Unforgettable: The Bold Flavors of Paula Wolferts Renegade Life by Emily Kaiser Thelin

Unforgettable: The Bold Flavors of Paula Wolferts Renegade Life Reviews

• 
  Mary

  The Gist
  What the cookbook is: A beguiling biography about the quirky and colorful Paula Wolfert, told through stories, photographs, and recipes.
  What the cookbook is not: A run-of-the-mill reference style cookbook.
  Who this book is best suited for: Anyone who enjoys reading about colorful, food-loving, memorable pioneers.
  Three words to sum it up: My new favorite.
  
  This book had me at “Good food is memory”. It is a theme of Emily Kaiser Thelin‘s biography about Paula Wolfert, wherein the author tells the story of the Couscous Queen, starting with her humble beginnings living in Brooklyn and ending with her third act, living with Alzheimer’s. Paula, who's been marching to the beat of her own drum since her childhood, is the most influential female chef most people have never heard of. Before reading this book, [as a food lover, I am ashamed to say] I didn’t know that I knew who Paula was. Twenty pages in, I was reminded that I've seen her writing and recipes before.
  
  Thelin's documentation in Unforgettable spares no detail. Her writing is loquacious; sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Occasionally, I felt like I was paying more attention to her voice than what she was trying to say. Though I found it to be irksome, it doesn’t detract from the overall body of work. In fact, I read the book cover to cover.
  
  I feel like I know Paula from the photographs and scanned memorabilia framing pages of each chapter. I want so badly to invite her to my house to teach me to cook and share her stories in-person. Among her accomplishments, Paula lived among the Beats in Morocco and caught the professional eye of one James Beard in the 50s. She assembled Columbia House party boxes in the 70s. And she assimilated into Moroccan, French, and Eastern Meditteranean cultures to bring their foodways into the then-modern American kitchen.
  
  Not only are the stories utterly captivating, but the recipes are mouth-wateringly documented and photographed. Paula's perspicacity and attention-to-detail undoubtedly brought a little spice (forgive the pun) into stateside kitchens and influenced the way Americans cook. See for yourself with the three page cassoulet recipe.
  
  Being someone who studies old cookbooks, I was surprised to see how timeless Paula’s recipes are. The ingredient lists are without processed ingredients or questionable pairings — something you can’t say about the vast majority of mid-century recipes.
  
  It was tough narrowing down which recipes to try from this cookbook because every single one looked out of this world. Because I wanted a lunch menu, I settled on Ćevapčići (pronounced Che-VAHP-chi-cee), Turkish Yogurt Sauce, and Deconstructed Hummus. Each of these recipes had the common thread of a healthy dose of a garlic-salt paste, made by pounding the two ingredients together with a mortar and pestle. The flavors, especially in the yogurt sauce and hummus, were robust and fresh. The directions were easy to follow and didn't take too much time or kitchen equipment, reason enough to sing its writer's praises.
  
  The time you spend reading is time you'll spend getting to know a vibrant, pioneering woman through her life's stories and her recipes. Subsequently, it's time you're sure to spend mending a broken heart when it hits you that such a bright, beautiful mind is now blotted by Alzheimer’s. More than anything, it will remind you why it's so important to feed your stomach and your soul with food (from near and far) and family (by blood or by bond) during your short stint on earth.  Reading this book, and eating your way through it, is an experience that is surely unforgettable.
  
  I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
• 
  Sally McComas

  A great life story with some of Paula's best recipes. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. It's one of those books that you miss your daily contact with, when you have finished.
• 
  Sara Fitzgerald

  I stumbled onto this book when I was purchasing one of Wolfert's early cookbooks for a friend. The biography is a fascinating story of her career as a cookbook writer, and how she traveled the world to learn more about foreign cuisines and ingredients before it was fashionable to do so. The book features a number of her key recipes, and tells the story behind them, and illustrates them with beautiful photographs, as well as photographs of Wolfert and her friends over the course of her life. Sadly, she has been diagnosed with Alzheimer's, and so the final chapters detail how her life has changed, but the steps she took to try to preserve her old self as long as possible. After reading this book, I went out and ordered another of the Wolfert cookbooks.
• 
  Danita

  A friend recommended this book and although I've heard of Paula Wolfert I was not familiar with her life or specialties. I really enjoyed the books and recipes plus learning about her adventurous life. She was truly a chef who discovered many foods, spices before they became mainstream.
• 
  Phyllis

