has officially left my hands, landing just a few seconds later on my editor’s desk, 3,635 miles away. The moment I hit “send”, my heart thumping audibly, I drew a deep breath, climbed down from the bar stool on which I was sitting, and walked to the fridge to retrieve the bottle of pink champagne that had been chilled for the occasion. A pop, a toast, a sip, a kiss — I believe there may have been a few giggles on my part, too, and perhaps a little happy dance.

Once enough champagne had been consumed to duly mark the event and the hunger pangs became more and more difficult to ignore, we walked out into the pouring rain to have dinner at Casa Olympe, which, in passing, I warmly recommend. What better way to celebrate than with a scampi broth followed by crispy veal sweetbreads, especially when Jean-Paul Gaultier happens to be sitting across the tiny room from you?

Of course, I am now anxiously awaiting the comments and edits on the manuscript, but today is a beautiful day, I feel like I’m on vacation, and I intend to spend the afternoon — the next week even — basking in the sunlight of the terrace across the street.

And for those of you who may be wondering, the book is scheduled for US publication on May 1, 2007.

(Casa Olympe – 48 rue Saint-Georges – 75009 Paris – 01 42 85 26 01)