Ginnie's review
Tender at the Bone: Growing Up at the Table by Ruth Reichl
I read the book because I wanted to learn more about how one goes about learning to appreciate the intricacies of food. If the only way one goes about it is by having a mother who cooks badly and with questionable ingredients, then I’m doomed to eat plainly. Reichl’s experiences of trying new foods are one-liners rather than an expression of growth and development of tastes. She comes closer to that in her writing about wine in France.
While Reichl definitely has amusing stories to tell, I wondered why she chose to continually bash her parents throughout this book. I felt pain for them and embarrassment for her. There is little understanding or acceptance of her mother’s bi-polar disease or her father’s adaptation to it. When she has a chance to better understand her father, after a boyfriend learned more about him in a few hours during his first visit than she did in her twenty years, she jumps into her conversation with her dad with resentment only to shut the conv...more
While Reichl definitely has amusing stories to tell, I wondered why she chose to continually bash her parents throughout this book. I felt pain for them and embarrassment for her. There is little understanding or acceptance of her mother’s bi-polar disease or her father’s adaptation to it. When she has a chance to better understand her father, after a boyfriend learned more about him in a few hours during his first visit than she did in her twenty years, she jumps into her conversation with her dad with resentment only to shut the conv...more
