Chefs, Drugs and Rock & Roll: How Food Lovers, Free Spirits, Misfits and Wanderers Created a New American Profession
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About this ebook
An all-access history of the evolution of the American restaurant chef
Chefs, Drugs and Rock & Roll transports readers back in time to witness the remarkable evolution of the American restaurant chef in the 1970s and '80s. Taking a rare, coast-to-coast perspective, Andrew Friedman goes inside Chez Panisse and other Bay Area restaurants to show how the politically charged backdrop of Berkeley helped draw new talent to the profession; into the historically underrated community of Los Angeles chefs, including a young Wolfgang Puck and future stars such as Susan Feniger, Mary Sue Milliken, and Nancy Silverton; and into the clash of cultures between established French chefs in New York City and the American game changers behind The Quilted Giraffe, The River Cafe, and other East Coast establishments. We also meet young cooks of the time such as Tom Colicchio and Emeril Lagasse who went on to become household names in their own right. Along the way, the chefs, their struggles, their cliques, and, of course, their restaurants are brought to life in vivid detail. As the '80's unspool, we see the profession evolve as American masters like Thomas Keller rise, and watch the genesis of a “chef nation” as these culinary pioneers crisscross the country to open restaurants and collaborate on special events, and legendary hangouts like Blue Ribbon become social focal points, all as the industry-altering Food Network shimmers on the horizon.
Told largely in the words of the people who lived it, as captured in more than two hundred author interviews with writers like Ruch Reichl and legends like Jeremiah Tower, Alice Waters, Jonathan Waxman, and Barry Wine, Chefs, Drugs and Rock & Roll treats readers to an unparalleled 360-degree re-creation of the business and the times through the perspectives not only of the groundbreaking chefs but also of line cooks, front-of-house personnel, investors, and critics who had front-row seats to this extraordinary transformation.
Andrew Friedman
Andrew Friedman has made a career of getting to know the heads and hearts of professional cooks and athletes. For more than ten years, Friedman has collaborated with many of the nation’s best and most revered chefs on cookbooks and other writing projects. His writing career began in 1997, when Alfred Portale asked him to collaborate on the Gotham Bar and Grill Cookbook. The book received wide acclaim, and since then, Friedman has worked as a cookbook collaborator on more than twenty projects, helping a number of the nation’s best chefs (Alfred Portale, David Waltuck, Tom Valenti, and many others) share their unique culinary viewpoints with readers. As coauthor of the New York Times bestseller Breaking Back, the memoir of American tennis star James Blake, Friedman took readers inside an athlete’s mind during training and competition, and he does the same as a frequent contributor to Tennis magazine. In Knives at Dawn: The American Team and the Bocuse d’Or 2009, Friedman combines these two personal passions to tell the story of the premier cooking competition in the world. Friedman has contributed articles to Oprah Daily and other publications and websites. He has been profiled in The New York Daily News and New York Magazine, and interviewed for, or featured in articles in, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, as well as on NPR’s Taste of the Nation and WOR Radio’s Food Talk. He holds a BA in English from Columbia University and is a graduate of the French Culinary Institute’s “La Technique” cooking program. He lives in New York City with his family.
Read more from Andrew Friedman
Knives at Dawn: America's Quest for Culinary Glory at the Legendary Bocuse d'Or Competition Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Don't Try This at Home: Culinary Catastrophes from the World's Greatest Chefs Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Dirty Dishes: A Restaurateur's Story of Passion, Pain, and Pasta Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
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Reviews for Chefs, Drugs and Rock & Roll
4 ratings1 review
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5I bought this because I'm interested in food history and therefore also in American food history but the book, as it is, is either too thick or too thin.Too thick; I was really surprised (being Dutch and not particlularly into American food) by how many of the persons in the book I knew. But it has so many names and the author refers to them by their first name, their last, both. Wolfgang Puck gets called e.g. Wolfgang or Puck or Wolf and then somebody with the name Carl Wolf shows up. So at the end it was a struggle to finish it. He describes such a long period in such a vast country as the US within so few pagesToo thin; If the book has only discussed a certain period there would have been an opportunity for more depth. Jeremiah Tower, Richard Olney and Alan Davidson founded PPC (petits propos culinaires)which is still going strong and a kind of Walhalla for food authors. But somtimes I think it has been forgotten by everybody. And he collaborated with Richard Olney on the cookery book series Practical Cook where he did get mentioned.But for me it's clear. If I'd ever have wanted to be cook in America it would have been in the 60's and 70's in California.