American Taste: A Celebration of Gastronomy Coast to Coast

such a great read, I love James Villas' books on food, he is indeed an American treasure.....the book arrived in perfect condition, only wish it was available in hardcover, as I tend to be rough on my bindings

`American Taste' is the first book of culinary writer extraordinare, James Villas, who has served the exposition of American eating by producing cookbooks of Southern cuisine with his mother, major books of great American comfort foods such as casseroles and biscuits, essays on American cuisine such as this work, and a better than average book of memoir essays entitled `Between Bites'. While not as dominant a figure as either James Beard or Julia Child, he has thereby succeeded at just about every recognized form of culinary writing, especially when you add his food column which ran for decades in `Town and Country' magazine. By covering so many culinary bases, Villas has created a niche for himself in American culinary writing which is not as scholarly as John Thorne, Jeffrey Steingarten, or Paula Wolfert, less personal than Jim Harrison, better informed and more involved than Alan Richman, but with certainly the strong opinions of Harrison and Richman, with the authority of having worked full time in the field for over thirty years now. For readers just discovering this book, it is important to recognize that the essays were published over 20 years ago and were probably written in the ten (10) years before that. Therefore, they represent something of a time capsule where one can read about the culinary world of almost a generation ago when Julia Child was important but not yet deified, James Beard was the biggest influence in writing about American food, Alice Waters was still getting her bearings at Chez Panisse, Paul Prudhomme had just left Commander's Palace in New Orleans and Emeril Lagasse was still a very minor player indeed. This is also a time just before the iron grip of the culinary police grasped our food conscience and made us fearful of all things tasty due to fats, eggs, or carbs. At least, that is how Villas makes us feel, with his rapture over good French fries, pates, terrines, gumbos, and Brunswick stew. It is no surprise that Villas, a North Carolina Tarheel to his core, largely equates American cooking with Southern cooking. His very first essay deals with that paragon of Southern cuisine, fried chicken. He here claims that no one except a native Southern cook can do true justice to fried chicken and proceeds to give the gospel on how it is done. It is notable that his recipe disagrees on some important points with many other experts on Southern fried chicken I have audited, especially those with such heady credentials as Edna Lewis, James Beard, and `Cooks Illustrated' magazine. What is interesting however is not the differences, but the similarities. While Villas calls for a marinade in sour milk, acidulated with lemon juice, Lewis and `Cooks' use buttermilk, which is simply a natural sour milk. Beard also uses mild, but no acid, and all agree on the importance of cutting whole chickens rather than using precut parts and using a cast iron frying pan. I am certain that Villas' recipe will produce primo fried chicken, but