book club + film series

There are so many smart books, essays and blogs out there that touch on the theme of women and food, which is why, with the help of project coordinator Caroline Jann, we’re launching the Feminist Kitchen book club + film series to get people talking about the ways media portrays the subject at the heart of this blog.

We’ll meet at 7 p.m. on the second Tuesday of every month at Thrice, the new cafe located right next to (and run by the same owner as) Thai Fresh at 909 W. Mary St.

NEXT MEETING: Feb. 7 at 7 p.m. (Note that this is the first Tuesday of the month. The second Tuesday is Valentine’s Day.)

For February’s book club meeting, we’ll be talking about Kim Severson’s “Spoon Fed: How Eight Cooks Saved My Life.”
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BookWoman, 5501 N. Lamar Blvd., will give a 10 percent discount on our book club selections if you mention the Feminist Kitchen. Not only will you be saving money but you’ll be supporting a local, female owned business. BookWoman is open from noon to 6 p.m. Sunday through Monday and 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday.

Below, I’ll keep a running tab of what we read and watch, as well as other pieces worth reading:

• “Something From the Oven: Reinventing Dinner in 1950s America” by Laura Shapiro
• “Perfection Salad: Women and Cooking at the Turn of the Century” by Laura Shapiro
• “Spoon-Fed: How Eight Cooks Saved My Life” by Kim Severson
• “Blood, Bones and Butter” by Gabrielle Hamilton (post)
• “Half Broke Horses” by Jeanette Walls (post: What a feminist kitchen looked like in 1932)
• “The Help” by Kathryn Stockett (post: ‘The Help’ reminds us just how far we’ve come)
• “Through the Kitchen Window: Women Writers Explore the Intimate Meanings of Food and Cooking” a compilation of essays from women writers edited by Arlene Voski Avakian
• “Can She Bake a Cherry Pie?: American Women and the Kitchen in the Twentieth Century,” a historical look at women in the kitchen during the past 100 years by Mary Drake McFeely
• “From Betty Crocker To Feminist Food Studies: Critical Perspectives on Women & Food,” a collection of essays from feminist scholars edited by Arlene Voski Avakian and Barbara Haber. (This book is also available free, in its entirety, online via scribd.)
• “Food: My Feminist Issue” a dissertation by Marie Drews

• “Food Puritanism and Food Pornography: The Gourmet Semiotics of Martha and Nigella” by Richard M. Magee

• “Bitchfest: Ten Years of Cultural Criticism from the Pages of Bitch Magazine,” essays edited by Lisa Jervis and Andi Zeisler