Yet, of all dishes, one reigns supreme: arroz con leche, which is Spanish for rice pudding. This was the dish my mother made on chilly Autumn nights while the rain was beating against the roof. The one she sprinkled with nutmeg & cinnamon while the tea kettle was whistling; the one she ate with me while Auntie Mame was playing on the television. This is my comfort food.

For years I tried to create my mother’s arroz con leche in my own kitchen without success. Indeed my quest to reproduce it lasted so long that I could fill an entire post with tales about my various attempts. Some are horrifying, and involve the color black, a hue that definitely should not be associated with rice pudding. Others are amusing and make frequent use of the phrase “so I improvised and…”. Oy. What can I say? I was seventeen, away at college and incredibly homesick, but alas my frustrated attempts at making a simple pudding always ended with pulling a box of the packaged stuff out of the cabinet - aka, Plan B. The problem was that my mother always made arroz con leche from memory, using “what looks right” as her only guide. This is a culinary talent to be sure, but when you put instructions like “add about two handfuls of rice” into the hands of an inexperienced cook, well, you can imagine what emerges from the pot.

Then one afternoon I was browsing through the cooking section of my local library, when I saw a much-used cookbook called “Authentic Mexican: Regional Cooking from the Heart of Mexico.” I pulled the text and was lazily flipping through the pages when I saw it: a recipe for arroz con leche, complete with precise ingredient amounts and variations. (I now realize that I should have looked for a formal recipe before - I mean, duh, Ari - but as I’ve mentioned in earlier posts, I wasn’t much of a cook until recently.) By this time I was living in an apartment with a real stove and a working oven, so I checked the book out of the library, stashed it away in my backpack, and began my adventures with Mexican cooking. I made rice pudding that evening and the resulting dish was so close to my mother’s version that Rick Bayless quickly became my hero. And I don’t mean that in a red cape, blue tights wearing sort of way. I was cooking! And Mexican food no less! Just like Mom!

Since then I’ve enjoyed many a Mexican meal - from a hot bowl of earthy beans accompanied by deep-fried, cheese-filled masa turnovers, to pollo pibil, which is red-seasoned chicken steamed in banana leaves. Though my knowledge of cooking and baking has grown, I always find myself coming back to Bayless’ books. He’s a gifted chef and author, the sort of down-to-earth guy who wows you on Iron Chef one moment, then dances the evening away in the next. When I began my blog interview series I knew he was one of the authors I wanted to include, but I was so nervous that working up the chutzpah to ask him took a couple weeks. What if he said no? What if he was insulted by a mere blogger asking for an interview? After all, he is an award winning author with his own television series right? Oh god! Yet when I finally emailed Rick’s assistant, Jen, she got back to me within an hour, then surprised me with the news that Rick was happy to let me interview him. A few weeks later the appointed day arrived and I sat at my desk, staring at the phone.

This is it, I thought, as I licked my lips and eyed the bottle of Amaretto in the pantry. Picking up the receiver, I dialed Rick’s number and Jen answered with a friendly, “Hi! This is Jen.”

“Hi…is this Jen?” I responded, immediately scrunching my face is silent agony. Arrgh, why did I say that?? Of course it’s Jen, she just said so! But within moments Jen had patched me through to Rick, and soon we’d developed an easy rapport that turned into a forty-minute conversation about everything from his daughter, Lanie, to his favorite kind of music. He had such an easy-going, approachable way about him that soon we were in the midst of a lively conversation. He even took the time to tell me how to make a dish called “guajes con pato en chile verde” - guajes with duck in green chili - the recipe for which my Nana has been looking for since her mother died some twenty years ago. “My mother used to make it for my father,” she told me when she heard I would be talking to Bayless, “It was my father’s favorite dish. But she never wrote down the recipe so it was lost when she died.” Thanks to Rick, this is one dish that can be resurrected from my Nana’s childhood in 1920’s Mexico City.

