An Extravagant Hunger: The Passionate Years of M.F.K. Fisher
As America's preeminent food writer and culinary grande dame, M.F.K. Fisher influenced our finest chefs, culinary writers, and legions of rabid readers and eaters. In An Extravagant Hunger, we learn how Fisher birthed the genre of food writing. Fisher's career began in the 1930s and spanned decades, her glittering prose blending musings on food, love, sex, and the pleasures of eating well and reveling in the senses. With dozens of books including Consider the Oyster, How to Cook a Wolf and The Gastronomical Me, Fisher pioneered an entirely new sensibility, daring to suggest that food be enjoyed sensually. In this age of celebrity chefs and reality food programming, her essays return the conversation to the simple, often intensely personal experience of food and dining—whether it's a five-course affair or the mysteries of the fried egg sandwich.
An Extravagant Hunger: The Passionate Years of M.F.K. Fisher traces Fisher's own appetites -- both professional and private, through painstaking research and her private papers and correspondence. In it, the author unearths Fisher's dramatic personal life, a story not told in her published autobiographical work. It offers readers a profound understanding of the legendary food writer and her work.
An Extravagant Hunger was reviewed in many publications including: The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Publisher's Weekly, Library Journal, San Francisco Magazine and San Francisco Weekly.