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Author | Julia Child with Alex Prud'homme |
---|---|
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Genre | Autobiography |
Publisher | Alfred A. Knopf |
Publication date | 2006 |
Media type | Print (Hardback) |
Pages | 317 pp (Knopf hardcover edition) |
ISBN | 1-4000-4346-8 (Knopf hardcover edition) |
OCLC | 61821870 |
641.5092 B 22 | |
LC Class | TX649.C47 A3 2006 |
My Life in France is an autobiography by Julia Child, published in 2006. It was compiled by Julia Child and Alex Prud'homme, her husband's grandnephew, during the last eight months of her life, and completed by Prud'homme following her death in August 2004.
In her own words, it is a book about the things Julia loved most in her life: her husband, France (her "spiritual homeland"), and the "many pleasures of cooking and eating". It is a collection of linked autobiographical stories, mostly focused on the years between 1948 and 1954, recounting in detail the culinary experiences Julia and her husband, Paul Child, enjoyed while living in Paris, Marseille, and Provence. [1]
The text is accompanied by black-and-white photographs taken by Paul Child, and research for the book was partially done using family letters, datebooks, photographs, sketches, poems and cards. [2]
My Life in France provides a detailed chronology of the process through which Julia Child's name, face, and voice became well known to most Americans.
The book also contains an extremely detailed index cataloging every person, place, ingredient, recipe, topic and event discussed. [3]
Julia's first descriptions and impressions of Paris, France. Julia reminisces about the Childs' search for an apartment in Paris, [4] Paul's job with the USIA, [5] and their exploration of Paris' restaurants. [6] Julia's sister Dorothy's visits. [7]
Julia excitedly describes the sole meunière lunch she savored in Rouen the day of their arrival, and which sparked her obsession with French cuisine, her "epiphany". [8]
Julia signs up for cooking classes at the École du Cordon Bleu, and has many disagreements with the school's owner, Madame Brassart, [9] but her cooking improves. Paul says that "All sorts of délices are spouting out of [Julia's] finger ends like sparks out of a pinwheel". [10]
She makes: [11]
The Childs learn that television is sweeping the States, [12] head to England for Christmas, [13] and Julia recounts her and Paul's family histories, and courtships, hardships and more. [14] Julia attempts (and fails) the Cordon Bleu final exam. [15]
Julia is invited into the exclusive women's eating club The Gourmettes, [16] and takes a trip back home to the United States. [17] Julia retakes the exam at the Cordon Bleu, and passes. [18]
Julia meets two fellow Gourmettes, Simone (Simca) Beck Fischbacher and Louisette Bertholle. They form L'École des Trois Gourmandes, a cooking school focusing on French food and classical techniques. [19]
The three Gourmandes meet celebrated gastronome Curnonsky, [20] and Simca and Louisette ask Julia to help them finish a cookbook of French recipes for an American audience. This cookbook eventually becomes Mastering the Art of French Cooking . [21]
Paul is promoted to Public Affairs Officer in Marseilles, and the Childs leave Paris. [22]
Julia and Paul adjust to the "hot noise" of Marseille. [23] Julia continues to research recipes for the cookbook, finds American equivalents for French ingredients, and works on finding a new publisher for the project. [24] Paul and Julia attend the Cannes Film Festival, [25] and come up with the idea of illustrating the making of recipes. [26]
Julia and Paul live in Marseille for a year before Paul is transferred to Germany as Exhibits Officer. [27]
Julia works long-distance from Germany on the cookbook, researching chicken, geese and duck, and disagrees with Simca over the cookbook's components. Louisette's contributions to the project wane, and she is made a "consultant". [28]
Paul is called home to Washington D.C., and is interrogated during one of Senator Joe McCarthy's investigations for Communists. He is eventually exonerated, and is transferred back to D.C. and promoted. [29]
Julia begins teaching cooking classes to Washington women, and revises and retypes the cookbook manuscript. [30]
