Delicious sound bites.

I’m reading Eat, Memory, a collection of New York Times food writing. It’s full of small delicious phrases I want to savor and write down.

“two things happen: I remain unenlightened by my uncertainty and I eat amazing food”- from “Turning Japanese” by Heidi Julavita.

“homesickness and the odd melancholy of Sundays in foreign places.” from “American Dreams” by Jon Robin Baitz.

I should do this more often, write down bits and phrases I like. This is a library book. I won’t be happy to give it back.

Too wonderful for words: “A Taste of Home” by Manil Suri. A daughter goes to France, comes home to India wanting to share her newfound love of French cooking. Does not go as planned.

Wonderful but in a quieter way: “Family Menu” by Allen Shawn.

Grabber of a first line: “Berlin is not the place most people would choose to celebrate Passover.” -  Anna Winger, “Ghosts of Passovers Past.”

Reading beautiful essays about food, of course poses the hazard that it will make you hungry. Sometimes for a specific thing. But…ending this essay collection with meditations on roast duck and gravy is just beyond. Dorothy Allison’s word by word construction of a good gravy made my stomach growl. And I don’t have anything particularly meaty in the house. Foo!

For every book I read in 2011, I’m donating $1 to the New York Public Library.