Cook and learn--splendid!

Take Big Bites
by Linda Ellerby


Early into this book I wrote a very mean review of what appeared to be "just about the worst recipe for chili I've ever seen." I was--and still am--tempted to try the recipe just to prove how hideous it would be. But instead I'll just mention that whoever wrote it down didn't have to wash their own pans.

But I'm deleting all that. Who cares about a bad recipe or two in such a wonderful book?  I feel honored to have been allowed to read it.  Food was just a tiny bit of her masterful approach to wringing the spice out of life, so I can't blame or fault her for attempting to recreate some of the significant meals of her magnificent journey through life.  It wouldn't mean anything to me to try to cook them, but to her, it was clearly worth the writing of them.

This cooking woman has a brain, a conscience, strength, compassion, bravery and an occasional, self-embarrassing admission of weakness. The episodes of her life included here are no doubt a tiny subset of all the fun, cool, and totally misery-making things she has experienced.  Volunteering for a church mission to get a free ride to visit Latin America. Hopping across the border at Brownsville with a best friend to relive the memories of food and friendship in the days before Tex-Mex cooking lost its spice. Causing a riot in Turkey by giving out oranges to hungry kids. Outward Bound trip down the Colorado. Being pummeled by the largest naked woman she'd ever seen at a bath + massage somewhere. And more and more--I'm having trouble finding a representative sample of adventures to list. They're so diverse.

And best and last, her walk down the Thames at age sixty. That's an essay that will make you cry, yet still bring a little hope to the passage of time.