Publisher : Tantor Media
Publication Date : 2010 03 08
>> Food as healing Where
Many of the official reviews for this book describe it as how food helped the author heal I realized about 3/4 the way through the book that that was not going to happen She begins each chapter with descriptions of food and then proceeds to tell another piece of her husband s problems without really connecting the 2 I say her husband s because this does seem to be about him and her reaction to him She suffered a terrible beating in the line of her work as well and also the suicide of her mother Her husband s reaction to these events appears to be non existant I found it very hard to be sympathetic to him or to her for that matter and in general I have great sympathy for people suffering from depression
I do believe that sitting down to home cooked meals is tremendous nourishment for the soul but she never really gets into that as a method of dealing with her husband s illness and recovery in any direct specific way
I ve given this book 2 stars because it s okay not terrible but it s nothing I would ever recommend
>> GENTLY AFFIRMING
Move over Elizabeth Gilbert
This is one tender story of one couple s sojourn in Italy and its healing power on their marriage
Not since Vanauken s A Severe Mercy has such a wonderful celebration of marriage been presented
A sweet gentle read
>> Food and cooking everywhere but not a recipe in sight
Well except in the first Comment
Paula Butturini and John Tagliabue met and and lived in Rome in the 1980s Like many of us their early romance was enhanced by shared cooking and meals Tagliabue was assigned to Warsaw and just before their wedding Butturini was badly beaten during the Velvet Revolution in Prauge Her husband was shot during the uprising against Ceausescu nearly died and fell into a deep depression
They returned eventually to Rome ghostlike to play the one wild card we possessed our love for Rome and the rituals we clung to there all involving nourishment of one sort or another Tagliabue s depression seems to have moderated from time to time through the endless rounds of cooking and eating the text reminds me of the joyous eating celebrated by A J Leibling in Europe and memorialized in books like A J Liebling The Sweet Science and Other Writings The Earl of Louisiana / The Jollity Building / Between Meals / The Press Library of America No 191
In the end though Butturini finds that she is healed by food All of us cook I think in part to feed our daily hunger but just as important and perhaps more so we cook and eat to feed our spirits to keep us all in the same orbit of life
As a caregiver myself many passages of this book resonated with me making my corned beef dinner yesterday was a pleasant interlude and eating it with my wife and son an even happier one
I would have like to see some of Butturini s recipes in this book and I ve taken the liberty to add two from her blog in the first Comment I enjoyed her style of writing these recipes they add a welcome element of happiness to my memory of her rather grim book
If you are struggling with depression or a loved one is you may find this brave memoir of great value I did
Robert C Ross 2010
Addendum Writing this review made me reflect on how important food is in the courting process somehow feeding a loved one seems to enhance the romance When I started dating my wife I took her to a number of fancy restaurants but realized to my horror on the third or fourth date that I had only enough money for half the bill
She bailed me out not for the first time and suggested that we should start to eat dinners at my apartment it would save me lots of money and the food would be just as good Turned out to be absolutely true and the ambience wasn t bad either Forty years on we are still cooking and eating together I wonder how important food was in that equation B
