A Literary Culinary Journal
At a dinner party one should eat wisely but not too well, and talk well but not too wisely.–W. Somerset Maugham, 1896
W. Somerset Maugham was an English playwright, novelist and short story writer who also held a medical degree. Maugham could have been a surgeon, but chose to use his medical background to influence his writing, as it did in his first novel in 1897 Liza of Lambeth, which was a tale of working-class adultery.
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Feasts must be solemn and rare, or else they cease to be feats.–Aldous Huxley, 1929
Aldous Huxley English novelist and critic, best known for his novel Brave New World (1931). Besides novels he published travel books, histories, poems, plays, and essays on philosophy, arts, sociology, religion and morals. Even today, Brave New World is so influential that an entire website is devoted to his writing.
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by Simón de Swaan
It is a hard matter, my fellow citizens, to argue with the belly, since it has no ears.–Cato the Elder
Cato the Elder was a Roman statesman, referred to as “The Elder” to distinguish him from his great great grandson, Cato the Younger. Although a very distinguished statesman, he deserves more notice as an author of the first history of Rome, written in Latin.
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Some sensible person once remarked that you spend the whole of your life in your bed or in your shoes. Having done the best you can buy shoes and bed, devote all the time and resources at your disposal to the building up a fine kitchen. It will be, as it should be, the most comforting and comfortable room in the house.–Elizabeth David, Slow Food, 1951
here was a British cookbook writer who, on her return from “exile” in Egypt after WW2, decided that action had to be taken with regard to the quality of food in Britain. She was outright hostile to second-rate cooking and the use of frozen, canned and out-of-season ingredients, and is, in many people’s mind, a precursor of the concept of Slow Food. In any case, she was a primary mover in bringing true traditional home cooking using quality ingredients back into the mainstream in Britain.
All her books are listed here, and most are still available at Book Depository or other online independent booksellers.
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Do not be afraid to talk about food. Food which is worth eating is worth discussing. And there is the occult power of words which somehow will develop its qualities.–X. Marcel Boulestin, Simple French Cooking for English Homes 1923
Xavier Marcel Boulestin was a French chef, restaurateur and the author of cookbooks that popularized French cuisine to the English-speaking world. The Restaurant Boulestin, known as the most expensive in London, opened in 1927. Its fame, and the long series of books and articles that Boulestin wrote, made him a celebrity. Among those influenced by Boulestin was the English cooking expert Elizabeth David, who praised Boulestin in her writings, and adopted many of his ideas.
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Cuisine is when things taste like themselves.–Curnonsky
Maurice Edmond Sailland, better known by his pen-name Curnonsky, and dubbed the Prince of Gastronomy, was the most celebrated writer on gastronomy in France in the 20th century. He wrote or ghost-wrote over 65 books and enormous numbers of newspaper columns, included his most famous book, La France Gastronomique: Guide Des Merveilles Culinaires Et Des Bonnes Auberges Fran Aises (Gastronomic France: Guide to Culinary Marvels and Good French Inns).
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There comes a time in every woman’s life when the only thing that helps is a glass of champagne.–Bette Davis (in the film Old Acquaintance)
Bette Davis was an American actress of film, television and theater. Noted for her willingness to play unsympathetic characters, she was highly regarded for her performances in a range of film genres, from contemporary crime melodramas to historical and period films and occasional comedies, although her greatest successes were her roles in romantic dramas. Click here to see a trailer from her movie Old Acquaintance.
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If you were to ask me if I’d ever had the bad luck to miss my daily cocktail, I’d have to say that I doubt it; where certain things are concerned, I plan ahead.–Luis Buñuel
The New York Times was a Spanish-born Mexican filmmaker who worked in Spain, Mexico, France and the United States. When he died at age 83, his obituary in The New York Times called him “an iconoclast, moralist and revolutionary who was a leader of avant-garde surrealism in his youth and a dominant international movie director half a century later.”
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“Shape is a good part of the fig’s delight.”–Jane Grigson
Jane Grigson was an English food writer. Grigson’s growing interest in food and cooking led to the writing of her first book, Charcuterie and French Pork Cookery (1967), which was translated into French, unusual for an English food writer. Elizabeth David read the book and was impressed by it, and recommended Grigson as a food columnist for The Observer, for which she wrote a column from 1968 until her death in 1990.
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by Simón de Swaan
Some people like to paint pictures, or do gardening, or build a boat in the basement. Other people get a tremendous pleasure out of the kitchen, because cooking is just as creative and imaginative an activity as drawing, or wood carving, or music.–Julia Child
Julia Child was an American chef, author, and television personality. She is best known for bringing French cuisine to the American public with her début cookbook, Mastering the Art of French Cooking, and her subsequent television programs, the most notable of which was The French Chef, which premiered in 1963.
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Meet Jonell Galloway, a freelance writer and editor specialized in French cuisine. 
