Dirt: Adventures in Lyon as a Chef in Training, Father, and Sleuth Looking for the Secret of French Cooking

"I have been waiting for this book for years. Ever since I got swept up in Bill Buford’s memoir Heat, in which he quit his plum job editing fiction at The New Yorker, volunteered in a restaurant as a kitchen grunt, then moved to Italy and apprenticed with a butcher. “I could do that!” I thought to myself. Well, maybe. But no way would my resulting memoir have been as delightful. Now Buford is back, this time with his twin toddlers in tow, as he moves to Lyon, looking for the origins of French cuisine. Buford is a self-deprecating writer who merrily catalogs his failures in the kitchen, always seems to be running late, and is perpetually bungling the language of his adopted country. It’s only once you’ve zipped through the book, learning reams about the history of famous chefs and ancient dishes, that you realize you’re actually in the hands of a master."