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Lunch in Paris: A Love Story, with Recipes |  | Author: Elizabeth Bard
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Category: Book
List Price: $23.99
Buy New: $10.99
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Seller: smokymtnbooks
Rating:  47 reviews
Sales Rank: 824
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1
Pages: 336
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.1
Dimensions (in): 8.3 x 5.8 x 1.2
ISBN: 031604279X
Dewey Decimal Number: 944.361084092
EAN: 9780316042796
ASIN: 031604279X
Publication Date: February 1, 2010
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| • | ISBN13: 9780316042796 | | • | Condition: NEW | | • | Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark. |
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Product Description
In Paris for a weekend visit, Elizabeth Bard sat down to lunch with a handsome Frenchman--and never went home again.
Was it love at first sight? Or was it the way her knife slid effortlessly through her pavé au poivre, the steak'spink juices puddling into the buttery pepper sauce? LUNCH IN PARIS is a memoir about a young American woman caught up in two passionate love affairs--one with her new beau, Gwendal, the other with French cuisine. Packing her bags for a new life in the world's most romantic city, Elizabeth is plunged into a world of bustling open-air markets, hipster bistros, and size 2 femmes fatales. She learns to gut her first fish (with a little help from Jane Austen), soothe pangs of homesickness (with the rise of a chocolate soufflé) and develops a crush on her local butcher (who bears a striking resemblance to Matt Dillon). Elizabeth finds that the deeper she immerses herself in the world of French cuisine, the more Paris itself begins to translate. French culture, she discovers, is not unlike a well-ripened cheese-there may be a crusty exterior, until you cut through to the melting, piquant heart.
Peppered with mouth-watering recipes for summer ratatouille, swordfish tartare and molten chocolate cakes, Lunch in Paris is a story of falling in love, redefining success and discovering what it truly means to be at home. In the delicious tradition of memoirs like A Year in Provence and Under the Tuscan Sun, this book is the perfect treat for anyone who has dreamed that lunch in Paris could change their life.
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| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 47
 Love and Laughter With An American In Paris January 8, 2010
Marianne O. Schmidt
20 out of 21 found this review helpful
I can not say enough wonderful things about this book. I confess that I am a sucker for all things French, and any book that tells me about Paris, food and the French is a book I will treasure. I didn't read the chapters in order, necessarily, and that is what I really loved about it. Although there is a chronological time line, you can read it out of order and enjoy it just as much as if you had done it the way most people do. The chapters really stand on their own, and the writing was delightful. It was tender, sassy, and kind, but honest. Ms. Bard clearly loves France, but she doesn't hold back from offering critiques either. I like her honesty, and I like that it was tempered with affection and humor. These are the stories that a friend would tell you, and make you laugh and think about, long after the covers are closed, and the book is sitting on a shelf. This is not a book that will, or should, sit on a shelf. It is part philosopher, part lover, part friend, and part chef. I loved the fact that the recipes are generally simple and good, and things that the French themselves eat, and are not show off or Haute Cuisine. Ms. Bard fell in love with a guy and with France, and she got both. Hats off to her. She made me feel like part of the family with her stories; this book is infectious and really invades your consciousness, and makes you want to read it. I would definitely give her high marks for voice, style and content. The only disappointment with my copy of the book, was the binding. The first time I opened it, one of the pages nearly fell out. I felt that the publisher let us down by putting up with such shoddy workmanship. I love this book enough to buy copies for my daughter and daughter-in-law, but I will warn them to handle it with care! It does detract from the joy of reading when you have to handle a book as gingerly as if you were holding a baby. It's a real shame that the book wasn't put together better, because it is one that you will want to read and savor more than once.
Enteraining, easy, good fun January 25, 2010
Kristine Hale (Utah)
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
I have secret fantasies of living in France, of shopping for food at the local market, heading over to the butcher and then whipping it all together in my quirky ancient apartment. But reality keeps me lodged firmly in my desert home, so I devour stories about other people living my fantasy with relish. Lunch in Paris is the perfect escape.
Lunch in Paris is the story of a New York gal falling in love and leaping across an ocean to live with the object of her affection. The story weaves back and forth between France, New York and the UK, between passion, food and fashion. Beautifully written and a pleasure to read, Bard manages to be both frothy and light, intelligent and observant. She isn't blinded by love (for France or her lover) and expertly slashes at bureaucracy and frivolity with equal humor.
My single complaint - and one that doesn't warrant a lower star ratings - was the recipes at the end of each chapter. I hate novels with recipes peppered in (except anything written by M.F.K. Fisher - the woman could do no wrong). I can never find a recipe when I am looking for it, it is difficult to reference a novel while cooking and it is so often unnecessary. This book is no exception. The recipes are delicious and easy to make, but they are totally unnecessary and often don't even relate all that well to the preceding chapter. Ah well, I'll just consider them to be an added bonus to a book well worth having all on its own.
Hugely enjoyable, also thought provoking... February 1, 2010
Storytime (UK)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
This is a terrific book. It is a memoir of the Author's move to Paris as she meets and gets to know her new boyfriend and as their relationship develops and he becomes her husband. But it is much more than this, it evokes the author's past, family (both real and chosen), in-laws and the reasons why they all have arrived where they are today. It is gentle, but also raw, passionate and angry at times. The descriptions of living within, and yet on the fringes of a different culture are so well expressed and resonate deeply for me. Small things become both joys (the perfect croissant) and frustration (bureaucracy). The need to connect and engage within a culture where you are without the rules is difficult to experience and more difficult to express fluently and coherently. The book is honest about her lonely times, and her struggles to adapt, but is leavened by the small and great triumphs she enjoys... lunch in a cafe, reading her first french book with fluency... I have been absorbed, transported, emphasised with the author and resented having to put it down to carry on with my normal life. Thank you for this glimpse into your life Elizabeth! I can't wait to get home to try the recipes, many of which are written with an emotional context. I think french onion soup will be first. Can we have a recipe for the chicken broth too please? It has also changed my eating habits. I was very struck by the different attitude to food that the french have, and have consciously changed my habits as a result. I feel better, and am losing weight!
