I’ve been reading Bill Buford’s Heat: An Amateur’s Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany, a hilarious and insightful chronicle of his taking a position as Mario Batali’s kitchen slave.
Buford, of course, was fiction editor at The New Yorker for eight years and the founding editor of Granta. I just can’t tell you how much I’m loving this book. Batali is such a larger-than-life character and the humorous acidity Buford employs is a perfect (and affectionate) counterpoint. I find myself wanting to read every paragraph out loud to Christopher (which I’m sure is annoying, when he’s trying to read himself).
You can read a review and excerpt here (and hear audio of Buford reading it). And a tip of the hat to The Wednesday Chef for being the first place I heard about this one.