Alice Waters Cooks Up a Food Revolution
by Diane Stanley
Illustrations by Jessie Hartland
A Paula Wiseman Book
Simon & Schuster
2022
48 pages
ISBN: 9781534461406
Alice Waters, chef, entrepreneur and pioneer of the organic food movement, started a revolution in quality food, great nutrition, farm to table cooking and influenced every chef and foodie after her.
Alice grew up on the east coast in the 1940s. Her family always planted a garden and the fresh strawberries and vegetables grown there provided Alice her first tastes of what fresh food should taste like, After growing season, processed foods from the supermarket made poor substitutions for the foods Alice loved.
She went to college in Berkeley, California and spent a year in France studying and eating. Everything she tastes in France is "THE BEST! EVER!" The difference was that French farmers and cooks worked with fresh food all the time. Unlike American restaurants who relied on packaged and processed foods during fall and winter months, French farmers and chefs had fresh ingredients within arms' reach.
Alice returns home but loves everything French and worships chef Julia Child, studying and cooking all her recipes. She vows to cook fresh all the time and wishes she had a restaurant of her own. One day, she finds a small ramshackle house that would be perfect for her small restaurant. Borrowing money from her parents, Alice opens Chez Panisse, her dream French restaurant. With her friends' help, she opens, but no one has experience. They learn as the go and soon, they have a local following.
Alice has trouble finding fresh ingredients, so she travels all over northern California searching for family farms she can buy from. Using the freshest ingredients, her little restaurant becomes world famous winning the James Beard Award in 1992 becoming the first woman ever to win Best Chef Award.
Since she influenced so many farmers, eaters and chefs, Alice Waters is credited for the way most people enjoy eating today: less preservatives, organically grown, less fat and sodium, and as fresh as they can find,
Highly recommended for any class studying food, nutrition, cooking and women in history. Illustrations by Jessie Hartland capture the beauty of fresh produce, the love Alice feels for France and the excitement of opening Chez Panisse.
Grades 1-5. Easy biography for reluctant readers.
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