Houghton Mifflin finds their manuscript too lengthy, and they agree to prune the book, making the recipes simpler, shorter, and with an emphasis on how to prepare ahead and reheat. However, even their edits prove to be too much for Houghton Mifflin, and they are encouraged to try their manuscript with a different publisher. [31]
Paul is transferred to Norway as the U.S. Cultural Attaché. [32]
The manuscript, tentatively titled French Recipes for American Cooks, is shown to Judith Jones, an editor at Alfred A. Knopf, and Knopf makes an offer to publish the cookbook. Some changes in serving sizes, recipe additions, and a new title, Mastering the Art of French Cooking, are made. [33]
Paul and Julia leave government service and return to the U.S. as civilians, to a home they purchased in Cambridge, Massachusetts. [34]
Julia and Simca proofread, edit, and argue over the soon-to-be-published manuscript. Once published, the cookbook catches on, and Julia and Simca head on a promotional tour, even doing a segment on the Today show. [35]
Julia does a segment on the show I've Been Reading on WGBH, which is met with favorable reviews. This segment leads to The French Chef, Julia's cooking show on WGBH, making her a household name. [36]
Julia and Paul take a trip to France and visit Simca in Provence. They rent a plot of land from Simca and her husband, and build La Pitchoune/La Peetch, or The Little Thing, a getaway cabin. [37]
Julia and Simca work on Volume II of Mastering the Art of French Cooking , [38] and Julia appears on the cover of Time Magazine in 1966. [39] Julia finds working at La Pitchoune extremely productive, [40] and she explores the mystery of baking French bread in the home kitchen. [41] Julia finds working with Simca increasingly frustrating, [42] and actually looks forward to returning to the U.S. [43]
Julia and the crew of The French Chef set out to do an ambitious series on how French food is actually made and sold in France, believing that the footage "...would prove to be an important historical document..". [44] that would archive many of the artisanal skills that were slowly disappearing. Segments were shot in the marketplace, restaurants, and while visiting the local butcher. [45]
Paul and Julia retire to La Pitchoune in 1971. [46] After Simca badly maligns the outcome of Volume II, Julia ends their collaboration, though Simca then goes on to write Simca's Cuisine. [47] Julia began working on From Julia Child's Kitchen . [48]
Paul and Julia move back to Cambridge in 1974 after Paul suffers a heart attack. Julia decides to close up La Peetch in 1992, after Paul suffers a series of strokes, and is no longer able to share the home with her. [49]
Julia Carolyn Child was an American cooking teacher, author, and television personality. She is recognized for bringing French cuisine to the American public with her debut cookbook, Mastering the Art of French Cooking, and her subsequent television programs, the most notable of which was The French Chef, which premiered in 1963.
Simone "Simca" Beck was a French cookbook writer and cooking teacher who, along with colleagues Julia Child and Louisette Bertholle, played a significant role in the introduction of French cooking technique and recipes into American kitchens.
Coq au vin is a French dish of chicken braised with wine, lardons, mushrooms, and optionally garlic. A red Burgundy wine is typically used, though many regions of France make variants using local wines, such as coq au vin jaune (Jura), coq au riesling (Alsace), coq au pourpre or coq au violet, and coq au Champagne.
Dione Lucas was an English chef, and the first female graduate of Le Cordon Bleu. Her father was the architect, jeweller and designer Henry Wilson, and her sister was the violinist Orrea Pernel (1906-1993). She married another architect, Colin Lucas (1906-1984).
Julia's Kitchen Wisdom is the final cookbook authored by chef and television personality Julia Child. Co-authored by David Nussbaum and edited by Judith Jones, the book covers basic cooking principles and techniques and was designed to serve as a reference point for amateur cooks. Julia's Kitchen Wisdom was the 17th book written by Child and gained widespread popularity following the release of the 2009 film, 'Julie and Julia'.
