The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen

In this captivating memoir, the man whom Julia Child has called the best chef in America tells the story of his rise from a frightened apprentice in an exacting Old World kitchen to an Emmy Award winning superstar who taught millions of Americans how to cook and shaped the nation s tastes in the bar [...]
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In this captivating memoir, the man whom Julia Child has called the best chef in America tells the story of his rise from a frightened apprentice in an exacting Old World kitchen to an Emmy Award winning superstar who taught millions of Americans how to cook and shaped the nation s tastes in the bargain.
We see young Jacques as a homesick six-year-old boy in war-ravaged France, working on a farm in exchange for food, dodging bombs, and bearing witness as German soldiers capture his father, a fighter in the Resistance. Soon Jacques is caught up in the hurly-burly action of his mother's cafe, where he proves a natural. He endures a literal trial by fire and works his way up the ladder in the feudal system of France s most famous restaurant, finally becoming Charles de Gaulle s personal chef, watching the world being refashioned from the other side of the kitchen door.
When he comes to America, Jacques immediately falls in with a small group of as-yet-unknown food lovers, including Craig Claiborne, James Beard, and Julia Child, whose adventures redefine American food. Through it all, Jacques proves himself to be a master of the American art of reinvention: earning a graduate degree from Columbia University, turning down a job as John F. Kennedy s chef to work at Howard Johnson s, and, after a near-fatal car accident, switching careers once again to become a charismatic leader in the revolution that changed the way Americans approached food. Included as well are forty all-time favorite recipes created during the course of a career spanning nearly half a century, from his mother s utterly simple cheese souffle to his wife s pork ribs and red beans.
"The Apprentice" is the poignant and sometimes funny tale of a boy s coming of age. Beyond that, it is the story of America s culinary awakening and the transformation of food from an afterthought to a national preoccupation."