  This is a special book - and not an easy one to describe. It contains recipes, all with gorgeous color photos, discusses cooking techniques and ingredients, but is so much more than a cookbook. It can be considered a biography of legendary food authority Paula Wolfert, an amazing and creative woman who researched food, flavors, and recipes from various countries never before explored for their unique dishes. Her enthusiasm for flavors and for preparing food authentically became the impetus for several food "movements" - couscous and other uncommon grains, kale and other unusual greens, foraging, slow food, Mediterranean cooking, and more. It is also a fascinating history of the development of food knowledge and U.S. food trends from the 1960's to the 2000's. But in addition, the topic of memory is woven throughout the book, beginning with the title "Unforgettable." This is poignant because Paula was diagnosed with dementia in 2013, which the reader doesn't learn until close to the end of the book. The author was able to spend an enormous amount of time with Paula, and the result is this wonderful book.
• 
  Jessica

  I didn't know what to expect with this book and I will admit I didn't know who Paula Wolfert was either, but after reading this memoir/cookbook I feel like I should have known who she was because she was a pioneer in the food world. The book is organized around her life with recipes at the end of each chapter, but it's not really a cookbook - more of a memoir with recipes included. Wolfert is now suffering from dementia, but cooking and eating bring back many fond memories. Wolfert was living abroad when her husband left her with two young children. She pretty much created a career for herself exposing Americans to, at the time, rare and exotic cuisines. She even worked for Columbia House creating subscribers monthly boxes with recipes and ingredients to create a dinner party with a specific country theme - an idea well ahead of it's time. She would travel to various countries and embed herself with local women and then create a cookbook around that country's cuisine. The author of 9 cookbooks she was the main impetus of bringing now-common ingredients and cuisines to Americans. While the book is huge and the print somewhat small, her story is truly Unforgettable and worth reading.
  
  Some quotes I liked:
  
  "[Columbia Records] The music subscription service was about to launch an epicurean program called International Home Dining. Paula was promptly hired to help run it. A kind of Blue Apron or Sun Basket of its day, the service sent subscribers a box every month or so containing everything they'd need to throw a dinner party from a different country: an album of music from that country (of course), plus a half-dozen illustrated recipes, printed invitations, a four-page newsletter, a battle plan for the cooking, and a half-dozen harder-to-find ingredients and necessary equipment (think a basic cleaver and wok). Each box cost $9.95 plus shipping and handling, about $60.00 in today's dollars - a bargain now but a bit steep in 1969." (p. 61)
  
  Paula embraced technology, "...she developed unparalleled recipes for all of them tailored for the Cuisinart. For years to come, Cuisinart founder Carl Sontheimer sent new models of his machine to Paula from time to time." She also purchased one of the first word processors, "Paula spent $4,000 (about $14,500 in today's dollars) to purchase a Lexoriter from Otterson's husand, who helmed the Lexor Corporation, an early computer company." (p. 120)
  
  "She wished people would be a little bit more willing to cook, if only to preserve all the bounty. She told Edible San Francisco magazine, 'When I lived in Morocco, all summer long people were making food for the winter. That's something that we don't even think about anymore - making jarred food.'" (p. 267)
• 
  MaryJo

  I felt that Thelin tried to do several different things in this book, with mixed results. Wolfert is a fascinating person, and a real pioneer in American cooking. At the time of the writing of this book she was suffering from dementia, yet food memories were among her strongest ones. So the book is a biography written in collaboration with Wolfert, with attention to the issues of dementia and memory loss in the telling of the story. I found this hybrid a little less satisfying than some of the other food memoirs I have read. Perhaps less intimate? At the same time, it is a terrific introduction to Wolfert's cooking, with gorgeous photographs, and details recipes at the end of each chapter. The chapters are chronological, and recipes start with the Ajvar made by her Balkan grandmother--awake with flavor in comparison to the food her mother cooked, and which she rediscovered when traveling--and eating--in the Balkans. The last three chapters are about her life in Sonoma, when she could no longer travel. The recipes are inviting, with the meticulous attention to detail that Wolfert is famous for and beuatiful photographs. My friend Maurita brought Wolfert to me attention about twenty years ago, when she loaned me her copy of Greens and Grains. Although according to Thelin, it was not a big seller, I found it fascinating, and eventually got my own copy. I also own The Slow Mediterranean Kitchen, although I can't say that I have cooked lot from either of them. I was not unfamiliar with this food--a many page spread in the Chicago Tribune in the 1970s had me making tagines, and even bstilla for special occasions. Listening to this account of Paula Wolfert's life as she followed flavor and then brought it back to cooks in the US has me getting out the books again. How different it is now when these exotic ingredients are known and available. It was fascinating to hear the ways she was and yet was not part of the food establishment first in New York and later on in California. She left NY with her first husband and child to live in Morocco, and was in and out of the US throughout her life. She had a facility with languages, and her early career is marked by her charming her way into the kitchens of the best cooks in towns and villages, sometimes in very remote places, and cooking with whoever knew the most about the food specialties. One fascinating story is of the time she and her husband went to Soviet sphere Syria, guests of a general for a three week trip to research the food. Her hotel rooms were bugged, and their host, the general, was known as a antisemite and a sexual predator. Still, she got her recipes. One gets the sense that for Paula it was always about the food. She was not an organizer or an institution builder. To the extent that she contributed to changing the ways we think about food, it was by sheer force of her recipes. Even though her cookbooks were not always commercial successes, they maintained an integrity to the cuisines. She was always looking for the next place to explore, the new flavors to savor.
• 
  Christina

  I met Paula Wolfert a number of years ago at a conference at the CiA-Greystone. She was inexplicably rude. Now I know why. Dementia is shitty.
  