And now without further ado, the interview:

Before writing your now classic cookbook “Authentic Mexican,” you and your wife, Deann, lived in Mexico for five years. What part of Mexico did you live in and what was the kitchen in your house like?
I lived in Mexico City most of the time and then in Oaxaca, and when I lived in Mexico City I didn’t actually have a kitchen because my goal was to eat out all the time. I wanted to learn about the kinds of food that people were making for themselves which is an important part of learning a regional cuisine. I think one of the biggest problems is when people don’t get the authentic taste in their head before making modifications, and you can’t do that by recipe - it simply won’t be the same as seeking out the person who grew up with the culinary tradition. So I spent a number of years just eating out all the time. I’m interested in culture as well as cuisine, so I would visit different places to see what people were eating around me. It’s the way that the dishes all come together on the table - during the day, and in a bigger sense, during the years - and also the way people eat the food. When they eat, what their portion sizes are - that sort of information tells you so much about a dish, and you can’t get that from a recipe. Eventually all of this knowledge became a part of my relationship with Mexican cooking.

What is your strongest food related childhood memory?
Peaches, definitely peaches. My grandmother canned peaches every year and the grandchildren all went with her. We would pick the peaches then come back for several days of canning with her. As one of the younger kids I was usually the one who took bruised peaches and made them into peach butter or jam. The older kids could peel the peaches beautifully so that they could be canned. We’d even make pickled peaches and then all through the year the big family dessert was peach cobbler. So we could come back and experience the peaches again in December. When you tasted it you remembered how much fun you had and the whole rawkus of activity when everyone was dealing with those bushels and bushels of peaches. It was the best thing in the world to me and I still have incredibly fond memories of peach desserts.

You and your daughter Lanie co-authored a cookbook last year. Clearly she has inherited your passion for food - is there anything she makes better than you? What does she make most often?
The first dish she ever made was oatmeal in the microwave when she was 3 years old. She liked doing that for a while. The first dish that I really taught her to make, oddly enough, was chocolate souffle. Kids love the physicality of cooking and certainly they love making sweets and desserts and stuff. So I thought, well, you can make a really simple chocolate souffle where you just melt chocolate, add some cream to that, mix in egg yolks, and then fold beaten egg whites into the base, then you’re done. It’s like four ingredients and it’s really, really simple. You can melt all the chocolate in the microwave so the kids don’t have to work with fire, so, that’s what I taught her to make. It was something that was super dramatic and we would take turns beating the egg whites by hand because you know, it was something to do because kids are so full of energy. She’d beat the egg whites for a while and then pass the bowl to me and I’d beat them for a while. I taught her how to fold them in, and then we’d bake them in little tiny ramekins. She loved the way they would puff all up and actually, I think chocolate souffle is a great thing to teach kids.

Nowadays she’s really into baking, in fact, she’s finished her sophomore year of High School and is working at a pastry station right now. She really loves making pastries and her specialty is profiteroles. She makes the cream puffs, the chocolate sauce, and then we usually put some vanilla ice cream in it. When we have friends and family over she’s always making those and she does an absolutely fabulous job.

And she must get such satisfaction out of that, to make something and then see the smiles on people’s faces as they enjoy it.
Completely, completely. In fact I think she actually said those words in the introduction to the book that we wrote together.

Your have a restaurant called Topolobampo and I’m curious, did you name it after the city in Sinaloa?
[Laughs] Yes.

Why did you name your restaurant after that city in particular?
Oh gosh, because I’m dorky. Topolobampo is an interesting place. I’m not a huge outdoors man but I drove the full 4,000 miles down the peninsula of Baja, and there aren’t very many people there so you just drive for hours and hours and hours. We camped along the way and when we got to La Paz we decided to take the car ferry across, which lands in Topolobampo - and I thought, ah, thank God - it was such a relief to get back to mainland Mexico. The interesting thing about Topolobampo is that back in the late 1800’s many people had pinned their hopes on it. For instance, an American guy had set up an utopian colony there; another person was convinced that Topolobampo was the next Acapulco, and they were going to send goods from the central USA by rail from Kansas down through the Copper Canyon to Topolobampo, and all the big cargo ships were going to go from there to Asia. Well, this never happened - they built the railroad - and this railroad is still used to go through the Copper Canyon- but it never developed into that major trade route that so many people had hoped for. Anyways, so a lot of people had pinned their hopes on Topolobampo so I thought why not me too?

