66 Square Feet: A Delicious Life

by Marie Viljoen

Marie Viljoen's beautiful first book draws the reader into a world of unfolding seasons, seen from the perspective of an expert gardener, cook and photographer. Each chapter is a month, divided into three New York City, the author's garden, and her kitchen, each setting the stage for a lavish seasonal menu with recipes drawn from farmers markets, wild-foraged ingredients, and produce grown on her city terrace and roof farm.Named for the size of her tiny Brooklyn terrace, and the blog it inspired, Viljoen's book is a unique perspective of the concrete jungle, where the month is known by the flowers in bloom, the vegetable in season, and the migrating birds criss-crossing a Brooklyn sky. It reveals a side of the city that few people know, and inspires a thoughtful way of living that is gaining traction in the 21st century.  Set against a backdrop of growing up in South Africa and moving to the United States, meeting her French husband, and finding a culinary and emotional home in Brooklyn, Viljoen's book is a love letter to living seasonally in the most famous city on the planet.

Genres: Cookbooks, Gardening, Cooking, Food, Nonfiction, Memoir, Food and Drink

224 pages, Hardcover

First published August 1, 2013

Reviews

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

So many reasons to buy this book. About half the book is mostly Mediterranean-inspired recipes. The remainder is stories about living, adventure, and celebration in New York City. Most recipes begin with commentaries and stories.

If you live in New York City, or did live there, or visited for a long period of time, the stories and photos in this book will take you to the City, not to the tourist spots but to its residential experience. Many photos have you on the ground, in the middle of the hubbub, viewing iconic landmarks from streets, seeing what residents see, transported.

This is also a cooking book, and a few recipes are adventuresome, either dishes outside most mainstream homecooks' repertory or using foraged ingredients. The photos make you want to try the recipes, even if they are new to you. Recipes with foraged foods use easily found ingredients, such as sumac flowerheads or Japanese knotweed. Respecting seasonality, recipes are organized by month. Coincidentally, I suspect this encourages readers to try new foods. For example, July is the month to try cold white garlic soup, with grapes. In September let's try dipping raw vegetables in hot olive oil flavored with anchovies and garlic. In December we can make cocktails from vodka we infused with sumac in August. Want to a new take on your go-to recipes? There is a chicken with olives stew in January, buttermilk mashed potatoes in February, and roast asparagus along with strawberries with prosecco in May. You can be as adventurous as you like. I plan to try one new-to-me dish each month. Which month is Ajo Blanco month? Recipes are easy to find using the book's two-page index.

Do you like gardening? In NYC, if you are lucky enough to have a terrace, even a small one--or some other small, easily accesible space--you can build a garden as lush as you want, with potted plants: perennial flowers, roses, herbs, a fig tree; grass for your big, black, Dominican cat. Viljoen was determined enough to haul bags of pea stone up four flights to pebble the terrace floor, and painted the terrace walls a vivid Benjamin Moore Roseate. Add a small table, two chairs, pillows, candles, plus linen napkins, silver silverware, china to make this the adult dinner spot. See the book cover: a reminder that dining can be a moment in paradise, with the right food, wine, setting, and people. This book is inspiring.

Viljoen's writing is crisp, clever, funny, clear. It is full of love for New York City and her home there. She is a good storyteller. I keep my cookbooks in a kitchen cupboard, but my copy of this book will be in the kitchen only on recipe nights.

[Sassy Katt · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's a beautiful book. I just didn't care for most if the recipes.

[Jill · Rating 5 out of 5]

I LOVED this book! Gardening and cooking and eating are all bound up together for me, and this book does a really wonderful job of combining them in one book. Seasonal cooking and eating is something that follows naturally from gardening, and so she divides her book into months. Each section has commentary on the weather and how it is changing, what is available at the farmer's market, what she has growing in her small New York City space, and recipes that go with what is available. I haven't made any of the recipes, yet, but they sound good and I have several marked to try. Even if I never make a recipe, this is a book that I'll be able to turn to for ideas and encouragement at different points throughout the year, and to look forward to what is coming. Her writing is also just good.

[Joana · Rating 3 out of 5]

I ordered this book from the library after I found the author's blog. Based on the blog, I was expecting that this book would be more about gardening and not so much about recipes. Not bad, just not what I was expecting.

[Karen Ballum]

It will make you hungry. It will make you look at your deck or balcony and feel inspired to grow all the things. But mostly, near the end of a long bitterly cold winter, it will make you believe spring really will come.

[lisa · Rating 2 out of 5]

This wasn't quite a memoir, and it wasn't quite a cookbook. There was very little practical advice I could use, some pretty pictures, and a lot of recipes I wasn't inspired to try. Maybe someday I will pick this book up again and like it, but not today.

[Barbara · Rating 2 out of 5]

Mostly recipes rather than small/container garden ideas or information

[Juli Anna · Rating 2 out of 5]

Very formulaic and the recipes generally did not appeal to me.