Paris...food....recipes....what's not to love? February 7, 2010
Colleen M. Schneider (San Lorenzo, CA USA)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
I loved this book. First of all I have a soft-spot for Paris, having gone there a few years back and love to read books that are set there, remembering some of the places that we visited and soaking myself into the culture.
Elizabeth Bard's book is wonderful, she has an easy style, like she is chatting with a girlfriend. At the beginning of the book she is living in London and making trips to see her French boyfriend. As the story goes on they decide to move to Paris and so she closes her former life in New York to start her new life in France. She is excited, but a bit unsure....visiting is one thing, but to actually live there, well, that is a whole different thing.
I enjoyed reading about how she begins to learn to cook in the French style, how to shop like the Parisians and how she assimilates into the culture, going from just another American to someone who is more of a "local". The stories are basically about her and her new husband, their family and in-laws and her day to day pursuits and learning to make friends in her new country and embrace her new home. It isn't a perfect fit at first, and that is maybe what makes the book so good, it isn't all sewn up. She isn't sure of things, she isn't sure what to do all the time, she isn't sure how to fit in or even how to go about taking back a pair of shoes to the store because she doesn't have a huge french vocabulary.
Interspersed throughout the book are recipes. I LOVE this part. She loves to eat and cook (me too!) and I am currently tagging many pages with her recipes to try. Pastries are kind of my thing, so I want to try the Chouquettes, little pastries with powdered sugar, also for the summer, a recipe for Tabouleh (couscous salad), and rice pudding with drunken raisins (mmmm!)I also want to make her Grandma's Mandel Bread (like a biscotti) and the eggplant stuffed with quinoa, and what could be an easier dessert than lemon sorbet with vodka. Elizabeth, you are my kind of girl! I found myself tagging quite a few pages to look at later.
As the story progresses you get to peak into Elizabeth's marriage to Gwendal and how planning her parisian wedding becomes quite the little "adventure".
What a fun book this was. I was completely engaged. As I said, Paris, food, and her recipes....really, what is not to love? A good book, a fun read and a book that I will be definitely using for a few recipes as well.
If you love Paris, love food and love a good story, pick up Lunch in Paris and sit back and enjoy....(with a glass of wine of course...it's good for the heart!)
Delightful and Delicious February 8, 2010
poltroon (Mendocino County, CA USA)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
I chose this novel because it sounded like a light romance with food. I was pleasantly surprised to find it informative and useful as well as a pleasant, entertaining read.
Elizabeth Bard tells of her courtship with Gwendal, a frenchman who eventually becomes her husband. The relationship goes a little slower than is implied from the back of the book, as Elizabeth commutes to see him from London for several months. Eventually she takes the plunge and moves in with him full time, gaining the love of her life but also gaining Paris and France as part of the deal, for the good and the bad. The food, she loves. The amazing things that come from Gwendal's tiny kitchen with a bare refrigerator and two portable burners astound her. The fact that she cannot work in France and that she is very isolated, not so much. The writing is witty and inviting. I found the anecdotes of ordinary life in Paris to be compelling.
I've never been particularly interested in visiting Paris before reading this memoir - it always felt overrated to me. But after reading this account of the day to day aspects of France, the little and big, I was left with a definite desire to experience Paris for myself. The little tidbits about differences between French and American culture were illuminating and are filed away in the back of my brain for reference. The French phrases dropped within the text were always given context and explained, expanding my extremely tiny French vocabulary a hair. She writes vividly about the frustration and triumphs of living in a new place, with a new language, finding herself unable to complete transactions at first due to a failure of vocabulary. What is the French word for parsnip, anyway?
Gwendal felt curiously offstage for most of the memoir, which keeps it in my mind from being a romance of any kind. Perhaps it's not so curious but in fact a close reflection of the truth, that most of Elizabeth's thinking and writing time would be when Gwendal was away at work. Perhaps that's just an artifact of the challenge of writing about real people without overly invading their privacy. It was interesting to feel his sensibilities become more American over time as Elizabeth's became more French.
Each chapter is followed by 2-3 recipes, generally food that was either mentioned as something made or eaten during the story. I decided it would be remiss of me to review this book without trying any of the recipes, so, as a grand sacrifice (wink), I decided to whip up "Gwendal's Quick and Dirty Chocolate Soufflé Cake" (Gateau au Chocolat). It took longer than the 20 minutes I expected (in retrospect she said, _bake_ not _make_) but this simple concoction of chocolate, coffee, eggs, sugar, and salt was everything she said it would be - easy, sophisticated, and fabulous. The other recipes look wonderful, too: mostly everyday, non-fussy recipes that open up new windows of cooking technique, though some are longer and more formal. I have several more marked to try. The narrative makes them more interesting and special than a typical cookbook, where you often have some trouble getting a sense of what an unfamiliar dish will be like. Here, her descriptions of making and eating and enjoying them go a long way toward making each recipe more approachable.
As a standalone piece of literature, the proper rating is probably 4 stars - delightful, worth reading, but not Great Literature. As a hybrid memoir and cookbook, I think it is quite successful. I give it an extra half star for exceeding my expectations, and a final half star for the delicious and simple chocolate soufflé cake that is definitely a keeper for my repertoire. I recommend it and plan to keep my copy close at hand.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 47
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