non-fiction food?

I just finished Julie & Julia My Year of Cooking Dangerously by Julie Powell. It is her hilarious story of cooking 524 recipes from Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Child in one year. She blogged about the experience while doing it, back in 2003 I think (http://blogs.salon.com/0001399/2002/08/25.html).
I really enjoyed the book. My husband kept asking "what"? as I laughed aloud while reading it. She explains many of the recipes and because of that I won't be making any of them soon!!

I loved that book soooo much, I read it just when I was about to turn 30 and I think I can blame it completely for my complete obsession with food. I've always liked cooking and eating, worked as a cook in a cafe but now this is something else I spend most my thinking what to cook for tea and most my money on cook books, though I agree that even though I had to buy Mastering the Art of French Cooking I wouldn't dare try any of recipes (espcially aspic!)

A good follow up to Julie & Julia is Julia Child's autobiography My Life in France.

I really did not like that book, and didn't find it funny at all.

One thing that I have always admired about Julia Child, a lesson I learned from her, is that food and cooking should be fun. But Powell took on a project that wore her out, required her to do things when she had neither the time nor desire to do them, interfered with her social and family life, and seemed generally to have made her miserable.

I kept wanting to slap Julie and say, "Look, if you hate this project so much, just STOP!"

It really wasn't enjoyable reading about Julie's self-imposed misery.

I'd rather just sit down and read Mastering the Art!

I have to admit that before I read the book I had no idea who Julia Child, don't know if this is true for everyone in Britiain or I just missed her somehow, but just reading the Guardian there's an article about how cookery shows now a days put the pressure on to cook complicated fancy dishes: http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2009/apr/12/tv-cookery-shows-...

I think I liked Julie's self imposed misery cause I've been there myself cooking ridiculous things at ridiculous times at night for no apparent reason.

Just finished another great non-fiction/cookbook by Guilia Melucci called I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti. Laugh out loud funny in parts, want to shake the author in parts and some delicious sounding recipes. She is an Italian girl with horrible taste in men. The story recounts each relationship and the food she cooked during that time. Her recipes are stuff I cook all the time, lots of pasta and sound great. Would highly recommend this book.