read 5/2024.

Fascinatingly delicious, surprisingly poignant. Recommend! ♥️ ( )

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, but there are a few nit-picky things that keeps me from going all the way up to 5 stars.

First, the narrative seemed a bit disjointed in places, particularly in the last third of the book. Certainly not disjointed enough to put down, but there is a definite feeling of maybe the author being rushed there at the end.

The other problem is that there sometimes seems to be a bit of inconsistency in who the audience is. There is lots of untranslated French, and, while I have always wanted to learn to speak and read French, I just haven't gotten around to learning much yet (oh, how I envy his wife's talent with languages...or maybe just her time and opportunity to learn them!). Also, in some places he tosses around highly technical French cooking vocabulary without explaining it while in other places he finds it necessary to define things like what a pizza peel is.

Besides those things, this is a very interesting read. He never presents Lyon as overly romantic, but he tells us all the things that made him love the place and the people he met there. He also made me want to try to find some of that amazing flour! I would bake a loaf of bread with it in tribute to Bob, the most interesting and heartbreaking person in the entire book! ( )

ספר על ליון, על צרפת ועל אוכל מסופר על ידי אמריקני. מהנה ומחכים באופן מפתיע, במיוחד עבורי שאני מכיר את שלושת הנושאים היטב. מגרעת יחידה, המספר לפעמים מעצבן ותמיד מאריך מדי, אבל ככה זה עם אמריקנים. ובכל זאת אקרא גם את הספר הראשון שלו שהוא על אוכל באיטליה. ( )

I bought this book for research purposes, and though it didn't provide new information in that regard, I found it to be an enjoyable, fascinating read on the modern food of Lyon as seen through the experiences of an experienced American chef. ( )