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Hunger Like a Thirst: From Food Stamps to Fine Dining, a Restaurant Critic Finds Her Place at the Table
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About This Book
A witty and lively memoir from food writer and New York Times contributor Besha Rodell, (formerly) one of the world's last anonymous restaurant criticsWhen Besha Rodell moved from Australia to the United States with her mother at fourteen, she was a foreigner in a new land, missing her friends, her father, and the food she grew up eating. In the years that followed, Rodell began waitressing and discovered the buzz of the restaurant world, immersing herself in the lifestyle and community while struggling with the industry's shortcomings. As she built a family, Rodell realized her dream, though only a handful of women before her had done to make a career as a restaurant critic.From the streets of Brooklyn to lush Atlanta to sunny Los Angeles to traveling and eating around the world, and, finally, home to Australia, Rodell takes us on a delicious, raw, and fascinating journey through her life and career and explores the history of criticism and dining and the cultural shifts that have turned us all into food obsessives. Hunger Like a Thirst shares stories of the joys and hardships of Rodell's coming-of-age, the amazing (and sometimes terrible) meals she ate along the way, and the dear friends she made in each restaurant, workplace, and home.
Reviews
"Rodell's foodie/hippie origin story, always entangled with issues of money and access, makes her insights throughout the book complex and encourages readers to understand opulence in new ways ..."
"Often joyous, sometimes melancholy, her first book recounts a lifelong hunger for discovery and meaning, with exceptional food as both focal point and an end in itself."
"Her outsider status has also left her well positioned to excavate the history of restaurant criticism and the role of those who have practiced it."
"Throughout, Rodell proves the accuracy of her self-description—'I'm a classic restaurant critic with a slightly filthier vocabulary and an audience in mind that was less wealthy gourmand and more ratbag line cook'—with punchy and accessible prose."
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