Culinary Memoirs

As we all know, a bibliography is an ongoing work of beauty, so if you see that your favorite title is missing, please send me a comment!

Enjoy.

I am happy to say that I have added my own culinary memoir to the list: Stoves & Suitcases: Searching for Home in the World’s Kitchens!

The Accidental Connoisseur: an irreverent journey though the wine world by Lawrence Osborne
A Cook’s Tour: global adventures in extreme cuisines by Anthony Bourdain
Acquired tastes: on the trail of the world’s most sought-after delicacies by Massimo Francesco Marcone
Adventures in Eating: an anthropological experience of dining around the world by
Adventures on the Wine Route: a wine buyer’s tour of France by Kermit Lynch
The African Kitchen: a day in the life of a safari chef by Josie Stow
The Agony of the Leaves: the ecstasy of my life with tea by Helen Gustafson
Al Dente: the adventures of a gastronomic in Italy by William Black
Alice, Let’s Eat: further adventures of a happy eater by Calvin Trillin
Alice Waters and Chez Panisse: the romantic, impractical, often eccentric, ultimately brilliant making of a food revolution by Thomas McNamee
All The Presidents’ Pastries: twenty-five years in the White House, a memoir by Roland Mesnier
Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant by Jenni Ferrari-Adler
Always Fresh: the story of Tim Hortons by the man who created a Canadian empire by Ron Joyce
Always Home: A Daughter’s Recipes & Stories by Fanny Singer
Amarcord, Marcella Remembers: the story of a woman who started out to teach science in Italy, but ended up teaching America how to cook Italian by Marcella Hazan
The Amateur Gourmet: how to shop, chop and table hop like a pro (almost) by Adam D. Roberts
American Pie: slices of life (and pie) from America’s backroads by Pascale LeDraoulec
American Terroir: savoring the flavors of our woods, waters and fields by Rowan Jacobsen
Among Friends by M.F.K. Fisher
Amore and Ameretti: a tale of love and food in Tuscany by Victoria Cosford
An Alphabet for Gourmets by M.F.K. Fisher
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: a year of food life by Barbara Kingsolver
Aphrodite: a memoir of the senses by Isabel Allende
Appetite for life: the biography of Julia Child by Noel Riley Fitch
The Apprentice: my life in the kitchen by Jacques Pepin
Arbitrary Stupid Goal by Tamara Shopsin
Are You Really Going to Eat That? Reflections of a culinary thrill seeker by Robb Walsh
Around the World in 80 Dinners: the ultimate culinary adventure by Cheryl Alters Jamison
The Art of Eating by M. F. K. Fisher
As Always, Julia: the letters of Julia Child and Alvis DeVoto by Joan Reardon
As They Were by M.F.K. Fisher
At Grandmother’s Table: women write about food, life, and the enduring bond between grandmothers and grandaughters
At My Grandmother’s Knee: Recipes and Memories Handed Down by Women of the South by Faye Porter

