Foreword by :
Alice WatersImprint:
Appetite by Random HouseISBN:
9780147530837Product Form:
HardcoverAudience:
General TradeDimensions:
9.4in x 6.7 x 1.1 in | 2.26 lbPage Count:
336 pagesIllustrations:
Y FULL COLOURALICE WATERS: No one knows Alice Waters like Fanny Singer, her daughter. The founder and owner of Chez Panisse in Berkeley, a preeminent food activist, and a bestselling, award-winning author, as well as a founder of the farm-to-table movement and a recipient of the James Beard Award for Lifetime Achievement Award, a National Humanities Medal, and the French Legion of Honor, Alice Waters is indisputably America’s culinary queen. Although she has spent decades in the public eye, no one knows her like her daughter, Fanny Singer, and Always Home is a fascinating look at this cultural icon as we’ve never seen her before.
AUTHOR: A star in her own right with a following of over 14.1k on Instagram, Fanny Singer is a contributing editor at the Wall Street Journal Magazine, has curated at the Tate, and recently launched her own company, Permanent Collection. She co-authored My Pantry with her mother in 2015, and has been profiled in the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times Magazine, and Food & Wine.
PART COOKBOOK, PART MEMOIR: In the spirit of Tamar Adler’s An Everlasting Meal, Ruth Reichl’s My Kitchen Year, Rick Bragg’s The Best Cook in the World, Molly Wizenberg’s A Homemade Life, and the books of Nigel Slater, Singer melds cookbook with memoir, recipes with stories. The result is a book that is every bit as wonderful to read as it is to cook from.
RECIPES: The book is built around 60 recipes that span Singer’s life and travels, from growing up in Northern California and holidaying in France to the years she spent in London and beyond. These are homey, Chez Panisse-style dishes that are perfect for recreating at home: think Fennel-infused Olives, Green Coriander Pasta, Garlic Shrimp, Herby Chicken Paillard Lunchbox Sandwich, Brussel Sprouts with Salsa Verde, and, of course, her mother’s Egg Fried in a Spoon in the Fireplace.
APPROACH: Singer is a pragmatist about food, about cooking, and about making ends meet, but her love of food and belief in the warmth and generosity of the table are her matrilineal inheritance. She sits between the rigorous idealism of her mother, and the engaged, but more casual attitudes toward food and eating evident amongst her peers.
PHOTOGRAPHY: Unlike Waters’ cookbooks, which contain no photographs, Always Home includes extensive photography by legendary photographer Brigitte Lacombe to give readers a behind-the-scenes glimpse into the life of an iconic chef and her family.
CAST OF STARS: The book includes glimpses into the lives of celebrated friends and colleagues including Bob Carrau, Susie Tompkins Buell, Jacques Pépin, Catherine Brandel, Jean-Pierre Moullé, Cal Peternell, Paul Bertolli, Gérard Boyer, David Tanis, Niloufer Ichaporia King, Lulu Peyraud and many more.
“You will probably pick up this book because you’re curious about how it feels to grow up with Alice Waters as your mother. But you will inevitably be captivated by Fanny Singer’s sensuous voice and sensible soul. The writing’s lovely, but more than that, Fanny has struck a kind of brutal honesty that is extremely rare and completely beautiful. Her writing makes you want to taste every flavor she describes, and soon you’ll be dashing into the kitchen to make watercress soup, wild fennel cakes, and breakfast pudding. But the really important thing is that I’m pretty sure everyone who reads it will come away with the same feeling that I have: Why don’t I live my life like this? How can I do better? I love this book.” —RUTH REICHL, author of Save Me the Plums
“A charming and unique almost–love story, almost-memoir, with predictably fabulous recipes.”—MARK BITTMAN, author of How to Cook Everything
“To read Fanny Singer’s intimate and honest memoir is like having a mouthful of jewels. After fourteen years of cooking with her and her mother, Alice Waters, I got to know her even better through her perfect book. Singer’s writing reminds me about everything important to me in life, the four f ’s: friends, food, family, and fun.”—CLAIRE PTAK, owner of Violet Bakery in London and author of The Violet Bakery Cookbook
“Fanny Singer’s joyful, witty, and loving encounter with American genius inside the home and in the world heralds the arrival of a new voice, one that understands the pleasure to be found in discovery, and the ever evolving mystery embedded in the known. A book like no other, an instant classic.”—HILTON ALS, staff writer, The New Yorker
“Singer’s memoir, Always Home: A Daughter’s Recipes & Stories, is a tender portrait of the woman better known to the world as the mother of the farm-to-table movement.” —CHLOE MALLE, Vogue, “The 5 Best Books of 2020 (So Far)”
“In this wondrous memoir-cookbook hybrid . . . Singer’s language is read-out-loud luscious, and her culinary coming-of-age story savory and sweet.” —Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)
“This heartwarming, feel-good, highly recommended memoir will appeal to fans of cooking, culinary travels, and family ties.” —Library Journal
“Singer’s charming narrative, interwoven with Lacombe’s painterly black-and-white photographs, bursts with sensuous descriptions of tastes, fragrances, and textures as she recounts her “very rich and full and just a little bit unconventional” young life . . . . An intimate homage to an iconic restaurateur.” —Kirkus Reviews
“Singer tells her own tale and that of her influential mother, tying the two together with their love of food and knack for powerful storytelling.” —Town & Country (“6 Best Books to Read This March”)
"Fanny Singer’s book about growing up with celeb chef and food activist Alice Waters—her mom—is a refreshing reprieve from sad tales of famous family life. It’s an intimate look at how a woman at the top of her culinary game has kept a close, collaborative relationship with her daughter."—Chatelaine (“11 Books We Can't Wait To Read This Spring”)