Product Description

Trapped in a boring job and living in a tiny apartment in New York, Julie Powell regularly finds herself weeping on the way home from work. Then one night, through her mascara-smudged eyes, Julie notices that the few items she’s grabbed from the Korean grocery store are the very ingredients for Potage Parmentier, as described in Julia Childs’ legendary cookbook, Mastering the Art of French Cooking. And The Project is born. Julie begins to cook – every one of the 524 recipes in the book, in the space of just one year. This is Julie’s story, as gradually, from oeufs en cocotte to bifstek sauté au beurre, from “Bitch Rice” to preparing live lobsters, she realises that this deranged Project is changing her life. The richness of the thousands of sauces she slaves over is beginning to spread into her life, and she begins to find the joie de vivre that has been missing for too many years.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #271251 in Books
• Published on: 2007-02-22
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 320 pages

From the Back Cover
`Sassy, quirky and disarmingly honest' Marie Claire

`Restore[s] your faith in eating for pleasure' Vogue

`A gem of a book ... both hilarious and touching' Glamour

`What lies at the heart is the power of food to transform the everyday act
of eating into a complex and potentially life-changing experience' Guardian
Review

`An entertaining romp portraying the joys and frustrations familiar to any
ambitious domestic cook' Sunday Times

About the Author
After spending a long, long time working as a temp, Julie Powell now writes in her pyjamas in Long Island City, Queens, where she shares a “loft” apartment with her husband Eric, their dog Robert, their cats Maxine, Lumi and Cooper, and their snake Zuzu Marlene.

Customer Reviews

Julie's wild ride is a winner
I was really surprised by the previous review, as this is the best book I've read in ages. Okay, granted I'm not bothered by Julie's effing and blinding - maybe I was prepared after the blog! I was a latecomer to the Julie/Julia project but you don't need to have read her blog to enjoy this book - it's as much about Julie coming to terms with who she is and what can make her special, even in her dead end job and turning 30, as it is about Julia Child and the massive cookery/blog project. Though the cooking stories make me laugh and cringe. And I want to know what happened to all her wild friends and family! I can't wait to see what Julie does (and writes about) next. My first true classic read of 2006.

Scrumptious!
'Without the project I was nothing but a secretary on a road to nowhere, drifting towards frosted hair and menthol addiction.'

Julie Powell is in a mundane and dead-end job with a government agency when she decides to inject a bit of a challenge into her life. Her aim is to cook the 524 recipes from Julia Child's 'Mastering the Art of French Cookery' within twelve months. The book includes such wonders as: eggs poached in red wine, various food stuffs suspended in aspic, 'B*tch rice', many lobster recipes and something unspeakable made with marrowbone.

I loved this book. Powell's sense of humour and determination make it a wonderful read. You'll cheer her triumphs and commiserate over her failures (and there are many!)

Highly recommended.

Yum!
I give this 5 stars for sheer enthusiasm. I bought this as a birthday present for myself and think it's just brilliant. As someone who tends to have bizarre kitchen accidents culminating in copious swearing, I guess maybe I found it comforting that someone else would admit to that. Julie is completely unpretentious in her writing -making this fairly unique among food books I've read- and makes some wonderful analogies about the dishes she is preparing. Julie & Julia is a wonderfully warm and witty book, with her enthusiasm for cooking and her friends making it a pleasure to read.

I'm surprised by the person who said it's not well-written. Sure, Julie is frank and frankly, at times, obscene. But she is, undeniably, a good writer. Her exuberance really shone through in this and I must say I found it really inspiring. It is clear at times that Julie is a relative newcomer to writing, but the thing that impressed me the most was how this slightly crazy cooking project inspired her to find and develop her unique voice. I hope she writes many more books.