Paper Palate

Maria Guarnaschelli.  Yeah, don’t feel bad.  I consider myself a food writer, and I didn’t know the answer either.  What’s worse is that I don’t think I’ve even ever heard of her.  Clearly I’m missing out.

She was recently highlighted in Saveur magazine’s 100 issue, and the W.W. Norton editor is synonmous with good cookbook editing.  Although she surprisingly holds a Ph.D. in Russian literature from Yale, she’s a force behind over 200 popular food titles that we have come to know and love, like Classic Indian Cooking, the controversial All New All-Purpose Joy of Cooking and Cradle of Flavor: Home Cooking from the Spice Islands of Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore.  Obviously she’s one to watch.

Lynne Rossetto Kasper, author of the Guarnaschelli-edited The Splendid Table: Recipes from Emilia-Romagna, the Heartland of Northern Italian Food, said, “For Maria, the dream of the book and the dream of the author are everything.  She reaches in, goes deep, and tries to pull out all there is in a writer.  She demands every iota of craft and focus.  But whatever you give, she’ll give back tenfold.”

Doesn’t get much better than that, folks.