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Spotlight

Cooks

As Thanksgiving occurs in the U.S. this months, homes will be filled with people cooking up delicious meals. Get inspired with stories of others who are brave enough to face down a saucepan.

Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly by Anthony Bourdain

Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly by Anthony Bourdain

New York chef Tony Bourdain gives away secrets of the trade in his wickedly funny, inspiring memoir and expos. From his first oyster in the Gironde to his lowly position as a dishwasher in a honky-tonk, Bourdain's tales of the kitchen are as passionate as they are unpredictable. "Kitchen Confidential" reveals what Bourdain calls "25 years of sex, drugs, bad behavior and haute cuisine".

Heat: An Amateur's Adventure as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany by Bill Buford

Heat: An Amateur's Adventure as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany by Bill Buford

From Bill Buford, one of our most interesting literary figures--eight years as fiction editor at "The New Yorker"--comes a sharp, funny, exuberant, close-up account of his headlong plunge into the life of a professional cook. A marvelous hybrid, "Heat" offers a memoir of Buford's kitchen adventure as well as an illuminating exploration of why food matters.

My Life in France by Julia Child

My Life in France by Julia Child

This delightful memoir of Julia's years in Paris, Marseille, and Provence opens with Paul and Julia, a tall, wide-eyed girl from Pasadena who can't cook and doesn't speak a word of French, disembarking in Le Havre, and ends with the launching of the two "Mastering" cookbooks and Julia winning the heart of America as "The French Chef."

 

The Making of a Chef: Mastering Heat at the Culinary Institute of America by Michael Ruhlman

The Making of a Chef: Mastering Heat at the Culinary Institute of America by Michael Ruhlman

Exploring the essence of becoming a chef, this book reveals the elusive, unnamable elements of great cooking.

 

 

Don't Try This at Home: Culinary Catastrophes from the World's Greatest Chefs edited by Kimberly Witherspoon and Andrew Friedman

Don't Try This at Home: Culinary Catastrophes from the World's Greatest Chefs edited by Kimberly Witherspoon and Andrew Friedman

In this raucous new anthology, 30 of the world's greatest chefs relate outrageous true tales from their kitchens. From hiring a blind line cook to witnessing security guards attacking hungry customers, these accounts are wildly entertaining and revealing.

Adults

NextReads
NextReads
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NoveList
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Staff Picks
Staff Picks
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Award Winners
 
Booker Prize Books -- Edgar Award Winners -- Hugo Award Winners -- Kiriyama Pacific Rim Book Prize Fiction -- Kiriyam Pacific Rim Book Prize Nonfiction -- National Book Award Fiction -- National Book Award Nonfiction -- National Book Award Poetry -- National Book Critics Circle Award, Fiction -- Nobel Prize for Literature -- Pulitzer Prize Biography -- Pulitzer Prize Drama -- Pulitzer Prize Fiction -- Pulitzer Prize History -- Pulitzer Prize Nonfiction -- Pulitzer Prize Poetry -- World Fantasy Awards
Reading Websites
Reading Websites

Receive book recommendations selected by librarians from the best places on the web.

Want to know what your friends, neighbors, and other Santa Clara County Library patrons read this summer? Click here to see their picks and pans.

Silicon Valley Reads
In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto by Michael Pollan

The 2010 selection for the Silicon Valley Reads community program is In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto by Michael Pollan.

Digital Media 24/7
Digital Media 24/7
Book Club Kits

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Oprah Book Club Selections
Say You're One Of Them by Uwem Akpan
Wonder what book is the latest Oprah Book Club selection? Want to keep up with Oprah's Book Club? You can always find Oprah's latest selection here.
Book Discussion Groups at the Library

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