Do you listen to music while you are writing? What is your favorite kind of music?
If you were to classify my favorite kind of music I would have to say World Music, because I love music from practically everywhere. And I listen to it all the time, I’m an iPod aficionado so I love to create play lists of things that mix up all the wonderful stuff in the world. But when I’m writing I usually listen to one CD over and over and over, all the way through the writing of the whole book.

So the last book you wrote, what were you listening to the whole time?
I was listening to the Buena Vista Social Club Presents Ibrahim Ferrer album. It’s great. For me, the reason I listen to one thing when I’m writing a book is because - just like smell brings you back to a certain place - I know exactly what the next song is, what the pace of it is, and so on, so the one CD immediately puts me back in the groove from where I left off between writing sessions.

You created the Frontera Farmer Foundation to help support small farms in the Midwest. Why is this cause so important to you and what would you like people to know about it? What can the average person do to support organic farming?
Farms help to create communities because they put us in touch with where our food comes from, and when we know this we realize its a natural product that is connected to weather, soil and our environment in general. We have become so disconnected from our food supply in this country that I’ve heard people say things like “Well, if we screw up the soil around here we’ll just get our food from someplace else.” And when people think food is too expensive they say things like, “Why don’t we have the people in Mexico grow it for us? Or bring it from China, I don’t care. I want all my food and I want it right now, I don’t care where it comes from.” This perspective is pretty common in the US, but I think it’s the most dangerous view someone can have. It’s incredibly narcissistic too because it doesn’t preserve anything for future generations.

But when someone is connected with the local food supply, they start to ask very different questions, to demand different things from their food and become willing to work with the natural world. One of the reasons that I think our restaurants are so successful, is that we work with local farmers. A farmer comes in and tells me, “Hey, my such-and-such crop failed but I’ve got too much of this other stuff.” And because we’re partners with those farmers - and I don’t mean in the business sense, we have a direct relationship with them and consider them our partners in producing quality food - we’ll figure out what we can do with whatever produce the farmer has available. Sometimes this means we’ll have five dishes with spinach, it also forces us to be incredibly creative with our food. We have to figure out how to feature spinach on five dishes while making each one unique, making soups, and sauces, then putting it on another plate cooked slowly with garlic. There are so many wonderful things you can do with spinach, but most cooks would just say, “No I have my special recipe for this kind of spinach dish so I can only put it on one plate.”

Being partners with the farmers who grow our food also introduces us to new things and teaches us about taking care of the earth. People put a couple tomato plants in their backyard and go “Wow! That’s all you get off those plants? Do the farmers have to deal with this?” And the answer is yes, they do. Once you begin a dialogue with farmers and, by extension, with the food you eat, you start to experience a different sort of respect for the earth. Living healthfully and responsibly is all about understanding and being partners with your environment.

You can visit Rick online at www.rickbayless.com.

I like to eat rice pudding with a caramelized banana cooked in butter and brown sugar, then lightly sprinkled with granulated white sugar.

Arroz con Leche
Reprinted with permission from “Authentic Mexican” by Rick Bayless
Although I also love cold rice pudding, Bayless recommends thinning leftovers with milk and warming the pudding for a delicious breakfast. I have to agree, a cinnamony pudding like this is great way to start the morning. Three variations are included below, two from Bayless and one from me.

Ingredients:

• 1 two inch long cinnamon stick
• A two inch strip of lime zest, colored rind only, 3/4 inches wide. (I usually skip this).
• 1 cup rice
• 1 quart (4 cups) of milk
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 4 large egg yolks
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup raisins
• 1 tablespoon unsalted butter, cut into bits.
• Ground cinnamon, for garnish

Step 1: The rice. Bring 2 cups of water to a boil in a medium size saucepan, add the cinnamon stick and lime zest, then cover and simmer over medium heat for 5 minutes. Pour in the rice, let the mixture return to a boil, stir once, then cover and cook over medium-low heat for 20 minutes, until all the liquid is absorbed and the rice is tender.

