Wayne Roberts – Sheryl Kirby

As I mentioned in yesterdays post – companies send us stuff. Often stuff that we can’t use in our regular articles because it’s not Toronto-specific. This includes books. Sometimes they just appear at my door unannounced. And while some readers might think this makes mine the dream job, keep in mind that I’m expected to write about said free books, so unless you were one of those keeners who loved writing book reports back in high school, the dream job might quickly become a nightmare. (Plus my job recently required me to eat bull’s testicles – bet you’re not so envious now, huh?)

The 500 Best-Value Wines in the LCBO 2009
Rod Phillips
Whitecap, 256 pages, paperback, $19.95

Ever stood in the aisle at the LCBO and didn’t have a clue what to buy? Rod Phillips aims to ease the stress with a handy list of his favourite picks of current wines. With easy to follow reviews and ratings, Phillips works his way through the world’s major wine regions with an overview of the industry in each country, and offers suggestions in all styles with witty (and occasionally punny) descriptions. He also answers common questions about buying and serving wine, and matching wine with food.

Continue reading “On the Shelf – Book Edition”

Most readers may not be familiar with the rapier pen of one A A Gill, a restaurant and television critic for the UK Times. Gill has recently had it in for the various UK chefs working to promote healthy, local, seasonal eating in Britain, and appears to take special exception to food journalist-turned-farmer Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall. Hugh F-W runs a farm, shop and restaurant operation called River Cottage in the Dorset area, and currently has a series on the air in the UK called River Cottage Autumn, in which he delves into the seasonal delights of local UK food, from the garden harvest, to fish in season to the fine art of foraging.

Gill reviews an episode of River Cottage Autumn in a recent television column, ostensibly killing two birds with one stone. But he’s not especially nice – to Hugh F-W, or to the millions of people who happen to revel in the joy of a home-grown tomato.

Why should poor, fearful folk have to put up with a bucketful of organic new-age anxiety to go with the anxiety their imperfect lives manufacture all on their own, especially when it’s created by a home-made television presenter in a Beatrix Potter set? The idea that ideal people should strive to live like 18th-century crofters is intellectual silage. The enthusiasm may be charming, but this fetishising of food is part of the problem, not the solution. Shirley Conran once said that life was too short to stuff a mushroom. She was wrong. But you’d have to live an awfully long time to make making your own baked beans on toast worthwhile. Self-sufficiency is not an admirable goal, it’s small-minded, selfish, mean, mistrustful and ultimately fascist. It ends up with people waving shotguns at strangers over their garden gates. We live in a complex, mutually reliant society, and the answer to our problems is not each to his own cabbage patch.

Continue reading “Gardens and Jealousy – Both Green”