Comfort Me with Apples: More Adventures at the Table

by Ruth Reichl
Comfort Me with Apples: More Adventures at the Table  
published 2002 by Random House Trade Paperbacks
binding Paperback
isbn 0375758739   (isbn13: 9780375758737)
pages 320
description Ruth Reichl's first book, the autobiographical Tender at the Bone, disarmed readers with its droll candor. The former restaurant critic of The New York Times...more
date added
12-09-06



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Alice
Alice rated it: 4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars
04/06/08

bookshelves: food
Read in April, 2008
recommends it for: people who love food
I can't be sure what I think of this book as a whole until I try some of the recipes, but the memoir parts are pretty good. I want her job! She's met some amazing chefs, including Alice Waters who is a big hero of mine. Ruth Reichl is a decent writer, funny and easy to read. The recipes sound pretty good, although they don't seem to be the main point. She gives a recipe for sweet potato pie and doesn't include a recipe for the crust. Maybe she assumes her readers know how to make a pie cru...more
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Becky
Becky rated it: 4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars
03/06/08

Read in April, 2004
recommends it for: people who like memoirs and food
This followup to Reichl's first memoir, Tender At the Bone, is as lush as its predecessor, if a little sickening as a comforting marriage splinters, a self is reinvented, and a longed-for child is gained and lost.

Though she's well-known for writing about food, Ruth Reichl is just as adept at writing about the self, particularly when the self is caught in unfamiliar, transitional phases.

In the beginning of Comfort Me With Apples, Reichl finds herself embroiled in one extrama...more
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Maudeen
Maudeen rated it: 5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars
01/14/08

Read in August, 2007



Ruth Reichl has done it again -- completely mesmerized me with a book I found hard to put down.


The current editor of Gourmet magazine goes from food critic a New West Magazine to the LA Times in this, the sequel to her first memoir, Tender at the Bone. How she reinvents herself from a hippie living in a commune in Berkeley cooking for her housemates to being one of the most respected food critics in the country is told with her usual candor, intelligence, humor, and poignancy. Her e...more
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Chelsea
Chelsea rated it: 3 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars
05/01/07

Read in February, 2007
Can I just say that I love that the prompt for these reviews is "What I learned from this book?" It's great!
Anyhow this book has a recipe for an extremely unhealthy mushroom soup which is delicious and the first thing that I ever made for myself that had mushrooms, because I had lived for 26 years pretty sure I didn't need mushrooms in my life. I don't really need them, but I bet that I will cook this soup again and enjoy it. In the book it is a soup for depressed rainy times, and...more
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Gabe
Gabe rated it: 4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars
10/18/07

Read in October, 2007
Having just read "Garlic and Sapphires", I enjoyed reading this account of how Reichl's late 20's/early 30's period led her to becoming the critic in "Garlic..."

In fact, I gained a distinct pleasure from having read "Garlic.." first, even though chronologically (both in terms of subject matter and author date) it comes afterwards. Reading "...Apples", I got to anticipate and wonder what changes would take place to bring her from where she begins to ...more
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Carissa
Carissa rated it: 3 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars
04/28/08

bookshelves: adult, listened-to-audiobook
Read in August, 2007
this is the book that comes before garlic and sapphires, which i read last month. i don’t think i liked it quite as much as garlic and sapphires, but it was ok. i wonder what it would have been like to listen to these books in the correct (chronological) order… it gives a bit more insight into her life. this book deals with her marriage falling apart and her efforts to have a baby with her second husband, as well as her development into a food critic. but there’s much less focus on the foo...more
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Camille
Camille rated it: 2 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars
04/01/08

Read in April, 2008
I read this right after its prequel, Tender at the Bone, and must admit it was a disappointment. I never hated it enough to stop reading, but the only great thing about it was learning about different kinds of food.

The rest was bla. I mean, do you have to be drunk for food to taste good? Is commitment despite discomfort out of the question these days? I could go on, but I'll refrain.

The last thing that bugged me about the book is that there was no triumph over what seemed to me the mai...more
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Tori
Tori rated it: 4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars
02/18/08

Read in February, 2008
Throughout Comfort, I imagined Reichl as someone I would love to have dinner with. The meal would, regardless of whether she introduced me to an amazing new restaurant or whipped up something in the kitchen at her commune home in Berkeley, be one to remember. Her love of food was infectious, and her relationships, dreams, and concerns felt both real and familiar. She was, simply put, someone I wanted to spend time with.

With beautiful writing, delicious descriptions of every food she encounte...more
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misha
misha rated it: 5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars
09/16/07

bookshelves: 2007, finished, greatreads, loved-it, memoirs, onedayreads
Read in September, 2007
recommends it for: anyone who loves food, and has a heart
I read this book on one part of a flight, and ended up in tears on the plane. Oh, she is such a beautiful writer, and just the type of writer that I love. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. I cannot recommend this book highly enough. I kept reading sections to my foodie husband, and it was just a delight to, on top of that, read about berkeley and boonville and truckee... living in oakland, my husband cooked at the boonville hotel, and my parents live in tahoe.

