The School of Essential Ingredients

Posted on 26 June 2017 by Erica Bauermeister

Reminiscent of Chocolat and Like Water for Chocolate, a gorgeously written novel about life, love, and the magic of food The School of Essential Ingredients follows the lives of eight students who gather in Lillian s Restaurant every Monday night for cooking class It soon becomes clear, however, that each one seeks a recipe for something beyond the kitchen Students include Claire, a young mother struggling with the demands of her family Antonia, an Italian kitchen designer learning to adapt to life in America and Tom, a widower mourning the loss of his wife to breast cancer Chef Lillian, a woman whose connection with food is both soulful and exacting, helps them to create dishes whose flavor and techniques expand beyond the restaurant and into the secret corners of her students lives One by one the students are transformed by the aromas, flavors, and textures of Lillian s food, including a white on white cake that prompts wistful reflections on the sweet fragility of love and a peppery heirloom tomato sauce that seems to spark one romance but end another Brought together by the power of food and companionship, the lives of the characters mingle and intertwine, united by the revealing nature of what can be created in the kitchen. Download The School of Essential Ingredients Author Erica Bauermeister – kino-fada.fr HmmmmI see a lot of people here liked this book For me the writing style was almost embarrassingly florid, and simile laden WAY too saccherine for me.The School of Essential Ingredients is a story of a cooking class, but is oh so muchThe spices, smells, textures, and flavors throughout the book are used as connection points to the students, their lives, memories, needs, and secrets As you read this book, you get a warm, cozy feeling from it that lingers with you You can almost smell and taste right through the book This is a book I probably would never have picked up, and if...Renowned chef Lillian owns a restaurant in the Pacific Northwest and every Monday night she hosts a cooking class.Yep, that s pretty much it Sounds too simple, right This novel is, above all else, a beautifully written character study of each student in Lillian s class Each character is given their own chapter and their diversity is bound to strike a chord in readers from all walks of life.Bibliophiles everywhere will see themselves in Lillian s mother, a woman who used books to escape the har Renowned chef Lillian owns a restaurant in the Pacific Northwest and every Monday night she hosts a cooking class.Yep, that s pretty much it Sounds too simple, right This novel is, above all else, a beautifully written character study of each student in Lillian s class Each character is given their own chapter and their diversity is bound to strike a chord in readers from all walks of life.Bibliophiles everywhere will see themselves in Lillian s mother, a woman who used books...oops I misposted this review with the wrong book earlier this week Sorry I m blaming holiday craziness This is a glorious book It s about food as a touchstone and a means for memory, community, nurturing, healing, loving, seduction, sustenance, pleasure, joy, beginning, endings life It is the story of a cooking class that learns farthan culinary skills at the hands of a chef whose wisdom is not limited to food stuffs The language is lush and decadent, rolling off the page and int oops I misposted this review with the wrong book earlier this week Sorry I m blaming holiday craziness This is a glorious book It s about food as a touchstone and a means for memory, community, nurturing, healing, loving, seduction, sustenance, pleasure, joy, beginning, endings life It is the story of a cooking class that learns farthan culinary skills at the hands of a chef whose wisdom is not limite... The School of Essential Ingredients is a quick read focused on a Monday night cooking class held at a popular local restaurant, Lillian s Lillian herself presides over these classes and, as someone who has always had an intrinsic understanding of the power of food to heal and comfort, she eagerly awaits each new class to see the transformations some positive, some negative that her students undergo as they respond to the food around them The novel opens as Lillian welcomes her new students The School of Essential Ingredients is a quick read focused on a Monday night cooking class held at a popular local restaurant, Lillian s Lillian herself presides over these classes and, as someone who has always had an intrinsic understanding of the power of food to heal and comfort, she eagerly awaits each new class to see the transformations some positive, some negative that her students undergo as they respond to the food around them The novel opens as Lillian welcomes her new students a beautiful woman, a happily married older couple, a harried young mother, an analytic young man, an uncertain and undefined young woman, an older woman who is losing her memory, and a damaged man Each chapter in the novel is told from the point of view of one of the students, as we find outabout their pasts, discover their reasons for taking the class, and witness how new relationships are forged Just as the ingredients in a recipe blend together to cre...I am not sure if this book can be called a culinary exercise in poetic philosophy But if it can work, then that is what I feel it is Add a touch of fairyland and a dollop of romance to it and the end result is a gentle, dreamy, adventure into vegetables and meat.Lilian runs a restaurant and offers cooking classes on Monday evenings when her business is closed Through her teachings she is changing the lives of the participants who all came for different reasons to attend the lessons They all I am not sure if this book can be called a culinary exercise in poetic philosophy But if it can work, then that is what I feel it is Add a touch of fairyland and a dollop of romance to it and the end result is a gentle, dreamy, adventure into vegetables and meat.Lilian runs a restaurant and offers cooking classes on Monday evenings when her business is closed Through her teachings she is changing the lives of the participants who all came for different reasons to attend the lessons They all come to mend, find, or understand love in their lives They are taught how to handle stress, loneliness, disappointment and loss Love is actually the essential ingredient of not only life, but also food She teaches them how to change any food into a work of love So the book is aptly titledThe...While I did finish this book, mainly to read about the food, this topic has been done before and done better, I think by Joanne Harris and Sarah Addison Allen I did not mind the magical realism I am a fan of Alice Hoffman s, after all but the writing left a lot to be desired I found the writing repetitious and the author used FAR TOO MANY SIMILES By the middle of the book I was mentally groaning every time I encountered yet another simile Another thing that annoyed me was her over use o While I did finish this book, mainly to read about the food, this topic has been done before and done better, ...When an ARC arrives at my house, it usually goes in the stack of ARCs waiting to be read But recently, I have cut down on ARC requests and have been diligently making my way through them I m pretty sure I only have one left in the stack to read So, when The School of Essential Ingredients by Erica Bauermeister arrived on Tuesday, it was serendipitous timing I had just finished Blindspot, and hadn t picked up another book yet.I started it Tuesday night, staying up way too late reading It gr When an ARC arrives at my house, it usually goes in the stack of ARCs waiting to be read But recently, I have cut down on ARC requests and have been diligently making my way through them I m pretty sure I only have one left in the stack to read So, when The School of Essential Ingredients by Erica Bauermeister arrived on Tuesday, it was serendipitous timing I had just finished Blindspot, and hadn t picked up another book yet.I started it Tuesday night, staying up way too late reading It grabbed me immediately, the food metaphors rolling around in my brain and making me hungry Bauermeister s writing is lyrical and heady, and drew me right into the stories of these strangers who come together to ...A solid 3.5 enjoyable read This was a comfort read for me A cast of characters from all walks of life with very different experiences and at very different stages all come together once a week for cooking class Of course, they learn so much .about themselves, about each other and about how to look at and experience life It was a quick and easy read, with a feel good ending For me, the food was as much a character of this ensemble cast as the others I would LOVE to find a class like A solid 3.5 enjoyable read This was a comfort read for me A cast of characters from all walks of life with very different experiences and at very different stages all come together once a week for cooking class Of course, they learn so much .about themselves, about each other and about how to look at and experience life It was a quick and easy read, with a feel good ending For me, the food was as much a character of this ensemble cast as the others I would LOVE to find a class like this I closed thi...This book was AMAZING I was hungry while reading it, and hungry forwhen I finished Congrats to Erica for writing such an amazing first novel I loved the how each chapter was a different characters point of view about their life and how they ended up in Lillian s cooking class There were some of the best pieces of advice within the page...

English
26 June 2017

Erica Bauermeister