Sunday, October 28, 2007

Alice Waters reaching Oprah-atic proportions


Just wanted to call people's attention to the growing number of Alice Waters sightings. She appeared in last Sunday's New York Times Magazine (click here for the 10/21/07 article while available) where she played fridge doctor to a working mom trying to make bag-lunches fun for her two teenage boys. Like the shining fairy godmother she is, Waters got them all to roast chicken for soup stock, toast tortillas over the open stove flame for breakfast, and make gourmet meals involving aioli sauce in a half-hour.

I especially like the "before" and "after" fridge photos, though I'd like to point out that the post-Waters makeover fridge was a little out of touch with reality. From what I can tell, she did away with the milk and juice and left the wine! But I guess not everyone can be a magical food fairy. Her daughter Fanny makes my head smoke with jealousy. She's beautiful and goes (went?) to Yale (check out p. 304 of November's Elle magazine profile for pictures of their fantasy family meal. It's so idyllic, it makes me want to squirt them all with Cheeze Whiz). Back to the NYT article, there's an interesting carrot soup recipe at the end that I hope to try...

Also, this-coming Tuesday, San Francisco's City Arts & Lectures series is having a special night dedicated to "The Art of Simple Food," coincidentally the name of Waters's new cookbook. Waters is speaking with food writers Ruth Reichl and Calvin Trillin. Erin and I are going early to try to get last-minute tickets to the sold-out event. We'll let you know how it goes if we manage to get in.

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