Reading this book made me want to put it down - and cook!

I can't honestly say that, despite repeated assertions, Luke Barr makes the case that the gathering of several food writers in Provence in 1970 marked the turning point, much less caused the transformation, of American cooking from a Franco-centric to a more American, multicultural, casual form of cooking. He does definitely make the case that the summer gathering marked the end of Julia Child's partnership with Simone Beck, which in turn freed her from Beck's obsession with authenticity and with all things French; he also makes the case that that summer marked the end of his great aunt's (MFK Fisher's) romance with France, which she'd come to see was steeped in nostalgia and was a romance with a form of cooking that by then barely existed and was in any case doomed. No - this premise gives him the occasion to write and to market a very readable book, but he definitely overstates it. I mean - to cite a few examples - James Beard had been writing extensively about American cooking, Craig Claiborne - barely mentioned in this book because he was at work in nyc - had written a lot amount American food, esp. Southern food, we were seeing new books coming forth about Mexican food and "whole foods" (Barr does mention these - but they didn't come about because of the disillusionment w/ French food), Calvin Trillin was writing about regional food in the NYer (albeit, maybe a little later), the first Szechuan restaurants and sushi restaurants were opening all over the place, youth traveling in Europe, which was so cheap then, came back really interested in Indian food (inspired by the Beatles et al.), and so on. Thesis aside, Barr does a terrific job conveying life among the food writers in France - the incredible meals and discussions, the general convivial lifestyle of shared cooking, mutual respect, a little competition, and a lot of serious work fueled by serious drinking. He's blessed by having very rich archives of letters and diaries to work from - but turning these into effective narratives, pulling together the many narrative voices, is no easy task, and Barr does it beautifully. Perhaps the highest praise is that reading this book made me want to put it down - and go into the kitchen and cook (which in fact I did - red lentil soup [home-made but reheated, admittedly], pasta with lemon sauce, green salad, chilled white graves estate bottled - nice!). Barr's last chapter, in which he and family and friends along w/ 90-year-old grandmother return to Provence to visit the old haunts, is especially beautiful - anyone who's ever returned to childhood scenes will appreciate with the way in which some iconic details - in this case, the black-outlined shapes of each kitchen utensil on the pegboard in the Child's kitchen - remain a ghostly presence and other major elements - the entire house where some of the gatherings took place, are completely vanished.