Book Review: United States of Arugula

I've been working on this book for quite a while:

Here's my review.

I think a large part of why it took so long is that this book is dense.  If you're not already very into food culture, I expect you'll have a bit of a learning curve, as I did.  For example, I knew of some of the later chefs, like Emeril Lagasse (mentioned only in later chapters) and Anthony Bourdaine (ditto).  I also knew of some of the earlier pioneers, such as Julia Child (duh) and Alice Waters.

But I'd never heard of James Beard or Craig Claiborne before.  And the same goes for many of the other people flying around.

That said, the book was a fascinating look at changes in foodie culture over the last 70 years or so.  For those wondering, it really focuses on the increase in gourmet and "picky eating" in general.  It doesn't really get into other topics, such as the rise of fast/prepared food.  For that sort of thing, go read Michael Pollan--he has a new book out which, while it may give impractical advice, gives out some good ideas.

In fact, I think that when David Kamp, the author, gets on that soapbox, the book suffers for it.  After a long read of evenhanded history, the last chapter gets a bit preachy.   I suppose that's to be expected when writing a history of something that's ongoing, i.e., here's where we're going.  But it seems like this is the one place that the author drops the neutral journalistic style.  Maybe it's just because I'm a critical reader, but it just didn't work for me.

Bottom line: if you have some time and can handle some sometimes-dense non-fiction, I recommend The United States of Arugula.

Tune in tomorrow to learn what I'm reading next.