The school of essential ingredients

No cover — Erica Bauermeister: The school of essential ingredients (2009, Wheeler Pub.)

English language

Published Nov. 15, 2009 by Wheeler Pub..

ISBN:: 978-1-59722-944-9
OCLC Number:: 297413695

(1 review)

Reminiscent of Chocolat and Like Water for Chocolate, a gorgeously written novel about life, love, and the magic of food.The School of Essential Ingredients follows the lives of eight students who gather in Lillian's Restaurant every Monday night for cooking class. It soon becomes clear, however, that each one seeks a recipe for something beyond the kitchen. Students include Claire, a young mother struggling with the demands of her family; Antonia, an Italian kitchen designer learning to adapt to life in America; and Tom, a widower mourning the loss of his wife to breast cancer. Chef Lillian, a woman whose connection with food is both soulful and exacting, helps them to create dishes whose flavor and techniques expand beyond the restaurant and into the secret corners of her students' lives. One by one the students are transformed by the aromas, flavors, and textures of Lillian's food, including a white-on-white cake …

Reminiscent of Chocolat and Like Water for Chocolate, a gorgeously written novel about life, love, and the magic of food.The School of Essential Ingredients follows the lives of eight students who gather in Lillian's Restaurant every Monday night for cooking class. It soon becomes clear, however, that each one seeks a recipe for something beyond the kitchen. Students include Claire, a young mother struggling with the demands of her family; Antonia, an Italian kitchen designer learning to adapt to life in America; and Tom, a widower mourning the loss of his wife to breast cancer. Chef Lillian, a woman whose connection with food is both soulful and exacting, helps them to create dishes whose flavor and techniques expand beyond the restaurant and into the secret corners of her students' lives. One by one the students are transformed by the aromas, flavors, and textures of Lillian's food, including a white-on-white cake that prompts wistful reflections on the sweet fragility of love and a peppery heirloom tomato sauce that seems to spark one romance but end another. Brought together by the power of food and companionship, the lives of the characters mingle and intertwine, united by the revealing nature of what can be created in the kitchen.

3 editions

kerry reviewed The school of essential ingredients by Erica Bauermeister

Review of 'The school of essential ingredients' on 'Goodreads'

2 stars

This book is what happens to a culture that is saturated by “reality TV.” Each character gets his or her moment in the spotlight only to fade away into the background once their turn is over. We don’t get much depth of anyone’s personality, history, or goals; instead, we get a series of short stories, each with a happy ending.

Somewhat reminiscent of A Visit from the Goon Squad and Olive Kitteridge, The School of Essential Ingredients features a different character in each chapter. Unfortunately, the narrative voice never changes even as we read about the frazzled young mother, or the widower, or the insecure young woman, or the elderly couple with a Secret. As a result, some of the characters fuzzed together (Ian and Tom were particularly interchangeable).

The “cooking school” that formed the nexus of the group didn’t teach much cooking. Typical was the instruction to “add some …

This book is what happens to a culture that is saturated by “reality TV.” Each character gets his or her moment in the spotlight only to fade away into the background once their turn is over. We don’t get much depth of anyone’s personality, history, or goals; instead, we get a series of short stories, each with a happy ending.

Somewhat reminiscent of A Visit from the Goon Squad and Olive Kitteridge, The School of Essential Ingredients features a different character in each chapter. Unfortunately, the narrative voice never changes even as we read about the frazzled young mother, or the widower, or the insecure young woman, or the elderly couple with a Secret. As a result, some of the characters fuzzed together (Ian and Tom were particularly interchangeable).

The “cooking school” that formed the nexus of the group didn’t teach much cooking. Typical was the instruction to “add some water” to make masa for tamales. “How much?” the student asks. “Do what makes sense,” she is told.

Turns out that the instructor, Lillian, has a Gift for understanding People, and her cooking school is a cover for helping her students uncover their True Selves. This book hinted at other themes (the simple goodness of fresh ingredients; cooking and eating slowly), but in the end we bounce from feel-good story to feel-good story as if the author didn’t trust our attention span. The book made me hunger for good, in-depth character studies like Jonathan Franzen’s [b:Freedom|7905092|Freedom|Jonathan Franzen|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1316729686s/7905092.jpg|9585796].

Subjects

Women cooks -- Fiction
Cooking schools -- Fiction
Friendship -- Fiction
Large type books