The Gospel of Food, by Barry Glassner

[MaxH]

Old delight at perusing (printed) newspapers has degenerated (sorry: "specialized") in my case to specific sections in them, which led to arranging to get (for instance) the single issue each week of dailies carrying food or wine sections. (One food editor marveled at this when I happened to mention it recently.) The following surfaced however in the book section of today's New York Times, March 11, 2007, which (you'll now understand why) I have no online link for.

Kim Severson reviewed Barry Glassner's new book The Gospel of Food. Glassner is a sociologist in Southern California. If nothing else, the following may evoke interest here: Severson reports Glassner skewering "an obnoxious subgroup of the culinary world he calls food adventurers, people who populate online communities dedicated to ethnic cuisine" and eager to try the latest ethic trend. Also, Glasser reports having some of his most memorable meals at "one of L. A's best-known restaurants" when accompanied by recognized food writers, but sub-par treatment in their absence. Severson says that he generalizes this into a rule, though my own experience differs. I've had some of the best meals of my life the last 30 years, in numerous regions, without benefit of celebrities or even knowing the restaurant.* Most of these, it's true, are less famous than top L.A. restaurants, but some are far more so. Glassner may be reading a lot into one restaurant. This is not just my guess: Severson describes "a loose observational approach based on what sometimes seem like personal hunches." (Thank goodness he's the only recent author doing that! :-) She says he jabs trade organizations for promoting news that, for instance, watermelons are found to have an important antioxidant -- what??! -- the quotation from the book comes across as contrived, witty only from a very narrow point of view. (What a target to choose, at a time when food advertising is full of boasts that foods are free of things no one ever associated with them -- what The Atlantic in a famous article once parodied as the low-cholesterol light bulb.)

But I haven't seen the book itself yet, I'd be interested in comments from anyone who has.

* I don't know if that counts as "food adventuring" because it entails going to the regions where the food is eaten, not local ethnic restaurants.

[Nathan]

apparently that's a rather narrow take on the book:

http://www.reason.com/news/show/119736.html