Step 2: The pudding. Stir in the milk, sugar and salt, and simmer over medium to medium-low heat, stirring frequently, until the liquid shows the first signs of thickening, 20 to 25 minutes. Take from the heat and remove the cinnamon stick and zest. In a small bowl beat the egg yolks until runny, stir in the vanilla and a few tablespoons of the hot rice, then spoon the yolk concoction back into the rice mixture. Mix in half the raisins, then spoon the rice pudding into a decorative 8-inch-square baking dish.

Step 3: Browning and finishing the pudding. Preheat the broiler and dot the rice pudding with the butter. Set the dish under the heat long enough to brown the top, 3 to 4 minutes. Sprinkle with the remaining raisins and the ground cinnamon, and serve warm or at room temperature.

* Technique notes: In Step 2, the mixture should be simmered only until the milk takes on a slight creaminess (it will still look soupy). Overcooking will give you something dense and unapproachable. Should the latter be your fate, stir in a few tablespoons of milk just as you’re about to serve, dot with butter and brown again.

Variations:

Coconut-Rice Pudding (Rick Bayless)
Prepare the rice as directed in Step 1. Hull, peel and grate a fresh coconut, reserving the coconut liquid. Add enough milk to the coconut liquid to bring the volume to 1 quart. Complete steps 2 and 3, using the milk-coconut mixture where milk is called for and stirring half the grated coconut into the rice pudding when you add the yolks. (Raisins can be omitted if you wish). Sprinkle a little coconut over the pudding before browning.

Cinnamon Rice Pudding with Caramelized Bananas (Baking and Books)
Prepare the pudding as directed in the original recipe above, omitting the raisins. Slice off the ends of an unpeeled, ripe banana, then slice it vertically down the middle so that you have two long halves. Carefully remove the peel, taking care not to break the pieces. Sprinkle both sides of each slice with dark brown sugar (about 1/4 to 1/2 tsp of sugar in total).

In a skillet melt 1 tablespoon of butter over medium-high heat, until foamy. Saute the banana slices, cut sides down, for one minute, shaking the pan occasionally to make sure the slices don’t stick. With two forks, gently flip the slices over and continue to saute for about 30 seconds longer, until the sugar melts and the banana has a light, golden brown color. As before, shake the skillet to prevent sticking.

Sprinkle the bananas with a pinch of granulated sugar and serve with warm rice pudding. Garnish the pudding with a pinch of ground cinnamon and freshly grated nutmeg.

Note: HarperCollins has donated 3 copies of “Authentic Mexican 20th Anniversary Ed: Regional Cooking from the Heart of Mexico” to the book raffle, along with several other books. Check it out!

Although I read a lot of books, as far as I can remember I’ve only read two memoirs: “Eat, Pray, Love” by Elizabeth Gilbert and “The Late Bloomer’s Revolution” by Amy Cohen. The first caught my eye because the title drew an implicit connection between food, spirituality and passion (and I am so down with that). The second came to my attention when a book publicist shot an email my way, which said, essentially, “I have a great book to share with you. It’s a memoir about a woman who lost her writing job, then her mother (to cancer), then her boyfriend (who was almost her fiancé), then her face (to a hideous rash).” Whoa, I thought. That sounds pretty heavy… not sure if I want to spend my leisure hours with a book like that. But then the publicist continued. “It’s filled with observations that are at times sweet, then bittersweet, and often laugh-out-loud funny,” and it was here that she caught my attention. How could a book about so many difficult experiences be funny? Do I even want a book about such serious topics to be amusing? I decided there was only one way to find out.

