The Tortoise and the Hare Entry No. 14

My Life in France
By Julia Child with A. Prud’homme

I can’t say I enjoyed every minute of it. I honestly felt it was too bourgeoisie for me. I didn’t have the patience to run to Google to translate every French word on the page. I didn’t have a special affinity for France and its ways. How much more could its food taste divinely better? I did not know the expat life in France right after the war. In many ways, I felt removed from the life portrayed in the book.

What I did understand, though, sterlingly, through Julia’s life was passion undecorated, stamina, and grit.I saw passion for French gastronomy descend upon her unsuspectingly, with the first taste of sole meunière. It is fascinating that passion could just present itself to you one day, like a visitor, with you being blissfully unaware of it before, and proceed to consume the whole of you.

As a foreigner in France, Julia enrolled herself at the Le Cordon Bleu amongst men. She worked at Mastering (Vol. 1) for 8 years, accumulating 750 pages. She experimented up to 15 times for a single dish, bothered with the nuances between French and American ingredients, and contacted a Nestle chemist for the peculiarities of chocolate in America. When her original publisher declined to publish her cookbook after it became a tome after 8 years, she wrote, “I wasn’t feeling sorry for myself. I had gotten the job done, I was proud of it, and now I had a whole batch of foolproof recipes to use. Besides, I had found myself through the arduous writing process. Even if we were never able to publish the book, I had discovered my raison d’être in life, and would continue my self-training and teaching.”

I looked her up in YouTube after reading the book. PBS still had some black-and white footage of the The French Chef. How down-to-earth and accessible French cuisine seemed through her. Her self-assured and non-self-conscious ways were refreshing. She made cooking a craft and then an art.

For its joie de vivre alone, I would say it is a winning book. In her own words: “… the pleasures of the table, and of life, are infinite - toujours bon appetit!”

A tortoise read. Read as it delights.