B

Backstage With Julia: my years with Julia Child by Nancy Verde Barr
Baked-Off!: memoirs of a Pillsbury bake-off junkie by Steve Grieger
Baking as Biography: a life in recipes by Diane Tye
Beaten, Seared, and Sauced: on becoming a chef at the Culinary Institute of America by Jonathan Dixon
Behind Bars: the straight-up tales of a big-city bartender by Ty Wenzel
Bento Box in the Heartland: my Japanese girlhood in whitebread America by Linda Furiya
Best Food Writing (yearly collection)
The Best Thing I ever Tasted: the secret of food by Sallie Tisdale
Between Bites: memoirs of a hungry hedonist by James Villas
Between Meals: an appetite for Paris by A.J. Liebling
Between Two Fires: intimate writings on life, love, food & flavor by Laura Esquivel
Big Appetite: my Southern-fried search for the meaning of life by Sam McLeod
Bitter Almonds: recollections and recipes from a Sicilian girlhood by Mary Taylor Simeti
The Bizarre Truth: culinary misadventures around the globe by Andrew Zimmern
The Black Family Reunion Cookbook by National Council of Negro Women
A Blissful Feast: Culinary Adventures in Italy’s Piedmont, Maremma, and La Marche by Teresa Lust
Blood, Bones, and Butter: the inadvertent education of a reluctant chef by Gabrielle Hamilton
The Blueberry years: a memoir of farm and family by Jim Minick
Blue Trout and Black Truffles: The Peregrinations of an Epicure by Joseph Wechsberg
The Book of Eating: Adventures in Professional Gluttony by Adam Platt
Boozehound: on the trail of the rare, the obscure, and the overrated in spirits by Jason Wilson
Bottomfeeder: a seafood lover’s journey to the end of the food chain by Taras Grescoe
Bread and Chocolate: my food life in & around San Francisco by Fran Gage
Breaking Bread: recipes and stories from immigrant kitchens by Lynne Christy Anderson
Born Round by Frank Bruni
The Bucolic Plague: how two Manhattanites became gentlemen farmers by Josh Kilmer-Purcell
The Burger King: Jim McLamore and the building of an empire by James W. Mclamore
Burgundy Stars: a year in the life of a great French restaurant by William Echikson
Burn the Place by Iliana Regan
Burnt Bread and Chutney: growing up between cultures, a memoir of an Indian Jewish childhood by Carmit Delman
The Butcher and the Vegetarian: one woman’s romp through a world of men, meat, and moral crisis by Tara Austen Weaver

C

Cakewalk by Kate Moses
Candy and me (a Love Story) by Hilary Liftin
Candyfreak: a journey through the chocolate underbelly of America by Steve Almond
Celebrating Our Mothers’ Kitchens by National Council of Negro Women
The Cheese chronicles: a journey though the making and selling of cheese in America, from field to farm to table by Liz Thorpe
Cheesemonger: a life on the wedge by Gordon Edgar
Chef’s story: 27 chefs talk about what got them into the kitchen
A Chef’s Tale: a memoir of food, France, and America by Pierre Franey
Cherries in Winter: my family’s recipes for hope in hard times by Suzan Colon
Choice Cuts: a savory selection of food writing by Mark Kurlansky
Citizen Coors: a grand family saga of business, politics and beer by Dan Baum
Cleaving: a story of marriage, meat, and obsession by Julie Powell
Clémentine in the Kitchen by Samuel Chamberlain
Cleora’s Kitchens: The Memoir of a Cook and Eight Decades of Great American Food by Cleora Butler
Climbing the Mango Trees: a memoir of a childhood in India by Madhur Jaffrey
The Comfort Food Diaries: My Quest for the Perfect Dish to Mend a Broken Heart by Emily Nunn
Comfort Food for Breakups: the memoir of a hungry girl by Marusya Bociurkiw
Comfort me With Apples by Ruth Reichl
Coming to My Senses: The Making of a Counterculture Cook by Alice Waters
Confections of a Closet Master Baker by Gesine Bullock-Prado
Confessions of a Carb Queen: the lies you tell others & the lies you tell yourself: a memoir by Susan Blech
Consider the Oyster by M.F.K. Fisher
Consuming Passions: a food obsessed life by Michael Lee West
Cooked: from the streets to the stove, from cocaine to foie gras by Jeff Henderson
Cooking and Screaming by Adreinne Kane
Cooking dirty: a story of life, sex, love and death in the kitchen by Jason Sheehan
Cooking for Kings: the life of Antonin Careme: the first celebrity chef by Ian Kelly
Cookoff: recipe fever in America by Amy Sutherland
Cooking for Mr. Latte: a food lovers courtship by Amanda Hesser
Corked by Kathryn Borel
Cosmopolitan: a bartender’s life by Toby Cecchini
Coyota in the Kitchen: A memoir of New and Old Mexico by Anita Rodríguez
Crazy in the Kitchen: food, feuds, and forgiveness in an Italian family by Louise DeSalvo
Crete on the half Shell: a story about an island, good friends and food by Byron Ayanoglu

