Gourmands And Gluttons

Utilizing texts ranging from the Slow Food Movement to «food porn» as a cornucopia of visual fantasies, this book maintains that the gourmand's role today is not only grand but also has come to epitomize the rhetoric of excess.

What do we mean when we call any group a cult? Definingthat term is a slippery proposition – the word cult is provocative and arguably pejorative. Does it necessarily refer to a religious group? A group with a charismatic leader? Or something darker and more sinister? Because beliefs and practices surrounding food often inspire religious and political fervor, as well as function to unite people into insular groups, it is inevitable that "food cults" would emerge. Studying the extreme beliefs and practices of such food cults allows us to see the ways in which food serves as a nexus for religious beliefs, sexuality, death anxiety, preoccupation with the body, asceticism, and hedonism, to name a few. In contrast to religious and political cults, food cults have the added dimension of mediating cultural trends in nutrition and diet through their membership. Should we then consider raw foodists, many of whom believe that cooked food is poison, a type of food cult? What about paleo diet adherents or those who follow a restricted calorie diet for longevity? Food Cults explores these questions by looking at domestic and international, contemporary and historic food communities characterized by extreme nutritional beliefs or viewed as "fringe" movements by mainstream culture. While there are a variety of accounts of such food communities across disciplines, this collection pulls together these works and explains why we gravitate toward such groups and the social and psychological functions they serve. This volume describes how contemporary and historic food communities come together and foment fanaticism, judgment, charisma, dogma, passion, longevity, condemnation and exaltation.

An essay collection from “the Henry Miller of food writing” and New York Times–bestselling author of The Raw and the Cooked (The Wall Street Journal). Jim Harrison was beloved for his untamed prose and larger-than-life appetite. Collecting many of his most entertaining and inspired food pieces for the first time, A Really Big Lunch “brings him roaring to the page again in all his unapologetic immoderacy, with spicy bon mots and salty language augmented by family photographs” (NPR). From the titular New Yorker article about a French lunch that went to thirty-seven courses, to essays on the relationship between hunter and prey, or the obscure language of wine reviews, A Really Big Lunch is shot through with Harrison’s aperçus and delight in the pleasures of the senses. Between the lines the pieces give glimpses of Harrison’s life over the last three decades. Including articles that first appeared in Brick, Playboy, Kermit Lynch Wine Merchant, and more, as well as an introduction by Mario Batali, A Really Big Lunch offers “sage and succulent essays” for the literary gourmand (Shelf Awareness, starred review).

At first, Mantaro Ohara was just an ordinary salaryman with slightly bigger appetite. For Mantaro, eating is something to be enjoyed and the idea of food battle does not sound attractive to him. But his meeting in Pork Cutlet store with the professional competitive eater, George Hunter, gradually changed his view and passion towards gourmet competition... And they probably would not let this unexpected "dark horse" escape either.

"Tales from the Three Ninth Kingdom" is semibiographical memoirs, written in format of imaginative fairytale, where characters are fictional and unanimous, suitable for gregarious and illustrious times immemorial. In process, she pieced together entertaining tales, epicurean quotations, proverbs and anecdotes, enriching them with the fantasy, only fairytale permit. It is a diary of consummation of culinary delights on all levels: from the doomed world of Romanoff and even more mysterious and strange times before; uncertain dimension of which served exactly the concept of this book It is a small forest of colorful stories, tailored with the twist on established genre of food memoirs: The first part of the book is nostalgic flash back to the postwar childhood, exploring a difficult and colorful survival, where reality was bearable only, when one applies a good doze of fantasy. The second part is a colorful world, occupied by eccentric and decadent characters, whose eponymous life still used as a source for hilarious entertainment. The third part is memorabilia of forgotten recipes, originated in palaces, urban mansions, hunting lodges, ancient monasteries and summer estates, unraveling culinary traditions and history of food, which always followed the rhythm of the changing Four Seasons. This book is contribution to the multicultural canvas of America, where among hundreds ethnic infusions, the Russian cuisine have been noticeably implanted.

A cornucopia of culinary essays from “the Henry Miller of food writing. His passion is infectious” (Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg, The Wall Street Journal). Jim Harrison was one of this country’s most beloved writers, a muscular, brilliantly economic stylist with a salty wisdom. For more than twenty years, he also wrote some of the best essays on food around, now collected in a volume that caused the Santa Fe New Mexican to exclaim: “To read this book is to come away convinced that Harrison is a flat-out genius—one who devours life with intensity, living it roughly and full-scale, then distills his experiences into passionate, opinionated prose. Food, in this context, is more than food: It is a metaphor for life.” From Harrison’s legendary Smart and Esquire columns, to current works including a correspondence with French gourmet Gerard Oberle, fabulous pieces on food in France and America for Men’s Journal, and a paean to the humble meatball, The Raw and the Cooked is a nine-course meal that will satisfy every appetite. “[A] culinary combo plate of Hunter S. Thompson, Ernest Hemingway, Julian Schnabel, and Sam Peckinpah.” —Jane and Michael Stern, The New York Times Book Review

The Final Battle between the Masked Man and Momoko started! Can the Masked Man won a Yokan eating contest against the queen of sweets? Will he reveal his identity?

The last challenge is a full-course Chinese meal... But both contestants have closed to their limit after the endless eating battles. Between Mirei Lin and Mantaro, who will be the champion for the biggest world eating contest?! A fantastic last volume!