Mastering the Art of French Cooking is a two-volume French cookbook written by Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle, both from France, and Julia Child, who was from the United States. The book was written for the American market and published by Knopf in 1961 and 1970.
Beef bourguignon or bœuf bourguignon, also called beef Burgundy, and bœuf à la Bourguignonne, is a French beef stew braised in red wine, often red Burgundy, and beef stock, typically flavored with carrots, onions, garlic, and a bouquet garni, and garnished with pearl onions, mushrooms, and bacon. A similar dish using a piece of braised beef with the same garnish is pièce de bœuf à la bourguignonne.
Salade niçoise, salada nissarda in the Niçard dialect of the Occitan language, insalata nizzarda in Italian, is a salad that originated in the French city of Nice. It is traditionally made of tomatoes, hard-boiled eggs, Niçoise olives and anchovies or tuna, dressed with olive oil, or in some historical versions, a vinaigrette. It has been popular worldwide since the early 20th century, and has been prepared and discussed by many chefs. Delia Smith called it "one of the best combinations of salad ingredients ever invented" and Gordon Ramsay said that "it must be the finest summer salad of all".
Alex Prud’homme is an American journalist and the author of several non-fiction books.
Julie & Julia is a 2009 American biographical comedy-drama film written and directed by Nora Ephron starring Meryl Streep, Amy Adams, Stanley Tucci, and Chris Messina. The film contrasts the life of chef Julia Child in the early years of her culinary career with the life of young New Yorker Julie Powell, who aspires to cook all 524 recipes in Child's cookbook in 365 days, a challenge she described on her popular blog, which made her a published author.
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Irena Chalmers-Taylor was an author and food commentator/essayist, teacher and culinary mentor. Named "the culinary oracle of 100 cookbooks" by noted American restaurant critic and journalist, Gael Greene, Chalmers was recognized as the pioneer of the single subject cookbook. Her life story revealed an unlikely journey to becoming a James Beard Foundation "Who's Who" of Food and Beverage in America 1988 Award Recipient.
Élisabeth Brassart (1897–1992) was the proprietor of the Le Cordon Bleu school in Paris from 1945 to 1984. Le Cordon Bleu had been founded in 1895 by Marthe Distel and Henri-Paul Pellaprat. In 1945, after the end of WWII, she purchased what had become a struggling school from a Catholic orphanage which had inherited it after the school's founder died in the late 1930s. The present owner, André J. Cointreau, purchased it from Brassart, who was an old family friend.
Judith Jones was an American writer and editor, best known for having rescued The Diary of Anne Frank from the reject pile. Jones also championed Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking. She retired as senior editor and vice president at Alfred A. Knopf in 2011. Jones was also a cookbook author and memoirist. She won multiple lifetime achievement awards, including the James Beard Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award in 2006.
Louisette Bertholle was a French cooking teacher and writer, best known as one of the three authors of the bestselling cookbook Mastering the Art of French Cooking.
La Pitchoune is a small stucco house that Julia Child and her husband, Paul, built in the Provençal village of Plascassier in France in the early 1960s. La Pitchoune is a Provençal expression for "the little one", deriving from the Occitan word pichon.
Paul Cushing Child was an American civil servant, diplomat, and artist known for being the husband of celebrity chef and author Julia Child.
Barbara Ketcham Wheaton, born in Philadelphia in 1931, is a writer and food historian. Since 1990, she has been the honorary curator of the culinary collection at the Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe College, one of the largest collections in the United States of books and manuscripts relating to cooking and the social history of food.
Madeleine Kamman was a French chef and restaurateur, cookery teacher and author of seven cookbooks, who spent most of her working life in America bringing the rigors of French technique to American ingredients and audiences.
In French gastronomy, cuisine bourgeoise is the home cooking of middle class families as distinguished from elaborate restaurant cooking, haute cuisine, and from the cooking of the regions, the peasantry, and the urban poor.