Taste: My Life Through Food

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So often I could picture Tucci with his sly wit and slightly curmudgeonly manner telling me these stories. (He loves poking fun at Meryl Streep, too.) Taste really was just an all-around fantastic reading experience that made me so hungry, and I, well, devoured it in no time. I’m not sure what to say about this book. It’s definitely not what I was expecting because I was expecting so much more.

We are glad you made it Stanley, and we love you. Your book is wonderful, and I highly recommend it. Describing Stanley Tucci wife, Felicity Blunt, cooking roast potatoes and complete confusion when they watch her boiling, fluffing them up and covering in goose fat.

Table of Contents

My name is Larry and I love food. I mean, seriously. I love to read about it, I love to cook it, and I seriously love to eat it. Most of the memoirs I’ve read have been written by chefs or have been about people’s love of food, so when I saw Stanley Tucci (one of my favorite actors) had written this book, I jumped on it like I would a buffet. (Hey, #fatboysgottafat.) Not sure why I was turned off at the part where his father moved his family to Italy so that the father could study art. Apparently his Italian American family was better off than mine as my parents didn’t see Italy until mid 70’s and they certainly never lived there!

Z eppole are deep-fried balls of a dough made with flour and, sometimes, mashed potatoes. The sweet version, dusted with sugar, are often filled with pastry cream, like the more famous cannoli. The savoury version, favoured in Calabria, in southern Italy, may contain anchovies, and go down very well indeed with a martini, or a glass of something cold, fizzy and unforgivably expensive. His humor is readily apparent, though he also has had his share of suffering. Ones life is never all peaches and cream and though his seems at time magical, the food he's eaten, the places he's been and the friends he has made, there is plenty of bad with the good. My bad I guess because I was hoping for more funny similarities about Italian Americans growing up! He has travelled through many countries, and it was interesting to hear about his encounters with numerous famous and not so famous chefs and restauranteurs, as well as his descriptions of the locales. He also provides an insiders view of the behind the scenes workings of movie sets and the actors, actresses, producers and directors he has worked with over his long career. Favorite chapters were when he talked about his shoots on films in different countries. The food that was provided. I think Iceland, surprisingly to him and me, was Iceland. The chapter when he talks about his family having to be isolated together due to Covid. Two young children, four over 18, himself and his wife. I was exhausted just reading about it.Taste is a reflection on the intersection of food and life, filled with anecdotes about growing up in Westchester, New York, preparing for and filming the foodie films Big Night and Julie & Julia, falling in love over dinner, and teaming up with his wife to create conversation-starting meals for their children. Each morsel of this gastronomic journey through good times and bad, five-star meals and burnt dishes, is as heartfelt and delicious as the last. If the title doesn't give it away, the book takes us through Stan's life with a big emphasis on food. We get to learn about how he explores different cities through cuisine when on location for a movie, how his Italian family cooked all the time, what he ate while living in New York as a struggling actor. Here's what I learned. I speed my audiobooks up so it only took me about 4 hours of listening and I couldn’t listen fast enough and had it on at every opportunity (walking, cooking, shower, dishes, washing). con Zucchine alla Nerano — SERVES 4 — About 16fl oz sunflower oil or vegetable oil, or, if you choose, olive oil 8 to 10 small zucchine (courgettes) 75g chopped fresh basil Sea salt to taste Extra virgin olive oil 500g spaghetti 200g grated Parmigiano-Reggiano • Put the sunflower oil in a large pot and bring to a low boil over medium-high heat. • Slice the zucchine into thin rounds and fry in the oil until they are golden brown. Remove and set aside on paper towels. • Sprinkle with basil and salt. • Transfer to a bowl and drizzle liberally with olive oil. • Boil the pasta until al dente and strain, reserving about two cupfuls of the pasta water. • Place the cooked pasta in a large pan or pot over low heat along with the zucchine mixture and combine gently. Add the pasta water, a little at a time, to create a creamy texture. You may not use all of the pasta water. Now add some of the Parmigiano to the mixture and continue to combine by stirring gently and tossing. When the mixture has a slight creaminess, remove from the stove and serve immediately. Note: The zucchine mixture can be refrigerated for about 5 days for use at a later date. Best to bring it to room temperature before using.” From award-winning actor and food obsessive Stanley Tucci comes an intimate and charming memoir of life in and out of the kitchen.