D

Dark and Light: the story of the Guinness family by Derek Wilson
Daughter of Heaven: a memoir with earthly recipes by Leslie Li
Day of Honey: a memoir of food, love, and war by Annia Ciezadlo
Death by Pad Thai: and other unforgettable meals by Douglas Bauer
Devil in the Kitchen: sex, pain, madness and the making of a great chef by Marco Pierre White
The Devil’s Picnic: around the world in pursuit of forbidden fruit by Taras Grescoe
The Dinner Diaries: raising whole wheat kids ina white bread world by Betsy Block
Dinner Party Disasters: True Stories of Culinary Catastrophe by Annaliese Soros
Dirt: Adventures in Lyon as a Chef in Training, Father, and Sleuth Looking for the Secret of French Cooking by Bill Buford
Dirty Dishes: a restaurateur’s story of passion, pain, and pasta by Pino Luongo
The Dirty Life: on farming, food, and love by Kristen Kimball
Dirty Sugar Cookies: culinary observations, questionable taste by Ayun Halliday
Domesticity: a gastronomic interpretation of love by Bob Shacochis
Don’t Try This at Home: culinary catastrophes from the world’s greatest chefs by Andrew Friedman
Dubious Honors by M.F.K. Fisher

E

Eat a Peach by David Chang
Eat Me: the food philosophy of Kenny Shopsin by Kenny Shopsin
Eating Mud Crabs in Kandahar: stories of food during wartime by the world’s leading correspondents edited by Matt Mcallester
Eat my Globe: one year to go everywhere and eat everything by Simon Majumdar
Eating by Jason Epstein
Eating as I go: scenes from America and abroad by Doris Friedensohn
Eating My Words: an appetite for life by Mimi Sheraton
Eat my Words: reading women’s lives through the cookbooks they wrote by Janet Theophano
Eat, Memory: great writers at the table a collection of essays from the New York Times by Amanda Hesser
Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert
87 Orchard: an edible history of five immigrant families in one New York tenement by Jane Ziegelman
Everything I ate: a year in the life of my mouth by Tucker Shaw
Everything is Under Control: A Memoir with Recipes by Phyllis Grant
An Extravagant Hunger: the passionate years of M.F.K Fisher by Anne Zimmerman
Extremely Pale Rose: a very French adventure by Jamie Ivey

F

Fair Shares for All: a memoir of family and food by John Haney
Family Life by Elizabeth Luard
Far Flung and Well Fed: the food writing of R.W. Apple, JR by R.W. Apple
Farm City: the education of an urban farmer by Novella Carpenter
Fat Girl: a true story by Judith Moore
The Feast Nearby: how I lost my job, buried a marriage, and found my way by keeping chickens, foraging, preserving, bartering and eating locally (all on $40 a week) by Robin Mather
Feeding a Yen: savoring local specialties, from Kansas City to Cuzco by Calvin Trillin
Feeding Frenzy by Stuart Stevens
Ferran: the inside story of El Bulli and the man who reinvented food by Colman Andrews
Field Days: a year of farming, eating, and drinking wine in California by Jonah Raskin
52 Loaves: one man’s relentless pursuit of truth, meaning, and a perfect crust by William Alexander
Finding Martha’s Place by Martha Hawkins
Food: A Love Story by Jim Gaffigan
Food: a taste of the road by Richard Sterling (a collection)
Food for the Soul by Monique Y. Wells
Food for the Soul: Recipes and Stories from the Congregation of Harlem’s Abyssinian Baptist Church
Fork it Over: the intrepid adventures of a professional eater by Alan Richman
Four Kitchens: my life behind the burner in New York, Hanoi, Tel Aviv, and Paris by Lauren Shockey
The Fourth Star: dispatches from inside daniel Boulud’s celebrated restaurant by Leslie Brenner
Fragrant rice: my continuing love affair with Bali by Janet De Neefe
French Lessons: Adventures with knife, fork, and corkscrew by Peter Mayle
Fried Butter by Abe Opincar
Forklore: recipes and tales from an American bistro by Ellen Yin
The Fortune Cookie Chronicles: adventures in the world of Chinese food by Jennifer Lee
From Here You Can’t See Paris: seasons of a French village and its restaurant by Michael Sanders
From Scratch: A Memoir of Love, Sicily, and Finding Home by Tembe Locke
From the Table of My Memory by Urmila Jithoo

