Book: Food Heroes

Food Heroes: 16 Culinary Artisans Preserving Tradition

by Georgia Pellegrini '03 | 240 pp. Abrams. $24.95.

A shoutout to '03, and an alumna some of you may know -- Georgia Pellegrini -- which profiles sixteen foodies around the world.

Here's an excerpt from her blog that describes the book:

The pace of rural life in the south of France was an exercise in extreme patience for someone who had the current of New York City coursing through her veins. I lived in a run-down house crowded with frogs and cobwebs set back into a deep field along the Rhône river. I slept under a tablecloth I took from the restaurant and woke to the sulfur smell of the marsh every morning, a particular Camargue charm that I never did get used to. My head spun with French words, the French language a thousand little dots in my head, which connected at random moments, while rolling out pasta dough or pulling heads off sardines.

As I worked in all of these restaurants I found that I was much more interested in the people who came to the kitchens to drop off their goods, than I was peeling and deseeding grapes with a paper clip. I often befriended these people and when I had a free day, would visit them at their olive oil vineyards, or in their farm that housed 160 varieties of figs, or in the woods where they foraged.

The blog also has a ton of recipes from her food travels and links to buy the book. Ale cuisine!

New Book by Ira Trivedi '06

One of our 2006 classmates, Ira Trivedi, is celebrating the release of her second novel, The Great Indian Love Story. A short blurb from the publisher, Penguin Books India:

The Great Indian Love Story is set in a world where appearances mean everything and nothing is as it seems. There’s no time for love in a world that revolves around the latest Ferraris, the hottest nightclubs, diamonds, single malts, cocaine and ecstasy. In this whirl of wild parties, sex and drugs we meet Serena Sharma who lives her life one debauched night at a time, always falling for the wrong men. Her life is a rollercoaster ride: her father’s death followed by her mother’s remarriage, a broken heart and a lost love. Adding to this is her torrid affair with Amar Khanna—a trophy husband, coke addict and serial adulterer. Riya, jaded by her unsuccessful attempt to find a job in America, returns to Delhi to find the city of her childhood changed beyond recognition. Striking an unlikely friendship with Serena, Riya finds her complacent torpor shattered. The Great Indian Love Story is also the story of Parmeet, Serena’s mother, who looks for passion outside her marriage with disastrous consequences, and S.P. Sharma, Parmeet’s husband, who is driven to violence by her infidelity. Ira Trivedi weaves together sex, revenge, glitz, friendship and a chilling murder to create a potent cocktail in this gripping novel on the perfidious nature of love and power.

Congratulations to Ira for publishing her 2nd novel!

If you've been published, let us know and we'll highlight it here on the class blog.

Read My Pins

As the resident librarian on our alumnae council, I thought it was natural to highlight a book for my first post on our blog.

As some of you might know, Madeleine Albright has written a new book, entitled Read My Pins. I heard a wonderful interview with her on NPR where she talks about the book and how she used her pins to communicate messages about her diplomatic efforts. You can listen to the interview and read an excerpt from the book here.

Unfortunately, I have not yet been able to get my hands on the book (ie, my library has not acquired it yet). If any of you have read it, please let me know what you think!