The first paragraph of Chapter 1 begins: “I grew up thinking my mother had the answer to everything. Watch any black-and-white film and she always knew some obscure fact about an actor with one line. ‘See the fishmonger behind the ox, the one who’s yelling, “Slay the hunchback!” she’d say. ‘His name was Skids Monroe. He came out of the Yiddish theater and was tragically maimed in a Ferris wheel accident.”‘ From a reader’s point of view, I like paragraphs like this because you start in one place (in front of a household television) and end up somewhere completely unexpected (the scene of a Ferris wheel ride gone awry). This particular example may be a touch morbid, but you have to admit, it’s also interesting. Thankfully, Amy’s mom knew others things as well, like words. “‘The term “steatopygous” means characterized by fat around the hips,’” Amy recalls her mother saying in paragraph two. “It was once considered not cellulite, but a highly desirable benchmark of fertility! Remember that the next time you say you look hideous in a bathing suit.”

“The Late Bloomer’s Revolution” is filled with chuckle-worthy moments like this, which makes it all the more heart wrenching when, for instance, Amy’s mother finally succumbs to her illness. I would lament the end of a relationship in one moment, then laugh at Cohen’s ability to bring humor to a bad situation in the next. For instance, one day she went to the dry cleaners only to have the service woman greet her with “Oh God! What that on your face? You burn in grease fire?” - which is how Amy discovered the onset of a serious rash that marred her face and kept her homebound for almost a year. Yet despite such upheavals Amy’s humor shines through, turning what could have been a “look at all the awful things that have happened to me” memoir into a poignant, thought-provoking account of one woman’s search for love in New York city.

Overall I was delighted with “The Late Bloomer’s Revolution,” so when Amy’s publicist suggested that I include Amy in my author interview series I was happy to comply. (Amy is actually making quite a few blog appearances this month, so I wouldn’t be surprised if her ‘blog tour’ pops up elsewhere while you’re surfing the internet.) To tie everything in to the food side of this blog I asked Amy about her favorite comfort food dishes, one of which was macaroni and cheese. Hence, the recipe featured in this post.

In your book you have a humorous take on everything that has happened to you. Is this how you have always dealt with difficult situations or did the humor develop in retrospect?
I think for years I didn’t think of myself as particularly funny, it was more of a survival mechanism I wasn’t actually aware of. I thought I was a little weird. At age eight, my favorite book was by the photographer, Diane Arbus. I was partial to her Transvestite Series in particular. And later I considered myself difficult, for things like bringing a ham and cheese sandwich to a Yom Kippur service, but never necessarily funny. My Mom was sick so often when I was growing up, I think I just always felt the need to lighten the atmosphere. But yes, I would say now humor is my way of dealing with difficult things. My whole family is like that.

What advice would you give women who want to be in a relationship but haven’t yet found a meaningful one?
Live your life and do not, under any circumstances, wait, because I really do think meeting someone – the right someone – is a matter of luck. Don’t listen to friends who say you want it too much or you don’t want it enough. Don’t let anyone convince you the reason you haven’t met the right one has anything to do with you.

Especially don’t let yourself wonder “What’s wrong with me?” (which I wondered for years) No one could have done more to meet someone than I did and I really do believe meeting the right one is all luck.

Travel to places you’ve always wanted to go and if you’re afraid to travel alone, go with groups or friends; enjoy going into a crowded movie alone and getting a great seat because there’s only one left; eat those weird dinners you can only have when you’re single – the kind where you can have dessert first and then have some tortilla chips and some chicken and then go back to the chocolate cake in the fridge.

I’m not saying it’s not going to be hard. I know as well as anyone how painful it can be to go to wedding after wedding, and then the first birthday parties and feel like “Why isn’t it me?” But it will be even worse if you haven’t enjoyed your freedom, which has so many wonderful advantages that should be savored.

When you write, do you have a writing ritual? For instance, do you go to a particular place or listen to a certain kind of music?

Good question. I write in my apartment. I work in a small office that’s painted a shocking, hot pink. I can’t listen to music. I’m barely a single-tasker so I can’t multitask.

