As Gourmet magazine celebrates its sixtieth anniversary, Modern Library Food series editor and bestselling author Ruth Reichl has compiled an enchanting compendium of food and travel essays from the magazine’s extensive archives. Spanning time and place, the writers showcased in Endless Feasts share their memories of exquisite meals and experiences in far-flung locales. Featured are essays such as M.F.K. Fisher’s marvelous “Three Swiss Inns,” about three exceptional restaurants she encountered while traveling through Switzerland. In the most out-of-the-way gasthaus, she finds trout swimming in a seemingly decorative tank, but in the flash of an eye the fish are scooped up in a net and carted off to the kitchen, to appear minutes later cooked to such delicate lightness and tender perfection that one could never hope to duplicate it. Ruth Harkness’s “In a Tibetan Lamasery” is the story of her travels as a single woman exploring Tibet during the Second World War. She describes her crumbling accommodations, the unusual animals caught by hunters, and the estimated ten thousand dollars’ worth of rare pheasants she ate during one winter. Complete with a new Introduction by Reichl and a sampling of original recipes, this savory collection contains essays by Anita Loos, James Beard, Madhur Jaffrey, Robert P. Coffin, Laurie Colwin, and many others. Sure to become a classic, Endless Feasts is comprised of beautifully rendered stories and descriptions of wonderful food in the most interesting and unlikely places. Contributors to Endless Feasts include: James Beard / Cooking with James Beard: Pasta Ray Bradbury / Dandelion Wine Robert P. Coffin / Night of Lobster Laurie Colwin / A Harried Cook’s Guide to Some Fast Food Pat Conroy / The Romance of Umbria Elizabeth David / Edouard de Pomiane M.F.K. Fisher / Three Swiss Inns Ruth Harkness / In a Tibetan Lamasery Madhur Jaffrey / An Indian Reminiscence Anita Loos / Cocktail Parties of the Twenties George Plimpton / I, Bon Vivant, Who, Me? E. Annie Proulx / The Garlic War Claudia Roden / The Arabian Picnic Jane and Michael Stern / Two for the Road: Havana, North Dakota Paul Theroux / All Aboard! Crossing the Rockies in Style Endless Feasts: Sixty Years of Writing from Gourmet, part of the Modern Library Food series, is a fascinating compendium of Gourmet magazine food and travel pieces spanning six decades--a collection that mirrors our dining habits over the years but is timeless in its underlying theme: we are what we eat. The assembled cast is tops: James Beard on pasta; Elizabeth David lauding epicure Edouard de Pomaine; M.F.K. Fisher on her favorite Swiss inns; Paul Theroux writing about crossing the Rockies; Anita Loos evoking cocktail parties of the 1920s. Compiled by Gourmet editor-in-chief (and series editor) Ruth Reichl, and with recipes from the contributors' pieces--including hobotee, North Carolina's famed meat custard, and Katherine Hepburn's brownies--the book will delight armchair and meal-chasing foodies alike. Most readers will discover new voices among the more familiar. Present, as noted, is M.F.K. Fisher, offering one of her most splendid sun-and-shadow portraits, but there's also the underread (and magnificently dry) Ruth Harkness providing glimpses of a World War II winter spent in a crumbling Tibetan Lamasery, where she devoured $10,000 worth of rare pheasants; the drolly avuncular Joseph Wechsburg on Austria's legendary patisserie, Demel's ("the loudest sound you hear there is the breaking of crisp strudel dough"); crusty Maine poet Robert P. Coffin on Down East breakfasts and lobstering ("a night like a night of marriage"); and the reportorial, unblinking Jay Jacobs on Beard himself ("the man remembers in minute detail every one of the eighty-seven-thousand-odd meals he has eaten since his birth"). The quality of the essays varies, of course, but the book overwhelmingly gladdens in its rich breadth of time and place and evocative storytelling. --Arthur Boehm Drawing from the archives of Gourmet magazine, editor in chief Reichl (Comfort Me with Apples) has chosen a tempting collection of articles and essays that celebrate the pleasures of food and delights of travel. Contributors include some of the leading culinary writers of the 20th century such as M. F. K. Fisher and Elizabeth David, and the range of subjects explored is quite diverse, from a memorable look at Shanghai in the 1920s to the delights of regional cooking in various sections of America. A few profiles of selected culinary notables are mixed into the collections as are the occasional musings on a particular food. Any recipes included appear as they were originally written. From the graceful simplicity of Laurie Colwin's prose to Ruth Harkness's evocative descriptions of living and eating in a Tibetan lamasery, there is a remarkable bounty of riches awaiting readers in this soon-to-be classic collection of culinary writings. Highly recommended for all libraries, this is a b