Relish: A Graphic Novel for Your Kitchen

Lucy Knisley's new graphic novel memoir, Relish: My Life in the Kitchen, is so mouth-watering that I couldn't put it down until I read it cover to cover. The book recounts her young life by describing the memorable tastes that punctuated it. I was salivating.

Relish: My Life in the Kitchen begins with young Lucy Knisley as a kid in the kitchen. Her mom worked in chef David Bouley's restaurant. Her godfather was a restaurant critic. Her Uncle Peter was Peter Dent, who taught her how to chuck oysters in his gourmet food shop. Her dad was a good home cook, and they were surrounded by artists and chefs and great dinner parties. It's how I imagined I'd raise my kids in New York City, yet my kids are known to eat mac and cheese out of a box.

When her parents divorced, Lucy and her mom went to live among the farms of the Catskills, where she tasted the freshest of fresh ingredients. She and her mom started baking like crazy to keep up with the enormous supply of eggs from their hens. I envied this childhood as someone who really didn't try a fresh mushroom until college. I thought it was normal to only eat mushrooms out of a can. I felt better when Lucy confessed to eating boxed mac and cheese and Oreos and other junky contraband at friends' houses.

My favorite part of the story is when Lucy as a tween girl went with her best friend and their moms to a small town in Mexico. Not only does she describe each bite of Mexican street food so completely that your stomach growls, but it's also a very funny coming of age story. With both moms stuck in the hotel with food poisoning, she and her friend Drew were left to their own devices in the street fairs and shops. Among the tamale stands they also discover cheap Mexican porno mags for a pubescent Drew, and meanwhile Lucy gets her first period.

In college she discovers all of the flavors that Chicago has to offer. Now life becomes a balance of food and art. Having had the reverse journey of Lucy Knisley – I grew up near Chicago and then moved to New York – I found myself being able to call to mind the flavor of so many of the places she describes throughout the book. Since I couldn't possible know what her and her mom's cooking tastes like, I was so grateful for the recipes that end each chapter. The pages of my book are already covered with food since this is now one of my go-to cookbooks. My favorite so far has been the recipe for spaghetti carbonara. It was amazing. I'm anxious to try the marinated lamb next.

I plan on buying this book for every foodie I know. Its a great book for budding foodie teens, too. There's some light drinking throughout the book, as well as a recipe for alcoholic (and non-alcoholic) sangria, but nothing else besides the porno mags that would be objectionable for the younger ones. I'm eager to share the book with my daughter when she gets older, though I'm sharing the recipes with her now.