Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

An Unexpected Delight

Indian(-ish), Recipes and Antics from a Modern American Family by Priya Krishna and Ritu Krishna

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Early in the morning a friend and I go on a walk together over the phone. It gets us out of the house, something we both need, me because I no longer have a bossy dog who insists and her because she is working from home because pandemic. Yesterday morning as we walked and talked, I noticed a brand new Free Little Library, just two houses up from mine. There were only 3 books in the library, but I knew that would change. I gathered […]

Kitchen Staple/Bingo Blackout

I’m Just Here for the Food by Alton Brown

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Cbr12bingo How To, BINGO BLACKOUT I’ve had this book on the shelf for nearly 2 decades. It was published in 2002 (with a version 2 published in 2006), and I’m sure I got it soon after it came out. My husband and I were (and are) great fans of Alton Brown and loved “Good Eats” when it aired. We learned so much from Alton Brown, notably how to make the best chocolate chip cookies and how to make gravy from roux. Brown is an engaging […]

It’s not easy being green (CBR12Bingo 2: Green)

Eating Animals by Johnathan Safran Foer

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” I can’t believe how much we have in common. We’re both studying the environment, we’re both utterly humorless about our vegetarianism, and we both love the Rolling Stones. Yes, not For their music, but for their tireless efforts to preserve historic buildings.” This book is Lisa Simpson and Hugh Parkfield in a nutshell. Because eating animals is wrong. So horribly, horribly wrong. In Simpsons arcana, the episode that follows this one establishes that Lisa is in fact a vegetarian, but that episode finds Apu […]

Emotions +Sight + Sound + Mouthfeel + Aroma + Taste = Flavor

The Flavor Equation: The Science of Great Cooking Explained by Nik Sharma

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I didn’t recognize Nik Sharma’s name when I requested to review The Flavor Equation: The Science of Great Cooking Explained, but a few minutes of research reminded me that I have enjoyed his cooking blog in the past – A Brown Table. His recipes are thoughtful and creative and his food photography is spectacular. I recommend him as a follow on Instagram and Twitter as well. I received this as an arc from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. The Flavor Equation sits in […]

How to do it (better than you) (CBR12Bingo2: how to)

Cooking by Michael Pollan

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Man, this is a good contender for the color square too because boy howdy can Michael Pollan’s writing turn to purple prose at times. I love reading about food, much to my coworker’s confusion, and particularly books like this, that view cooking as a whole rather than a collection of recipes. I know that reading about food is like dancing about architecture, to borrow from Frank Zappa, but when Pollan waxes poetic at times I wanna roll my eyes. It doesn’t help that Pollan can […]

Finally Giving Credit Where It Is Due in the US Cooking Scene

The Jemima Code: Two Centuries of African American Cookbooks by Toni Tipton-Martin

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CBR Bingo Review #I’ve lost track: UnCannon I was thinking about using N.K. Jemisin’s Fifth Element here, but then I figured that was actually somewhat in my wheelhouse as it’s fantasy and queer. Not so much my standard wheelhouse is American History non-fiction. To make it palatable, I found what’s basically history via thing I do like: cookbooks. Scholar and cookbook collector Toni Tipton-Martin is not old (she’s later middle aged, about 60), not white (African American), and not a man. When I was checking […]



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