Food & Cooking

Cookbook author and food writer Jack Bishop. His latest book is called Vegetables Everyday (Harper Collins). BISHOP writes about food for the New York Times, and Cooks Illustrated and Natural Health Magazines. His other cookbooks include Pasta e Verdura, The Complete Italian Vegetarian Cookbook, and Lasagna.

Marie Simmons, author of The Good Egg.

Novelist Jay McInerney (“MAC-in-UR-knee”). He broke onto the literary scene with his bestselling novel “Bright Lights, Big City,” about the excesses of the a Manhattan yuppie in the 1980s. His new book is a collection of essays about the pleasure of wine. It’s called “Bacchus & Me: Adventures in The Wine Cellar” (The Lyons Press).

Writer Clifford Wright. His new book is “A Mediterranean Feast: The Story of the Birth of the Celebrated Cuisines of the Mediterranean, from the Merchants of Venice to the Barbary Corsairs, with more than 500 Recipes.” (Morrow) As you can tell from the title, it’s a comprehensive look at Mediterranean foodstuffs, cooking and culture, at over 800 pages. It won the James Beard Cookbook of the Year award, and it is being developed into a 13-part series for PBS called “A Cook’s Tour: Mediterranean Journeys with Clifford Wright.”

Writer Andrew Smith has written a new book about the food that is a staple at movie theatres - popcorn. It's called "Popped Culture: A Social History of Popcorn in America" (University of South Carolina Press).

Carolyn Wyman is author of "Spam, A Biography: The Amazing True Story of America's "Miracle Meat."" (Harvest) She also wrote "I'm a SPAM Fan," and "The Kitchen Sink Cookbook." her syndicated weekly column, "Supermarket Sampler," present reviews of new food products in more than 100 newspapers around the country. She is a staff writer at the New Haven Register in Connecticut.

Chris Fehlinger is the co-founder of the on-line food magazine "Pheast" and is a contributing writer for the print magazine "Wine X. Recently he was the subject of the column "Table Talk" in The New Yorker 4/5/99. In that article, he confesses that he suggest bizarre food dishes, i.e. goat's head, on unsuspecting diners, just for the sport of it. In our interview, he gives us an insider's view of the restaurant business...how maitre d's get better tips, and how to get customers to order what you want them too.

From "Junior's" Restaurant in Brooklyn, Marvin and Alan Rosen. Marvin has collaborated on a new book about his family's Brooklyn restaurant renowned for its rich and creamy cheesecake. Marvin inherited the restaurant from his father who opened it in 1950. Alan is Marvin's nephew. The book is called "Welcome to Junior's: Remembering Brooklyn with Recipes and Memories from Its Favorite Restaurant" (William Morrow).

Cookbook author Bruce Aidells. He's co-authored (along with Denis Kelly) the new book, "The Complete Meat Cookbook" (Houghton Mifflin). It's the first comprehensive reexamination of meat cooking to come along in 20 years. Recipes include: The Classic Hamburger, Not-Like-Mom's Meat Loaf, and Beef Stew with Mushrooms, Onions, and Dark Beer. Aidells is also the founder of Aidells Sausage Company. The teams previous cookbook "Hot Links & Country Flavors" won a Julia Child Award.

An expert on fungi, George Hudler is a professor of Plant Pathology at Cornell University. He's written a new book about the existence of fungi in all its forms, "Magical Mushrooms, Mischievous Molds: The remarkable story of the fungus kingdom and its impact on human affairs." (Princeton University Press).

Peter Menzel and Faith D'Aluisio are the authors of "Man Eating Bugs: The Art and Science of Eating Insects" (A Material World Book/Ten Speed Press). The book is a pictorial guide to how insects are made delectable throughout the world.

The television cook discusses her book and her new PBS series. "Jewish Cooking in America." The book and show are a patchwork of reminiscences and recipes from around the country. The 26-part series premieres this month.

Schiavelli just written a memoir about growing up in Brooklyn, New York. It's called "Bruculinu, America: Remembrances of Sicilian-American Brooklyn, Told in Stories and Recipes." (Houghton Mifflin) Schiavelli is a character actor who's been in the films "Ghost," "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest," "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" and "The People Vs. Larry Flynt."

Raichlen's new book is "The Barbecue Bible" (Workman Publishing) which includes over 500 recipes which he collected in his worldwide travels researching and tasting the way foods are barbecued in other countries. His travels took him to The Caribbean, South America, Europe, Africa, the Middle East, Asia and Australia. Raichlen wrote the award-winning cookbooks, "Miami Spice" and the "High-Flavor, Low-Fat" series.

Food critic Ruth Reichl. Her new book is called "Tender at the Bone: Growing up at the Table," (Random House) and it's her memoir of a lifelong passion for food. Reichl has been the restaurant critic for the New York Times since 1993. Prior to that, she reviewed restaurants for the Los Angeles Times. She ran her own restaurant in Berkeley, California in the 1970s.

Epidemilogist Susan Oliveria is an expert on the link between nutrition and cancer. She is one of the authors of the new book, "The Strang Cookbook for Cancer Prevention: A Complete Nutrition and Lifestyle Plan to Dramatically Lower Your Cancer Risk" (Dutton). The book includes recipes from gourmet chefs. Oliveria teaches at the Strang Cancer Prevention Center, Cornell University Medical College, and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.

Journalist Michael Ruhlman is the author of the book, "The Making of a Chef: Mastering Heat at the Culinary Institute of America" (Henry Holt). Ruhlman attended the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, New York to research his book. (Interview by Barbara Bogaev)

TV Critic David Bianculli reviews a cooking show from Japan called "Iron Chef". It is shown in New York and San Francisco. The show features Japan's top chefs in the heat of competition.

Jerry Strahan is the author of the memoir "Managing Ignatius: The Lunacy of Lucky Dogs and Life in the Quarter" (Louisiana State University) about his 20 years managing Lucky Dogs, Inc., a fleet of hot dog carts in New Orleans, French Quarter. Strahan writes that he works among panhandlers, prostitutes, pimps, con artists, drifters, transvestites, and more.

Brother Victor-Antoine D'Avila-Latourette cooks and tends garden at Our Lady of the Resurrection Monastery near Millbrook, New York. He's the author of several bestselling cookbooks including: "From a Monastery Kitchen" (Triumph Books), "Twelve Months of Monastery Soups" (Broadway books), as well as his introductory book to the Monastic Life: "A Monastic Year: Reflections from a Monastery" (Taylor Publishing). (Interview by Marty Moss-Coane).