Vive la France!

It may look to the casual reader of this blog that I am obsessed with books about France. I’m not, I swear it! However, I am obsessed with books about food (and food itself), and it just so happens that two of the recent food books I stumbled upon happen to be about food in France. The latest is John Baxter’s The Perfect Meal. I am officially declaring Baxter the Clive James of books about life in France. He has written a male Baby Boomer’s amusing and fact-packed take on traditional French food and culture; it was a nice, easy book to read and kept me entertained.

There were plenty of really interesting historical facts peppered throughout the book, and I think that's what I enjoyed the most about it. Sometimes books about food can get a bit too gushy, but this was never a problem in The Perfect Meal, as the focus was more on the various quirks of history than the food itself. I didn't fall in love with this book the way I fell in love with Mastering The Art of French Eating, but I did enjoy reading it almost as much. 

Three roast oxen out of five.

Image credit http://mwoodpenblog.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/m-wood-vive-la-france.jpg