G

Garlic and Sapphires by Ruth Reichl
Garlic, Mint, & Sweet Basil: Essays on Marseilles, Mediterranean Cuisine, and Noir Fiction by Jean-Claude Izzo
A Garlic Testament: seasons on a small New Mexico farm by Stanley Crawford
Gastronaut: adventures in food for the romantic, the foolhardy and the brave by Stefan Gates
The Gastronomical Me by M. F. K. Fisher
The Gastronomy of Marriage: a memoir of food and love by Michelle Maisto
Ginger and Ganesh: adventures in Indian cooking, culture, and love by Nani Power
Going With the Grain: a wandering bread lover takes a bite out of life by Susan Seligson
Gordon Ramsey by Neil Simpson
Growing a Farmer: how I learned to live off the land by Kurt Timmermeister
The Gumbo Tales: finding a place at the New Orleans table by Sarah Roahen

H

Hallelujah! The Welcome Table: a lifetime of memories with recipes by Maya Angelou
Ham Biscuits, Hostess Gowns, and Other Southern Specialties: an entertaining life (with recipes) by Julia Reed
Harlot’s Sauce: a memoir of food, family, love, loss, and Greece by Patricia Volonakis Davis
Harvest: a year in the life of an organic farmer by Nicola Smith
Havana Salsa: stories and recipes by Viviana Carballo
Hay Fever: how chasing a dream on a Vermont farm changed my life by Angela Miller
Heat by Bill Bufford
Heirloom: notes from an accidental tomato farmer by Tim Stark
Here Let us Feast: a book of banquets by M.F.K. Fisher
Her Fork in the Road: women celebrate food and travel by Lisa S. Bach (a collection)
Hidden Kitchens: stories, recipes and more from NPR’s The Kitchen Sisters by Nikki Silva
Hollywood Dish! recipes, tips, & tales of a Hollywood caterer by Nick Grippo
Home Cooking: a writer in the kitchen by Laurie Colwin
A Homemade Life: stories and recipes from my kitchen table by Molly Wizenberg
Hometown Appetites: the story of Clementine Paddleford, the forgotten food writer who chronicled how America ate by Kelly Alexander
Honey from a Weed by Patience Gray
Hour of the Goddess: Memories of Women, Food, and Ritual in Bengal by Chitrita Banerji
How I Learned to Cook: culinary educations from the world’s greatest chefs edited by Kimberly Witherspoon
How to Cook a Dragon: living, loving, and eating in China by Linda Furiya
How To Cook a Wolf by M.F.K. Fisher
How To Eat a Small Country: a family’s pursuit of happiness, one meal at a time by Amy Finley
Hugh Fearlessly Eats it All: dispatches from the gastronomic frontline by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall
Humble Pie by Gordon Ramsay
The Hunger: a memoir of an accidental chef by John Delucie
Hungry Monkey: a food-loving father’s quest to raise an adventurous eater by Matthew Amster-Burton

I

I loved, I lost, I Made Spaghetti: a memoir of good food and bad boyfriends by Giulia Melucci
In Buddhas Kitchen: cooking, being cooked, and other adventures in a meditation center by Kimberly Snow
Indulgence: around the world in search of chocolate by Paul Richardson
I Never Forget a Meal: an indulgent reminiscence by Michael Tucker
Insatiable: tales from a life of delicious excess by Gael Greene
I was Never Here and This Never Happened: tasty bits and spicy tales from my life by Dorinda Hafner
It must Have been Something I ate by Jeffrey Steingarten

