Synopsis:
A hilarious series of culinary adventures from GQ's award-winning food critic, ranging from flunking out of the Paul Bocuse school in Lyon to dining and whining with Sharon Stone.
Alan Richman has dined in more unlikely locations and devoured more tasting menus than any other restaurant critic alive. He has reviewed restaurants in almost every Communist country (China, Vietnam, Cuba, East Germany) and has recklessly indulged his enduring passion for eight-course dinners (plus cheese). All of this attests to his herculean constitution, and to his dedication to food writing.
In Fork It Over, the eight-time winner of the James Beard Award retraces decades of culinary adventuring. In one episode, he reviews a Chicago restaurant owned and operated by Louis Farrakhan (not known to be a fan of Jewish restaurant critics) and completes the assignment by sneaking into services at the Nation of Islam mosque, where no whites are allowed. In Cuba, he defies government regulations by interviewing starving political dissidents, and then he rewards himself with a lobster lunch at the most expensive restaurant in Havana. He chiffonades his way to a failing grade at the Paul Bocuse school in Lyon, politely endures Sharon Stone's notions of fine dining, and explains why you can't get a good meal in Boston, spurred on by the reckless passion for food that made him "the only soldier he knows who gained weight while in Vietnam" and carried him from his neighborhood burger joint to Le Bernardin.
Alan Richman, once described as the "Indiana Jones of food writers," has won more major awards than any other food writer alive, including a National Magazine Award, eight James Beard Awards for restaurant reviewing, and two James Beard M.F.K. Fisher distinguished writing awards.
The all new cover will emphasize Richman's globetrotting persona and attract a wide audience
Review:
It seems like Alan Richman has been writing about food--certainly in GQ--like, forever. Turns out he made the switch from sports writing to food, primarily restaurant reviews, a mere 14 years ago. Fork It Over is his first collection of essays published in those years. He has a charming, easy voice; self-deprecating humor; well-honed wit; and a defined sense of what he does and does not like--about food, restaurants, cities, hotel rooms, waiters, and just about everything else. You are a passenger along for the ride, a willing listener of road stories. The car is decidedly American, the upholstery fine leather.
The collection is laid out like a classic menu of French parentage. In Amuse-Bouche, we are treated to "The Eating Life," an essay written for the book that establishes the writer-critic credentials and ground rules. His mother was a terrific cook; the author can't boil water, nor sees any need to. He's a regular guy from a regular background who can wax as poetic about Philly cheese steak as he can the most delectable and exotic of delicacies. From that point on--through Appetizers, Entrees, Sides, Cheese, Wine, and Gratuity--the reader is escorted from one side of the world to the other, to high-end restaurants and low-end dives. As the fellow traveler, the reader is never allowed to wander off from Richman's voice and perspective. He is, in fact, the axis mundi around which each and every essay revolves. Which is to say, Fork It Over is much more a book about Alan Richman than it is about food.
The essays that comprise Fork It Over appeared in major monthly magazines, one at a time. To read this body of work cover to cover is to run the risk of losing one's appetite in the middle of the meal. It's rich stuff. Delectable. Charming. And a little bit goes a long way. --Schuyler Ingle
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