Her love stories are ...more
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Jessica
bookshelves: food
I enjoyed Ruth Reichl's three memoirs much more than I'd expected to. She'd always gotten on my nerves as the Times food critic -- I found her prose both purple and utterly solipsistic. However, in memoir format talking about herself and her personal experience of making and eating food is entirely appropriate, and her lifelong relationship with food and cooking is pretty interesting. This volume covers Reichl's diverse education and experience in food -- including everything from living in a Ba...more
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Sundry
Sundry rated it: 2 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars
09/03/07

bookshelves: nonfiction
Read in August, 2007
I liked the real foodie parts of this book, but it pretty quickly devolved into the sort of memoir where I felt somewhat aghast for Ruth’s friends, family, former and current spouses, and lovers. Yikes!

TMI!

It would have comforted me if she had stuck an apple in her mouth rather than telling me quite so much about her infidelities.

[SPOILERS….]

I don’t know why this is so…she just seemed so stupidly self-destructive at some points and yet constantly fell forward into better ...more
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Holly
10/02/07

bookshelves: yummies
Read in October, 2007
Reichl writes so well about food, you can almost taste it. And when she sticks to her food stories, it's fascinating. The story of the disintegration of her marriage was sad and well written, but less interesting for me.

I loved her stories about MFK Fisher and Danny Kaye though.

I'm now reading Garlic and Sapphires, and loving it. Mostly because I'm really into the whole evolution of restaurant criticism. I first got into reading them as an art form about 8 years ago and there really is ...more
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Gina
Gina rated it: 5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars
10/19/07

Read in January, 2005
really successful people were fucked up in their 20s, too! no, seriously... this book was courageous in its honesty, and impressive in that it effectively takes readers through a wide range of emotions. you feel excited when she feels excited, you feel an experience begin to deflate when she begins to feel it deflate, you fall in love with food when she falls in love with food. in fact, why live at all? ruth reichl has done it and summed it up very nicely for you. oh yeah. there are recipes, too...more
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Kady
06/13/07

bookshelves: favorites
Read in January, 2005
recommends it for: anyone
(see other reviews of Ruth's books under favorites)

This last book in her memoir trilogy chronicles her days as the New York Times food critic and how she would dress up in elaborate costumes so that the restaurants wouldn't know she was there (she wanted the review to be authentic).

By the time you finish all three books you feel like Ruth is your best friend. Then you realize, of course, that she's not your friend and you're a little sad. That's why you go out and buy the big fat yello...more
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Katie
Katie rated it: 4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars
11/07/07

Read in November, 2007
Now I can see that Tender to the Bone was simply an appetizer to the main course. Comfort Me With Apples is a Reichl struggling with bigger issues, taking more magnificent and exotic trips, meeting more famous people, and getting ever more personal--it doesn't hurt that the recipes are mouthwatering as well. Reichl doesn't hide her flaws from the reader, and you leave the book feeling as if you've made a new friend, the sort who will cook you a delicious dinner and drink a bottle of wine with yo...more
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Molly
Molly rated it: 4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars
09/26/07

I really liked this book and was actually sort of impressed that someone could write about all of their indiscretions and negative qualities in such a straightforward and unapologetic manner without sounding like a total monster. The amazing mushroom soup recipe included in the book is sure to give me a heart-attack later in life, but is the most delicious thing. The descriptions of foods sometimes get a little drawn out, but otherwise I loved reading her adventures as she transitioned through ...more
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Joy
05/25/07

This is the second of three books about Ruth’s life. I loved this one as much as the other two. This was a fun book to read because it reminded me of life in the 70’s and the values that were being explored. Ruth lived in a commune where one roommate recycled EVERYTHING and everyone showed up on Sundays for her great cooking. As a young woman she is married and starting her career working at Alice Water’s restaurant and getting her first food review gig. The book is also filled with great ...more
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Anna
Anna rated it: 4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars
05/06/08

Read in May, 2008
This foodie's memoir tracks her professional path from a stint as a chef living in a Berkeley commune in the 1970s to an editorial career that has landed her to the helm of Gourmet Magazine. Like any good editor, she hits the high points true and doesn't drag the reader down with excess baggage. Through her adventures in food, Reichl constructs a revealing, disarming life tale that also gives us insight into her family relationships, love life and travels around the world.
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Jessica
Jessica rated it: 2 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars
02/10/07

bookshelves: random
Read in January, 2006
recommends it for: foodies
I really enjoyed Ruth's reflections on her struggle to have a baby/adopt while exploring the impact that food and cooking have on our relationship with ourselves and loved ones. As she grows in her relationship with her mother, husband, ex-husband, and so on, her career as a writer and chef grow too, culminating in a job offer from the NY Times. A heartwarming story, and the recipies are good too, but I enjoyed her next book, Garlic and Sapphiers, much more.
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Deb
Deb rated it: 5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars
10/03/07

Read in November, 2001
recommends it for: lovers of good food writing, memoirs
This is Ruth Reichl's sequel to Tender at the Bone and is, well, maybe not as good, but certainly a great read. Reichl -- who's now editor of Gourmet magazine -- is an excellent writer who's led an interesting life. These are the kinds of essays, memoirs I, too, would love to write someday. In this book, Reichl gets into more of her adult years and drops a few names here and there, such as Wolfgang Puck and Alice Waters.
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book data (includes all editions)

avg rating (all editions): 3.93 (1170 ratings)
avg rating (this edition): 3.94 (1081 ratings)
number of reviews: 155






other editions

Comfort Me with Apples (Hardcover)
Comfort Me with Apples (Paperback)
Comfort Me with Apples: More Adventures at the Table (Hardcover)