The Man Who Ate Everything

November 3, 1997
This book ministers to readers who, over the past eight years, have missed former lawyer Steingarten's informative yet hilarious food columns in Vogue. Starting with a piece on fighting his own food phobias so as to qualify as an omnivore for the magazine job, he reads the scientific literature on human food selection and manages to expunge his repulsions by eating "at least one food that I detested" every day for six months. He applies a similar modus operandi to other food problems--collect expert opinion and do one's own experiments--and reports his findings on, among other things, the cheapest survival diet ($2.50 a day), the fat substitute Olestra ("the first nearly successful virtual pleasure") and the best recipes for ribs, fruitcake, choucroute, turkey, French fries and pie-crust, to name a few. Above all, in these reprinted articles, the author emphasizes the advantages of eating well-prepared, healthy food, noting that France, with its delicious albeit high-fat diet, has the world's second-lowest (after Japan) rate of death by heart attack. Besides its sensible advice and some intriguing recipes, this book serves up generous helpings of laughter.