French Provincial Cooking Read Online Free Page A

upright banana (or other less innocent object). Imbedded in this structure were cubes of banana, peeled white grapes, and diced marshmallows, the whole garnished by canned whipped cream generously squirted in mounds about its base. Proudly presented by our hostess, it was heartily applauded and gobbled up with enthusiasm.
    No. We were not yet ready for Elizabeth David. But the English were. Only a hop, skip, and ferry ride from France, and starved for good food after the lean war years, the English welcomed Elizabeth David, with her wonderfully readable and sensuous descriptions of good things to eat—olives and garlic and sausages, rare cheeses, truffled terrines and pâtés, long-simmered wine-steeped beef stews, and herb-drenched soups. The English took to her at once; she was adored and immensely appreciated from her first book on.
    Now, with full and fast access to the rest of the world by air, we in America have enjoyed a number of awakenings. Our first was certainly sparked in the sixties by the Kennedys in the White House, with their glorious French food. Suddenly, as never before, food was news! More news followed in a decade or so with the decorative minimalism of nouvelle cuisine, followed by the diet version and then a downright fear of food coupled with an overdose of nutritional discipline. At last we seem to be emerging into an era of food that tastes and looks like real food. Eggs are no longer forbidden, nor is a little butter; steak houses are flourishing. This is the time for those who knew the books of Elizabeth David to revel in them again. You will be surprised and delighted to find them so contemporary and so fresh. And if you don’t know her yet, you will have a new world to discover, and your food will never be quite the same again.
    Born in 1913 and raised in comfortable upper-class British circumstances, Elizabeth David was privately educated in London until she was sixteen. She then spent a year and a half at the Sorbonne, in Paris, where she lived with a French family and was thoroughly inducted into the pleasures of the French table. Next, being of an adventurous spirit, Elizabeth (a real beauty and budding sophisticate) spent time in Munich, dabbled in the theater in London, worked in Cairo, and visited Greece, Crete, and Alexandria. Much of her knowledge and love of good food came from her friendship with the international bon vivant and writer Norman Douglas, whom she met during her Mediterranean travels. Although several decades older than she, he became young Elizabeth’s most influential companion and mentor during those exploratory years abroad.
    After World War II Elizabeth David, then in her early thirties, returned from the sun and warmth of Greece and Cairo to chilly food-rationed England. She found living and eating so dismal in the hotel where she was staying, and English food so discouraging in general, that for her own comfort and amusement she began writing down memories of meals and recipes from her years abroad, particularly those from the warm and sunny Mediterranean. These notes and jottings became the basis for her first published work, The Book of Mediterranean Food , which appeared in 1950 with a jolly cover illustrating a small round dining table loaded with shellfish, salads, and the inevitable bottle of wine. The summery scene continued around on the back cover, showing a sandy beach and a colorful seaside village—a setting to dream about during long and dreary winters. A handful of rustic woodcuts were scattered throughout the text, making an appealing small book of not quite a hundred pages. It was an immediate success, and she followed it with another small book, French Country Cooking. Another resounding success, and she had found her niche at last. Wishing to enlarge it, she decided to take on Italy, where she had spent so many happy days with her fond mentor, Norman Douglas. After serious background study and much travel and tasting in Italy, her next book was