Cynthia D. Bertelsen's Blog, page 2

The Kitchen Library

In these days of unrest, I find myself turning to things that always sustain me when life becomes overwhelming: reading and cooking. And thus I also find myself writing a new book. The Kitchen Library: Why Reading and Cooking Feed So Many Hungers will not be available for some time, but here’s the nostalgic front […]

Joy of Cooking, or, Escaping the Deluge

With politics these days reminding me of demagoguery and dictatorship, I turned to my copies of Joy of Cooking for something very different: escapism. Cooking offers me a way to flee the outside world. So, I decided to bake Buttermilk Potato Rolls. Pure joy, pure delight. If I could own only one cookbook, it would […]

The Many Permutations of Chicken

Diana Henry’s A Bird in the Hand: Chicken Recipes for Every Day and Every Mood Like many of you, I find that the daily “dinner dilemma” presents challenges. Just what is the “dinner dilemma”? It’s the dull, ongoing, everyday search for tasty-but-easy dinner menus. Dishes that don’t require hours in the kitchen, but taste as […]

Nutty as a …*

The worst gift is fruitcake. There is only one fruitcake in the entire world,and people keep sending it to each other.~~ Johnny Carson ~~ It’s like liver: either you love it or you hate it. What? Fruitcake, that’s what. I hadn’t thought about fruitcake much this year until I read my fellow food writer Gary […]

A Slice of Escapism: M.F.K. Fisher’s Provence

For a while, years ago, France’s Provence became a mecca for food writers and cooks. The stunning light, so like a winter’s morning in Florida, elevated the storied landscape to the magical. The dry air whispered possibilities as the soil sprouted lavender as far as the eye could see. The culinary luminaries flocked to the […]

A Woman of Substance

Barbara Taylor Bradford’s A Woman of Substance When life wounds or pains me, I escape into books. I always have. Lately, life insists on throwing boulders in my path, not mere stones. When that happens, I turn to books on the so-called lighter side. No Dostoevsky or Sartre for me! When news came of Barbara […]

Ina Garten’s “Be Ready When the Luck Happens: A Memoir” – A Review

Prolific cookbook author and home cook Ina Garten’s Be Ready When the Luck Happens turned out to be a fun read. So much fun that I ended up wanting all of her cookbooks, too, after borrowing two of her previous books from my local library. (A confession: I’d never paid much attention to Ina’s cookbooks, … More Ina Garten’s “Be Ready When the Luck Happens: A Memoir” – A Review

“Season of the Wolf: A Riveting Saga Set in WWII France” is Now Available

My newest book is now available. If you like WWII novels, this will be just the thing for you. Spring, 1940. The River Seine in Paris sparkles in the warm sunlight. Flowering trees along the banks of the river drop their white and pink blossoms into the swirling water below. And although the French people … More “Season of the Wolf: A Riveting Saga Set in WWII France” is Now Available

Swamp Cabbage and Sunshine: Craziest-Ever Hearts of Palm Salad Sums Up Florida’s Food History

Two baseball-sized scoops of green peanut-butter ice cream grabbed my attention right away. Resting on shredded iceberg lettuce, they were melting fast in the Florida heat. Beads of condensation dribbled across the white plate, like a pearl necklace ringing the throat of a marble Venus. Ice cream and lettuce? What a crazy combination! What sat before … More Swamp Cabbage and Sunshine: Craziest-Ever Hearts of Palm Salad Sums Up Florida’s Food History

The Paris Novel, by Ruth Reichl: A Review

Despite preordering it, I hesitated before reading Ruth Reichl’s The Paris Novel when it came out on April 23, 2024. Why? I’d given up on her previous novel, Delicious (2014), for a reason I do not recall at the moment. Did I want to invest the time in reading a novel right now? But I … More The Paris Novel, by Ruth Reichl: A Review