Taste Makers: Seven Immigrant Women Who Revolutionized Food in America
Who's really behind America's appetite for foods from around the globe? This group biography from an electric new voice in food writing honors seven extraordinary women, all immigrants, who left an indelible mark on the way Americans eat today. Taste Makers stretches from World War II to the present, with absorbing and deeply researched portraits of figures including Mexican-born Elena Zelayeta, a blind chef; Marcella Hazan, the deity of Italian cuisine; and Norma Shirley, a champion of Jamaican dishes.
In imaginative, lively prose, Mayukh Sen--a queer, brown child of immigrants--reconstructs the lives of these women in vivid and empathetic detail, daring to ask why some were famous in their own time, but not in ours, and why others shine brightly even today. Weaving together histories of food, immigration, and gender, Taste Makers will challenge the way readers look at what's on their plate--and the women whose labor, overlooked for so long, makes those meals possible.
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Reading Taste Makers is a lot like enjoying an amazing meal: It surprises you, fills you, and you're sorry when it's over. Mayukh Sen has crafted something truly special, a book where women's stories take center stage.--Jessica Valenti, author of Sex Object: A Memoir
Taste Makers is beautiful. Mayukh makes the American kitchen feel vast, interconnected and full of wonder - never insular, small-minded or cold - and weaves together these undertold stories with unmatched care and respect. He's a masterful chronicler of American cooks and cooking, and we're lucky to have this book.--Ruby Tandoh, author of Eat Up!
A gathering of voices that's altogether necessary, radical, heartfelt, and intimate.--Monique Truong, author of The Book of Salt
A fascinating and impeccably researched book. Taste Makers is a joyous celebration of the cooks whose lives have enriched so much of our cooking and eating.--Nigel Slater
A beautiful, engaging, and long-overdue book, one which highlights some of the best-known and most influential cooks of the recent past as well as some whose names are not as familiar but should be. An invaluable book that's also a pleasure to read.--Mark Bittman, author of Animal, Vegetable, Junk
Taste Makers introduced me to the life stories of extraordinary women and offered me an invigorating history of cooking--as life's purpose, as pleasure, as political act--in America. Mayukh Sen writes with great heart and a spirit of vibrant inquiry to give us a magnificent book.--Megha Majumdar, author of A Burning
Through meticulous research and broad insight, Mayukh Sen follows seven immigrant women who crashed the gates of the U.S. food establishment in the twentieth century. Taste Makers is essential history for understanding American food's current reckoning with inclusion and diversity.--John Birdsall, author of The Man Who Ate Too Much
In this dazzling debut, James Beard Award-winning food writer Sen looks at the lives of seven remarkable immigrant women whose passion for their homeland's food transformed how Americans cook and eat... A vibrant, empathetic, and dynamic exploration of culture, identity, race, and gender... Thoughtfully written, Sen's portrayals of his subjects reveal how rich and nuanced being 'American' can truly be. Food lovers with a big appetite for knowledge will gobble this up.-- "Publishers Weekly (starred review)"