I need silence. And I typically work from 7 am to 2 pm. And every day is Shabbat – meaning I turn off the phone and don’t watch tv. But I do have lights. And my computer. And shrimp in the freezer (for when I make Fra Diavolo with linguine). Okay, so it’s my version of Shabbat.

What is your all-time favorite book?

Tough. Oooooh. I know it’s unfair of me to choose more than one, but the all time favorite shifts occasionally as years pass. At different times of my life it’s been each of these books: Eleven Kinds of Loneliness (Richard Yates); Nine Stories (J.D Salinger); Lolita (Nabokov); The Collected Stories of John Cheever; Naked by David Sedaris.

If you could invite any living person to dinner, who would you invite and what would you serve?

I’d love to have Elizabeth Edwards. She and my sister were diagnosed with breast cancer the same day and I’d like to have a little celebratory dinner for the three of us and the many other breast cancer survivors we’ve gotten to know in the last few years.

Since it would be a celebration, I’d go all out.

I would start with a baked artichoke dip, served alongside a bowl of sweet and spicy cashews; a Caesar salad with homemade dressing, croutons and pancetta; sweet sausage and spinach lasagna; garlic bread with basil; and for dessert, an Apple Cake. And I’d serve Prosecco, too, because I love it and when I was at Graceland I got some Elvis champagne flutes.

To you, comfort food means…
Fried Chicken – we had this every Friday night growing up. I sat so close the TV, my eyeballs got tan and ate fried chicken.

Tuna Casserole (not because I like it, but I love seeing and thinking about tuna casseroles, because it was the one dish my mother made – literally THE ONE – she made it with sweet, Italian sausages and Campbells Cream of Mushroom soup — and it always reminds me of her.)

Macaroni and Cheese – elbow, noodle, American cheese, Fontina and Parmesan. Any take on this yummy classic.

Amy Cohen lives and writes in New York City. You can visit her online at www.byamycohen.com and, if you live in the NYC Metro area, you can meet her this Tuesday, July 10th, at 7pm. Location: Barnes & Noble 675 6th Ave. (21street).

Macaroni & Cheese (My Recipe)

• 1 lb short pasta (cavatappi, rotini, macaroni, whatever you like best. I used whole wheat pasta in the Mac N’Cheese pictured above)
• 5 tablespoons of butter
• 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 4 cups milk
• 1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1/8 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg (you can use dry ground nutmeg too, but fresh is better)
• 3 cups of cheese (You can use whatever combination of cheeses you like so long as the cheese melts well. In the photo above I used 1 1/2 cups of sharp cheddar and 1 1/2 cups of Monterrey Jack. Other good options include: Parmesean, mozzarella, Muenster, Swiss, Gruyere and Pecorino Romano. You can add up to 1 additional cup of cheese if you like for a total of 4 cups of cheese.)
• 1 1/2 cups coarse breadcrumbs
• Kosher salt

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees F.

Bring a large pot of salted water to boil and cook the pasta 1 to 2 minutes less than the package instructions indicate. Lightly butter a large casserole dish and add the drained pasta. Set aside.

Heat 4 tablespoons of butter in a medium saucepan over medium-high heat. Add the flour and cook, whisking constantly, for about 1 minute. Add the milk, nutmeg, cayenne, and 2 teaspoons of kosher salt. Bring to a simmer, whisking continuously, and continue to cook until the sauce is thick enough to lightly coat the back of a wooden spoon. Add the cheese, 1 cup at a time, whisking between additions. Continue to stir until all the cheese has melted and the sauce is smooth.

Pour the cheese sauce over the pasta (which should be in the baking dish), mix well to coat.

Melt 1 tablespoon of butter. Put the breadcrumbs in a small dish then add the melted butter, mix well. Sprinkle this mixture over the pasta. Cover with aluminum foil and bake for 30 to 35 minutes. For a golden color you can remove the foil near the end of the baking time and cook the mac n’cheese uncovered for 5 minutes.

