M.F.K. Fisher, Food and Travel Writer
Fisher Takes Readers on Global Trips via the Taste Buds
Feb 1, 2009 Laura Harrison McBride
There are several books that do the “mental travel” job exceptionally well. One is reviewed below, and a few other particularly insightful ones are listed.
The Gastronomical Me by M.F.K. Fisher
Fisher, who died at age 84 in 1992, was a food writer, but part of her culinary education involved travel. She grew up in Whittier, California, bastion of such Quakers—and presumed non-gourmands—as Richard M. Nixon. Her family, however, was Episcopalian, and she was sent to quite demanding private schools. In the end, she had to leave the country to get free of abundant restrictions and experience life and eating.
Fisher could turn a steak or a phrase with equal skill. And, no matter how one feels about eating trout that was alive a few minutes before it is cooked (Truite au bleu, a staple of French cuisine), Fisher’s description of the blue-fleshed fish and its accompaniments makes one want to travel to rural France to eat that dish, or others if that’s too squeamish-making.
How to Deal with "Turista"
In The Gastronomical Me, Fisher also writes about taking a freighter from Europe to the U.S. with her young children just before World War II. Stomach ailments, due to foul drinking water on board, were normal. But she learned to always put some brandy in the drinking water…even for brushing the children’s teeth. The brandy would kill apparently kill off the little beasties in the water. It’s still good information, useful for anyplace one thinks the water might be iffy.
Patricia Storace, in The New York Review of Books, wrote that this book is, “Unique among the classics of gastronomic writing, with its glamorous but not glamorized settings, its wartime drama and its powerful love story…(it) is a book about adult loss, survival, and love.” It’s perfect for any journey.
A reader comment on Amazon.com noted:
"Being a gourmand is an enlightened point of view, a matter of personal taste. In my opinion this is Ms. Fisher’s very best book. The writing, and the personality, are exquisite. Especially in the chapter about her Father and a childhood journey, and the discovery of her crush on a fellow boarding school student (female) and her love of oysters, at the same time! Am I the only one who feels that I’ve shared all of those wonderful meals with her when I put down this book? Great to pack along when you are traveling, even if you’ve read it before!"
More Travel Books for Armchair or Airplane Reading
Other “traveling” books that offer insights valuable at home or away are:
- Under the Tuscan Sun by Frances Mayes
- A Year in Provence by Peter Mayle
- All of the Beatrix Potter books by Susan Witting Albert (particularly for traveling to England)
- Bitter Lemons by Lawrence Durrell
- The Great Railway Bazaar by Paul Theroux
MFK Fisher book cover portrait
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