Life After Life and Egyptian Pudding

 

Kate Atkinson's Life After Life was made for this blog.  Never before have I been so spoiled for choices for what to make for bookcooker.  The novel is set in England, from about 1910 to after WWII and includes countless references to very British sounding dishes - roly poly, rose madder, windsor brown, lump cookies, milk fadge, cabinet pudding, picallili, bakewell tart, iced fancy.  The list could go on.  In addition, there is a brief detour in Germany - Pfannkuchen, Schokolade, Palatschniken, Schawrtzwalder kirschtorte.  How could I possibly decide what to make?  I landed on Egyptian pudding, which I think was the first reference in the book to a fabulous English dessert.  It was Mrs. Glover, the housekeeper to the Todd family makes after the birth of the book's protagonist - Ursula Todd.  The shear volume of interesting British dishes is a result of the novel's unique narrative device - throughout the book Ursula Todd is born, dies and then born again - each time making it a little farther into her life.  Atkinson starts over and over again, starting the story from the same place - Ursula's birth, and each time some disaester befalls her.  I thought this might bore me (the same stuff over and over again), but it really is a fascinating story every time - a little different every time.  The effect of this unique narrative device was truly dazzling, and the Egyptian Pudding rocked too.

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Cover Recipe: Berry Float

I am hoping to start a new feature here on bookcooker, partly as an attempt to get out of my blogging rut!  Every month I will make a cover recipe from some food magazine - first up the cover of Martha Stewart Livings June issue  - a very simple berry float.  It feels a bit like cheating to make this, it is nothing much more than berries, vanilla ice cream and soda thrown together - but it has been impact, both visually and in taste.  It is a great easy treat to throw together when you are in the mood for something special and the color scheme obviously works perfect for July 4th or for chearing on Team USA in the World Cup!  Yum!

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Americanah and Jollof Rice

Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is an amazing book that is many different things in one package - a coming of age story, an immigrant story, a commentary on race and at its vibrant, beating heart - a love story.  As you may be able to tell from my description, I absolutely loved it.  It was both thought provoking and emotionally satisfying on multiple levels.  The book tells the story of Ifemelu, a Nigerian woman who moves to the United States and then decides to return home to Nigeria.  The story starts in Princeton, where Ifemelu is doing a fellowship.  When we first meet her she has already decided that she is going to move back to Lagos, leaving her American boyfriend behind.  Before she leaves she needs to get her hair braided, and the only place for her to do that is an African hair salon in Newark - as she sits in the salon chair (with an uneasy relationship with the woman braiding her hair) for the long braiding process, Ifemelu thinks back on everything that has led up to this moment.  Adichie moves back and forth in time for most of the novel, moving back in time and returning every so often to this salon chair.   The hair braiding process and Ifemelu's choice of what to do with her hair (chemically straighten in, chop it all off, braid it) serves throughout as a touch point for her identify both in Nigeria and as an African woman in America.  Ifemelu (and Adichie) is a sharp, keen eyed observer of the world around her, particularly as an "outsider" in America.  Her experiences and commentary are both funny and painfully on point.  I could have read 300 more pages of her story.

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Laura Lamont's Life in Pictures and Cherry Frozen Custard

Any book that gives you an excuse to make frozen custard, must be good, right?  Laura Lamont's Life in Pictures is mostly set in glamorous (and not so glamorous) Hollywood, but at its heart and start it is a story about a girl from Door County, Wisconsin - where frozen custard is a summertime staple.  The novel tells the story of the improbable rise to stardom of Elsa Emerson, a young girl from Wisconsin.  Elsa has the theater in her blood - her parents run a summer theater in rural Wisconsin.  But it is a family tragedy that propels her determination to escape Wisconsin and make it in Hollywood - her drive to succeed is not just for herself, but for her family.  Elsa spends her first years in Hollywood as a young wife and mother, never really making it in the Hollywood studio system.  She finally makes it when she meets a man who convinces her to shed "Elsa" and transform into Laura, the glamorous Hollywood starlet.  The book spans 40+ years of Elsa/Laura's life and career, and the ups and down that come with it.

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