Last weekend, as I was shuffling around BookExpo Canada, searching for catalogs and in need of fresh air, I came across the booth of Ten Speed Press, who really are a top-notch operation. I was drawn by what appeared to be a finished copy of Grant Achatz’s new Alinea cookbook. It turned out to be a dummy copy, though one that in its size and beautiful dust jacketry gave an idea of how impressive this book will be. The Ten Speed rep had a black and white galley of the book, though, and I can report that the recipes are aesthetically stunning and practically impossible for the average home chef. (Apparently by buying the book you’ll have access to a website that will let you learn from Grant & Co., which sounds to me like another way to feel inadequate. To learn more about Achatz, you should read D.T. Max’s very good New Yorker profile from a few weeks ago.)

While at the booth, I was reminded of Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s exceptional books, which were also on display. I’ve had his River Cottage Family Cookbook for a while, and I love it. I also have his River Cottage Meat Book, which just last week won the James Beard Cookbook of the Year Award. Though I haven’t actually cooked anything out of the River Cottage Meat Book, I feel pretty comfortable in saying that it’s an astonishingly good book, a word I used deliberately instead of ‘cookbook’ because what Fearnley-Whittingstall has accomplished moves far beyond a list of recipes. Instead, it’s a prescriptive guide for to how to live as a meat eater in the world today, as well as a handy instruction manual for understanding how an animal ends up as that thing on your plate. It almost goes without saying that Fearnley-Whittingstall advocates locally-oriented, responsibly-farmed methods of obtaining meat, but the difference is that he does it with a vastness of knowledge and generosity of spirit that place him above most of today’s nattering eco-pundits.

Like his recent TV show, The River Cottage Treatment, the book furthers the sort of activist/interventionist impulse that has been creeping into the food industry’s cultural products lately. It’s even reached Jamie Oliver, who has actually always been a proponent of responsible eating; his new book includes a two-page colour photograph of dead hares lying on a table. (Fearnley-Whittingstall takes this project to a new level. Among the book’s best, most affecting moments: a photo essay of the day he takes two of his cows to be killed, including a brutal shot of one of them staring into the camera as a gun is pressed against the top of its head.) In other words, this new book is another step in a movement that seeks to make the real costs of food obvious to consumers, and which is predicated upon the argument that such awareness cannot help but make us more responsible when we decide what to eat. For a guide, I can’t recommend Fearnley-Whittingstall enough. Even if every recipe in this new book were a disaster—which I’m certain they’re not—its wisdom, style, and conscience would make it well worth your time.

Tags: books, literature

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Posted on Thursday, June 19th, 2008 at 1:38 pm. Follow comments through the RSS 2.0 feed. Comment or trackback.