  Reading this book filled in a wide gap in my knowledge of the American food and food media landscape of the last 50 years. Read "The United States of Arugula," then read this.
  
  While some of these recipes will never make it to my kitchen (they may be good but I currently don't have days, let alone hours to cook a meal, let alone a single dish), I loved reading through them and appreciate her abilities as a researcher in tracking them down and reporting them. I love that Mourad Lahlou used her Morocco cooking book as a reference before launching his first restaurant. That alone, is enough of a statement about Wolfert's abilities in capturing a region's cuisine.
• 
  Debbi

  Paula Wolfert has had a fascinating life. I found myself wishing this book had been a memoir, sadly the subject is battling Alzheimer's disease. I am reminded of how difficult it is to write a biography of a living subject. This book is a description of events in the life of an extraordinary woman yet I was never immersed in her story or in the incredible places Wolfert travelled. The author seemed like she didn't want to delve too deeply into any sensitive subjects. I'm glad however Paula's story has been documented. She is a true talent. The format of the book is interesting it's printed on heavy stock and feels like a cookbook. The recipes are wonderful and the photography is lovely. It will have a place among my well used Paula Wolfert cookbooks.
• 
  Sylvia Johnson

  I didn't know the name Paula Wolfert but I did enjoy the Moroccan cooking she inspired in the 70's. I am so glad the author revived her name and I enjoyed learning about her life especially its beginnings with the beats and now that she battles Alzheimer's. She married and her mother suggested cooking lessons so she ended up at classes given by Dione Lucas, first female graduate of Cordon Bleu in Paris. From there she was a protégé of James Beard but given the opportunity to be a chef at the Four Seasons, she turned him down which led to a falling out. I marveled that she followed her own path throughout her life exploring the home cooking of Morocco, France, Catalonia, and other places. She was down to earth and quite of full of life and continues to be.
  
• 
  Ambur Taft

  The recipes are pretty intense, as far as procuring ingredients and work load, but they are lovely.
  The story of Paula Wolfert’s life is fantastic. And the information on Dementia and foods that can help and hurt is great, especially connecting with loved ones with dementia through cooking and flavors.
• 
  Paula

  This is a nicely written, somewhat nostalgic biography of Chef Paula Wolfert, who at 78 is living in California and suffering from dementia. The books chronicles her adventuresome life, her fascinating professional path, and deals with her issues of aging and dementia. It includes recipes from each period - and international destination - of her life. I enjoyed the narrative - and the recipes.
• 
  Eden

  A wholly enjoyable collection of memories, photos, and delicious (!) recipes from food writer Paula Wolfert, set against her dementia diagnosis in her late 60's - a sort of curated potpourri of her approach to life, told by a good friend and fellow food writer, against the ticking clock of lost memories.
• 
  Walter Underwood

  Some of the recipes are very challenging, some are approachable, and all look delicious. But the heart of this book is Paula's life, and what a life. I'd try and summarize it, but the story is in the texture.
• 
  Ethnea Ferguson

  Paula Wolfert is truly amazing...traveling all over the world to discover food, recipes, cooking methods...she was unstoppable. I used to subscribe to Food & Wine magazine, and I remember her articles - a combination of travel, exotic places and recipes!
• 
  Caroline

  Haven't tried any of the recipes yet. Appreciated the tips at end for warding off dementia. A shame that Wolfert didn't have the following that she deserved, that many of her books are no longer in print. Perhaps she didn't have as big as an ego as Diana Kennedy, Colman Andrews...
• 
  Linda

  4.5
• 
  Melissa

  A poignant read, as Paula struggles with dementia and the loss of self after a lifetime of culinary discovery. Her wonder at the joy of eating delicious food should inspire us all.
• 
  Margo Peggy

  I wasn’t sure at first but then so enjoyed Paula’s brave approach to life and the depth of her passion for food.
• 
  Chad Waite

  Nice bio of a true visionary!!!
• 
  jennifer

  This book is charming and fascinating and I can’t believe all the publishers rejected it. Also: obsessed with her party boxes and the fact something like that even existed back then, however briefly; someone should reissue them.
  
  PS Feeling vindicated in my love for the Time Life Cooking of the World series.