J

Julie and Julia: my year of cooking dangerously by Julie Powell

K

Keeping the Feast: one couple’s story of love, food, and healing in Italy by Paula Butturini
Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain
The Kitchen Book and The Cook Book by Nicolas Freeling
Kitchen Yarns: Notes on Life, Love, and Food by Ann Hood

L

The Language of Baklava by Diana Abu-Jaber
Laughing With my Mouth Full: tales from a Gulf Islands kitchen by Pam Freir
Let Them Eat Pancakes: How I Survived in Paris Without Losing My Head by Craig Carlson
Life, Death & Bialys: a father/son baking story by Dylan Schaffer
Life Is Meals: A Food Lover’s Book of Days by James and Kay Salter
A Life of Spice: stories of food, culture, and life by Monica Bhide
Life, on the Line: A Chef’s Story of Chasing Greatness, Facing Death, and Redefining the Way We Eat by Grant Achatz
Life from Scratch: A Memoir of Food, Family, and Forgiveness by Sasha Martin
Lilla’s Feast: one woman’s true story of love and war in the Orient by Frances Osborne
Living in a Foreign Language: a memoir of food, wine, and love in Italy by Michael Tucker
Long ago in France: the years in Dijon by M. F. K. Fisher
Lost Recipes of Hoboken by Laura Schenone
Love by the Glass: tasting notes from a marriage by Dorothy J. Gaiter
Lunch in Paris: a love story with recipes by Elizabeth Bard

M

Mama Dip’s Kitchen by Mildred Council
The Man Who Ate Everything by Jeffrey Steingarten
Mastering the Art of French Eating: From Paris Bistros to Farmhouse Kitchens, Lessons in Food and Love by Ann Mah
Meatballs & Lefse: Memories and Recipes from a Scandinavian-American Farming Life by Cynthia Bertelsen
Medium Raw by Anthony Bordain
M.F.K. Fisher and Me: a memoir of food and friendship by Jeannette Ferrary
Midnight Chicken (& Other recipes Worth Living For) by Ella Risbrindger
Miriam’s Kitchen by Elizabeth Ehrlich
Monsoon Diary: a memoir with recipes by Shoba Narayan
More Home Cooking by Laurie Colwin
Of Morsels and Marvels by Maryse Conde
Music, Food, and Love: a memoir with recipes by Guo Yue and Clare Farrow
My Berlin Kitchen: A Love Story by Luisa Weiss
My Last Supper: 50 great chefs and their final meals by Melanie Dunea
My Life as a Wife by Elizabeth Luard
My Life From Scratch: a journey of starting over, one cake at a time by Gesine Bullock-Prado
My Life in France by Julia Child

N

Notes from a Young Black Chef: A Memoir, by Kwame Onwuachi
Notes on a Banana by David Leite
Nothing Fancy: Recipes and Recollections of Soul-Satisfying Food by Diana Kennedy

O

An Omelette and a Glass of Wine by Elizabeth David
On a Dollar a Day: one couple’s unlikely adventures in eating in America by Christopher Greenslate
On the Line by Eric Ripert
On Rue Tatin: living and cooking in a French town by Susan Herrmann Loomis
An Onion in My Pocket by Deborah Madison
Our Lady of Perpetual Hunger by Lisa Donovan
Out of Line: A Life of Playing with Fire by Barbara Lynch

P

Pass the Polenta: and other writings from the kitchen, with recipes by Teresa Lust
The Perfectionist: a food-obsessed life by Rudolph Chelminski
Pig-Tails and Breadfruit by Austin Clark
Plenty: one man, one woman, and a raucous year of eating locally by Alisa Smith

R

The Reach of a Chef: beyond the kitchen by Michael Ruhlman
Rebel Chef: In Search of What Matters by Dominique Crenn
Risotto with Nettles: a memoir with food by Anna Del Conte
Roast Chicken and Other Stories by Simon Hopkinson