Two More Reviews:
Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant
I love reading essays about food, especially when they are authored by talented writers like Laurie Colwin, M.F.K. Fisher, Ann Patchett and Nora Ephron. So when I opened this book and discovered that the first chapter was a story by Laurie Colwin my curiosity was immediately piqued. “For eight years I lived in a one bedroom apartment a little larger than the Columbia Encyclopedia,” Colwin begins, “… I had enough space for a twin-sized bed, a very small night table, and a desk… Instead of a kitchen, this minute apartment featured a metal counter… on top of which was what I called the stove but which was only two electric burners - in short, a hot plate.” With the scene set Colwin then proceeds to share with her readers some of the meals she cooked for herself, and others, in her tiny abode. One of her favorite things to cook when dining alone was eggplant, and hence it is from this portion of the story that Colwin’s essay, and this book, get their title: “Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant.”

Indeed, eating alone, whether at a restaurant or at home, is the theme of this book, in which the author attempts to answer the question: how do we feed ourselves when we’re alone, when there are no one else’s needs to take into consideration? Each writer interprets this question in their own way, with some lauding the versatility of beans and others reminiscing about spaghetti. Amanda Hesser shares her thoughts on “single cuisine,” by which she means the simple, yet satisfying, meals she and her friends enjoy during their solitary nights at home: truffled egg toast, single girl salmon, and an enticing pasta dish made with garlic, olive oil, fried eggs, pepper and freshly grated cheese. This latter dish belongs to Hesser’s sister who, once all her ingredients are assembled, tosses them with pasta water, causing the egg yolks to crack open in the process. The yolks then dress the strands of pasta turning an ordinary dish into “a rustic, simple carbonara, minus the bacon.” Delicious descriptions like this made my mouth water and in an act of profound thoughtfulness many essays are accompanied by recipes. In the end I couldn’t help but devour this book.

A Slice of Organic Life
“A Slice of Organic Life” introduces readers to the various ways they can incorporate organic living into their routines, regardless of where they live or how much time they have on their hands. Chapter one, titled “No Need for a Yard,” has a variety of easy tips that can be adopted by someone living in a small apartment, from shopping ethically and growing strawberries in a hanging basket, to growing herbs indoors and then drying those herbs for storage. Each topic is 2 to 4 pages long and gives the reader a brief, yet helpful, introduction to the subject. Recipes are included where appropriate, for instance, in the section about how to make & freeze baby foods, where the authors share recipes for baby meals like herb mash, carrot soup, and fruit smoothies. The second chapter of this book is meant, as the title indicates, for people who live in an apartment or house with a “Roof terrace, Patio, or Tiny Yard.” Here how-to topics include growing an apple tree in a pot, gardening without pesticides and collecting rainwater to water your plants. The third chapter, titled “Yard, Community Garden, or Field,” takes organic living to its utmost manifestation and includes sections such as how to preserve fruit, create a wildlife pond, make apple juice, milk a cow and make freshly churned butter. Every page includes eye-catching color photographs and much food for thought. Indeed, if I had a large yard the section on keeping chickens would have left me seriously considering building a coop.

In general the chapters in this book are well-conceived and enjoyable, but on a couple occasions the authors took their enthusiasm for organic living a bit too far. For instance, on page 102 they counsel readers to forage for mushrooms in the wild, which is dangerous advice if only because several lethal mushrooms resemble their edible cousins. Though the authors share photos of four poisonous mushrooms and council newbie foragers to tag along with experienced foragers in the beginning, only an expert should attempt to gather mushrooms for consumption. Every year approximately 9,000 people in the US accidentally poison themselves with mushrooms, and though one could easily talk around this point by noting how a majority of the people poisoned are curious children with an appetite for fungi, in my book it counts for something that even food expert Alton Brown has said he wouldn’t presume to pick mushrooms in the wild. Nevertheless, on the whole, this book is an excellent introduction to organic living, giving readers the opportunity to thumb through a user-friendly manual on how to make their lives more environmentally friendly without abandoning metropolitan life or giving up creature comforts. “A Slice of Organic Life” will make you rethink how you approach even the most mundane aspects of your life.