Let me begin by saying that I have never, ever read a cookbook from cover to cover. Most cookbooks have only a handful of recipes that I use, some more than others. Most cookbooks, at least the ones that I own, have short entries about the chapter, or a delicious promise that tempts taste with texture and colour. This cookbook is about the author and her journey following the demise of Gourmet in the fall of 2009. She had been the Editor in Chief of this once popular magazine for ten years and was suddenly confronted by a blank calendar. Each recipe comes from a thought, a worry, a memory or just the experience of the day. They are recipes she has known, recipes she has recreated from a favourite restaurant or tweaked to shape her preferences. Experimenting with No Knead Bread in my own kitchen was from one such recipe from the original by James Lahey. My Kitchen Year is also replete with photos. Photos of plates of finished recipes, but also photos of the seasons and places. My Kitchen Year is sectioned with the seasons beginning with Fall, each recipe matching the season with dishes that nourish not only the body but the soul.
Ruth Reichl has writes about preparing and cooking food with gentle passion. Yes, some of the dishes have ingredients that I will probably never have access to, but then she lived in a world of extraordinary fare. What she discovered after being away from such a world is that extraordinary fare was found in her own home, and from her own hand. If you enjoy preparing to cook, cooking or baking and then enjoying the results of this act of creativity, you will enjoy this book. Ruth Reichl brings the cook into the kitchen.
“To me recipes are conversations, not lectures; they are a beginning,
not an end. I hope you’ll add a little bit more of this,
a little less of that, perhaps introduce new spices or different herbs.
What I really want is for my recipes to become your own.”
~ Ruth Reichl, My Kitchen Year
Title: My Kitchen Year - 136 Recipes that Saved My Life
Author: Ruth Reichl
Published in Canada by: Appetite by Random House
Copyright: 2015
Format: Hard Cover
ISBN: 978-0-14-752995-4
eBook ISBN: 978-0-14-752996-1
Type: Cookbook
While reading Ruth Reichl’s book My Kitchen Year, she showed me word pictures of how food feeds not just the body, but the soul. I have often gone to the kitchen with the pretext of wanting some specific thing to eat but found myself more entranced with the creation of a dish - usually from left overs or just whatever is in the cupboard or fridge. The follow up eating of the food is merely a tasty completion of this process. Did the taste match the imagining in my head? Was the texture right, was it too soft or not soft enough? Of course, someone has to do the dishes and even that, sometimes, is satisfying to me. This writing exercise should prove interesting over the next eleven days as I have no clue what I may ‘cook up’ in the way of word crafting! 
Let me begin by saying that I have never, ever read a cookbook from cover to cover. Most cookbooks have only a handful of recipes that I use, some more than others. Most cookbooks, at least the ones that I own, have short entries about the chapter, or a delicious promise that tempts taste with texture and colour. This cookbook is about the author and her journey following the demise of Gourmet in the fall of 2009. She had been the Editor in Chief of this once popular magazine for ten years and was suddenly confronted by a blank calendar. Each recipe comes from a thought, a worry, a memory or just the experience of the day. They are recipes she has known, recipes she has recreated from a favourite restaurant or tweaked to shape her preferences. Experimenting with No Knead Bread in my own kitchen was from one such recipe from the original by James Lahey. My Kitchen Year is also replete with photos. Photos of plates of finished recipes, but also photos of the seasons and places. My Kitchen Year is sectioned with the seasons beginning with Fall, each recipe matching the season with dishes that nourish not only the body but the soul. 