S

The Saucier’s Apprentice: one long strange trip through the great cooking schools of Europe by Bob Spitz
Save Me the Plums: My Gourmet Memoir by Ruth Reichl
Say Grace: How the Restaurant Industry Saved My Life by Steve Palmer
The Seasoning of a Chef: my journey from Diner to Ducasse and beyond by Doug Psaltis
Serve it Forth by M.F.K. Fisher
Service Included: four-star secrets of an eavesdropping waiter by Phoebe Damrosch
Sex, Death and Oysters: a half shell lover’s wold tour by Robb Walsh
The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry: love, laughter, and tears in Paris at the world’s most famous cooking school by Kathleen Flinn
Siren’s Feast, An Edible Odyssey by Nancy Mehagian
The Soul of a Chef: the journey toward perfection by Michael Ruhlman
Southern Homecoming Traditions: Recipes and Remembrances by Carolyn Quick Tillery
The Spice Necklace: my adventures in Caribbean cooking, eating, and island life by Ann Vanderhoof
Spiced: a pastry Chef’s true stories by Dalia Jurgensen
Spoonbread & Strawberry Wine by Norma Jean Darden and Carole Darden
Spoon Fed: how eight cooks saved my life by Kim Severson
Starting from Scratch: memoirs of a wandering cook by Patty Kirk
Steak: one man’s search for the world’s tastiest piece of beef by Mark Schatker
Stealing Buddha’s Dinner by Bich Minh Nguyen
Start the File: How I Started a Food Revolution in America by Jeremiah Tower
Still Life by Elizabeth Luard
Stir: My Broken Brain and the Meals That Brought Me Home, by Jessica Flechtor

Stoves & Suitcases: Searching for Home in the World’s Kitchens by Cynthia D. Bertelsen
Stuffed: adventures of a restaurant family by Patricia Volk
The Sweet Life in Paris: delicious adventures in the world’s most glorious-and perplexing city by David Lebovitz
Sweet-Sour Memoir of eating in China by Fuchsia Dunlop
Sweety Pies: An Uncommon Collection of Womanish Observations, with Pies by Patty Pinner

T

A Taco Testimony: Meditations on Family, Food, and Culture by Denise Chávez
Talking With my Mouth Full: crab cakes, bundt cakes, and other kitchen stories by Bonny Wolf
Taste of Country Cooking by Edna Lewis
A Taste of the Past by Andras Koerner
Tastes Like Cuba by Eduardo Machado
The Telling Room by Michael Paterniti
Tender at the Bone by Ruth Reichl
The Tenth Muse: my life in food by Judith Jones
Terra Madre by Carlo Petrini
32 Yolks: From My Mother’s Table to Working the Line by Eric Ripert
Tiny Hot Dogs: A Memoir in Small Bites by Mary Giuliani
Toast by Nigel Slater
Toujours Provence by Peter Mayle
The Town that Food Saved: how one community found vitality in local food by Ben Hewitt
Trail of Crumbs: hunger, love and the search for home by Kim Sunee

U

Under the Table: saucy tales from culinary school by Katherine Darling
Under the Tuscan Sun by Frances Mayes
The Ungarnished Truth: a cooking contest memoir by Ellie Mathews
Untangling my Chopsticks: a culinary Sojourn in Kyoto by Victoria Abbott Riccardi

V

Vertamae Cooks Again by Vertamae Smart-Grosvenor
Vibration Cooking by Vertamae Smart-Grosvenor

Waiting by Debra Ginsberg
When French Women Cook by Madeleine Kamman
Where I Come From: Life Lessons from a Latino Chef by Aaron Sanchez
White House Chef: eleven years, two presidents, one kitchen by Walter Scheib
Wine Girl by Victoria James
With Bold Knife and Fork by M.F.K. Fisher
The Woman Who Ate Chinatown: a San Francisco Odyssey by Shirley Fong-Torres
Wrestling With Gravy: a Life, with food by Jonathan Reynolds
Women Who Eat: a new generation on the glory of food by Leslie Miller