Blood, Bones, and Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef by Gabrielle Hamilton
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
A very compelling chef's memoir about her family life and how she developed her love of food and cooking. Gabrielle Hamilton grew up as the youngest in a family of five children. Her mother was French and was constantly making French dishes. However, her parents divorced when she was relatively young and she soon found herself on her own, supporting herself through petty thievery and food service jobs. Drug addiction, school dropout, and family alienation followed. She has an MFA from the University of Michigan (go blue), but didn't seem to enjoy much of the two years spent in Ann Arbor other than making friends with a co-worker/mentor. Years later, she opened up a small restaurant in the East Village in NYC, having never actually worked in a restaurant kitchen previously.
Her writing could use some editing, in her sentence structure, the length of her descriptions, and in continuity. Towards the end she talks about trying to find a restaurant to eat at on a late Sunday afternoon in Brooklyn. She is with her husband and two children. In one paragraph her younger son in 3 months old, and on the next page (same afternoon), he is eight months old. Examples like this abound throughout the book.
Her writing about her love of food and the restaurant was what really drew me in. So 4 stars for that, but 3 stars for the story of her messy life. I'm anxious to discuss this with my eclectic book club next week.
Read more of my reviews at https://thegoodreader13.blogspot.com/.