[Stephanie · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very interesting book… Even after having had it for two weeks from the library, I’m not entirely sure how I feel about it. The writing is good, but there were a number of very odd editorial choices made: for a book that is so heavily illustrated, there were scarcely any images of the actual recipes presented. Most of the colour printing and glossy paper went towards images of New York City, or farmers markets or the titular 66 square foot terrace from which the author sources her ingredients. The photos were all lovely, but when I pick up a cookbook, I really want photos of the food. I appreciate the emphasis on eating seasonally, but some of the recipes sound a little odd—even for my foodie sensibilities. Apple soup consisting of one apple which is supposed to serve four people? Crabs with black bean sauce (seasoned with ginger?) Is roast asparagus even a recipe, or just a cooking method? I’m not opposed to trying the weird sounding crab thing, but pictures to entice me to do so would have been nice.

I understand the intention to showcase seasonality, city life, and garden recipes but the production choices made with this book just didn’t get it over the finish line. I hope to read many more books that highlight seasonal eating based on what grows in the garden.

[Madelyne! · Rating 3 out of 5]

Liked this, although I would have preferred more info about her terrace garden, not just the surrounding city.

[Tessa Walker · Rating 5 out of 5]

Outstanding! So I bought one for my mum and a friend too.
I want to get her new one too. Loving her zest, knowledge and style. Pretty awesome on Insta too.
Ek hou baie van hierdie boek.

[Barbara · Rating 2 out of 5]

I liked the part about the terrace garden.

None of the recipes appealed to me.

I passed this book onto a friend who might be interested in the recipes.

[Laurie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked the photography and the forager or grow-it-yourself feature of each month.

[Mdbeltrano]

Wonderful book!

[Keke · Rating 4 out of 5]

I would have liked to see more gardening info.

[Stacey-girl · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's not what I was expecting. It's a cross between an autobiography and recipe book. I thought it would be full of ideas on how to garden in small spaces. I skimmed a lot of it.

[Jessica · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really liked how this book is laid out - the author goes month by month for a whole year featuring recipes that showcase whatever is in season that month. I also really appreciate how the author uses her 66 square foot balcony to grow as much food as she can. It just goes to show that you don't have to have 5 acres to grow some of your own food. There are definitely some recipes I want to try from this book.

[Мария Бахарева · Rating 4 out of 5]

Милая книга любящей природу жительницы Нью-Йорка, приятное чтение для тех, кто любит наблюдать за сменой времен года. Месяц за месяцем Мари рассказывает о своих садовых работах (сад контейнерный, на террасе), о том, что происходит в садах и парках города и, наконец, делится сезонными рецептами. Три главки на каждый месяц, можно прочесть подряд, а потом перечитывать помесячно. А я теперь подписалась на блог Мари, по мотивам которого и была написана книга.

[Lisa Taylor · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love reading stories about other people's lives when those lives are simple, inspiring, of another place etc. This lady blogs about her garden in New York which is on a balcony of 66 square feet. It tells about the garden, the produce, recipes and life stories and is lovely. She has since had to move from this apartment (much to her dismay) and start again in another part of New York with a bare garden.

[Karen Gates · Rating 5 out of 5]

My idea of cooking is microwave or Dominos delivering, but I may change my mind after reading Marie Viljoen's book. I also may change my mind about New York City, too. Her book is wonderful, full of beautiful pictures, wondrous prose and mouthwatering recipes which could inspire a noncooker to cook!

[Cherie · Rating 4 out of 5]

A What a delicious, wonderful book. I know I related to it more because I live in Brooklyn and garden (though I sadly don't have as much space to garden as she has - I just have my fire escape). I absolutely love the combination of recipe, gardening, memoir...beautiful writing, lovely photos, truly delicious. Oh, one bummer - many of the recipes are not vegetarian.

[Jane · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pleasant. Month-by-month in the city with a terrace garden (that's 66 square feet). An elegy to Brooklyn and Manhattan, it's completely without darkness or conflict. Lots of nice seasonal recipes. I read it when I couldn't sleep, and I found it both sweet and relaxing. Too many adjectives for my taste, but I think she was trying to convey a kind of sensuality or even ecstasy (a la William Blake).

[Lori · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a charming read based on a blog by Marie Viljoen. The book is part memoir and part food recipes. Her terrace is lovely and inspires me to plant and cultivate more plants this spring. I recommend this read.

[Shannon · Rating 2 out of 5]

More of a garden journal and memoir of the author's love of NYC than a cookbook. Might be the first "cookbook" I've ever read that didn't inspire me to try a single recipe.
Beautifully photographed and the author has a lyrical, poetic flair to her writing. However for the cookbook shelves, no.

[Laura]

Yawn ........

[Susan Black · Rating 5 out of 5]

absolutely LOVE it !

[Dee Muller]

Love this book and Marie Viljoen's blog. One day, I will go to New York and book on a foraging expedition with her.

[Betsy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a beautiful book. While many of the recipes include ingredients I've never heard of and dishes I'll never cook, the prose is lovely. The pictures are too.